This just in from my morning meditation! A great follow up to Chrysostom (see last post)...
...to detect the defects of people and systems is a very rudimentary--the very lowest--form of criticism. It must always be a function of criticism to discover error, and I must train myself to possess it, lest I follow, in blind hero-worship, some wayward but forceful leader.
But it is much more necessary for me to be able to detect beauty, half-hidden or ill-expressed. That is the highest, because it is the most creative, form of criticism and will be of most intense help to me in the spiritual life....
...The critic in this sense is the most noble and magnanimous and helpful of men, for his gift of finding fault is balanced by his gift of finding value.
--Fr. Bede Jarrett, O.P.
So I'm off in search of beauty and value...
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