EPILOGUE

Therefore I bring these rhymes to you Who brought the cross to me.

During the writing of this book, the Bishop of Northampton announced that he was assigning a cleric to explore the possibility of a sainthood cause for G.K. Chesterton. This was met with pleasure and hope. Gilbert Chesterton has certainly written plenty, has numerous biographies, and has left a trail of witnesses as to his likely sainthood.

The news gave pleasure to Chesterton’s many admirers, even as it provoked outburst from his critics (who, unlike those who disagreed with him in life, have no opportunity of entering into open debate with the gracious, charitable, undaunted defender of the Faith).

Is G.K. Chesterton a saint? (Incidentally, this is not a question Frances herself asked; she had an assurance that Gilbert was with God, and that she could rely on his intercession on her behalf.)

While leaving this question to the wisdom of Mother Church, it is useful and instructive to explore what this entire question means for us as readers and (it is hoped) admirers of his work. What purpose might it serve to investigate such a cause? Does our admiration of him require this recognition?

For our answer, we look to the source. Who are the saints? The Catechism of the Catholic Church provides a concise answer:

828 By canonizing some of the faithful, i.e., by solemnly proclaiming that they practiced heroic virtue and lived in fidelity to God’s grace, the Church recognizes the power of the Spirit of holiness within her and sustains the hope of believers by proposing the saints to them as models and intercessors….¹⁶

“The saints have always been the source and origin of renewal in the most difficult moments in the Church’s history.”¹⁷

Indeed, “holiness is the hidden source and infallible measure of her apostolic activity and missionary zeal.”¹⁸ The purpose of the saints, the faithful witness and heroic virtue that brings renewal to the Church, is a purpose to which all souls are called to aspire.

But did Gilbert thus aspire?

We have the answer, from his own lips. As he wrote to Maurice Baring, describing that tenuous time between his decision to convert and its actualization: “I am concerned most, however, about somebody I value more than the Archbishop of Canterbury; Frances, to whom I owe much of my own faith.” Here is the woman who first inspired in him respect for sacramental Christianity.¹⁹

Imagine for a moment Gilbert Keith Chesterton without Frances. Gilbert alone could have been a famous author, but he would have failed to arrive at most of his speaking engagements. He might have indulged his appetites disproportionately. He might have died in 1915, failing to write The Everlasting Man, Eugenics and Other Evils, St. Francis of Assisi, The Outline of Sanity, many Father Brown stories, St. Thomas Aquinas, all issues of G.K.’s Weekly, and a host of other articles and books. He might never have converted to the Catholic faith. Without Frances, he simply would not have been able to do all he did. As O’Connor wrote to Frances after Gilbert’s death: “How much of him and his best might have been lost to the world only for you.”

Like most married women, Frances did not know what to expect out of her married life or her husband. We have seen that her dream, particularly as regards those “seven beautiful children”, never reached fulfilment. Some things she did know, of course. After almost five years of knowing Gilbert, she was well aware of his wonderful, exuberant ways, as well as his quirky eccentricity. (Like most wives, she perhaps thought she would change his habits; like some wives, she was wise enough, in practice, merely to seek to amend and work with them.)

Gilbert was not famous when they met and married. Frances could have had no idea he would become so famous, so well-known, such a public figure. She could not have known how much he would depend on her—or how much she would depend on him. It was a struggle for each of them to be so needed by the other, and yet their bond was tightly bound by this mutual need: it caused them to cling tightly to each other.

Of all people in the world, Frances knew Gilbert best—knew him, and loved him. She helped him become the person he was, write all he wrote, and see the world in the way he did. Theirs was a truly deep, truly divine, truly loving love story, and, because of this, well worth knowing.

Frances’s life was indeed courageous. She had many tragedies to overcome, and yet, left a lingering memory of a woman who was unwavering in her unselfishness, charitable without limit, devoting every thought and action to others—with that gift for “self-forgetfulness”, as Fr. Vincent McNabb put it. Her life was one of service: listening to young people; taking care of and visiting the sick; creating plays for entertainment and pleasure and moral edification; taking care of Gilbert in every way, always thinking of him and what he needed before thinking of herself. Because of Frances, Gilbert could write what he wrote. Because she took good care of him, he lived past the illness of 1914-15. Because she encouraged him, he sought and found success through publishing in the first place. Because she supported him emotionally, he was able to love one woman, be beloved by that woman, and give himself to England. Because she loved him, he belonged to her; because she helped him, he belonged to the world.

Looking once again to Gilbert, he shows us how to value her:

Therefore I bring these rhymes to you

Who brought the cross to me.

This dedication of The Ballad of the White Horse says everything.

In my introduction to this book, I suggested Frances as the forerunner of her husband; a sometime John the Baptist, who might have said: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” This is only an earthly reflection on his success; there is a supernatural angle to be considered as well. Frances’s true witness is as a forerunner to Jesus Christ. She who quietly carried the cross within the context of her own life, through the duties of the married state and the extra duties of marriage to Gilbert Keith Chesterton, was thereby able to bring it to another. This is an authentic apostolate, a bringing of Christ to a fallen world. And, as an enduring example to married women, she did so through the very basic, repetitive duties of her state in life (duties that might be monotonous, even married to G.K.).

She brought Christ to Gilbert. She brought Christ to everyone she met. We see this clearly in numerous letters, and perhaps none so poignantly as this letter of sympathy written by a stranger after the death of Gilbert:

Dear Mrs. Chesterton,

I am loathe to intrude on you in these sad hours of bereavement, and pray that God may give you strength to bear your loss bravely; but I wanted you to feel the sympathy of one of the many millions to whom G.K.C. was an inspiration and delight through his works.

Our family are converts, and to such he was, no is especially dear because of his brave self-sacrificing fight in defence of the Faith.

Personally I cannot put into words my regard for the great minded gentleman to whom the world owes an inestimable debt.

Genius, the same world declares him, yet I often wondered if he could have done so much without your able help and unstinting love. It is you who must be thanked for fostering and allowing that genius full play. God bless you. …

The family and all my friends send messages of deep sympathy. Though we are strangers yet you shared the biggest blessing of your life with the world and them and so made them your friends.

Maude McKendry²⁰

The facets of her example are numberless: acceptance of infertility; acceptance of financial struggles; patience in and out of adversity; heroic endurance in sickness; loving care as an aunt and godmother; gracious, enthusiastic hospitality, especially to children; the kindness of a listening ear; docile following of Christ, even in the midst of intense doubts or spiritual aridity.

As Chestertonian scholar Peter Floriani, Ph.D., remarked about Frances: “I just know it makes sense, for a saint like him needed a saint like her, and we indeed learn much from that—maybe more than from GKC’s most profound writings!”²¹

Together they lived holy lives, dedicated to one another, to their faith, to the poor and the sick, and to all the children they knew. And because of that faith, they lived the way they did, generously sharing their lives with family, friends and strangers. Without lapsing into too much hagiographic enthusiasm, I think we can truly say: if Gilbert is to be considered a saint, we must look to his wife, for she was, if not the “saint-maker” per se, the saint beside the saint. May she, as she did for Gilbert, bring yet the cross to us.

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¹⁶ Vatican Council. Lumen Gentium (Dogmatic Constitution on Church), November 21, 1964, §40; 48-51.

¹⁷ John Paul II, Christifideles Laici §16, 3.

¹⁸ Ibid., §17, 3.

¹⁹ Gilbert Keith Chesterton, 460.

²⁰ British Library folder 73455 A-D.

²¹ Private correspondence with author.