Who needs the Church!

Who Needs the Church! 

How baffling you are, O church, and yet 
how I love you. 
How you have made me suffer and yet 
how much I owe you. 
I should like to see you destroyed, and yet 
I need your presence. 
You have given me so much scandal and yet 
you have made me understand sanctity. 
I have seen nothing in the world 
more devoted to obscurity, 
more compromised, more false,      
and I have touched nothing 
more pure, more generous, more beautiful. 
How often I have wanted to shut the doors 
of my soul in your face, and how often 
I have prayed to die in the safety of your arms. 
No, I cannot free myself from you, 
because I am you, although not completely. 
Besides, where else could I go? 

       —Carlo Carreto*