As soon as I read that this was the day for honoring Saint Bertille, my mind flew (pun intended) back to Sister Bertrille–the levitating convent member who was the featured character in the late 1960s sitcom, The Flying Nun. In my view, both of these women were great stuff!
Meanwhile, back to today’s saint. She was yet another of those amazing females who went from cradle to grave, seemingly always with her eyes set on virginal service to God. At some point in the latter part of the 7th century, Bertille found herself the Mother Abbess in a convent that, in time, came to house two queens (who had retired to the convent after their husbands died) and a number of other sisters who were similarly more highly born than Bertille. In short, Bertille found herself with (former) queens bowing to her as the head of the convent.
Butler’s description of Bertille’s leadership is one that I could only pray that our elected and appointed leaders might somehow, in some way, miraculously learn from and emulate (and that we, too, in our own lives might also so do):
The holy abbess (Bertille), who saw two great queens every day at her feet, seemed the most humble and the most fervent among her sisters, and showed by her conduct that no one commands well or with safety who has not first learned, and is not always ready, to obey well. This humble disposition of soul extinguishes pride, and removes the fatal pleasure of power which that vice inspires and which is the seed of tyranny, the worst corruption of the human heart. This virtue (humility) alone makes command sweet and amiable in its severity, and renders us patient and firm in every observance and duty. [emphasis added]
How far removed from humble leadership we have come, and it is not an understatement that pride such as we are experiencing daily conjures a pleasure of power that is and will ever be tyrannical… impatient… infirm… in short in the last analysis, fatal.
No one commands well
or with safety
who has not first learned
and is not always ready
to obey well.
No one.