Gospel Living: St. Francis of Assisi Yesterday and Today

Introduction

The Franciscan Spirit Through the Ages / 149 Introduction The Franciscan Roger Bacon (d. 1292) wrote: "To discover the shape of the earth, one must set sail toward the west to reach the east."1 Here we have an eminently Franciscan insight: it went against everything one could imagine, but it led to the discovery of America. In the same way, Francis pursued a path different from that of the knights, the townspeople, the monks, the canons and the canonists; and he thrust upon the world this vast current of thought, of action and of holiness which remains even today the Franciscan family. It is an easy enough matter to put together a few pages on Franciscan spirituality; one has only to list in alphabetical order everyone who has published one or several spiritual treatises appealing more or less to St. Francis' authority. In fact, this has already been done, and it has made some important contributions. But it is a little like writing the history of a European country and paying attention only to its literature. In the same way, one cannot limit oneself to writing a literary history of a spirituality and then claim that it is the history of the spirituality as a whole. One could never, in that way, give a vital portrayal of what was over the centuries the spiritual life of millions of men and women who looked to Francis of Assisi as their master and model of the Christian life. So the task is to attempt a history of Franciscan spirituality which is neither exclusively literary nor entirely doctrinal. One could also choose certain holy men and women typical of Franciscanism: St. Colette (d. 1447), St. Peter of Alcantara (d. 1562), St. Maximilian Kolbe (d. 1941). . . . But the result would still be only a partial history, that of Franciscan holiness, and one would be faced with such different typologies that one would still wonder, in the long run, just what a Franciscan saint is. 1Roger Bacon, Tractus de Geographia. 150 / Willibrord C. VanDijk, O.F.M. Cap. It is hard, then, to present briefly a historical account of Franciscan spirituality which would take into account such varied aspects as holiness, theology and ascetical and mystical writings. And just as it was possible to discover America only by setting out toward the west to reach the east, should one not seek Franciscan spirituality in what does not at first sight seem to be spirituality, but rather in what is material, while emphasizing the opposition between these two words? That is the way it is with several fields: the apostolate, history, painting, sculpture, the arts in general, and perhaps also some apparently "dangerous" areas like political involvement, scientific research and paid manual labor. All these things can be rooted in the depths of a spiritual life and lead toward an authentic holiness. An overview of the history of Franciscan spirituality coincides then with a global study of Franciscan history in which one pays attention less to events than to persons, and in which one tries to discern beneath the facts and the names the spirit manifested through them. Some choices must obviously be made, so that one is led to highlight certain people who already stand out by virtue of their role or character. A St. Bonaventure (d. 1274), a St. Veronica Giuliani (d. 1727), a Joseph of Tremblay (d. 1638) can never be overlooked. But in contemplating the history of a spirituality, one must think also of all those who, infinitely more numerous than the stars of the heavens, have been the "stars" of lesser brilliance, invisible to the naked eye even of their contemporaries and colleagues. In every religious province, in every Poor Clare monastery, in every Franciscan fraternity, there have been men and women whose zeal, holiness and love have been appreciated during their own lifetime without their names being passed along to posterity nor their fame spread abroad. Accounts of their lives are sometimes published, their necrology entries written with enthusiasm and then twenty or thirty years later they are forgotten. Were their spiritual lives therefore insignificant? One last feature should be emphasized. There was a time when the family of St. Francis resembled a basket of crabs. This is no longer the case, but juridical realities remain beneath the names of Franciscan, Conventual and Capuchin; and this division is reflected in the female orders as well as in the secular fraternities. But given the grace of the Franciscan calling, given the...