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Prayer of St Francis Powerpoint]
"Praised
be You, my Lord, with all your creatures, especially Sir Brother Sun,
who is the day and through whom You give us light."
It is difficult
to think clearly about Francis of Assisi. The first thing that comes
to mind is the gentle saint who preached to birds, tamed wolves, and
padded about in flower-filled fields basking in the love of God. But
it's also difficult to imagine how such a benign figure could turn thirteenth-century
Europe upside down.
In fact, Francis
was a complex figure, a man who contemporaries claimed lived out the
Sermon on the Mount better than anyone else, except of course, the man
who first preached it. If that's even close to the truth, it's a bit
easier to see why he left such an impression on his age and every age
since.
He was born
in Assisi, Italy, as Giovanni Francesco Bernardone, son of a wealthy
merchant. As a young man, Francis led a worldly, carefree life. An early
biographer said, "He squandered his time terribly. Indeed, he outshone
all his friends in trivialities."
In 1202 he marched
off to battle against the city of Perugia, full of a young man's dreams
of military glory. But he was taken prisoner during the battle, and
a year passed before his father could arrange ransom. That was followed
by a year's convalescence in Assisi, a year in which Francis, now in
his early twenties, was slowly transformed.
During his illness,
he experienced dreams and visions. One day as he prayed in a dilapidated
church in San Damiano, at the edge of Assisi, he heard Christ say three
times from the crucifix: "Francis, go repair my house, which, as
you can see, is falling completely to ruin." Francis understood
that he was to repair the church he prayed in (though his followers
later would see this as his call to reform the church), so he proceeded
to sell off family goods to raise money for repairs.
When his father
caught wind of this, he was furious. He dragged Francis before the local
bishop to force his son into changing his unseemly behavior and to pay
him back. In the course of the interview, Francis took off his clothes
and laid them neatly in a pile before his father. "Up to today
I called you 'father,'" he said to him, "but now I can say
in all honesty, 'Our Father who art in heaven.'" He walked out
of the cathedral to become a hermit--to "be alone in solitude and
silence," a biographer noted, "to hear the secrets which God
could reveal to him."
Other inspirations
followed. One day in church he heard from the Gospel of Matthew, "Take
no gold or silver or copper in your wallet, no bag for your journey,
nor two tunics or sandals or a staff." He took it literally and
began an itinerant life: he intended to live in utter simplicity and
to preach a gospel that usually entailed strong injunctions to repent.
"He denounced evil whenever he found it," wrote one early
biographer, "and made no effort to palliate it; from him a life
of sin met with outspoken rebuke, not support."
Francis was
more rigorous than popular imagination allows. In winter, he sometimes
hurled himself in a ditch full of ice and stayed there until every vestige
of sinful temptation departed. To avoid lust, he fixed his gaze on the
sky or ground whenever he spoke with a woman.
Though known
for his infectious joy, Francis abhorred laughing or idle words. By
1209 he had gathered a small band of "brothers" (12 men who
wished to share in his life and ministry). He set off to Rome to gain
the church's approval for his work. This became the First Order of Franciscans,
and Francis was elected superior.
Women also were
fascinated by Francis's message, and when Francis received a rich young
women of Assisi named Clare, the Second Order of Franciscans was founded,
also known as Poor Clares. (The Third Order of Franciscans, which Francis
founded in 1221, is for those who lead their secular lives while trying
to live by a modified Franciscan rule.) Francis wandered all over Italy
and at one point crossed the Mediterranean, visited a Crusader expedition
in Egypt, crossed enemy lines, and attempted to convert the Muslim sultan.
The sultan was unconvinced by the message but so impressed by the messenger
that he afforded him safe passage back.
Soon his brothers
(called friars, and growing rapidly in numbers) were making trips to
France, Spain, Germany, England, Hungary, and Turkey, preaching the
message of repentance, gospel simplicity, and radical obedience to Christ's
teaching.
It was an era,
like many, in which corruption infected ecclesiastical circles and indifference
permeated the laity. But as one contemporary noted, as a result of the
preaching of the Franciscan brothers and sisters, "persons of both
sexes, rich and worldly, have renounced possessions and, for the love
of Christ, turned their backs on the world." In short, Francis
had begun a religious revival that spread over Europe.
With the order's
growth came complications. The Rule that had served a small band was
inadequate for the large organization the Franciscans were becoming.
Francis himself sensed his own inadequacy to continue leading a large
organization, so after penning a new Rule and his Testament (in a sense,
last wishes), urging his brothers to retain the primitive standards
used from the beginning, he resigned as head of the order.
In his last
years, Francis popularized the living creche to highlight the poverty
into which Christ was born. In 1224, on a mountaintop retreat, Francis
had a mystical encounter that left him with bleeding wounds in his feet,
hands, and side--the first recorded instance of stigmata.
As he entered
his mid-forties, illness racked his body, finally taking his eyesight
completely.
In his last
years, he composed his famous Canticle of Brother Sun. From this poem
Francis gets his deserved reputation as one who reveled in God's creation:
"Praised
be You, my Lord, with all your creatures, especially Sir Brother Sun,
Who is the day and through whom You give us light ?" In the poem
Francis also praised "Brother Wind" and "Brother Fire"
and "Sister Mother Earth."
Such was the
death of Francis, whose life was so clearly committed to God's "holy
will" that he was canonized within two years--exceedingly fast
by Roman Catholic standards.
After Francis's
death, the Franciscans continued to grow and-ironic for an order once
told by their founder "to appropriate nothing for themselves, neither
a house, nor a place, nor anything else"-soon became quite rich.
A stunning basilica was built in Assisi, and Francis's relics were moved
there in 1230.