From news editor Daniel Silliman: Thinking about Martin Scorcese’s The Saints, I recently heard a story about a saint from my church who died a few years ago. Mary was much beloved, and her commitment to being like Jesus still inspires awe. If you went to her and told her you were quarreling with somebody, for example, hoping that she would take your side, she would tell you to be kind to that person. And then she’d go out of her way to be nice to the person you were mad at.

Whenever people talk about Mary, they mention the cheese grits she used to make. Apparently they were mind-blowing. She’d make them for people to eat after a prayer meeting or at a potluck, and people still talk about them as if just the memory makes them hungry.

Someone else told me, though, the dish was actually really simple. She bought the cheese and the grits, combined them, and stirred a little. That was all. 

Maybe that’s how it is with saints, though. What they do is simple and pretty easy to emulate, actually. They are not superheroes. They are not giants from another age, whose stories can only be told with epic poetry. They just take Jesus at his word and show us we can too.