Eva M. Clayton: “the world lost two well-known, highly respected and dearly loved women in the last week, Mother Teresa and Princess…”

“the world lost two well-known, highly respected and dearly loved women in the last week, Mother Teresa and Princess Diana. Mother Teresa. Mother Teresa, early in her life, committed herself to an order of the nunnery and that would have been sufficient in itself, because she had a high calling, and it was indeed commendable and honorable that she did that, but that is not the reason she was dearly loved. Princess Diana was both titled and wealthy and had style. Again, those attributes and privileges were advantages for her, but again, that is not the reason there was such deep love and emotion for her. In both of their lives, I think we learned that the attribute of compassion was the quality that people endeared from them, or were endeared to them because of. It was their compassion, their ability to reach out, their ability to be concerned, their ability to embrace others, to reach out beyond their own points of comfort. It was their ability to support and embrace the poor, their ability to support and embrace the lepers, to care enough for the aged or to hug a person with AIDS, their ability to welcome the unwanted, their ability, or certainly Mother Teresa's ability, to comfort the dying. So as we give tribute to their lives, we have an opportunity, as legislators, to reflect to what extent do we reach out beyond our ability of comfort? We are having the opportunity to appropriate resources.…”