"God has been very good to me, for I never dwell upon anything wrong which a person has done, so as to remember it afterwards. If I do remember it, I always see some other virtue in that person"
About this Quote
Sanctity here looks less like haloed innocence and more like a practiced refusal to let grievance set up permanent residence. Teresa frames her “good fortune” as divine gift, but the machinery is psychological: she describes a discipline of attention. “I never dwell” is the operative verb. Wrongdoing isn’t denied; it’s starved. Memory, in her telling, is not a passive archive but a moral choice - a place where you can either curate resentments or cultivate mercy.
The second sentence sharpens the subtext: if the offense returns anyway, she doesn’t negotiate with it on its own terms. She counter-programs the mind by deliberately “see[ing] some other virtue.” That’s not sentimental whitewashing; it’s a strategy for preserving relationships, community, and her own interior freedom. In a convent world dense with hierarchy, gossip, and interpersonal friction, dwelling on injuries could metastasize into factionalism. For a reformer who needed allies and stamina, resentment was not merely a vice; it was logistical sabotage.
There’s also a quietly audacious claim about power. Teresa implies the offender doesn’t get to author your inner life. By refusing to rehearse the wrong, she relocates control from the provocateur to the self, from the social drama to the spiritual project. The line between grace and technique blurs: God is “very good” to her, yet her goodness is executed through a repeatable habit. She’s offering a blueprint disguised as gratitude, making mercy sound less like an ideal and more like a workable practice.
The second sentence sharpens the subtext: if the offense returns anyway, she doesn’t negotiate with it on its own terms. She counter-programs the mind by deliberately “see[ing] some other virtue.” That’s not sentimental whitewashing; it’s a strategy for preserving relationships, community, and her own interior freedom. In a convent world dense with hierarchy, gossip, and interpersonal friction, dwelling on injuries could metastasize into factionalism. For a reformer who needed allies and stamina, resentment was not merely a vice; it was logistical sabotage.
There’s also a quietly audacious claim about power. Teresa implies the offender doesn’t get to author your inner life. By refusing to rehearse the wrong, she relocates control from the provocateur to the self, from the social drama to the spiritual project. The line between grace and technique blurs: God is “very good” to her, yet her goodness is executed through a repeatable habit. She’s offering a blueprint disguised as gratitude, making mercy sound less like an ideal and more like a workable practice.
Quote Details
| Topic | Forgiveness |
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