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
December 2025
O admirable heights and sublime lowliness! O sublime humility! O humble sublimity!
That the Lord of the universe, God and the Son of God,
so humbles Himself that for our salvation
He hides Himself under the little form of bread!
Look, brothers, at the humility of God and pour out your hearts before Him!
Humble yourselves, as well, that you may be exalted by Him.
Therefore, hold back nothing of yourselves for yourselves
so that He Who gives Himself totally to you may receive you totally.
Daily reminders from the sources are from the Assisi Compilation #82-#84
Quotes for each day from the works of C.S.Lewis
83 – BROTHER ELIAS AND CARDINAL HUGOLINO ASK HIM TO ACCEPT MEDICAL HELP HE COMPOSES THE CANTICLE OF BROTHER SUN AT SAN DAMIANO
1 – The Bishop of Ostia, who later became the apostolic bishop, seeing how blessed Francis was always severe with his body, and especially because he was rapidly losing his eyesight because he refused to have himself treated, admonished him with great kindness and compassion.
– You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.
2 – He told him: “Brother, you do not do well in not allowing yourself to be helped with your eye disease, for your health and your life are of great value not only to yourself but also to others.
– When the whole world is running towards a cliff, he who is running in the opposite direction appears to have lost his mind.
3 – If you have compassion for your sick brothers, and have always been and still are merciful to them, you must not be cruel to yourself in such a serious and manifest need and illness. I therefore order you to allow yourself to be helped and treated.”
– Life with God is not immunity from difficulties, but peace in difficulties.
4 – Likewise, two years before his death, while he was already very sick, especially from the eye disease, he was staying at San Damiano in a little cell made of mats. The general minister, seeing and considering how tormented he was with the eye disease, ordered him to let himself be treated and helped.
– Don’t shine so that others can see you. Shine so that through you, others can see HIM.
5 – He also told him that he wanted to be present when the doctor began the treatment, especially so that he could more effectively arrange for him to be cared for and comforted, since he was suffering a great deal from it. At that time it was very cold, and the weather was not conducive to treatment.
– Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less.
6 – Blessed Francis lay there for more than fifty days, and was unable to bear the light of the sun during the day or the light of a fire at night. He stayed in the dark in the house, inside that little cell. In addition, day and night he had great pains in his eyes so that at night he could scarcely rest or sleep. This was very harmful and was a serious aggravation for his eye disease and his other illnesses.
– Hardship often prepares an ordinary person for an extraordinary destiny.
7 – Sometimes he did want to rest and sleep, but there were many mice in the house and in the little cell made of mats where he was lying, in one part of the house. They were running around him, and even over him, and would not let him sleep.
– Once people stop believing in God, the problem is not that they will believe in nothing; rather, the problem is that they will believe anything.
8 – They even disturbed him greatly at the time of prayer. They bothered him not only at night, but also during the day, even climbing up on his table when he was eating, so much so that his companions, and he himself, considered it a temptation of the devil, which it was.
– Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
9 – One night as blessed Francis was reflecting on all the troubles he was enduring, he was moved by piety for himself. Lord,” he said to himself, “make haste to help me in my illnesses, so that I may be able to bear them patiently.” And suddenly he was told in spirit: “Tell me, brother, what if, in exchange for your illnesses and troubles, someone were to give you a treasure?
– If you never take risks, you’ll never accomplish great things. Everybody dies, but not everyone has lived.
10 – And it would be so great and precious that, even if the whole earth were changed to pure gold, all stones to precious stones, and all water to balsam, you would still judge and hold all these things as nothing, as if they were earth, stones and water, in comparison to the great and precious treasure which was given you. Wouldn’t you greatly rejoice?”
– There is someone that I love even though I don’t approve of what he does. There is someone I accept though some of his thoughts and actions revolt me. There is someone I forgive though he hurts the people I love the most. That person is……me.
11 – “Lord,” blessed Francis answered, “this treasure would indeed be great, worth seeking, very precious, greatly lovable, and desirable.” “Then, brother,” he was told, “be glad and rejoice in your illnesses and troubles, because as of now, you are as secure as if you were already in my kingdom.”
– I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.
12 – The next morning on rising, he said to his companions: “If the emperor were to give a whole kingdom to one of his servants, shouldn’t he greatly rejoice? But, what if it were the whole empire, wouldn’t he rejoice even more?” And he said to them: “I must rejoice greatly in my illnesses and troubles and be consoled in the Lord, giving thanks always to God the Father, to His only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit for such a great grace and blessing.
– The greatest evils in the world will not be carried out by men with guns, but by men in suits sitting behind desks
13 – In His mercy He has given me, His unworthy little servant still living in the flesh, the promise of His kingdom. “Therefore for His praise, for our consolation and for the edification of our neighbor, I want to write a new Praise of the Lord for his creatures, which we use every day, and without which we cannot live.
– The fact that our heart yearns for something Earth can’t supply is proof that Heaven must be our home.
14 – Through them the human race greatly offends the Creator, and every day we are ungrateful for such great graces, because we do not praise, as we should, our Creator and the Giver of all good.” Sitting down, he began to meditate and then said: “Most High, all-powerful, good Lord.”
– One of the most cowardly things ordinary people do is to shut their eyes to facts.
15 – He composed a melody for these words and taught it to his companions so they could repeat it. For his spirit was then in such sweetness and consolation, that he wanted to send for Brother Pacifico, who in the world was called “The King of Verses,” and was a very courtly master of singers.
– Evil comes from the ABUSE of free will.
16 – He wanted to give him a few good and spiritual brothers to go through the world preaching and praising God. He said that he wanted one of them who knew how to preach, first to preach to the people. After the sermon, they were to sing the Praises of the Lord as minstrels of the Lord.
– Don’t judge a man by where he is, because you don’t know how far he has come.
17 – After the praises, he wanted the preacher to tell the people: “We are minstrels of the Lord, and this is what we want as payment: that you live in true penance.” He used to say: “What are the servants of God if not His minstrels, who must move people’s hearts and lift them up to spiritual joy?”
– If nothing in this world satisfies me, perhaps it is because I was made for another world.
18 – And he said this especially to the Lesser Brothers, who had been given to the people for their salvation. The Praises of the Lord that he composed, that is, “Most High, all-powerful, good Lord,” he called “The Canticle of Brother Sun,” who is more beautiful than all other creatures and can be most closely compared to God.
– The most dangerous ideas in a society are not the ones being argued, but the ones that are assumed.
19 – He used to say: “At dawn, when the sun rises, everyone should praise God, who created it, because through it the eyes are lighted by day. And in the evening, when it becomes night, everyone should praise God for another creature, Brother Fire, because through it the eyes are lighted at night.“
– If you live for the next world, you get this one in the deal; but if you live only for this world, you lose them both.
20 – He said: “For we are all like blind people, and the Lord lights up our eyes through these two creatures. Because of this, we must always praise the glorious Creator for these and for His other creatures which we use every day.” He did this and continued to do this gladly, whether he was healthy or sick.
– God allows us to experience the low points of life in order to teach us lessons that we could learn in no other way.
21 – And he encouraged others to praise the Lord. Indeed, when his illness grew more serious, he himself began to say the Praises of the Lord, and afterwards had his companions sing it, so that reflecting on the praise of the Lord, he could forget the sharpness of his pains and illnesses. He did this until the day of his death.
– Love is never wasted, for its value does not rest upon reciprocity.
84 – HE MAKES PEACE BETWEEN THE BISHOP AND MAYOR OF ASSISI, ADDING A VERSE TO THE CANTICLE
22 – At that same time when he lay sick, the bishop of the city of Assisi at the time excommunicated the podestà. In return, the man who was then podestà was enraged, and had this proclamation announced, loud and clear, throughout the city of Assisi: no one was to sell or buy anything from the bishop, or to draw up any legal document with him. And so they thoroughly hated each another.
– Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different.
23 – Although very ill, blessed Francis was moved by piety for them, especially since there was no one, religious or secular, who was intervening for peace and harmony between them. He said to his companions: “It is a great shame for you, servants of God, that the bishop and the podestà hate one another in this way, and that there is no one intervening for peace and harmony between them.”
– We must stop regarding unpleasant or unexpected things as interruptions of real life. The truth is that interruptions are real life.
24 – And so, for that reason, he composed one verse for the Praises: Praised be by You, my Lord, through those who give pardon for Your love, and bear infirmity and tribulation. Blessed are those who endure in peace for by You, Most High, they shall be crowned.
– You don’t have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.
25 – Afterwards he called one of his companions and told him: “Go to the podestà and, on my behalf, tell him to go to the bishop’s residence together with the city’s magistrates and bring with him as many others as he can.”
– Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.
26 – And when the brother had gone, he said to two of his other companions: “Go and sing the Canticle of Brother Sun before the bishop, the podestà, and the others who are with them. I trust in the Lord that He will humble their hearts and they will make peace with each other and return to their earlier friendship and love.”
– There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.
27 – When they had all gathered in the piazza inside the cloister of the bishop’s residence, the two brothers rose and one of them said: “In his illness, blessed Francis wrote the Praises of the Lord for His creatures, for His praise and the edification of his neighbor. He asks you, then, to listen to them with great devotion.” And so, they began to sing and recite to them.
– To love at all is to be vulnerable
28 – And immediately the podestà stood up and, folding his arms and hands with great devotion, he listened intently, even with tears, as if to the Gospel of the Lord. For he had a great faith and devotion toward blessed Francis. When the Praises of the Lord were ended, the podestà said to everyone: “I tell you the truth, not only do I forgive the lord bishop, whom I must have as my lord, but I would even forgive one who killed my brother or my son.”
– Atheists express their rage against God although in their view He does not exist.
29 – And so he cast himself at the lord bishop’s feet, telling him: “Look, I am ready to make amends to you for everything, as it pleases you, for the love of our Lord Jesus Christ and of his servant, blessed Francis.” Taking him by the hands, the bishop stood up and said to him: “Because of my office humility is expected of me, but because I am naturally prone to anger, you must forgive me.” And so, with great kindness and love they embraced and kissed each other.
– Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important.
30 – And the brothers marveled greatly, considering the holiness of blessed Francis, that what he had foretold about peace and harmony between them had been fulfilled, to the letter. All the others who were present and heard it took it for a great miracle, crediting it to the merits of blessed Francis, that the Lord had so quickly visited them, and that without recalling anything that had been said, they returned to such harmony from such scandal.
– I didn’t go to religion to make me happy. I always knew a bottle of Port would do that. If you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity.
31 – Therefore we who were with blessed Francis bear witness that always whenever he would predict “such-and-such a thing is or will be this way,” it happened almost to the letter. We have seen with our own eyes what would be too long to write down or recount. – God doesn’t want something from us. He simply wants us.
– I gave in, and admitted that God was God.
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