St. Katherine Drexel Regional Fraternity
Regional Spiritual Assistant
St. Francis of Assisi Friary
1901 Prior Road
Wilmington, Delaware 19809
tel: (302) 798-1454 fax: (302) 798-3360 website: skdsfo email: pppgusa@gmail.com
July 2025
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis,
The Lord bless you with His peace!
Everyone knows what it is to hope. In the heart of each person, hope dwells as the desire and expectation of good things to come, despite our not knowing what the future may bring. Even so, uncertainty about the future may at times give rise to conflicting feelings, ranging from confident trust to apprehensiveness, from serenity to anxiety, from firm conviction to hesitation and doubt. Often, we come across people who are discouraged, pessimistic and cynical about the future, as if nothing could possibly bring them happiness. For all of us, may the Jubilee be an opportunity to be renewed in hope. God’s word helps us find reasons for that hope. Taking it as our guide, let us return to the message that the Apostle Paul wished to communicate to the Christians of Rome. (Spes non confundit – Indiction of the Jubilee Year 2025, 1)
Looking at the first quarter of the twenty-first century, loaded with wars and the fear of getting involved in them, it is obvious how the Holy Father Pope Francis, of happy memory, was “on target” and fully in accord with the Gospel. In a very clear ecumenical spirit, every Jubilee Year aims at rekindling faith in Jesus Christ as the only Lord and Savior. He is the only “Holy Door”- Jesus said again, Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep (John 10: 7-11) – that leads to salvation. It is He Who helps us to rediscover the immense value of Sacred Scripture that remains eternally true – but the word of the Lord endures forever. And this word is the gospel that was proclaimed to you. (1 Peter 1: 25).
The Pontiffs of the last half of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first centuries have the theme of hope in their teachings: Popes St. John XXIII, St.Paul VI, even briefly Bl. John Paul I in his catecheses, St. John Paul II who encouraged the faithful to ‘rediscover this theological virtue’ by not losing sight of the ultimate goal. However, it is Pope Benedict XVI who dedicates an encyclical – Spe salvi (Saved in Hope) 2007 – to this biblical as well as theological virtue.
Faith is intimately connected with Hope. Faith is the certitude (substance) of the things we hope for. We are encouraged to keep our perspective clear and not lose sight of the goal. We are reminded to see the present in light of the future. Confusing? Not at all! Faith in what we do not see allows us to see what we believe. The words of the Vatican Council II concerning the Kingdom of God say that the kingdom of God is already here but not yet (iam sed nondum).
This rather strange statement is easier to understand than it seems. We believe the kingdom of God is coming in its fullness. We also believe that it will come gradually for us in the here-and-now present. Thus, we acknowledge that we are attracted and pulled into the future. This then is anticipated by growing and living in the values that reach perfection when the kingdom is fully among and within us. Jesus says: The kingdom of God does not come with observation; or will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20–21).
One of the aspects of hope is precisely to look with anticipation for the arrival of what we await. It is a certainty rooted in faith. It is a joy that flows from that certainty.
As Franciscans, we are celebrating the Hope born of the faith we have in God’s call to be children of the Poverello of Assisi. This celebration of “Hope fulfilled and fulfilling” is being celebrated over a period of several years. We began the five Franciscan eight hundredth anniversaries in 2023 with the approval of the Rule of the Friars Minor and we will conclude in 2026 with the celebration of the Transitus (Death) of St. Francis at the Portiuncula. Each anniversary leads to the next and reminds us of the desire of St. Francis and the goal of all Franciscans to be conformed to Jesus Christ. It is a “hope”, a deep-rooted desire, attainable but not yet attained. The joy of the quest animates the soul and the person to move forward. Through obstacles, spiritual and otherwise, we see the strength of grace in faith that leads us to the fulfillment of our hope. It is not that we see God in all things each in its own manner. We see ourselves in God’s will and love and thus live in mystery the joy we hope to share fully in eternity – Hope fulfilled! Perfect Joy regardless of the challenges!
The Hope these celebrations instill in those who remember, believe and celebrate remind all of the joy born of hope that St. Francis and his Franciscan Brotherhood gave to their world and all who even today encounter him in his brothers and sisters. Faith drives out fear. Fear drives out faith. Knowing what drives us is the first real step in living in a faith-founded hope that lives now, but not yet, the joy of what our journey and its challenges is all about. Franciscans love the mystery and dance through the obstacles, until they see the object of their quest, God!
-The approval of the Rule of the Friars Minor by Pope Honorius III, celebrated 29 November 1223, instilled an effective hope that the Gospel Life Jesus lived with His disciples, could be lived and is definitely a means of daily growth in conformity to Christ. We are reminded by G. K. Chesterton that: It is not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting. It is that it has not been tried. The Gospel is Christ. Christ is the Hope of the world. Thus the Gospel life begins a process of hope for an anxious world.
-One month or so after the approval of the Rule, the reenactment at Greccio of the Birth of Jesus at Bethlehem was set up by Francis for the people at Christmas of 1223. It visibly and emotionally enkindled a joyful hope of a God Who loves His creatures – children. He is an “Infant God” Who conforms Himself with us that we may become one with Him. We are a people of God living in the hope of Him Who created us for Yourself and our hearts are restless until they rest in You (Confessions of St. Augustine), but, we could say, His heart was restless until He became one with us.
-Not even one year later, in the solitude of prayer, St. Francis received the Stigmata of Our Lord Jesus Christ on La Verna Mountain – September 1224. It was the “Seal of Approval” God imprinted on the body of St. Francis. His hopes of conformity to Christ were permanently made tangible for all to see. Encouraged by the holiness of the Poverello, the Stigmata he bore enkindled in those who saw him a renewed confidence in the providential presence of God in their lives. St. Francis’ experience of his hopes fulfilled beyond imagining served and serves also as a “pledge of future glory” that awaits all who hope in the Lord (Isaiah 40: 31; Psalm 31: 24).
-Broken with ill health and suffering now from the Wounds of the Passion, Francis is taken, gradually, back to where the Crucifix spoke to him. The Canticle of the Creatures was composed by St. Francis during his convalescence at San Damiano as he knowingly prepared for Sister Death. Blind and in pain, the joy of the poet troubadour of Peace and Blessings (Pax et Bonum) composes the praises of the God of Creation seen in the beauty, power, variety, utility, strength, stability of creation that tells us that we are never alone. God is always with us in Himself or in all that shares his attributes. Even the gift of forgiveness becomes a sign of the divine for all who go beyond their egos and are forgiven in mercy as they show mercy. Thus, even “Sister Death” is not an “exterminator” but a gentle “sibling”, always with us, who eventually takes us to live eternally the fulfillment of all our hopes…
-The last Franciscan Jubilee Year, 2025 to 2026, celebrates St. Francis’ Transitus (Paschal Mystery/Death). It is the feast of “Hope Fulfilled”. The process of preparation has finally led him home. The Portiuncula where it all took form as a Gospel brotherhood opens his heart in hope to see the unseen God of his faith and desired destination of his life and dreams.
Our Seraphic Father is a voice of Christian hope that sounds ever more distinctly through a world of fear and seeming hopelessness. More than enough has been written in our time by poets, philosophers, and theologians on the situation of modern man who experiences the disappointment of all his hopes, the frustration of his labors, the despair of the future. Often there is a sense of anxiety. With all that happens daily in the world and the immediacy of information – true or fake news – we may feel deprived of the comfort that people of former generations found in their religion or in their intellectual pursuits.
No century before the last had achieved such triumphs in science and technology. Yet, we seem incapable of making any other use of these advances other than to destroy rather than build up. Never before have such serious attempts been made to prevent wars and to establish lasting peace and justice in the world, but the result has been that the wars became worse and the original rules and principles of international law are forgotten. These contradictions drive humankind, individuals, and nations, into discouragement and perhaps even despair. When you feel there is no way out of the “pit” because they keep looking down and around at what surrounds them, then it is we all must look up at the One Who is Above us. Hope in Him. Our help comes from the Lord Who made heaven and earth (Psalm 46: 1). Our “help” is our “hope” because our help and hope is the Lord Himself!
The first followers of St. Francis were a rather “diverse” group of men. They came from all walks of life: wealthy, poor, learned, illiterate, and so forth. Just remember St. Francis’ example(s) of the “perfect friar”. There way of Gospel living challenged the understanding of the local people, and even the Church. The Gospel was their way of life and poverty the means to achieve living the Gospel more effectively. This was extremely radical for the time. However, theirs was not a polemic statement against the Church. It was, and still is, a prophetic statement that condemns no one. People began to understand the joy of God and God alone. Whether one followed as a member of the Franciscan family or was present to the development of the growth, joy, effectiveness of the friars, the joy was contagious. The radicalism of the Franciscans taught by His Presence that God is enough. The joy with which they lived this expression, given the diversity of personalities and social strata from which they came, encouraged the people they ministered. Are we different? The example is clear.
In such times, the Church preaches the eternal Gospel of hope. Are we able to proclaim this glorious message, the source of peace and joy in human hearts? It is the great antidote the world needs. Have we already been affected by the poison of discouragement to such a degree that we no longer understand the God-given message of hope we can see throughout all of Sacred Scripture?
We must not identify the secular hopes of our modern civilization with the hope of the New Testament. That is a very real and dangerous stance of many who teach or even preach the “Good News” of Jesus. It shows itself more often than not as an extreme form of a theology under the influence of modern secular philosophy, and thus loses the biblical message of hope. It robs the preaching of the Church of the joy that belongs to the “glad news” of the Gospel. The whole New Testament is pervaded by great joy, from the joy proclaimed in the Gospel of Christmas to the joy of which Jesus spoke in his last discourses before the Passion (John 15:11; 16:20–24; 17:13), the joy of Easter, and the joy that for all apostles is one of the fruit of the Spirit (e.g., Gal. 5:22; 1 Peter 1:8; 1 John 1:4).
Every Christian within the depth of his heart is a believer, who earnestly desires to live in the Spirit, and share with all others the hope that belongs to the nature of all human beings. All saints of God, all believers, share the same hope that belongs to the very nature of humanity. We live by hope (For whoever is chosen among all the living has hope: A live dog is better off than a dead lion. – Ecclesiastes 9:4) and cannot live without hope. The hope of the sick for the restoration to health, the hope of the prisoner for freedom, the hope for social justice in a nation and for peace between the nations of the world—all these human hopes are common to Christians and non-Christians. No Christian should ever dissociate himself from the hopes of his fellow men, as long as these hopes are justified.
Depriving someone of hope would be a grave violation of the great commandment to love our neighbor. Pilgrims of Hope in this Jubilee Year of the Church as well, are active participants in the lawful attempts to open the hearts of all to realize that hope does not disappoint because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts (Romans 5: 5). To live is to hope. To hope is to be at peace. To be at peace is to live in harmony with one self and God.
Hope is the great motor that moves the history of Israel. Hope in the Messiah to come, the Redeemer of God’s People, is expressed throughout the Old Testament. Their history is unparalleled in the entire history of the world. And, in the New Testament hope gets a new significance. So Christian hope means always hope in God and hope in the Christ simultaneously without distinction. In 1 Tim. 1:1, Paul calls himself an apostle by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope. In Rom. 15:13, the apostle expresses the wish, May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
Hope belongs together with faith and love. It constitutes with them the triad St. Paul mentions repeatedly, not only in 1 Corinthians 13 where St. Paul sings the hymn of the praises of Charity(Love), but also 1Thessalonians 1:3 – We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, and Ephesians 4:1–6 – There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. May we live our earthly life with hope in the One Who calls us to Follow Me (Matthew 4: 19; Luke 9: 57-62; John 12: 26).
God bless all of you. Our Heavenly Mother and good St. Joseph guide, guard, and protect you and your loved ones. St. Francis and St. Clare intercede for you as you continue joyfully on your Franciscan Pilgrimage of Hope. May we all be bearers of Peace and All Good to those we encounter on our way.
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, O.F.M. Cap.
Regional Spiritual Assistant
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