Thursday, January 25, 2007

Responding to Hate Mail

The American Congregationalist pastor, Henry Ward Beecher, once received a letter containing the single word, ‘Fool’.

Beecher told his congregation about it but not to rouse their ire or gain their sympathy. He went on to add, “I have known many an instance of a person writing a letter and forgetting to write their name but this is the only instance I have ever known of a person signing their name and forgetting to write the letter.”

Source: Robert J McCracken, Questions People Ask, New York: Harper & Row, 148.

Image: Henry Ward Beecher