Mass with
Pilgrims from the U.S.A.
The Solemnity of
Saint Francis of Assisi
Dear
brothers and sisters in Christ,
May
the Lord give you peace! Although you have been in Assisi now for only one day,
you have been here long enough to realize that the common conception of Saint
Francis is quite false (despite the images of him you see for sale in the
shops). While it is true that the little poor man of Assisi maintained a great
love for animals, this is only a very small part of his life. The birdbaths and
gentle images of the Saint we are accustomed to seeing are caricatures at best.
Better are those images that depict Saint Francis holding a cross or a skull;
they get closer to the heart of Franciscan spirituality.
 |
| Caravaggio: Saint Francis in Prayer |
What
most people associate with Saint Francis, Saint Bonaventure, in the official biography,
barely mentions. Far from describing Francis as a lover of animals, the
Seraphic Doctor describes him instead as “the preacher of Christ’s Cross.”[1]
Francis’ way of life began to take on definitive form when he heard the Lord
speak to him from the crucifix at San Damiano. He chose the design of the habit
because it resembles a cross. He prayed with arms uplifted in the form a cross.
He even signed his name with the Tau.
Simply put, the cross stands at the
center – as the goal and the form – of his life.
Even
before his experience at San Damiano, Saint Francis kept the Cross close to his
heart. Saint Bonaventure relates for us a vision Francis received after he
kissed the leper:
One day while he
was praying in such a secluded spot and became totally absorbed in God through
his extreme fervor, Jesus Christ appeared to him fastened to the cross. Francis’
soul melted (Song of Songs 5:6) at
the sight, and the memory of Christ’s passion was so impressed on the innermost
recesses of his heart that from that hour, whenever Christ’s crucifixion came to
his mind, he could scarcely contain his tears and sighs, as he later revealed
to his companions when he was approaching the end of his life. Through this the
man of God understood as addressed to himself the Gospel text: If you wish to come after me, deny yourself
and take up your cross and follow me (Matthew 16:24).[2]
It
was only after his soul melted that the Lord called out to him, “Francis, go
and repair my house, which, as you see, is falling completely into ruin.”[3]
Here we would do well to ask ourselves two questions: At what does my soul
melt? Is the passion of the Lord impressed deep within my heart?
Why
was the Lord’s house falling completely into ruin? Perhaps because too many
neglected the love of the Crucified. Not only did they neglect the love
lavished upon them from the Cross, but they neglected to return this love. Is
this situation very different from our own day? They neglected to look upon the
Lord’s face to gain wisdom and knowledge, to learn to serve him and to walk in
his light (cf. Psalm 119:135, 66, 91, and 130).
By
his grace, the Lord called Saint Francis, him who had the simplicity of a
child, to embrace the Cross as no one before him had done (cf. Luke 10:21). From
the very beginning, this Preacher of Christ’s Cross called everyone to this
same love of the Crucified. This is why “the Friars followed his teaching in
every detail; and before every Church and crucifix which they saw even from a
distance, they humbly prostrated themselves and prayed according to the form he
had taught them.”[4]
What is more, “Jesus Christ crucified always rested like a bundle of myrrh in the bosom of Francis’ soul (Songof Songs 1:12), and he longed to be totally transformed into him by the fire of
ecstatic love.”[5]
So
it was that, just before he received the grace of the Stigmata, Saint Francis
prayed to the Lord for two graces. In his own words, he prayed:
My Lord Jesus
Christ, I pray you to grant me two graces before I die: the first is that
during my life I may feel in my soul and in my body, as much as possible, that
pain which You, dear Jesus, sustained in the hour of Your most bitter
passion. The second is that I may feel in my heart, as much as possible,
that excessive love with which You, O Son of God, were inflamed in willingly
enduring such suffering for us sinners.[6].
Because
Francis had already embraced the Cross with such a devoted love, the Lord
granted his two requests and impressed within his body what he had already
impressed within his soul. As Benedict XVI observed, “The experience of La
Verna, where he received the stigmata, shows the degree of intimacy he had
reached in his relationship with the Crucified Christ. He could truly say with
Paul: ‘For me to live is Christ’ (Philippians 1:21).”[7]
 |
| Frederico Barroci: St. Francis Receives the Stigmata |
It
is to this same intimacy with the Crucified that you and I are each called; it
is to this same relationship that Saint Francis longs to lead us. This is why,
one year ago today, Pope Francis prayed here in Assisi, “We turn to you, Francis, and we ask you:
Teach us to remain before the cross, to let the crucified Christ gaze upon us,
to let ourselves be forgiven, and recreated by his love.”[8]
The way to do so is - as with all things in the Christian life –
simple; it is simple, but it is not easy. The way to remain before the Cross,
to allow the Lord to gaze upon us, is, as Saint Francis said, to “hold back
nothing of yourselves for yourselves so that He Who gives Himself totally to
you may receive you totally.”[9]
In everything he did and in everything he said, Saint Francis
repaired the Church by placing the Cross back at the center of life, back where
it belongs. Today, then, let us pray all the more earnestly to be conformed perfectly
to him who is Crucified Love, that, we, too, may be known as preachers of
Christ’s Cross and work to repair the Church. Amen.
[1] Saint Bonaventure, The Life of Saint Francis, 4.9.
[2] Ibid.,, 1.5.
[3] Ibid.,, 2.1.
[4] Ibid.,, 4.3.
[5] Ibid.,, 9.2.
[6] In The Little Flowers of Saint Francis, 190-191.
[7] Pope Benedict XVI, Meeting with
Youth, 17 June 2007.
[8] Pope Francis, Homily, 4 October
2013.
[9] Saint Francis of Assisi, A Letter to the Entire Order, 29.
No comments:
Post a Comment