Spiritual Quote of the Day (David James Duncan, on St. Francis of Assisi’s Love for Our Lord)

“[St.] Francis’ love for his Lord was so ecstatic, creative, physical, and contagious that even though there are things I believe I would die for, I feel, in comparison to this man, that I have hardly begun to love at all. As far as I can see, Francis had no ‘average’ or ‘everyday’ sense of things; for him every creature was a miracle, every moment a gift, every breath a prayer in God’s Presence, and if we were sitting with him tonight disbelieving in his miracles, gifts, and Presence completely, he’d go on believing in them so much more powerfully than we bums know how to disbelieve that we would have to run from the room to escape the great gravitational pull of his love.”— American novelist and essayist David James Duncan, “The French Guy,” originally published in Portland, August 2004, reprinted in The Best American Spiritual Writing 2005, edited by Philip Zaleski (2005)

The image accompanying this post, St. Francis Preaching to the Birds, was painted from 1297 to 1299 by the Italian Renaissance artist-architect Giotto di Bondone (1266-1337).

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Fr. John Welch, on St. Francis and the Language of Creation)

“St. Francis was not being romantic when he praised ‘brother sun’ and ‘sister moon.’ He understood that the stars, trees, rivers, and all the elements of creation are a language God speaks to us. Some saints claim God communicated with them through visions and voices. With the perspective of faith, the entire world becomes voice and vision. Any bush can be the burning bush through which God is present.” —John Welch, O. Carm., “Catholic Imagination,” Carmelite Review, Fall 2013-Winter 2014 issue

The image accompanying this post, St. Francis Preaching to the Birds, was painted from 1297 to 1299 by the Italian Renaissance artist-architect Giotto di Bondone (1266-1337).

Quote of the Day (St. Francis of Assisi, on ‘The Light of a Single Candle’)

"All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle." – St. Francis of Assisi, The Little Flowers of St. Francis of Assisi

This post is dedicated to the memory of my cousin, Margaret Lenihan Siegel.

Quote of the Day (G.K. Chesterton, on St. Francis of Assisi Receiving the Stigmata)

“Saint Francis saw above him, filling the whole heavens, some vast immemorial unthinkable power, ancient like the Ancient of Days, whose calm men had conceived under the forms of winged bulls or monstrous cherubim, and all that winged wonder was in pain like a wounded bird. This seraphic suffering, it is said, pierced his soul with a sword of grief and pity; it may be inferred that some sort of mounting agony accompanied the ecstasy. Finally after some fashion the apocalypse faded from the sky and the agony within subsided; and silence and the natural air filled the morning twilight and settled slowly in the purple chasms and cleft abysses of the Apennines. The head of the solitary sank, amid all that relaxation and quiet in which time can drift by with the sense of something ended and complete; and as he stared downwards, he saw the marks of nails in his own hands.”—G.K. Chesterton, Saint Francis of Assisi (1923)

On or about the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (September 14) in 1224, St. Francis of Assisi, in prayer on Mount Alverna, received the stigmata—the marks of the nails and lance wounds of Christ’s body  on the Cross. Shortly after this, he began to go blind and became terminally ill. The incident remains one of the most powerful legends associated with the founder of the Franciscan order. The Roman Catholic Church celebrates this extraordinary event tomorrow.

G.K. Chesterton, the versatile and accomplished English man of letters, wrote his biographical study of the great saint within a year of his own entry into the Roman Catholic Church.

Photo of the Day: St. Francis and the Wolf Statue, Chautauqua NY

I have spent so much time at the Chautauqua Institution that the last time I went, at the start of August, I did not expect to record much if anything with my camera that I hadn’t seen already.   

But this picturesque village in upstate New York continues to surprise me. In particular, I was struck by the sight of this outdoor sculpture on the Brick Walk, in front of the east facade of The Hall of Missions.

“St. Francis and the Wolf of Gubbio,” dedicated in 1933, was created by Ruth Sherwood. Another sculpture on this subject by the same artist stands in the famous Mission Inn of Riverside, Calif.

I think, however, that this tale of St. Francis of Assisi is more in keeping with the spirit of Chautauqua than California.  The Catholic Church doesn’t claim that this incident is factual. (Even the deeply orthodox Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Philadelphia denies that it occurred.) But as an allegory, it represents why the saint became so beloved.

The story goes that a wolf so terrified the people of Gubbio that they prevailed upon Francis to intervene. Astonishingly, the wolf listened to the saint's command to leave the townspeople alone--and the assurance that he, in turn, would not be touched--and lay at his feet.

In Francis’ day, many would have understood the wolf in a different context—as signifying the potentially mortal threat posed by Moslems in the Middle East at the time of the Crusades. The wolf’s submission to Francis’ command--a command given without a weapon at hand--can be seen as a rebuke to the notion of force.

In other words, conquering terror through the power of love is as miraculous today as it was a millennium ago.

Quote of the Day (G.K. Chesterton, on St. Francis and the Nativity)

“For that is the full and final spirit in which we should turn to Saint Francis; in the spirit of thanks for what he has done. He was above all things a great giver; and he cared chiefly for the best kind of giving which is called thanksgiving….He knew that we can best measure the towering miracle of the mere fact of existence if we realise that but for some strange mercy we should not even exist…. From him came a whole awakening of the world and a dawn in which all shapes and colours could be seen anew…. It is said that when Saint Francis staged in his own simple fashion a Nativity Play of Bethlehem, with kings and angels in the stiff and gay mediaeval garments and the golden wigs that stood for haloes, a miracle was wrought full of the Franciscan glory. The Holy Child was a wooden doll or bambino, and it was said that he embraced it and that the image came to life in his arms.” – English man of letters G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936), St. Francis of Assisi (1923)

On this date in 1223, in the town of Greccio, St. Francis of Assisi displayed the first known three-dimensional presepio or crèche. It wasn’t the type of elaborate Nativity scene found in some suburb. No, he worked through Christmas Eve on a simpler but more fascinating recreation of Christ's birth. 

And, Francis being Francis, he used one of the things he loved the most—Nature—to bring it to life in a visceral way, using merely a straw-filled manger set between a real ox and donkey.

According to this post I found from the “Atonement Parish” blog, people from the vicinity of Greccio began arriving with torches and candles once they got wind of this. 

They were greeted by something perhaps equally extraordinary: Francis reading from the Gospel about the birth of Jesus, then elaborating, in his sermon, how Christ assumed the reality of poverty so that those who believed would find wealth in the love of God.

I find this account powerfully moving, not just as a Roman Catholic but as someone who believes in the power of creativity. 

St. Francis not only commemorated the creation of a redeemed world, but also, through the visual arts and spoken word, reminded people of the extraordinary miracles present in their own world when they took joy in nature and extended love to one another. May we all do the same.

(The image accompanying this post shows a nativity scene with mangers and angels. It’s on the door of the “Duomo,” or cathedral, in Milan, Italy.)