Religion_Christ_Francisc_Saint

Saint Francis Of Assisi

b. 1181/82, Assisi, Duchy of Spoleto d. Oct. 3, 1226, Assisi; canonized July 15, 1228; feast day October 4 Italian SAN FRANCESCO D'ASSISI, BAPTIZED GIOVANNI, RENAMED FRANCESCO, original name FRANCESCO DI PIETRO DI BERNARDONE founder of the Franciscan orders of men and women and leader of the church reform movements of the early 13th century. His fraternal charity, consecration to poverty, and dynamic leadership drew thousands of followers and made him one of the most venerated religious figures. He is (with Catherine of Siena) the principal patron saint of Italy.

Early life and career.

Francis was the son of Pietro di Bernardone, a cloth merchant, and the lady Pica. Nothing certain is known of the family background. At Francis' birth, his father was away on a business journey to France, and his mother had him baptized Giovanni. On his return, Pietro di Bernardone changed the infant's name to Francesco; thus his full name was Francesco di Pietro di Bernardone. Francis learned to read and write Latin at the school near the church of S. Giorgio and later acquired some knowledge of the French language and literature, especially of the troubadours. He liked to speak French, although he never did so perfectly, and even attempted to sing in it. His youth does not seem to have been marked by serious moral lapses; nevertheless, an exuberant love of life and a general spirit of worldliness made him a recognized leader of the young men of the town.

In 1202 he took part in a war between Assisi and Perugia, was held prisoner for almost a year, and on his release fell seriously ill. After his recovery, he attempted to join the papal forces under Count Gentile against Frederick II in Apulia in late 1205; at Spoleto, however, he had a vision or dream that bade him return to Assisi and await a call to a new kind of knighthood. On his return, he began to give himself to solitude and prayer so that he might know the will of God for him.

Several other episodes make up what is called his conversion: a vision of Christ while he prayed in a grotto near Assisi; an experience of poverty during a pilgrimage to Rome, where, in rags, he mingled with the beggars before St. Peter's Basilica and begged alms; an incident in which he not only gave alms to a leper (he had always felt a deep repugnance for lepers) but also kissed his hand. One day at the ruined chapel of S. Damiano outside the gate of Assisi, he heard the crucifix above the altar command him: "Go, Francis, and repair my house which, as you see, is well-nigh in ruins." Taking this literally, he hurried home, gathered much of the cloth in his father's shop, and rode off to the nearby town of Foligno, where he sold both cloth and horse. He then tried to give the money to the priest at S. Damiano. Angered, his father first kept him at home and later brought him before the civil authorities. When Francis refused to answer the summons, his father called him before the Bishop. Before any accusations were made, Francis, "without a word peeled off his garments even down to his breeches and restored them to his father." Covered only by a hair shirt, he said: "Until now I have called you my father on earth. But henceforth I can truly say: Our Father who art in heaven." The astonished bishop gave him a cloak, and Francis went off to the woods of Mt. Subasio above the city.

Francis had renounced material goods and family ties to embrace a life of poverty. He repaired the church of S. Damiano, restored a chapel dedicated to St. Peter the Apostle and then restored the now-famous little chapel of St. Mary of the Angels (Sta. Maria degli Angeli), the Porziuncola, on the plain below Assisi. There, on the feast of St. Matthias, Feb. 24, 1208, he listened at mass to the Gospel account of the mission of Christ to the Apostles: "Take no gold, nor silver, nor money in your belts, no bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor a staff; for the labourer deserves his food. And whatever town or villa you enter, find out who is worthy in it, and stay with him until you depart" (Gospel According to Matthew 10:9-11).

The Franciscan rule of life.

Although he was a layman, Francis began to preach to the townspeople. Disciples were attracted to him, and he composed a simple rule of life for them. In 1209, when the group of friars (as the mendicant disciples were called) numbered 12, they went to Rome to seek the approval of Pope Innocent III, who, although hesitant at first, gave his oral approbation to their rule of life. This event, which according to tradition occurred on April 16, marked the official founding of the Franciscan order. The friars, who were actually street preachers with no possessions of any kind and with only the Porziuncola as a centre, preached and worked first in Umbria and then, as their numbers grew, in the rest of Italy.

The early Franciscan rule of life, which has not survived, set as the aim of the new life, "To follow the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ and to walk in his footsteps." Probably no one in history has ever set himself so seriously as did Francis to imitate the life of Christ and to carry out so literally Christ's work in Christ's own way. This is the key to the character and spirit of St. Francis. To neglect this point is to show an unbalanced portrait of the saint as a lover of nature, a social worker, an itinerant preacher, and a lover of poverty.

Certainly the love of poverty is part of his spirit, and his contemporaries celebrated poverty either as his "lady," in the allegorical Sacrum Commercium (Eng. trans., Francis and His Lady Poverty, 1964), or as his "bride," in the fresco of Giotto in the lower church of S. Francesco at Assisi. It was not, however, mere external poverty he sought but the total denial of self (as in Letter of Paul to the Philippians 2:7).

He considered all nature as the mirror of God and as so many steps to God. He called all creatures his "brothers" and "sisters," and in his "Canticle of the Creatures" (less properly called by such names as the "Praises of Creatures" or the "Canticle of the Sun") he referred to "Brother Sun" and "Sister Moon," the wind and water, and even "Sister Death." His long and painful illnesses were nicknamed his sisters, and he begged pardon of "Brother Ass the body" for having unduly burdened him with his penances. Above all, his deep sense of brotherhood under God embraced his fellow men, for "he considered himself no friend of Christ if he did not cherish those for whom Christ died."

In 1212 Francis began a second order for women that became known as the Poor Clares. He gave a religious habit, or dress, similar to his own to a noble lady of Assisi, later known as St. Clare (Clara) of Assisi, and then lodged her and a few companions in the church of S. Damiano, where she was joined by women of Assisi. For those who could not leave their families and homes he eventually (c. 1221) formed the Third Order of Brothers and Sisters of Penance, a lay fraternity that, without withdrawing from the world or taking religious vows, would carry out the principles of Franciscan life. As the friars became more numerous, the order extended outside Italy.

Probably in the late spring of 1212 Francis had set out for the Holy Land but was shipwrecked on the east coast of the Adriatic Sea and had to return. A year or two later, sickness forced him to abandon a journey to the Moors in Spain. In 1217 he proposed to go to France, but Cardinal Ugolino of Segni (later Pope Gregory IX) advised him that he was needed to direct the order in Italy. He did go to Egypt, where the crusaders were besieging Damietta, in 1219. He went into the camp of the Saracens and preached to the Sultan, who was impressed by him and gave him permission (it is said) to visit the holy places in Palestine.

News of disturbances among the friars in Italy forced Francis to return. There were 5,000 members of the men's order, and it was continuing to grow at a faster rate than any previous religious order; yet the order had little more than Francis' example and his brief rule of life to guide its increasing numbers. To provide someone to handle the order's practical affairs, Francis appointed Peter Catanii as his vicar; after Peter's early death in 1221 he chose Elias of Cortona. Francis asked Pope Honorius III for legislation introducing a year of probation (novitiate) for new friars and set about amplifying and revising the rule. After the new rule was approved by Honorius III in final form on Nov. 29, 1223, Francis tended to withdraw more and more from external affairs.

Francis' vision and the stigmata of the Crucified.

In the summer of 1224 Francis went to the mountain retreat of La Verna (Alvernia), not far from Assisi, to celebrate the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (August 15) and to prepare for St. Michael's Day (September 29) by a 40-day fast. There he prayed that he might know how best to please God; opening the Gospels for the answer, three times he came upon references to the Passion of Christ. As he prayed one morning, about the time of the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (September 14), suddenly he beheld a figure coming toward him from the heights of heaven. St. Bonaventure, general of the Franciscans from 1257 to 1274 and an important thinker of the 13th century, wrote:

As it stood above him, he saw that it was a man and yet a Seraph with six wings; his arms were extended and his feet conjoined, and his body was fixed to a cross. Two wings were raised above his head, two were extended as in flight, and two covered the whole body. The face was beautiful beyond all earthly beauty, and it smiled gently upon Francis. Conflicting emotions filled his heart, for though the vision brought great joy, the sight of the suffering and crucified figure stirred him to deepest sorrow. Pondering what this vision might mean, he finally understood that by God's providence he would be made like to the crucified Christ not by a bodily martyrdom but by conformity in mind and heart. Then as the vision disappeared, it left not only a greater ardour of love in the inner man but no less marvelously marked him outwardly with the stigmata of the Crucified.

For the remainder of his life, Francis took the greatest care to hide the stigmata--marks resembling the wounds on the crucified body of Jesus Christ. After the death of Francis, Brother Elias announced the stigmata to the order by a circular letter. Later, Brother Leo, who was the confessor and intimate companion of the saint and who left a written testimony of the event, said that in death Francis seemed like one just taken down from the cross.

Francis lived two years longer, in constant pain and almost totally blind (he had contracted an eye disease in the East). Medical treatment at Rieti was unsuccessful, and after a stay at Siena he was brought back to Assisi, where he died at the Porziuncola. He was buried temporarily in the church of S. Giorgio, at Assisi. In 1230 his body was transferred to the lower church of the basilica that was being erected in his memory by Elias at the west end of the city. (I.C.B.)



	Saint Francis Of Assisi b. 1181/82, Assisi, Duchy of Spoleto d. Oct. 3, 1226, Assisi; canonized July 15, 1228; feast day October 4 Italian SAN FRANCESCO D'ASSISI, BAPTIZED GIOVANNI, RENAMED FRANCESCO, original name FRANCESCO DI PIETRO DI BERNARDONE founder of the Franciscan orders of men and women and leader of the church reform movements of the early 13th century. His fraternal charity, consecration to poverty, and dynamic leadership drew thousands of followers and made him one of the most venerated religious figures. He is (with Catherine of Siena) the principal patron saint of Italy. Early life and career. Francis was the son of Pietro di Bernardone, a cloth merchant, and the lady Pica. Nothing certain is known of the family background. At Francis' birth, his father was away on a business journey to France, and his mother had him baptized Giovanni. On his return, Pietro di Bernardone changed the infant's name to Francesco; thus his full name was Francesco di Pietro di Bernardone. Francis learned to read and write Latin at the school near the church of S. Giorgio and later acquired some knowledge of the French language and literature, especially of the troubadours. He liked to speak French, although he never did so perfectly, and even attempted to sing in it. His youth does not seem to have been marked by serious moral lapses; nevertheless, an exuberant love of life and a general spirit of worldliness made him a recognized leader of the young men of the town. In 1202 he took part in a war between Assisi and Perugia, was held prisoner for almost a year, and on his release fell seriously ill. After his recovery, he attempted to join the papal forces under Count Gentile against Frederick II in Apulia in late 1205; at Spoleto, however, he had a vision or dream that bade him return to Assisi and await a call to a new kind of knighthood. On his return, he began to give himself to solitude and prayer so that he might know the will of God for him. Several other episodes make up what is called his conversion: a vision of Christ while he prayed in a grotto near Assisi; an experience of poverty during a pilgrimage to Rome, where, in rags, he mingled with the beggars before St. Peter's Basilica and begged alms; an incident in which he not only gave alms to a leper (he had always felt a deep repugnance for lepers) but also kissed his hand. One day at the ruined chapel of S. Damiano outside the gate of Assisi, he heard the crucifix above the altar command him: "Go, Francis, and repair my house which, as you see, is well-nigh in ruins." Taking this literally, he hurried home, gathered much of the cloth in his father's shop, and rode off to the nearby town of Foligno, where he sold both cloth and horse. He then tried to give the money to the priest at S. Damiano. Angered, his father first kept him at home and later brought him before the civil authorities. When Francis refused to answer the summons, his father called him before the Bishop. Before any accusations were made, Francis, "without a word peeled off his garments even down to his breeches and restored them to his father." Covered only by a hair shirt, he said: "Until now I have called you my father on earth. But henceforth I can truly say: Our Father who art in heaven." The astonished bishop gave him a cloak, and Francis went off to the woods of Mt. Subasio above the city. Francis had renounced material goods and family ties to embrace a life of poverty. He repaired the church of S. Damiano, restored a chapel dedicated to St. Peter the Apostle and then restored the now-famous little chapel of St. Mary of the Angels (Sta. Maria degli Angeli), the Porziuncola, on the plain below Assisi. There, on the feast of St. Matthias, Feb. 24, 1208, he listened at mass to the Gospel account of the mission of Christ to the Apostles: "Take no gold, nor silver, nor money in your belts, no bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor a staff; for the labourer deserves his food. And whatever town or villa you enter, find out who is worthy in it, and stay with him until you depart" (Gospel According to Matthew 10:9-11). The Franciscan rule of life. Although he was a layman, Francis began to preach to the townspeople. Disciples were attracted to him, and he composed a simple rule of life for them. In 1209, when the group of friars (as the mendicant disciples were called) numbered 12, they went to Rome to seek the approval of Pope Innocent III, who, although hesitant at first, gave his oral approbation to their rule of life. This event, which according to tradition occurred on April 16, marked the official founding of the Franciscan order. The friars, who were actually street preachers with no possessions of any kind and with only the Porziuncola as a centre, preached and worked first in Umbria and then, as their numbers grew, in the rest of Italy. The early Franciscan rule of life, which has not survived, set as the aim of the new life, "To follow the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ and to walk in his footsteps." Probably no one in history has ever set himself so seriously as did Francis to imitate the life of Christ and to carry out so literally Christ's work in Christ's own way. This is the key to the character and spirit of St. Francis. To neglect this point is to show an unbalanced portrait of the saint as a lover of nature, a social worker, an itinerant preacher, and a lover of poverty. Certainly the love of poverty is part of his spirit, and his contemporaries celebrated poverty either as his "lady," in the allegorical Sacrum Commercium (Eng. trans., Francis and His Lady Poverty, 1964), or as his "bride," in the fresco of Giotto in the lower church of S. Francesco at Assisi. It was not, however, mere external poverty he sought but the total denial of self (as in Letter of Paul to the Philippians 2:7). He considered all nature as the mirror of God and as so many steps to God. He called all creatures his "brothers" and "sisters," and in his "Canticle of the Creatures" (less properly called by such names as the "Praises of Creatures" or the "Canticle of the Sun") he referred to "Brother Sun" and "Sister Moon," the wind and water, and even "Sister Death." His long and painful illnesses were nicknamed his sisters, and he begged pardon of "Brother Ass the body" for having unduly burdened him with his penances. Above all, his deep sense of brotherhood under God embraced his fellow men, for "he considered himself no friend of Christ if he did not cherish those for whom Christ died." In 1212 Francis began a second order for women that became known as the Poor Clares. He gave a religious habit, or dress, similar to his own to a noble lady of Assisi, later known as St. Clare (Clara) of Assisi, and then lodged her and a few companions in the church of S. Damiano, where she was joined by women of Assisi. For those who could not leave their families and homes he eventually (c. 1221) formed the Third Order of Brothers and Sisters of Penance, a lay fraternity that, without withdrawing from the world or taking religious vows, would carry out the principles of Franciscan life. As the friars became more numerous, the order extended outside Italy. Probably in the late spring of 1212 Francis had set out for the Holy Land but was shipwrecked on the east coast of the Adriatic Sea and had to return. A year or two later, sickness forced him to abandon a journey to the Moors in Spain. In 1217 he proposed to go to France, but Cardinal Ugolino of Segni (later Pope Gregory IX) advised him that he was needed to direct the order in Italy. He did go to Egypt, where the crusaders were besieging Damietta, in 1219. He went into the camp of the Saracens and preached to the Sultan, who was impressed by him and gave him permission (it is said) to visit the holy places in Palestine. News of disturbances among the friars in Italy forced Francis to return. There were 5,000 members of the men's order, and it was continuing to grow at a faster rate than any previous religious order; yet the order had little more than Francis' example and his brief rule of life to guide its increasing numbers. To provide someone to handle the order's practical affairs, Francis appointed Peter Catanii as his vicar; after Peter's early death in 1221 he chose Elias of Cortona. Francis asked Pope Honorius III for legislation introducing a year of probation (novitiate) for new friars and set about amplifying and revising the rule. After the new rule was approved by Honorius III in final form on Nov. 29, 1223, Francis tended to withdraw more and more from external affairs. Francis' vision and the stigmata of the Crucified. In the summer of 1224 Francis went to the mountain retreat of La Verna (Alvernia), not far from Assisi, to celebrate the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (August 15) and to prepare for St. Michael's Day (September 29) by a 40-day fast. There he prayed that he might know how best to please God; opening the Gospels for the answer, three times he came upon references to the Passion of Christ. As he prayed one morning, about the time of the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (September 14), suddenly he beheld a figure coming toward him from the heights of heaven. St. Bonaventure, general of the Franciscans from 1257 to 1274 and an important thinker of the 13th century, wrote: As it stood above him, he saw that it was a man and yet a Seraph with six wings; his arms were extended and his feet conjoined, and his body was fixed to a cross. Two wings were raised above his head, two were extended as in flight, and two covered the whole body. The face was beautiful beyond all earthly beauty, and it smiled gently upon Francis. Conflicting emotions filled his heart, for though the vision brought great joy, the sight of the suffering and crucified figure stirred him to deepest sorrow. Pondering what this vision might mean, he finally understood that by God's providence he would be made like to the crucified Christ not by a bodily martyrdom but by conformity in mind and heart. Then as the vision disappeared, it left not only a greater ardour of love in the inner man but no less marvelously marked him outwardly with the stigmata of the Crucified. For the remainder of his life, Francis took the greatest care to hide the stigmata--marks resembling the wounds on the crucified body of Jesus Christ. After the death of Francis, Brother Elias announced the stigmata to the order by a circular letter. Later, Brother Leo, who was the confessor and intimate companion of the saint and who left a written testimony of the event, said that in death Francis seemed like one just taken down from the cross. Francis lived two years longer, in constant pain and almost totally blind (he had contracted an eye disease in the East). Medical treatment at Rieti was unsuccessful, and after a stay at Siena he was brought back to Assisi, where he died at the Porziuncola. He was buried temporarily in the church of S. Giorgio, at Assisi. In 1230 his body was transferred to the lower church of the basilica that was being erected in his memory by Elias at the west end of the city. (I.C.B.)