Poverty is the glorious standard, the impregnable fortress of the religious life.Poverty is the glorious standard, the impregnable fortress of the religious life.
I recommend to you holy poverty; if you remain poor, you will be holy; on the contrary, if you seek to enrich yourselves, you will lose the religious spirit, and regular observance will disappear from your midst.
The children of the Passion of Jesus ought to be despoiled of all created wealth, and our Congregation should be distinguished by its poverty of spirit and perfect detachment from all things.
If the religious of the Congregation preserve the true spirit of poverty, the Congregation will maintain its vigor; I shall never cease to repeat it. If I were at the point of death, I should recommend three things; namely, to preserve the spirit of prayer, the spirit of solitude, and the spirit of poverty. Let the Congregation do this, and it will shine before God and men.
Poverty, of which the world has so great an abhorrence, imparts true joy and is a source of riches in the sight of God.
- text taken from Flowers of the Passion, taken from the letters of Saint Paul of the Cross