"You shall love the Lord your God with
your whole heart, with your whole soul, and with all
your mind, (and) you shall love your neighbor as
yourself." (Jesus's words as recorded in Matthew
22:37-38)
Archives 2008-2009: Following
Francis, Following Christ
ARCHIVES:
FOLLOWING FRANCIS, FOLLOWING
CHRIST
A monthly reflection on the
life and teachings of Saint
Francis of Assisi as they relate to a life of
penance
(2008-2009)
By Jim Nugent of the
Confraternity of Penitents
Click on the following blue
links to access the article.
2009 Reflections
Saint Francis and the
Eucharist (December 2009)
Saint Francis' "Dark Side"
(November 2009)
Obeying the Lord in Ways
We Dislike (October 2009)
Revering the Priest
(September 2009)
The Church: Not Just an
Institution (August 2009)
Checking with the Church
(July 2009)
Francis' Attitude toward
Clothing (June 2009)
The Help of the Saints
(May 2009)
Embracing True Freedom
(April 2009)
"Look for the Things That
Are Above" (March 2009)
Saint Francis and "Going
Green" (February 2009)
Suffering and Holiness
(January 2009)
2008 Reflections
Christmas: Seeing the
Hidden God (December 2008)
Following the Will of the
Father, until the End (November 2008)
Francis, the Prophet
(October 2008)
Martyrdom, Saint Francis,
and Us (September 2008)
Seek the Face of God and
"Follow Instructions" (August 2008)
Francis and the Leper
(July 2008)
Gospel Poverty, Gospel
Childhood (June 2008)
Penitential Practices (May
2008)
Unless a Grain of Wheat
Dies (April 2008)
Which Master Do You Serve?
(March 2008)
Brother Giles (February 2008)
What Do You Value the
Most? (January 2008)
Saint Francis
and the Eucharist
During his life, St. Francis wrote to his friars
several Admonitions which give us wonderful
insight into his spiritual life. The first of
these Admonitions concern the Blesses Sacrament.
Here we see how thoroughly St. Francis believed
in the Real Presence of the Lord in the Blessed
Sacrament. This faith led him to his life of
penance and conversion.
Francis opens this first Admonition with a quote
from the Gospel of John (Jn 14: 6-9): “The Lord
Jesus said to His disciples: "I am the Way, and
the Truth, and the Life. No man cometh to the
Father, but by Me. If you had known Me you
would, without doubt, have known My Father also:
and from henceforth you shall know Him, and you
have seen Him. Philip saith to Him: Lord, show
us the Father, and it is enough for us. Jesus
saith to him: Have I been so long a time with
you and have you not known Me? Philip, he that
seeth Me seeth [My] Father also. How sayest
thou, Shew us the Father?”
Francis understood that Jesus Christ was one with the
Father. Of course, he would want to follow Him
and give his life to Him. Francis truly believed
that in the Blessed Sacrament the Lord is truly
with us. Francis says “Wherefore [he who has]
the Spirit of the Lord which dwells in His
faithful, he it is who receives the most holy
Body and Blood of the Lord: all others who do
not have this same Spirit and who presume to
receive Him, eat and drink judgment to
themselves.” (1Cor.11:29)
Francis saw that when we are in the presence of the
Blessed Sacrament, we are in the presence of the
Lord just as the apostles were in the presence
of the Lord. “And as He appeared in true flesh
to the Holy Apostles, so now He shows Himself to
us in the sacred Bread; and as they by means of
their fleshly eyes saw only His flesh, yet
contemplating Him with their spiritual eyes,
believed Him to be God, so we, seeing bread and
wine with bodily eyes, see and firmly believe it
to be His most holy Body and true and living
Blood. And in this way our Lord is ever with His
faithful, as He Himself says: `Behold I am with
you all days, even to the consummation of the
world.’" (Mt. 28:20) According to St. Francis,
we can see the Lord in the Eucharist with the
“spiritual eyes” of faith or we can see only
bread with our “fleshly eyes”.
Francis believed that we have to see with “spiritual
eyes”: “Wherefore, all those who saw the Lord
Jesus Christ according to humanity and did not
see and believe according to the Spirit and the
Divinity, that He was the Son of God, were
condemned. In like manner, all those who behold
the Sacrament of the Body of Christ which is
sanctified by the word of the Lord upon the
altar by the hands of the priest in the form of
bread and wine, and who do not see and believe
according to the Spirit and Divinity that It is
really the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord
Jesus Christ, are condemned, He the Most High
having declared it when He said, `This is My
Body, and the Blood of the New Testament,’ (Mk
14: 22-24) and `he that eateth My Flesh and
drinketh My Blood hath everlasting life.’ (John
6:55-58)”
While many people admire the life of St. Francis and the
way he lived, it is important for us to see the
faith which nourished his life and his deeds.
The wonderful things which St. Francis did
during his life flowed from his very deep faith.
We should avoid the error of trying to separate
our life and our actions from our faith. If our
faith is weak and shallow, our actions for the
Lord will also be weak and shallow. A strong
faith nourishes heroic actions. The lives of St.
Francis and other saints prove it.
Jim Nugent
Saint
Francis’ “Dark Side”
St. Francis is certainly one of the most popular
saints even among non-Catholics and secular
minded people. He is loved for his concern for
animals and also for his emphasis on poverty and
simplicity. However, he also had a “dark side”.
By this we mean that there are some aspects of
St. Francis which many people would prefer to
forget. Many of these aspects are contained in
St. Francis’s Letter to All the Faithful. It is
not known exactly when this letter was written,
although it is considered to be authentic. St.
Francis realized that not everyone can live the
gospel in the way of poverty which he spelled
out for his friars. Yet he also wished all to be
saved, and so he wrote this letter to all
Christians to spell out what is needed to be
saved.
According to Francis, “We ought indeed to
confess all our sins to a priest and receive
from him the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He who does not eat His Flesh and does
not drink His Blood cannot enter into the
Kingdom of God. Let him, however, eat and drink
worthily, because he who receives unworthily
‘eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not
discerning the Body of the Lord,’ —that is, not
discerning it from other foods.” Francis
understood that the Eucharist worthily received
is essential for salvation. Of course this goes
with living a holy life. Francis says, “Let us,
moreover, ‘bring forth fruits worthy of
penance.’ And let us love our neighbors as
ourselves, and, if any one does not wish to love
them as himself or cannot, let him at least do
them not harm, but let him do good to them. ”
In this letter Francis demonstrates how living a
holy life and living in the Church are linked:
“We ought also to fast and to abstain from vices
and sins and from superfluity of food and drink,
and to be Catholics. We ought also to visit
Churches frequently and to reverence clerics not
only for themselves, if they are sinners, but on
account of their office and administration of
the most holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ, which they sacrifice on the altar and
receive and administer to others. And let us all
know for certain that no one can be saved except
by the Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the
holy words of the Lord which clerics say and
announce and distribute and they alone
administer and not others.”
Then Francis goes on to tell us what must be
done to live a holy life: “We ought to hate our
bodies with [their] vices and sins, because the
Lord says in the Gospel that all vices and sins
come forth from the heart. We ought to love our
enemies and do good to them that hate us. We
ought to observe the precepts and counsels of
our Lord Jesus Christ. We ought also to deny
ourselves and to put our bodies beneath the yoke
of servitude and holy obedience as each one has
promised to the Lord. And let no man be bound by
obedience to obey any one in that where sin or
offence is committed.”
St. Francis then goes on to warn those who
choose not to “observe the precepts and counsels
of our Lord Jesus Christ.” He says “But all
those who do not do penance and who do not
receive the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ, but who give themselves to vices and
sins and walk after evil concupiscence and bad
desires and who do not observe what they have
promised, corporally they serve the world and
its fleshly desires and cares and solicitudes
for this life, but mentally they serve the
devil, deceived by him whose sons they are and
whose works they do; blind they are because they
see not the true light,—our Lord Jesus Christ.
They have no spiritual wisdom, for they have not
in them the Son of God who is the true wisdom of
the Father: of these it is said: ‘their wisdom
was swallowed up.’ They know, understand, and do
evil and wittingly lose their souls. Beware, ye
blind, deceived by your enemies—to wit, by the
world, the flesh and by the devil—for it is
sweet to the body to commit sin and bitter to
serve God because all vices and sins come forth
and proceed from the heart of man, as it is said
in the Gospel.”
Francis then goes on to say what happens to
those who do not live the gospel: “But let all
know that wheresoever or howsoever a man may die
in criminal sin, without satisfaction—when he
could satisfy and did not satisfy—the devil
snatches his soul from his body with such
violence and anguish as no one can know except
him who suffers it. And all talent and power,
learning and wisdom that he thought to possess
are taken from him. And his relatives and
friends take to themselves his substance and
divide it and say afterwards: "Cursed be his
soul because he could have acquired and given us
more than he did, and did not acquire it." But
the worms eat his body. And thus he loses soul
and body in this short life and goes into hell,
where he shall be tormented without end.”
According to Francis, everyone needs to live a
life of prayer, penance, and conversion within
the Church and her sacraments in order to be
saved. This is a message which many would prefer
not to hear. May we all live the way he
recommended so that those who are outside the
faith or have fallen away may see what they are
missing.
Jim Nugent
Obeying the Lord in Ways We Dislike
Late in 1207, as Francis was embarking on his
life of poverty, he encountered situations which
we all encounter as we embark on a life of
conversion. We have to do things which we are
not used to doing and which we naturally don’t
want to do. He already had started on that path
when he embraced the leper. Later he even worked
among the lepers in Assisi. But he also had the
call from the Lord to “rebuild My Church”. He
went to continue rebuilding the Church of San
Damiano. Since he had no money, he had to beg
for the stones he needed: “Whoever gives me a
stone will have one reward; whoever gives me two
stones, two rewards; three stones, a treble
reward.” Since Francis was the son of a rich
merchant, this must have been extremely
difficult for him. Yet he was now the Herald of
the Great King and so he had to obey the King.
Of course people thought he was mad. But then
does not the world think that everyone who
rejects the ways of the world and embarks on a
life of penance and conversion is mad?
During that time the priest at San Damiano felt
sorry for Francis and sometimes offered him some
better food, remembering the comfortable
circumstances in which Francis had grown up. Yet
this did not do honor to the knight of Lady
Poverty. So one day Francis took a bowl and went
out to beg for food or alms. He afterwards mixed
it all up to make a disgusting mess. And yet he
ate all of it. The people of Assisi were amazed
that he would do that considering the fine
circumstances in which he was raised. This gave
Francis great consolation, and he experienced a
great light in receiving what was given him out
of love even if it was not pleasant for him.
These actions relate to Francis being the Herald
of the Great King. He was simply obeying his
King. The King himself had done the same thing.
The Lord had resided for all eternity with the
Father and the Holy Spirit in unapproachable
light. Yet He became a man. This means that He
experienced everything human except sin. The
Lord must have had to do many things during His
life on earth which humanly speaking He would
not want to do. But he did them anyway in
obedience to the Father. Of course, he performed
the ultimate act of obedience by going to the
cross. Francis even shared in that act of the
Lord’s obedience when he received the wounds of
Christ in 1224. The Father required this of the
Son out of love for sinful humanity.
In chapter 4 of John’s gospel we read of Jesus
doing a rather difficult thing and asking for a
drink of water from a woman who was a Samaritan
and therefore an enemy of the Jews. And the
Samaritan woman did not flee from the enemy Jew
but even asked Him for water, and then brought
people from the town to Jesus asking whether He
was the Christ. Jesus must have seen love in the
sinful Samaritan woman who had had five husbands
and was living with a man who was not her
husband. By doing something which was humanly
difficult, Jesus was giving and receiving love.
By begging food from the people of Assisi,
Francis was imitating his King. Jesus received
water from the Samaritan woman but gave so much
more both to her and to the Samaritan town.
Francis also received scraps of food from the
people of Assisi, but he gave so much more to
them. By uniting himself to the Lord, Francis
was also giving the Lord to the people of
Assisi. The fruits of Francis’s gift to the
people of Assisi endures down to this day.
All Christians know that they should imitate
Christ, but Francis and other Saints both
canonized and uncanonized show us how to do it.
They show us how to obey the Lord even when it
is difficult and even when it goes against our
human inclinations. Everyone has a different
calling. Francis was called to beg from the
people of Assisi, but the people of Assisi were
called to give to Francis. In both cases, they
received from the Lord much more than they gave.
That is what happens when we obey the Lord.
Jim Nugent
Revering the Priest
St. Francis wrote his last Testament shortly
before he died on October 4, 1226. It includes
the following:
God inspired me, too, and still inspires me with
such great faith in priests who live according
to the laws of the holy Church of Rome, because
of their dignity, that if they persecuted me, I
should still be ready to turn to them for aid.
And if I were as wise as Solomon and met the
poorest priests of the world, I would still
refuse to preach against their will in the
parishes in which they live. I am determined to
reverence, love and honour priests and all
others as my superiors. I refuse to consider
their sins, because I can see the Son of God in
them and they are better than I. I do this
because in this world I cannot see the most high
Son of God with my own eyes, except for his most
holy Body and Blood which they receive and they
alone administer to others.
We all know holy priests whom it is easy to
reverence. We also know priests who annoy us
and, in truth, have serious human failings. Yet
as we can see, Francis reverenced them all. He
also tells us why.
The holiest of laypersons cannot show us and
give us Christ, but the most sinful of priests
can do it if he says a valid Mass. When a priest
is ordained, he does not become a magician. The
priest has been authorized by Christ himself,
acting through the bishop. Is the consecrated
host “really” the Body of Christ? The answer
depends of who Jesus Christ is. If he was a man
who had a profound experience of God, then the
Eucharist is a symbol of Jesus giving himself
for all humanity. Cannot any Christian celebrate
the Eucharist and give us Jesus? If He was truly
God the Son, then he could call on the Holy
Spirit to change bread and wine to His Body and
Blood when a valid Mass is celebrated by a
priest whom He has authorized.
This is a great stumbling block to many who
wonder why anyone cannot celebrate the
Eucharist. It was not a stumbling block to
Francis. In his time, just as today, there were
priests who were not paragons of virtue and
holiness. Yet, as he said, “I refuse to consider
their sins, because I can see the Son of God in
them and they are better than I.” Francis could
see beyond the human failings and weakness of
priests, bishops, and other high church
officials and recognize the Son of God in them.
He recognized their sins but refused to consider
them. But isn’t the Son of God present in
everyone? Yes, but God chooses to offer
salvation to everyone by choosing some for
special tasks. Those whom he calls are not
necessarily those with the greatest personal
merit. The priest is to be reverenced and
honored because he has been chosen to act in the
person of Christ. When Francis says that priests
are “better than I,” he is correct in the sense
that priests can bring Christ in a way which
laypersons cannot. As noted above, this is a
mystery which is a stumbling block to many.
While St. Francis is one of the world’s favorite
saints, this is an aspect of Francis which the
world chooses to overlook. Yet this is central
to who Francis is. He did not cling to “my God”
or “my Jesus”. He did not attempt to fashion a
God or a Jesus who was conformable to his own
way of thinking. For Francis, the Word became
flesh in Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ founded
the Church. He did not separate Christ from His
Church. He certainly saw the human Church and
human priests, but the eyes of faith helped him
to see the Lord in the Church since it was His
Church. Francis simply understood that this is
God’s world and not our world. God can act the
way He sees fit. Francis’s desire was to do good
in the world by doing God’s Will and not “good”
according to some humanly derived grand plan.
This should also be our desire.
Jim Nugent
The Church: Not Just an Institution
In the summer of 1216, St. Francis was in the
chapel of St. Mary of the Angels. It was the
night before he was to journey to Perugia to
visit Pope Honorius III. Christ and His Mother
appeared to him, surrounded by angels. The Lord
said, “Francis, ask of Me whatever you will for
the glory of God and the salvation of men.”
Saint Francis replied, “Lord, I pray You by the
intercession of the Virgin, Advocate of mankind
and present here, to grant an indulgence to all
those who visit this church.” The Blessed Mother
bowed before her Son to second the request. The
Lord told Francis to go to the Pope to obtain
the desired favor. Even though there was much
opposition from the cardinals to this idea, the
Pope quickly agreed to St. Francis’s request.
This was the Portiuncola Indulgence of August 2.
Here we can see in Francis’s vision four
essential and inseparable aspects of our life as
Christians: Christ, Mary, angels, and the
Church. First of all, Christ did not appear
alone to Francis as if Francis’s life as a
Christian consisted only in his relationship
with Christ. Christ appeared with his Mother and
told him to go to the Church with his request.
This shows us how much Mary and the Church
belong together. We can see in Scripture how
Mary gave her total “Yes” to the Lord in the
same way that the Lord gave his total “Yes” to
the Father. Then Francis was told by the Lord to
go to the Church. All of this takes place
surrounded by the angels, God’s messengers.
First of all, the Lord does not tell Francis
what He wants but asks Francis what HE wants.
Surely Christ knew what was needed for the
“glory of God and the salvation of men”. Yet
Christ asks Francis for what Francis wanted
since He knew that Francis was already uniting
his own will to the Will of the Lord. Francis
did have something in mind, but he also sought
the intercession of Mary. Even though Francis
was told by the Lord to go to the Church in the
person of the Pope, Francis in a sense had
already done that when he asked Mary to
intercede with the Lord for his request. Mary
has been called by theologians “The Church at
the Source” and the archetypal Church, whose
form we must take as our pattern. Just as Mary’s
receptivity to the Word of God is a model for
all individual Christians, it is also a model
for the Church. Francis did not separate Christ
from Mary or from the Church. After Francis’s
request was ratified by the “archetypal” Church
and granted by the Lord, Francis went to the
concrete, “sinful” Church to have his request
granted.
This again points out the error of seeing the
Church simply as a “structure” or “institution”.
The Church started as a human person totally
united to Christ and continues in that mode in
spite of all the human imperfections we see in
the Church. St. Paul’s concept of the Church as
the “Body of Christ” becomes very concrete here.
While Francis was not a theologian, he still
knew all these things. He knew that the Church
had to give her total “Yes” to the Lord in the
same way that Mary gave her total “Yes” to the
Lord.
In making his request, Francis referred to Mary
as the “Advocate of mankind”. This surely is
true. But then the same can be said for the
Church. Unfortunately, many people, including
many Catholics, see the Church as just another
human institution. However, when the Pope
granted the Portiuncola Indulgence, the Church
was not just functioning as another human
institution; she was functioning as the
“Advocate of mankind”.
Jim Nugent
Checking
with the Church
In the book Test Everything – Hold Fast to
What is Good, the great 20th
century theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote
“Before Saint Francis, no one had thought so
deeply about the poverty of Christ. This
poverty is not a secondary consideration but a
new access to the center.”
The above statement sheds light on who Jesus
Christ is. If He were just a man, even a great
one, one could study His life and eventually
exhaust all there is to know about Him. But
that is not possible with Christ. As the letter
to the Hebrews says “At many moments in the past
and by many means, God spoke to our ancestors
through the prophets; but in our time, the final
days, he as spoken to us in the person of his
Son, whom he appointed heir of all things and
through whom he made the ages.” (Heb 1:1-3).
The Divinity of Christ means that we cannot
possibly know all that can be known about Him.
There were, of course, many great and holy
Christians before St. Francis. None, however,
had prayed and contemplated the poverty of
Christ the way St. Francis did. This is not a
negative judgment on one any of them, but a
recognition that the riches of Divine Revelation
in general and Jesus Christ in particular are
inexhaustible. God spoke first to the people of
Israel and finally to all of us though Jesus
Christ. Yet are we listening? Listening does
not just mean theology and doctrines, but what
is the Lord saying to me in particular. What
does he want ME to do? Francis was listening
and so he ended up doing great things. Yes,
what the Lord wanted of Francis was revealed to
him gradually, probably because of Francis’s
limitations as a human being and also because
what the Lord wanted of him changed with
circumstances, and so Francis had to keep
listening. Of course, the poverty of Christ was
always there in the gospels, but nobody else
heard it the way Francis heard it because nobody
else was Francis. Francis was addressed by the
Lord as a member of the Body of Christ, but also
as an individual, unique person. Often, what
the Lord communicates to us if we are listening
is meant only for us, but sometimes God uses one
individual to communicate to many others and
even to everyone. This was the case for
Francis.
There is also something else which Francis can
teach us. One may believe that God is teaching
us something new, and we must communicate it to
others. Francis surely felt that, but how did
he know that the idea of poverty that he
embraced was not a heresy, distortion, or the
work of the devil? There have been others who
found “new” ways to live the gospel and yet
their efforts eventually came to nothing. This
is why Christ founded the Church. Francis knew
that his way of life could be a distortion of
the gospel. Therefore, he went to the Church.
First he went to the Bishop of Assisi and then
to the Pope in Rome. The medieval Church had
many problems and yet it seemed to have
functioned in the way the Lord wanted it to
function. It had to guard against heresies and
protect Divine Revelation but not stifle the
Holy Spirit.
When Francis proposed to the Church his way of
radical poverty, it could not be denied that
this was in the gospel. Naturally, his Rule and
the way Francis lived it had to be examined
carefully. While some in the Magisterium did
not like what he was doing, many saw the value
of it. As the second sentence from the above
quote points out “This poverty is not a
secondary consideration but a new access to the
center.” At a time when the Church was at its
peak of worldly power, Francis opened up to the
Church an aspect of the gospel which had been
largely forgotten. Francis allowed many to find
Christ at a time when worldly power and
ambitions seemed to be overtaking everyone.
The Church teaches that since “the Word was made
Flesh” in Jesus Christ, there is no new Divine
Revelation. Yet this Divine Revelation is
inexhaustible. St. Francis showed the truth of
that when he lived. Eight hundred years later
it is still true. Even if the Lord does not
call us to transform the Church as St. Francis
did, like St. Francis we need to listen to what
the Lord is saying to us through prayer.
Jim Nugent
Francis' Attitude toward Clothing
-
In keeping with
section 1 of the Rule:
1a. Those belonging to this Confraternity shall
dress in humble and inexpensive cloth. Subdued,
solid colors, as opposed to patterns and
designs, should be chosen. Colors shall be
neutral shades (black, white, cream, ivory,
beige, tan, camel, brown, gray, charcoal, etc.)
in conformity with the colors worn by the first
penitents and blue in honor of the Blessed
Mother who is the patron of the Confraternity of
Penitents. The penitent should strive to have
only the least expensive and minimum amount of
clothing needed for comfort, employment, and
utility.
1b. The penitent should mix and match styles and
colors so as appear indistinguishable from other
seculars and to avoid the appearance of a
wearing a habit. Thus penitents will do penance
privately and inconspicuously.
1c. For evident and necessary cause, a temporary
dispensation on clothing colors and quality may
be given.
Above is
listed part of the Rule of Life of the
Confraternity of Penitents adapted from the
original rule of 1221. The goal of this, and
other sections of the Rule of Life which deal
with more specific details regarding clothing,
is to avoid calling attention to oneself.
St. Francis is a wonderful example and
inspiration of this part of the Rule of Life. We
should recall that Francis’s father, Pietro di
Bernardone, was a cloth merchant. He was not
selling cloth for the mere purpose of keeping
warm. No, people purchased his cloth for the
purpose of calling attention to themselves, both
because of the expense of the cloth and the
beauty of the cloth. As a savvy businessman,
Pietro must have known how to appeal to and
profit from the vanity of his customers. The
youthful Francis was certainly exposed to this
way of thinking. Like many other aspects of
secular life, Francis saw that it was necessary
to reject this way of thinking and acting. He
knew that he could not serve “two masters”. He
made this very clear when he appeared naked in
the Bishop of Assisi’s court and dramatically
handed all his fine clothing back to his father
Pietro early in 1207. Yes, the Bishop did
immediately cloth Francis in a rich velvet
mantle as he took Francis under his protection,
but Francis was quick to give the mantle back to
the bishop. Instead, he obtained a torn and
tattered tunic from a farmer to wear. Thus
Francis exchanged his rich and fine clothes for
rags which would make him indistinguishable from
the most insignificant and despised beggar
At first probably Francis was not noticed except
in a negative way because of the contrast with
his previous life. But then Francis’s life did
attract attention, not for himself but for the
Lord. Just as Jesus Christ possessed the
splendor of Divinity under the cloak of humble
humanity, Francis also possessed the splendor of
living a life in union with the Lord under the
cloak of rags and humble attire. But eventually
Francis did succeed in drawing attention, not to
himself but to the Lord. There were others who
were attracted to the Lord through Francis. Of
course, Francis’s rule for his friars to live
the gospel also entailed simple clothing.
This “counter-cultural” way of dressing did not
stop with those who became friars. Francis was
asked to provide a rule of life for lay people
who were not free to become friars. This rule
was the Rule of 1221 written by Cardinal
Hugolino, the protector of the Order. The Rule
and Constitutions of the Confraternity of
Penitents is adapted from this 1221 rule. We as
laypersons are to imitate St. Francis by showing
the splendor of Christ under the cloak of
simple, humble clothing. The clothing aspect of
the rule is one more way to try to avoid putting
ourselves between those we meet and Jesus
Christ. Our clothing, of course, should not turn
others away from Christ. We need to refrain from
causing others to focus on the glories of this
world and thereby forgetting the glories of
Christ because of our dress. Ornate dress does
certainly have a place in the Church since the
vestments of priests and bishops, for example,
do serve to draw attention not to the wearer of
the vestments but to the priestly and kingly
character of Jesus Christ. We need to have the
same sense of balance that St. Francis had when
he honored priests and bishops even in their
ornate vestments, without desiring the fine
dress which goes with that honor.
Jim Nugent
The Help of the
Saints
When Pope Benedict XVI was installed as Bishop
on Rome on April 24, 2005, he said the following
concerning how he could possibly fulfill the
task which was given to him. “And now, at this
moment, weak servant of God that I am, I must
assume this enormous task, which truly exceeds
all human capacity. How can I do this? How will
I be able to do it? All of you, my dear friends,
have just invoked the entire host of Saints,
represented by some of the great names in the
history of God’s dealings with mankind. In this
way, I too can say with renewed conviction: I am
not alone. I do not have to carry alone what in
truth I could never carry alone. All the Saints
of God are there to protect me, to sustain me,
to carry me.” Of course, the Saints are there
not only for the Pope but for us also. Since the
Saints are those who through Christ have emerged
victorious over sin, they can help us in our
struggles.
Those of us who especially honor St. Francis
have one who has gone before us in many of the
same battles against evil and has triumphed in
Christ. While Francis lived in a different era
than we live in, the temptations are the same as
we experience. First there was the youthful
Francis who was drawn to worldly glory and
triumph like so many of his contemporaries. Yet
in Christ he was given the strength to turn away
from that and turn towards the Lord to become
the Herald of the Great King.
How many of us have friends, coworkers, and even
relatives who do not understand why we take the
Catholic faith seriously? Yet Francis had to
deal with the same issues in his own time with
his father, brother, and the friends of his
youth. Like us, Francis was surrounded by people
who professed to be Catholics and yet lived as
though there was no God. Francis’s desire to
live the gospel made him look like a freak. Even
those who professed to be followers of Francis
often did not understand him or his mission to
live the Gospel. They were attracted to his
charism of poverty and simplicity but were not
willing to live as he lived.
We should not assume that it was easy for
Francis of Assisi to become St. Francis of
Assisi. The life of penance that God calls us to
surely is not an easy life. Yet Francis knew
what the “good life” was yet he rejected it for
the infinitely better life. But the pull of the
former life was surely always there. This is
probably why Francis undertook penitential
practices for himself which did not require of
his friars. The siren call of sexual immorality
was certain there throughout his life. Then
there was also the call to power and self will.
Even when many of his friars were not living the
life he desired them to live, he still
understood that the Order of Friars Minor
belonged to the Lord and not to him. Then there
was also the call of legitimate comforts and
pleasures, which Francis did at times engage in,
but which had to be kept under control. Just as
Francis could not overcome these problems alone,
neither can we. But Francis, along with many
other Saints, showed us how to overcome the
world because Christ overcame the world. (John
16:33)
We do not all have the burden of being the Pope
like Benedict XVI, but we do have our own trials
of living a Christian life in a world which is
not friendly to the Christian life.
Just as Pope Benedict is not alone in performing
his task, we are not alone in performing our
tasks. All the Saints, and especially St.
Francis, are with us in all of our struggles.
Since we know so much about the life of St.
Francis, we can see in detail the conflicts and
struggles he faced and can see that they are not
so different from our own. May we invoke his
assistance in these struggles.
Jim Nugent
Embracing True
Freedom
We can look at the life of St. Francis as a
challenge to the modern concept of freedom. It
is common in modern society to look at freedom
as the ability to follow ones own will and do
exactly as one wants. It is common to think, “I
can do whatever I want in my life with regard to
sex, money, politics, relationships, free time,
and so forth as long as I am doing what I think
is right.” Obligations such as taxes, family, or
the need to make a living are looked upon as
interfering with freedom. In such an
environment, traditional morality is seen as a
great inhibition on freedom. Right and wrong are
what I think they are and not what some
authority from the past tells me they are.
Francis as a youth seemed to have a large degree
of freedom. He was young, healthy, and came from
a rich family. His dream was to become a knight
and he pursued that dream. Even in our modern
world we are told to do exactly what Francis did
as a youth- follow your dreams. While Francis
probably never had the current modern attitude
toward freedom, he still must have felt the
seductive pull of the world which told him that
he can have full happiness and fulfillment from
the things of this world. Then came the reality
check. Francis was captured. Francis was
imprisoned. Francis got sick. This was probably
the start of Francis’s conversion.
Even after Francis was released from prison and
recovered from his illness, he was now aware of
reality. Who is really free? Who can do anything
they want? No matter how much money they have or
how much power they possess or how much security
they have, no one is free from things that are
beyond their control. Who is secure from
terrorism, economic disasters, natural
disasters, sickness, or even the duplicity of
those around them? Is the earth itself secure
from cosmic disasters? Are not people who pursue
“peace and security” running after something
which they will never possess?
Yet Francis also knew that there was One who
walked the earth who did possess all these
things. All the great ones and lords of the
earth did not possess it, but this One did. The
freedom that the modern world seeks can only be
possessed by God.
What did He do with His freedom? Did he solve
all the world’s problems and thus build up His
own power and glory? No, He obeyed His Father
even to the point of being despised and rejected
by men undergoing a shameful crucifixion with
criminals. What a way to use freedom!
Is then freedom the “impossible dream”? Can no
human being be really free? Are we the slaves of
the capricious whims of a vast and impersonal
universe? Francis knew that the answer was no.
We can have the same freedom that the truly free
One had if we unite ourselves with Him and live
as He lived in union with the Father. Francis
decided to stop serving “lords” who were not
really free themselves and to start serving the
One who has absolute freedom. He decided to
become the “Herald of the Great King”. Did
Francis have no more pains, sorrows, and
frustrations after that? Of course he did. But
he also knew, like the King he served, that he
was in the hands of the Creator and Ruler of the
universe. Francis knew that even the “bad”
things that happened only happened with the
permission of the Lord of all of it. And this
Lord of the universe is infinitely more
benevolent than any human Lord could ever be. He
sacrificed His Son for us. This is a source of
great joy for us even in times of trial and
tribulation.
What about us? Do we seek the false freedom
which the world promises and can never be
delivered? Or do we seek the freedom which comes
from union with the Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit? Francis had that freedom along with all
the saints both canonized and uncanonized. Do we
want it?
Jim Nugent
"Look for the Things That Are Above"
We read in St. Paul’s letter to the Colossians
“Since you have been raised up to be with
Christ, you must look for the things that are
above, where Christ is, sitting at God’s right
hand. Let your thoughts be on things above, not
on the things that are on the earth, because you
have died, and now the life you have is hidden
with Christ in God. But when Christ is
revealed-and he is your life- you,
too, will be revealed with him in glory.” (Col
3:1-4) These words of St. Paul are very
beautiful, but how do we apply them to our own
lives as Christians? We can get help with this
from the life of St. Francis who really did live
for the things that are above.
Francis lived at a time when the dominance of
the Church in society meant that the “things
above” were before the eyes of everyone. Even
so, the pull of the “things that are on the
earth” was very strong also. A brief study of
medieval society shows that the glory, riches,
and power of this world had a very strong pull
on people, even those within the Church.
Francis was very much a part of that society and
he fully experienced the opposing forces.
As the young Francis gradually moved from being
the lover of friends, good times, and knightly
glory to being the “Herald of the Great King”,
he was not engaging in an “escape to heaven” or
a “flight from this world”. No, Francis lived
in this world until he died. But he also
understood the words of the Lord: “Anyone who
wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone
who loses his life for my sake will find it.”
(Mt 16:25) He could see that those who lived
only for this world ended up focusing only on
the self and ended up losing their life. By
focusing on Christ, who is “above”, Francis
could pull out of himself and truly love others
because it is the very nature of God to love.
We can understand why Francis insisted so much
on poverty for the Friars Minor. He could see
clearly from his own experience how riches can
pull us away from the Lord and cause us to focus
on what is here below. Francis’s mistrust of
worldly learning can also be understood in this
light. Even the study of sublime Divine Truths
can lead one to pride and to the exaltation of
the self. Francis’s absolute obedience to the
Church aided his quest to set the self aside in
order to obey Christ. Even his love of God’s
creatures should be understood in the sense that
they reflected God’s glory and not their own
glory.
By choosing to die to himself, Francis was able
to follow Christ. Since he followed Christ, he
was able to experience Christ in many ways. Thus
he was able to bear witness to Christ and bring
the light of Christ to the world. By not
clinging to the world and not trying to grasp
the world as a possession, Francis was able to
change the world in a way which could not be
done by “worldly” people. By seeking that which
is above, Francis was certainly not abandoning
or leaving the world.
In our modern society, the “pull” of the world
is so much stronger than it was in Francis’s
time because of our imagined self-sufficiency
which stems from our greater material
prosperity. It seems as though we do not need
to worry about the “above” because our
scientific expertise can take care of
everything. We as Christians need to pay
attention to what St. Paul says about seeking
that which is above but also what Paul says
happens if we cling to this earth: “That is why
you must kill everything in you that is earthly:
sexual vice, impurity, uncontrolled passion,
evil desires and especially greed, which is the
same thing as worshipping a false god; it is
precisely these things which draw God’s
retribution on those who resist.” (Col 3:5-6).
Can we not see all these things in our modern
“enlightened” society? We can be inspired by
the words of St. Paul but we can also be
instructed by the way St. Francis lived these
same words of St. Paul.
Jim Nugent
Saint Francis and
"Going Green"
There are many stories of St.
Francis’s love for all creatures. For example,
there is the time that Francis saw a man walking
in a village with two lambs tied together and
wrapped around his neck. They bleated in
distress and Francis had pity on them. The man
who had the lambs was taking them to sell for
food because he needed the money. Francis gave
the man his cloak in payment for the lambs.
Another time Francis encountered
a boy who had caught some turtle doves in a
snare and was taking them to sell. Francis asked
for them and the boy gave them to him. Francis
made nests for the turtle doves and they laid
their young at the friary. They were as tame as
chickens. Finally, Francis sent the family of
turtle doves on their way. There also was
Francis’s crow that went to choir with the
brothers, ate with them, visited sick friars
with them, and even went to beg alms with them.
When Francis died, this crow refused to eat and
died of grief at the tomb of Francis. There are
many other stories of Francis protecting
creatures, even worms, from harm from humans and
other animals.
Francis even made friends with a
cricket. One hot day, Francis heard a cricket
singing. Francis was so enthralled, that he
approached the cricket. Normally, the cricket
would fall silent when humans approach. But when
Francis bid the cricket to come to him, she came
out of her hiding place in a tree and into
Francis’s hand. The cricket then sang for
Francis and Francis spoke to the cricket of his
hopes and dreams. Then Francis lifted his hand
and the cricket returned to her tree. For eight
days the cricket would fly to his hand, sing, or
be silent according to his command. Then Francis
let the cricket go so that he and the friars
would not glory over such a thing.
These stories about St. Francis
have endeared him to both believers and
unbelievers alike. St. Francis’s love for all
creatures fits in well with the current emphasis
on ecology, environmentalism, and “going green”.
We must, however, understand that Francis does
not just confirm our inclination for harmony
with nature and the environment. He demands much
more from us than that.
Francis honored and respected
nature and creatures not because they were a god
to be worshipped but because they, like us, came
from the hand of God. The cricket who can sing,
the dove who can moan, or the lamb who could
bleat are reflections of the glory of God.
Francis was in harmony and peace with himself
because he was in harmony and peace with God.
Because he was in harmony and peace with God, he
was in harmony and peace with all creatures. Why
would the cricket fly into the hand of Francis
or the wild doves and crow stay with Francis and
the friars if they did not trust Francis? Why
would they trust Francis? They trusted him
because he was in harmony with himself, God, and
all creation. Francis knew very well of his
dependence on God and he lived this dependence
by his poverty. I think that these creatures in
their own way also sensed their dependence on
God and could sense this in Francis. They knew
that Francis was a “higher” being than they but
also a higher being who could be trusted. Just
as a pet such as dog or a cat can learn to trust
their master, they somehow could sense that
Francis could be trusted.
Let St. Francis teach us the true
environmentalism. Francis can teach us that we
should not exploit and despoil nature to the
detriment of both creatures and other humans. We
also should not adore or worship nature as a
god. Both ways will lead us away from the path
showed us by St. Francis. We need to understand
that it all comes from the hand of God and live
our lives in harmony with God.
Jim Nugent
Suffering and
Holiness
Most of us are familiar with the Old Testament
book of Job. In that book, God speaks to Satan
and praises Job for being such a good man who
shuns evil. Satan responds that Job is only good
because God had made him prosperous and
protected him from evil. Satan challenges God to
allow him to take these things away and then Job
will curse God. God allows Satan to take away
Job’s possessions, but Job does not curse God.
Then Satan challenges God to allow him to take
away Job’s health and then Job will curse God.
God allows Satan to make Job very sick but to
spare his life.
The book continues with a discussion between Job
and his friends on the reasons for Job’s
suffering. Job’s friends give the traditional
view that suffering is a punishment for sin and
prosperity a reward for virtue, and so Job’s
suffering is caused by sin. Yet Job protests
that he has not sinned and asks God for an
explanation for his suffering. Job’s friends
reply that Job must have sinned since suffering
is a punishment for evil. This debate goes on
for many chapters. Finally, God appears and
gives His answer which is really not an answer.
The ways of God are beyond human comprehension,
and so Job is reduced to silence. God also
rebukes Job’s friends for misrepresenting God
and thinking that they understand the ways of
God. God does not rebuke Job for questioning Him
but restores Job’s fortunes double.
When we look at the life of St. Francis, we can
see how consoling is the book of Job for us. St.
Francis suffered greatly in his life. First he
suffered, like Job, from not having possessions.
He also suffered, like Job, from his many
illnesses and infirmities and from his stigmata.
St. Francis also suffered greatly to see so many
of his followers not following the vision he had
for the Friars Minor. Francis’s greatest
sufferings came near the end of his life when he
was also at his highest state of holiness. If
the friends of Job were correct, and suffering
is a punishment for sin, what must be the
suffering which those of us who are far less
holy than St. Francis must endure? God’s rebuke
to the friends of Job demonstrates that God is
not the way Job’s friends envisioned Him.
Yet God does not give Job an answer concerning
why the virtuous suffer. Why did St. Francis,
St. Clare, St. Elizabeth of Hungary, and so many
other saints, both canonized and uncanonized,
down through the ages suffer even while they
were living very holy lives?
The book of Job does not give an answer nor do
other books of the Bible supply a pat answer as
to why the innocent and virtuous suffer. Yet it
does seem that in the mysterious ways of God,
love and suffering go together in this world.
It seems that those like St. Francis and others
who love greatly also suffer greatly. Of course,
when we gaze at a crucifix we see infinite love
and infinite suffering at the same time.
Naturally, suffering is not the object of our
love. We are commanded to love God and our
neighbor as ourselves. We are not commanded to
love suffering. St. Francis certainly loved
intensely during his life on earth, and he also
suffered intensely. Does St. Francis still love
even now? Yes. Does he suffer now? No. This may
be one crucial difference between heaven and
earth. We do not know why we must suffer even
when we love, yet in God’s infinite and
mysterious wisdom it is part of the human
condition of this world. Even our Lord Jesus
Christ was not exempt.
We certainly are not to love sufferings and yet
it seems as though in this world those who flee
from suffering also flee from love. Since God
is love, those who will not love separate
themselves from God. This is not a pat answer to
the question of suffering. Like Job, St.
Francis, and all the other saints we have to
understand that we are God’s creatures and not
His equal.
Jim Nugent
Christmas: Seeing the Hidden God
As is well known, St. Francis was the first to
give us the “Christmas Pageant”. This was done
at Greccio on Christmas Eve of 1223. He had
arranged for Christmas Eve Mass at real manger
on a mountainside with the hay, the ox, and the
ass. There was a procession of friars and people
from Greccio who carried a thousand torches up
the mountain on a snowy night. We can safely say
that St. Francis gave us Christmas in a new way.
What, however, did St. Francis, in 1223, do for
the people of Greccio and for us? Francis
certainly did see God in nature as The Canticle
of Brother Sun amply illustrates. However, one
can see God in nature even without the eyes of
faith. Francis, at Greccio, brought to us what
only the eyes of faith can see, the hidden God.
Moses had to leave his familiar circumstances
and climb Mount Sinai to find God in the cloud.
Elijah had to go to Mount Horeb to find God not
in a hurricane, earthquake, or fire but in a
light murmuring sound. (1K 19:9-18). The
shepherds at Bethlehem were told “This will be a
sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in
swaddling cloths and lying in a manger” (Lk
2:12). Also, the wise men from the east came
from far away to find the infant King of the
Jews (Lk 2:1-2). Likewise, Francis led the
people of Greccio out of their homes and up a
mountain to meet the hidden God. Francis knew
that we do not meet God in terrible and
spectacular manifestations which force us to
adore Him. No, we find Him in the helpless and
dependent baby. We find Him in the Man totally
under the power of sinful men who relied
completely on His Heavenly Father. Yes, there
was the glory of the resurrection, which we
celebrate on Easter, but even that was seen only
by those chosen by the Father to witness it.
Advent, like Lent, is a time of penance, a time
of conversion. It is a time to leave our
comfortable circumstances and turn to the hidden
God. Unfortunately, Christmas is now often
looked upon as an event to be remembered from
the comfortably distant past. Of course, the
abbreviation, A.D. does not mean “after Christ”
but “anno Domini” or “year of our Lord”. This
means that Christ is with us. Advent reminds us
that, to the extent that we live in egotism and
self-sufficiency, we are still “before Christ”
and not in the “year of our Lord”. While the
secular world celebrates the time before
Christmas with shopping and parties, it seems to
know nothing about Advent as a time of penance
and conversion. Even those who decry the
commercialism of Christmas often talk of
Christmas in warm, fuzzy terms of peace and
goodwill. They fail to see the source of peace,
which is the hidden God. As St. Francis pointed
out to us, Christmas is time to go out to
encounter the hidden God who comes to us in
weakness and dependency on the Father. A few
months later St. Francis himself went out to
Mount La Verna to encounter the hidden God and
receive the stigmata from an angel. The peace
that Christmas brings comes from the God who
came to us in hidden form as a helpless baby.
We have to ask ourselves with whom we align
ourselves. Are we with Herod and Jerusalem with
him who were concerned only with their comfort
in this life and could not recognize Him even
when He was pointed out to them by the wise men
and scripture? Or are we with Mary, Joseph, the
wise men, the shepherds, Francis? They could see
with the eyes of faith the hidden God.
Jim Nugent
Following the Will of the Father, until the End
We are all familiar with the Gospel accounts of
the Transfiguration of the Lord. In these
accounts Jesus took Peter, James, and John to a
high mountain “to pray”. (Lk 9:28) He was then
transfigured before their eyes so that his face
shown “like the sun” and his garments became
“white as light” (Mt 17:2). Then Moses and
Elijah appeared and spoke with Jesus about his
coming Passion (Lk 9:31). After Peter proposed
the construction of three tents, the Voice from
the cloud came stating, “This is my Son…..”. In
the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, this
event comes a few days after Peter’s profession
of faith in the Lord. It is also linked with the
coming Passion of the Lord. The Lord made this
very clear as they were coming down the
mountain. Thus we must recognize that the
divinity and glorification of the Lord belong
with the Cross.
We can see how this idea applies to all of us
when we look at the life of St. Francis. In the
late summer of 1224, Francis went up to mount La
Verna to pray. On the eve of the feast of the
Triumph of the Cross, September 14, Francis
received the stigmata of the Lord. He had the
wounds of Christ on his hands, feet, and side.
Here we can see in St. Francis how glory and
exaltation go with the shame and agony of the
cross just as it did with the Lord. Just as the
Lord had His Transfiguration, St. Francis had
his transfiguration on mount La Verna. Of
course, his was different from that of the Lord.
When Christ’s face shown like “the sun” and his
garments were “white as light” this was a
manifestation of His Divinity which He possessed
in Himself. The wounds of Christ which were
placed on St. Francis’s body were a reflection
of the Glory and Divinity of the Lord. This was
a time in Francis’s life when he was being
honored as a living saint. The stigmata was a
visible confirmation of the life that Francis
was leading at that time.
As it was with the Lord, with St. Francis the
cross also came along with the glory and
exaltation. The stigmata were given to Francis
two years before he died. In the last two years
of his life, Francis suffered grievously from
many physical ailments. He also suffered greatly
in seeing his vision for the Order being
rejected by many of his friars as his ideas
about poverty and humility were set aside. He
now also lived in dependence on and obedience to
others. Just as the nails in Our Lord’s hands
and feet slowly drained his life away, so the
stigmata was a visible manifestation of the life
of Francis draining away. Francis was simply
following his Lord. The Lord was obeying the
Will of the Father to the very end. Francis did
the same.
The life of St. Francis helps us to understand
Jesus Christ as well as our own lives. The cross
and divinity go together. Even those of us who
do not experience worldly honor and glory will
experience it with and in Christ as did St.
Francis. This is not only for the next life but
also for this one. St. Francis certainly
experienced great suffering and pain in the last
years of his life. He also received great
consolations from the Lord. Francis shows us
that we have to follow the Lord by obeying the
Father’s Will no matter where it leads us. This
certainly does not mean that we all go to mount
La Verna to receive the stigmata. It does mean
that we must unite ourselves to the Will of the
Father. Why did the Lord go to the mountain of
the Transfiguration? To pray. Why did St.
Francis go to the mount La Verna? To pray. This
is what we all must do to truly follow the Lord.
Jim Nugent
Francis, the
Prophet
We
generally do not think of St. Francis as a
prophet. Why not? We usually think of a prophet
as someone who predicts future events. St.
Francis was certainly not known for that. The
idea that the job of prophets is the prediction
of the future is a distortion of the office of
prophecy. Since knowing the future is a strong
human desire, there have always been in pagan
religions fortune tellers and soothsayers. Even
now in our “enlightened, secular” times there
are people and techniques for foretelling the
future.
Prophecy is something different. It arose from
the faith of Israel. The people of Israel
worshipped the true God, the real God, the God
who created everything and was in charge of
everything. The enlightened pagans knew this God
existed, but this God chose Israel especially as
His own people. Moses was the first prophet of
the people of Israel.
In
Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict XVI
tells us why Moses was a prophet. “The most
important thing about the figure of Moses is
neither all the miraculous deeds he is reported
to have done nor his many works and sufferings
along the way from the ‘house of bondage in
Egypt’ through the desert to the threshold of
the Promised Land. The most important thing is
that he spoke with God as with a friend. This
was the only possible springboard for his works;
this was the only possible source of the Law
that was to show Israel its path through
history.” (page 4) This definition applies not
only to Moses but to all the genuine prophets of
the people of Israel. The ultimate prophet was
the One who Moses himself predicted would come.
Jesus not only spoke with God as a “friend” but
as a Son in the full and literal sense. The
divine and human natures were in the one person,
Jesus.
Going by Pope Benedict’s definition of a
prophet, St. Francis certainly qualifies as a
prophet. Francis was so close to God that the
divine Son chose to share His Wounds from our
sins with Francis. This brings us to another
insight for Pope Benedict XVI in Jesus of
Nazareth. “Prophets fail: Their message goes
too much against general opinion and the
comfortable habits of life. It is only through
failure that their word becomes efficacious.
This failure of the Prophets is an obscure
question mark hanging over the whole history of
Israel, and in a certain way it constantly
recurs in the history of humanity. Above all, it
is also again and again the destiny of Jesus
Christ: He ends up on the Cross. But that very
Cross is the source of great fruitfulness.”
(pages 189-190)
We
can see this very readily in the life of St.
Francis from the beginning. In 1207, after
Francis had broken with his former way of life
and stood naked before his father, the people of
Assisi, and the Bishop of Assisi, he fled to the
neighboring city of Gubbio. There he was
welcomed by the people of Gubbio and into the
home of a rich citizen of that city. However,
Francis was not welcomed there because of his
radical embrace of poverty and abandonment to
the Lord. Rather, he was welcomed because Assisi
and Gubbio were allies against the common enemy,
Perugia. It was know that Francis had fought
bravely and suffered imprisonment in the war
against Perugia. They were more interested in
the fight against Perugia than in Francis’s
message of poverty, humility, and abandonment to
Christ. At that time and up to the present, the
people of Gubbio still celebrate the feast of
Bishop Ubaldo, who courageously led the people
to a victory against Perugia in 1151. The people
of Gubbio were not hostile to Francis; they just
could not understand what he was telling them
about his new way of life. After a few months
Francis returned to Assisi to care for the
lepers.
This
event in the life of St. Francis illustrates
what Pope Benedict says about the “failure” of
prophets. Francis’s new way of life did not come
from himself but from his closeness to the Lord.
This closeness increased until his death. Yes,
there were many who followed Francis in varying
degrees, but very few fully embraced his vision.
This was a great source of suffering for
Francis. Yet, like Jesus, Francis’s life of
“failure” has provided great fruitfulness
through the centuries. We need to understand
that as we grow closer to the Lord and become
“prophets” there will be those who understand
and help us, but there will also be many who
will look upon is as “strange”, “odd”, or
“weird”. The pull of the world is stronger than
the pull of God for many people.
Jim Nugent
Martyrdom, Saint Francis, and Us
What is a martyr? Usually, a martyr is defined
as someone who dies for some religious principle
and in the Christian sense, for Christ. By that
definition, the first Franciscan martyrs are the
five who were brutally killed by Muslims in
Morocco in 1220. They were Sts. Berard, Peter,
Otto, Accursius, and Adjutus. They were sent by
Francis to evangelize in Africa. By that
definition, therefore, Francis himself was not a
martyr.
We must understand that “martyr” in the above
sense is a very narrow definition of the word.
The word “martyr” derives from the Greek word
for “witness”. It really has nothing to do with
a bloody death. For the Christian, dying for
Christ certainly is the ultimate witness to Him,
but it is not the only form of witness. When
Peter stated publicly, “You are the Christ, the
Son of the living God” (Mt 16:16), he was
already a martyr, although he did eventually
suffer martyrdom in the narrow sense. The martyr
as a witness is not an anonymous group or
committee. It is a person who takes
responsibility for their witness. That is what
Peter did. Of course, it is also possible to
fail as a witness as when Peter denied the Lord
three times, “I do not know the Man”. The Lord
gave Peter a “second chance” to witness when He
asked Peter after His Resurrection by the Sea of
Tiberias, “Simon son of John, do you love me
more than these others do?” (Jn 21:15). Three
times He asked Peter this question and three
times Peter answered in the affirmative. Then
the Lord three times asked Peter to “Feed My
Sheep.”
Jesus was really asking Peter if he would
witness to Him. For the three times that Peter
denied being a witness of Christ, Peter was
given the opportunity to affirm that he would
witness for the Lord. For that time onward,
Peter was a martyr (witness) for Christ and not
just at his death. Peter had taken personal
responsibility for his witness to Christ.
In the full sense of the word, Francis was a
martyr for Christ, especially after his
conversion. His martyrdom expanded as his life
progressed, and he drew many others into his
martyrdom. But how did Francis live as a martyr?
It is easy to pick out specific instances where
Francis gave witness to Christ and thus
functioned as a martyr. When Francis stood naked
before his father, the Bishop, and many of the
people of Assisi, he was certainly giving
witness to the Lord. Another dramatic example
occurred when Francis stood before the Sultan in
Egypt and preached the gospel. Near the end of
his life, the stigmata certainly showed
Francis’s willingness to witness to the passion
of the Lord. It was not only by dramatic means
that Francis served as a witness. He did this by
his dress, his poverty, his penances, and his
total lifestyle, all of which were very much
against the culture of the time. In all these
things he was a witness for Christ.
While Francis and other saints were certainly
martyrs or witnesses for Christ, we are all
called to do the same. Most likely, none of us
will be called to witness in the dramatic ways
that St. Francis witnessed. Yet we can witness
to Christ by our penitential lifestyle, our
dress, our living at peace with all.
Unfortunately, our society suffers from the
failure of Christians to witness. Do we not say
with Peter “I do not know the Man” when we treat
Sunday as just another day to pursue our own
agenda? Do we not deny Him when our sexual
morality, our donations to charity, our voting
preferences, our use of money, and our general
lifestyle are indistinguishable from everyone
else’s? Of course, martyrdom had its costs for
St. Peter, for St. Francis, and it has its costs
also for us. Are we willing to pay the price?
Jim Nugent
Seek the Face of God and “Follow Instructions”
There are times when all of us are bewildered
and do not know where to turn. Francis was in
that situation in 1206. He knew that he had a
call from the Lord to abandon his former life,
but what did the Lord want of him? This was
the question in Francis’s mind when he entered
the very run down, crumbling church of San
Damiano. Over the door of the church there were
the words “Domus mea”, My house. The now famous
San Damiano crucifix, the symbol that has been
adopted by the Confraternity of Penitents, which
hung near the altar, had survived the decay.
What was Francis doing in “My house”? He was
doing what people have done since Old Testament
times--he was seeking the face of God. We read
in Psalm 24: “Who may go up the mountain of the
Lord? Who can stand in His holy place? The
clean of hand and pure of heart, who are not
devoted to idols, who have not sworn falsely.
They will receive blessings from the Lord, and
justice from their saving God. Such are the
people that love the Lord, that seek the face of
the God of Jacob.” (Ps 24:3-6) When Francis
embraced the leper, he was rejecting his former
attachment to earthly beauty and now he was
“pure of heart”. Even that, however, is not
enough. Francis still had to seek the “face of
God” and he did that by going to the Church of
San Damiano and praying before the crucifix.
In the Church of San Damiano, Francis found what
he was seeking. By gazing at the San Damiano
crucifix, the Lord returned the favor by gazing
back at him. Then, the Lord spoke to Francis
saying, “Francis, go and repair My house, which,
as you see, is falling into ruin.” This call
was repeated a second and third time.
Francis immediately set out to obey the Lord.
He went and took some rich cloth from his
father’s shop and sold it in the neighboring
city of Foligno to get money to pay for the
restoration of San Damiano. Since this occurred
before Francis was disowned by his father, he
was not stealing. Francis had taken the Lord
literally and understood that He wanted him to
repair churches. Therefore, Francis set about
to repair churches in the area. I believe that
Francis understood the Lord correctly. While
the Lord did not want Francis to spend the rest
of his life repairing churches, that is exactly
what the Lord demanded of Francis at that time.
By selling his father’s cloth, he angered his
father so much that it led his father to disown
him. Francis was pushed further into the
Church. This in turn led Francis to seek
support from the Church which led to the
formation of the Friars Minor.
Here, Francis can teach a practical way to seek
the will of God for our lives. First, we have
to take the advice of Psalm 24 and seek to rid
ourselves of attachment to sin. Sin is the
barrier which blocks the face of God from our
eyes. When the flesh and worldly cares dominate
us, then we are not “pure of heart” and God is
unable to reach us. Then we have to seek His
Face, in other words, His Presence. Francis did
it with the San Damiano crucifix. Francis’s
experience before the crucifix teaches us that
we should not expect the Lord to lay out an
entire life plan before us. We only need to
know what He expects of us now. We must learn
to “just follow instructions” and not worry
about what is down the road.
Jim Nugent
Francis and the Leper
Even those of us who have decided to follow the
Lord Jesus Christ totally often still have our
attachments to the world. An example of this
from the life of St. Francis comes from his
attitude toward leprosy after his conversion.
In the Old Testament times, Sheol was known as
the abode of the dead. It was believed then that
death did not bring about total annihilation as
the materialists now believe. The person still
existed as a shadow of their existence while
alive. They did not have communion with fellow
human beings or with God, but existed in
isolation. As the psalmist prays, “Yahweh,
relent and save my life, rescue me because of
your faithful love, for in death there is no
remembrance of you: who could sing your praises
in Sheol?” (Ps 6:4-5). Leprosy and other
sicknesses were considered to be a foretaste of
Sheol. The sick, and especially lepers, were
isolated from the human community.
During the time of St. Francis, this attitude
toward leprosy continued but with one important
difference. In the region of Assisi, there was a
hospital near the castle of Arce dedicated to
Saint Lazarus, the beggar who was covered with
sores in the parable of Jesus related by St.
Luke (Lk 16:19-31). When a person showed the
symptoms of leprosy, they needed to hide from
human society. When they were discovered, they
were taken to the leper hospital. Each leper
entered the hospital with a ceremony in the
hospital chapel presided by a priest. The priest
sprinkled the leper with holy water and said “My
brother, dear poor little man of good God, by
means of great sadness and tribulation, of
sickness, of leprosy, and of many other
miseries, one gains the kingdom of heaven, where
there is no sickness or sorrow, and all is pure
and white, without stain, more brilliant than
the sun. You will go there, if it pleases God.
In the meantime, be a good Christian, bear with
patience this adversity, and God will be
merciful to you.”
The priest then said, “My brother, the
separation has to do only with your body. As for
the spirit, which is more important, you are
still, as you were before, a participant in the
prayers of our Holy Mother Church, as if every
day you were assisting in the Divine Offices.
Charitable men will provide for your lesser
needs, and God will never abandon you. Take care
of yourself and have patience. God is with you.
Amen.”
Black earth is then sprinkled on the head of the
leper and the priest said, “Die to the world, be
born again in God. O Jesus my Redeemer, who made
me of earth and clothed me with a body, make me
rise again in the new day.” The people then
responded, “My bones tremble, my soul loses its
way. Alleluia. Have mercy on us, O Lord. Keep us
from evil.”
The Gospel relating the story of the ten lepers
was read. The leper was then given a list of
instructions on how he was to now behave to
avoid contact with human society. He was to wear
a special cloak which identified him as a leper.
He was forbidden to drink from rivers, springs,
or wells. He could only drink from a special
flask. He could touch nothing which was not his
own with his bare hands but must wear gloves.
Other instructions were given him for the
purpose of avoiding human contact so as to not
contaminate others with leprosy. Finally, he was
given a wooden clapper which he was to sound to
warn others of his presence.
The leper then proceeded with the priest and
congregation to the cell where he must live with
the meager things he needed to live. His former
possessions went to the hospital. Then, the
leper must respond, “Here is my perpetual
resting place. Here I shall live. This is my
vow.” Outside his cell was a stump for the
collection of alms which the priest and
congregation would leave for the leper. Everyone
then left the leper in his cell, and the priest
chanted, “Omnipotent God, who throws down the
pride of the ancient enemy through the
sufferings of your Only Son, give to your
servant the necessary strength to bear with
devotion and patience the evil that oppresses
him. Amen.” Then the people responded, “Amen.”.
The leper was sent to “Sheol”, but the Church
also gave him the Hope of Christ. Like a
religious even now, the leper had to die to the
world in order to live for Christ.
After his conversion, Francis still had not made
the break with the world which the leper was
required to make. He avoided the leper hospital,
and when he gave alms, he asked others to
deliver them. When he did see a leper, he was
repulsed by the sight. However, the Lord saw his
deficiency and remedied it. Once, when Francis
was riding on a horse, he saw a repulsive leper
right in the middle of the road. He could not
avoid him. However, he did not flee. He got off
his horse, walked up to the leper, put an
offering of charity into the hands of the leper,
and then kissed the deformed flesh of the hand
of the leper. After the leper withdrew his hand,
Francis looked up and the leper was gone.
Several days later, Francis went to the hospital
of Saint Lazarus and gave each leper a piece of
gold and a kiss on the lips.
St. Bonaventure says that the leper was Christ
who returned to fulfill the prophesy of Isaiah:
“he was despised, the lowest of men, a man of
sorrows, familiar with suffering, one from whom,
as it were, we averted our gaze, despised, for
whom we had no regard. Yet ours were the
sufferings he was bearing, ours the sorrows he
was carrying, while we thought of him as someone
being punished and struck with affliction by
God.” (Is 53:3-4)
Francis, like all of us, had to embrace the Lord
in whatever form He comes to us.
Jim Nugent
Gospel Poverty, Gospel Childhood
In the Gospels, Jesus praises two states of
life: childhood and poverty.
Regarding childhood, the Gospels recount the
following incident: “At that time the disciples
came to Jesus and said, `Who is the greatest in
the kingdom of Heaven?’ So he called a little
child to him whom he set among them. Then he
said, `In truth I tell you, unless you change
and become like little children you will never
enter the kingdom of Heaven. And so, the one
who makes himself as little as this little child
is the greatest in the kingdom of Heaven.” (Mt
18:1-4)
Jesus praised poverty in these words: “How
blessed are you who are poor: the kingdom of God
is yours.” (Lk 6:20)
In the life of St. Francis we can see clearly
the relationship between poverty and childhood.
Certainly Francis embraced poverty for himself
and the Friars Minor, but he also embraced
childhood during his whole life in the sense
that Jesus spoke of it in the Gospels.
There is good reason to believe that Francis,
like Jesus, had a happy childhood. Francis’s
father, Pietro Bernardone, and his mother, Lady
Pica, were good parents. While Pietro is often
viewed in a negative light because he did not
support Francis’s vocation, he did provide a
secure family environment for Francis. Pietro
probably often took Francis to France with him
for the purpose of teaching him the merchant’s
trade to prepare him for adulthood. Lady Pica
saw to it that Francis learned the Catholic
faith. Although the details of Francis’s
childhood are not known in detail, the problems
which often affect modern home life seem to be
absent.
One can easily see how Francis’s childhood
helped make it possible for him to embrace the
very countercultural life of a friar’s poverty.
Throughout his life Francis was never “self-
sufficient”. He never really “earned his own
keep.” As a child he was dependent on his
parents. As a soldier, he was dependent upon
the military. As a friar, he was dependent upon
God. The life of St. Francis helps clarify why
Jesus makes becoming a child necessary to enter
the kingdom of Heaven. Jesus was certainly not
praising the immaturity and self-centeredness of
children. Hopefully these aspects of childhood
are temporary. What should endure from
childhood are the need and dependence on others
and ultimately on God and the lack of power and
possessions. When we become totally
“self-sufficient” and trust in our power and
possessions, we are lost. Francis was not a
parasite who received and never gave back. He
did give to others and supported others, but his
“payment” was the alms that others had freely
given to him and which he saw as coming from
God. Francis demanded nothing as his own. Like
a child, he took everything as a gift.
Francis’ attitude helps us to see the
relationship between poverty and childhood. In
both cases, the person is not self-sufficient
but is lacking in power while being dependent on
others and ultimately on God. Poverty can help
anyone, and certainly did help Francis, to
maintain the essence of “childhood” throughout
his life. Of course, poverty alone cannot do
that. A person can be poor and still be very
possessive and materialistic. Conversely, one
can be materially rich but “poor in spirit”, so
that one does maintain the essence of childhood
throughout life.
Francis’s vocation was to “live the Gospel”. He
saw that the eternal childhood of Jesus, known
as “the Son”, and the poverty of Jesus, which
united Him to the mass of humanity, were
essential components of the Gospel. May we
always be grateful to God for what He has given
us and grateful to all humanity to whom we are
indebted. This humble gratitude is essential to
all of us who, like Francis, wish to live the
Gospel.
Jim Nugent
Penitential
Practices
In the spring of 1206, after Francis had broken
away from his lifestyle as a carefree youth, he
made a pilgrimage to Rome. There he put on the
rags of the Roman beggars and begged alms just
like they did. This was extremely
“countercultural”. At that time material goods
and prosperity were of the utmost importance and
yet Francis was mysteriously drawn to poverty.
He was torn between the way of the world and the
direction in which he was drawn. He seemed to
hear God saying to him, “All the things that you
have carnally loved and desired, you will have
to despise and hate, if you wish to know the
will of God. After you have begun to do this,
those things that were at first sweet and
desirable to you will become insupportable and
bitter, and in those that have been horrid and
exhausting, you will experience great sweetness
and infinite balm.”
There is a large problem here, which Francis was
probably aware of. Was he falling into heresy?
In the second century there appeared a heretic
named Marcion. He taught that the creator God of
the Old Testament was evil and the God of Jesus
Christ was the good God and opposed to the God
of the Jews. Marcion was separating the God who
created us from the God who redeemed us. It
followed logically from this that the body and
material creation was evil and to be despised.
This led Marcion to an extreme and neurotic
hostility to the body. Yet Pope Benedict XVI has
pointed out that those who despise the body and
the self-indulgent libertine are really very
close to each other. When our sexual life is
separated from God and morality, the body and
all of creation are just things to be used. We
see this now in people who believe that their
sexual practices are not the concern of the
Church. In both cases, God as Creator is not
really understood. Indeed, when we despise
creation, we are really despising ourselves. The
heresy of Marcion took one of its many new forms
with the Cathari who were very strong in the
time of St. Francis. Since the Church always
maintained the unity of the Old and New
Testaments, it was necessary for these heresies
to be condemned.
In fact, Francis was not being led in heresy.
Even when Francis undertook penitential
practices which were unwise, he did it out of
love for the Lord rather than because he
despised creation or the body. For Francis,
creation is what Pope Benedict has called a
“compass” which points us toward God. One can
find many examples from the Life of St. Francis,
such as the “Canticle of the Brother Sun” which
show the great respect that Francis had for
creation. This “compass” is sometimes called
“natural law” which in not a popular concept
now. Yet we should not lose sight of the truth
behind the “natural law” idea. Thus, we read in
St. Paul “The retribution of God from heaven is
being revealed against the ungodliness and
injustice of human beings who in their injustice
hold back the truth. For what can be known about
God is perfectly plain to them, since God had
made it plain to them: ever since the creation
of the world, the invisible existence of God and
his everlasting power have been clearly seen by
the mind’s understanding of created things. And
so these people have no excuse: they knew God
and yet they did not honor him as God or give
thanks to him, but their arguments became futile
and their uncomprehending minds were darkened.”
(Rm 1:18-21)
Those who undertake penitential practices such
as those contained in the Rule of 1221 do so not
out of contempt for the body or creation but in
recognition that all of creation comes from God.
They recognize that everything is subject to God
and must not pull us away from God. Creation and
our fellow creatures are honored and respected
because of the Majesty and Greatness of God.
Jim Nugent
Unless a
Grain of Wheat Dies
In the Gospel of John we read “In all truth I
tell you, unless a wheat grain falls into the
earth and dies, it remains only a single grain;
but if it dies it yields a rich harvest. Anyone
who loves his life loses it; anyone who hates
his life in this world will keep it for eternal
life. Whoever serves me, must follow me, and my
servant will be with me wherever I am. If
anyone serves me, my Father will honor him.” (Jn
12:24-26)
This passage brings to mind Francis’s last
banquet as a member of the carefree youth of
Assisi in spring, 1204. Since Francis had been
a leader of that group, he was chosen to be the
leader of the banquet. He sat at the head table
and wore a crown of roses on his head. He was
surrounded by good food, handsome young men, and
beautiful young girls. Yet Francis did not enter
into the merry mood of the gathering but
remained detached and pensive. When the supper
was over, Francis was saluted by his
companions. Who played the lute the best, had
the best voice for singing love songs, was the
most popular with the girls, was the most
inventive poet, the bravest fighter, the most
generous cavalier? The answer was Francis!
Then a young girl placed another crown of roses
on his head to replace the one that was
wilting. A kneeling page offered him a
scepter. Francis had the best that this life
could offer him, and yet he was melancholy.
The whole group went out with lutes and
mandolins into the tranquil spring night. Then
Francis suddenly saw the same beautiful lady
which he had previously seen in a vision of an
enchanted castle. In that vision she was
dressed in rich purple clothes. Now, however,
she was dressed in rags like a beggar and
barefoot. Yet, she was much more beautiful to
Francis than all the pretty young girls in their
rich clothing. As the singers walked along the
street, she walked along with her bare feet very
close to Francis. She then disappeared just as
suddenly as she had appeared, and nobody else
saw her. Francis left the group and searched
for her frantically, but she could not be found
anywhere. Francis then stopped, paralyzed as
if in a daze. He felt nothing except the
sweetness of the lady of his dreams. Francis
was in love.
The others came looking for him and asked why he
had left them. He could give no reply. He was
in another world. As a joke, someone asked him,
“Have you perhaps finally found a bride?” This
question brought him back to reality and he
replied, “It is true. I have found my beloved
bride. And she is the noblest, the richest, the
most beautiful bride who ever lived on earth.”
This reply was met with sarcastic laughter.
Since it was now near daybreak, the group broke
up to go home. Francis had now seen the love of
his life, Lady Poverty.
We can then recall what the Lord says in John’s
Gospel, “unless a wheat grain falls into the
earth and dies, it remains only a single grain;
but if it dies it yields a rich harvest.” Did
perhaps the Lord send Lady Poverty to Francis to
“seduce” him? Francis had to, like the grain of
wheat, fall to the earth and die twenty-two
years before he died physically. In doing so,
he yielded a much richer harvest than he would
have if he remained attached to the “stalk”, his
life as a rich merchant’s son in Assisi.
Perhaps, Lady Poverty caused Francis fall to the
earth like the grain of wheat.
“Anyone who loves his life loses it; anyone who
hates his life in this world will keep it for
eternal life.” By Francis finding no joy in the
celebrations of this life, but only melancholy,
the Lord was causing Francis to “hate” his life
in this world so that he could keep it for
eternal life.
“If anyone serves me, my Father will honor
him.” Francis received much honor at this
celebration, but it was infinitesimal compared
to the honor which the Father has given him
during his life and after his life was over.
Should we be considering what we must do to
“fall to the earth and die” so that we can
“yield a rich harvest”?
Jim Nugent
Which Master
Do You Serve?
In chapter 9 of the book of Acts, we read how Saul of
Tarsus was on his way to Damascus, fired with
zeal, to arrest Christians and take them to
Jerusalem. Why? He wanted to preserve the true
Law of God and Worship of God from those who
would destroy it. Then, a light from heaven
shown and he heard a voice saying “Saul, Saul,
why are you persecuting me.” Saul did not think
that he was persecuting anyone. He was simply
defending God, His Law, and His Temple. He
asked the voice “Who are you Lord?” The answer
came “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.
Get up and go into the city, and you will be
told what to do.” The zealous Saul became the
zealous Paul who now served his new Master,
Jesus Christ.
St. Francis had a conversion experience very similar to
St. Paul’s. Early in 1204, Francis was very
zealous in his quest to become a knight and win
the glory of knighthood. He was on his way to
Apulia to enlist in the service of the Sire de
Brienne so that he could earn knighthood.
Shortly before that time he had a dream of an
enchanted castle which was full of the arms of
war such as helmets and shields. He also saw a
beautiful lady dressed in purple in the castle.
He then heard a voice saying “All this is for
you and your knights”. Francis was sure he was
on the right path.
When Francis arrived in Spoleto, however, he was not
feeling well and went to bed with apprehension
about the journey. When he was half asleep he
heard a voice asking where he was going. He
told the voice of his plan to go to Apulia to
become a knight in the service of Sire de
Brienne. Then Francis was asked “Who do you
think can best reward you, the Master or the
servant?” Francis answered “The Master.” The
reply came “Then why do you leave the Master for
the servant, the rich Lord for the poor man?”
Just as St. Paul on the road to Damascus, Francis
realized in a flash that the path he was taking
was wrong. Francis immediately realized that he
was on his way to serve the wrong master. When
Francis was a soldier, the emblem of the
military group to which he belonged was the
sword that severed the head of St. Paul. Now
this sword was turned on him to remake him for
Christ. Francis was no longer to love his
neighbor as himself but to love his neighbor
more than himself. Then Francis, like St. Paul,
asked “O Lord, what do you wish me to do?”
Similar to the reply that Paul received, Francis
heard “Return to your own place and you will be
told what to do.” The voice then explained to
Francis that the arms in the enchanted castle,
which Francis had seen in his previous vision,
were for a different sort of knight than Francis
had imagined and Francis would win honor also in
a very different way. In obedience to the
voice, Francis halted his journey to Apulia and
returned to Assisi.
The path that the Lord wants us to take is certainly
going to be different for each of us. Yet we
constantly have to ask which Master we are
serving. Francis, throughout his life, wanted
to serve Christ. Yet he had chosen to serve the
servant of the Master rather than the Master
directly. He was forced to think about who
could give him a better reward for his service.
If Francis had gone on to Apulia as he had
intended, what would he have achieved for his
real Master in comparison to what he did really
achieve? This is something for all of us to
ponder as think about the direction of our
lives.
Jim Nugent
Brother Giles
During the time of St. Francis, there were many
young men who, like Francis, were inspired by
the ideals of chivalry. One of theses was a
young man named Egidio. He was nicknamed Gilio,
or in English, Giles. He had heard in his own
house arguments over Francis who seemed to turn
the ideas of chivalry upside down. Giles was
pondering these things on the eve of the feast
of St. George, April 22, 1209.
St. George’s feast day was very big in the
Middle Ages. George was a Roman soldier who was
rising in the ranks of the Roman military.
However, when he was commanded to persecute
Christians by the emperor Diocletian in 303, he
refused and revealed himself as a Christian.
George is quoted to have said to the emperor: “I
am a knight and I have left riches and all
worldly pomp in order to serve Jesus Christ, who
is the true Lord.” This earned George torture
and martyrdom. George is also famous for slaying
a dragon. In the vicinity of Silena, Libya,
there lived a dragon in a lake. Local people
would sacrifice sheep to the dragon to placate
it. When they ran out of sheep, they started to
sacrifice maidens to the dragon. Once a princess
was chosen to be sacrificed. St. George happened
by and killed the dragon with his lance. George
then preached a powerful sermon and converted
the people to Christianity. The king gave a
large reward to George, but he gave it all to
the poor and rode away on his horse.
The following day, April 23, the feast of St.
George, Giles went to Mass and heard the words
“O Saints, O just ones in the Lord, rejoice!
Alleluia!” and “God elects you his heirs!
Alleluia!” Inspired by St. George and the words
of the Mass, Giles went out to look for Francis.
God guided Giles to the Porziuncola where he
suddenly encountered Francis. Giles knelt and
putshis arms in the form of a cross as he saw
new knights do in the act of investiture.
Francis then said to Giles, “My dearest
brother, God has given you great grace. What you
have desired is fulfilled, beyond your dream.
Today is Saint George’s day. If the emperor
should come to Assisi to make some citizen his
knight or keeper of his treasury, should you not
rejoice over it? How much greater joy you must
have now that God has chosen you his knight and
most beloved servant, to observe the perfection
of the holy Gospel!”
As Francis invested Giles into knighthood, he
said, “And, therefore, be firm and constant in
the vocation to which God has called you.” They
then proceeded to eat the noon meal with
Francis’s other two companions. Since they
needed a sackcloth habit for Giles, Francis and
Giles returned to Assisi to obtain one. On the
way they encountered a poor woman who asked for
alms for love of God. They had no money to give
her. But then Francis suggested, “For love of
God, my dearest brother, let us give your mantle
to the poor woman.” Giles’ mantle was ornate and
made of satin. The beggar woman was stunned by
the gift.
On the feast of Saint George, Giles did slay the
dragon of worldly possessions and attachments
which had oppressed the people of Assisi just as
the dragon oppressed the people of Silena,
Libya. Giles later described the tremendous joy
he felt upon giving his mantle away. In the
evening Francis and Giles returned from Assisi
with Giles carrying his sackcloth habit which
replaced his beautiful mantle. The personal
victory that Giles had earlier dreamed of had
been achieved. Giles saw that Francis, like
Saint George, was serving the true Lord. Giles
wanted to do the same.
Jim Nugent
-------------
What
Do You Value the Most?
We
often hear the question: What do you value the
most? What is most important to you? Francis
asked that question of his contemporaries and
continually asks the same question of us. He
asks us this question, not by his words, but by
his life.
The
first follower of Francis was a pious and devout
man whose name is unknown. He came into
Francis’s life and then quickly disappeared.
Apparently, the pull of the world was too great.
The
first known companion of Francis was Bernardo di
Berardello. Bernardo was a very rich, learned,
and respected lawyer in Assisi. He was puzzled
by this “lunatic” Francis who rejected all the
worldly values of Assisi. He wondered why
Francis was not bothered by the jeers of the
people. Yet he could see something grand in this
ragged beggar who threw away the bourgeois
comforts of being a merchant’s son. Early in
April, 1209, he invited Francis to his large
house. Francis spoke to Bernardo about his life
and about what was most important him. Bernardo
came to see that his past life of worldly
success and power was a futile abyss. These two
men, who had known each other for a long time,
could now talk of whom they should serve rather
than of riches, war, power, and conquests.
After dinner, both men went to bed, but neither
one could sleep. They were both excited about
the new life which lay ahead. In the morning,
Bernardo the lawyer, who was the learned one who
answered other people’s questions, asked Francis
a question. “A servant has certain goods from
his lord. He held them for many years. Now he
wishes to give them up. What should he do? What
is the best course for him to follow?” Francis
responded that he should restore the goods to
his Lord. Bernardo responded, “Then, my brother,
all my substance, for love of our Lord who
entrusted these things to me, I wish to restore
to him, in the way that seems most appropriate
to you.”
Then, Francis and Bernardo sought another lawyer
of Assisi, Pietro di Catanio, whom they thought
might join them, and went to the Church of San
Nicolo to seek the will of the Lord. They asked
the priest to open the missal to the Gospel
three times to determine what they should do.
The first time the priest read to them, “If you
seek perfection, go, sell your possessions, and
give to the poor. You will then have treasure in
heaven.” The next time the priest opened the
book he read, “Take nothing on the way.” The
third time the priest read, “If a man wishes to
come after me, he must deny his very self.”
Francis then said to his two new disciples:
“Brothers, this is our life and our rule and
that of all who are going to want to enter our
company. And, therefore, go and fulfill
everything that you have heard.”
Bernardo then hastily went to go through the
legal process needed to sell all of his
property. All were amazed at the lack of good
sense that Bernardo showed in so hastily selling
his property at ridiculous prices. Since
Bernardo’s property was considerable, he
nevertheless obtained a considerable amount of
gold in payment. Francis and Bernardo then went
to the hospital of San Rufino to give the money
to the inmates, thus following the Gospel to the
letter. Here is where Francis and Bernardo
showed the people of Assisi what they valued the
most. The gold had been put in Bernardo’s
mantle. Francis scooped it out with full hands
and gave it to the poor inmates. If some fell on
the pavement, it did not matter. Even the canon
Silvestro, who was not poor, demanded payment
from Francis for stones he had given him.
Francis cheerfully reached into Bernardo’s
mantle and scooped out his two hands full of
gold and gave it to Silvestro. In this way,
Francis and Bernardo showed the people of Assisi
and us what was most important to them and what
was not important.
Jim Nugent
Confraternity of Penitents
520 Oliphant Lane
Middletown RI USA
02842-4600
401/849-5421
bspenance@hotmail.com
copenitents@yahoo.com
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