|
|
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on June 4th, 2023 June 2023
(The following prayer was prayed by St. Pio of Pietrelcina everyday.
This might be a simple daily tribute to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, requesting that He remain in our hearts always.)
Stay with me, Lord, for it is necessary to have You present so that I do not forget You. / You know how easily I abandon You. / Stay with me, Lord, because I am weak and I need Your strength, that I may not fall so often. / Stay with me, Lord, for You are my life, and without You, I am without fervor. / Stay with me, Lord, for You are my light, and without You, I am in darkness. / Stay with me, Lord, to show me Your will. / Stay with me, Lord, so that I hear Your voice and follow You. / Stay with me, Lord, for I desire to love You very much, and always be in Your company. / Stay with me, Lord, if You wish me to be faithful to You. / Stay with me, Lord, for as poor as my soul is, I wish it to be a place of consolation for You, a dwelling of Your Love. / Stay with me, Jesus, for it is getting late; the days are coming to a close and life is passing.
Death, judgment, eternity are drawing near. / It is necessary to renew my strength, so that I will not stop along the way and for that, I need You. / It is getting late and death approaches. / I fear the darkness, the temptations, the dryness, the cross, the sorrows. / O how I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile! / Stay with me tonight, Jesus, because in the darkness of this life, with all its dangers, I need You. / Help me to me recognize You as Your disciples did at the breaking of bread, so that the Eucharistic Communion be the light which disperses the darkness, the power which sustains me, the unique joy of my heart.
Stay with me, Lord, because at the hour of my death, I want to be one with you, and if not by Communion, at least by grace and love. / Stay with me, Jesus. / I do not ask for divine consolation, because I do not deserve them, but I only ask for the gift of Your Presence. / Oh yes, I ask this of You! / Stay with me, Lord, for it is You alone, Your Love, Your Grace, Your Will, Your Heart, Your Spirit, because I love You and ask for no other reward but to love You more and more, with a strong and active love.
Grant that I may love You with all my heart while on earth, so that I can continue to love You perfectly, throughout all eternity, dear Jesus. Amen
(The following are taken from Franciscan Sources and each is followed by a quick thought for the day)
The Tribulations
[Francis Instructs His Companions]
1
His companions—namely Bernard of Quintavalle, Giles, Angelo, Masseo, and Leo —related that Saint Francis once said in secret to these five: “Brothers, although I may be the most vile man and least worthy creature of God, nevertheless, that you may grow in reverence and faith in your vocation and the promise of the life and Rule revealed to me by the Lord, know that Christ reveals His presence to me with great kindness and familiarity, especially whenever I cry out to Him for the benefit of the religion. He so fully and clearly agrees to all the things that I ask for that—as the Lord Himself once told me—He gave to very few, to the rarest of saints, such an abundance of His presence. – No wise man wants a soft life.
2
By His kindness and grace alone He called me and revealed Himself to me, and He taught me that I should seek confirmation of His spotless life from the Church and the Lord Pope. And Christ swayed the Lord Pope and his brothers the Lord Cardinals, and they understood that I had been sent to them by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and the Lord Pope granted me everything that I asked. – Wisdom has four virtues: prudence, temperance, courage and righteousness.
3
“Happy are they who faithfully and devoutly strive to live according to their vocation, and observe purely and simply until the end the things which they promised the Lord, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven with unique glory. – There is no wisdom disjoined from goodness.
4
And woe to those who attempt to nullify out of their knowledge those things which He deigned to reveal to me to the glory of His grace, for the present and future benefit of the whole religion, and for the salvation of the souls of all the brothers. Because such people deprive themselves of grace, and drag others away from salvation, they deserve the most bitter punishments of Gehenna.” – It is always wise to look ahead, but difficult to look further than you can see. – Carry your cross patiently and in the end it will carry you.
5
Christ did not wish to hide from him the good things and the bad, defects and progress, slips and falls, what trials and tribulations, what struggles, and what revelations would follow and happen to the religion until the end. – The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.
6
Now, after that remarkable vision and its effect on the heart of each—when, absent in body, Francis was present to his brothers in a fiery chariot and their consciences were laid bare to each other, as the holy man Brother John of Celano wrote in his legend—on returning to the brothers he first comforted them regarding the heavenly vision shown them, then foretold in detail what was to happen in the religion after them. – A wise person looks at things the way they are.
7
“Do not be discouraged, brothers, because you are few and simple. Shortly many shall come to this life and religion, not only simple men, but also the wise and noble, rich and poor, laymen and clerics; and not only Italians, but also French, Spanish, Scots, Irish, Germans, Slavs, Hungarians, and those from other nations. Behold, the sound of their feet is in my ears. – Pain is God’s way of arousing a deaf world.
8
“Therefore be grateful to God and strive with all your might to make firm before Him your vocation and election in both works and holy feelings, because God placed us—unlettered, contemptible, and abject—as founders of this humble, poor, and first and last final state in this last hour. – God whispers in our pleasures but shouts in our pains.
9
It follows that it is fitting that we be even more humble, and with fear and trembling work out our salvation and bear worthy fruit of penance before God, Who by His good will alone called us to the heavenly following of His life. – Great things are accomplished with great endurance.
10
“Since many will be called and few chosen even in this religion, especially in the last days, when the times of tribulation approach, you should understand the truth of future happenings. The Most High will fill us now, at the beginning of the religion, with gifts and graces, with the sweetness of His blessing and the fruits of charity. – Beauty is God’s handwriting.
11
Like guests at His table, He will feed us the bread of life and understanding and give us to drink spiritual joy and happiness, and content us with the ineffable taste of peace and wisdom. – It is impossible for the world to exist without God.
12
“But an enemy will try to sow weeds in the religion, and many will enter the religion who will begin to live not for Christ but for themselves, and will follow the prudence of the flesh more than obedience to the faith and the Rule, granting much to the flesh and little to the spirit, acquiescing to the fragility of nature, and closing the ears of the heart to grace. – We expect too much of God, but He always seems ready.
13
They shall neglect to do violence to themselves that they may seize the kingdom of God. Because of this the religion will diminish and decline from perfection, and the fervor of perfect charity will begin to grow tepid. – The hardness of God is always kinder than the softness of man.
14
There shall also be some who innocently and faithfully follow after us in sorrow and weariness, and they shall be afflicted and oppressed by those who differ from them. – God is not an idea or a definition we have committed to memory, He is a presence we experience in our hearts.
15
“Then, after that tribulation of evils and sufferings, the situation will decline toward what is worse and even more bitter. Evil spirits shall attack the religion, and many shall rise against it: those living carnal, animal lives in the religion shall be multiplied, and they shall be entangled and caught in the delights and the cares of life. – If God loves us as much as we love God, where would we all be?
16
“They shall shamelessly throw themselves into lawsuits in order to acquire money, bequests, and legacies. They shall withdraw from love of holy poverty and humility. In hatred they shall persecute and punish those in the religion who resist them. Because of this their words and deeds, internally and externally, shall be very bitter. Internally, they shall move away from poverty, humility, and prayer; they shall give themselves ambitiously to learning and lecturing, and they shall prefer words to virtues, learning to holiness, pride and arrogance to humility. – God would not be the God that He is if we could prove that He was.
17
Accusing those who oppose them, they shall call it piety to shame and oppress them by deceit, and will preach that it is justice to wage war upon them. They shall disturb clerics and fall away from reverence for them, contradicting the humility they promised. – The atheist staring from his attic window is often nearer to God than the believer caught up in his own false image of God.
18
The laity shall be scandalized by their greed for things, and they shall give an example of frivolity and vanity in their changing places, and in sumptuous and ornate buildings. They will bite and devour each other. They will pant for ecclesiastical honors, competing among themselves to be and to appear superior. – God is a busy worker, but He loves help.
19
But they shall despise as crazy brothers who try to cling to humility and labor to rise up to Heaven through a pure observance of their promises. They will revile such brothers as useless and good for nothing, but they will admire and extol those intent on seeking high offices, and praise their prudence. – Nothing is impossible to a willing heart.
20
“Therefore, after these things, their conduct and life will be very bitter and completely unbearable to everyone, and they shall shame and persecute and defame each other. The stench of their conduct will be impossible to hide. Then the religion beloved by God will be so defamed by bad example that the good brothers will be ashamed to go out in public. – Give what you have; to someone it may be more than you dare to think.
21
Then every wicked man will turn the stench of his own malice back at the brothers, and will start to excuse and minimize his crimes by comparing his deed to those of the brothers, saying: ‘The brothers do things that are even worse.’ Only a few, with many tribulations and much opposition, will turn themselves wholeheartedly to Christ and the observance of their vocation. – The return from our generosity is not always evident.
22
The novices who shall then enter the religion, lacking the example and direction of their superiors, will be stunned by the things they will see and their life-giving desires and works of grace will dry up, and they shall look back. But some of them shall cry out to Christ in prayer and, lacking the guidance of masters, they shall be filled with outstanding gifts of grace and blessings from the Lord and shall be led to the summit of highest perfection. – When the hand ceases to scatter, the mouth ceases to praise.
23
In the end what will become of them is what usually happens with fishermen: they cast their net into the sea, and catch a great multitude of bad fish and a few good ones. Hauling it to shore they pick out the few good ones and place them in their containers, but they toss out the bad ones and leave them on the shore to be devoured by birds.” This is already happening to this religion in these last days. – There is nothing permanent except change.
[Confirmation of the Rule]
24
After a few days, when their number had now come to twelve, Christ appeared to him again and said: “Write down the life which I have revealed to you and present it to My Vicar. Request in My name that it be confirmed for you, your companions, and all who wish to accept it. Those who shall receive it humbly and reverently, and observe it simply and faithfully, will share in the spirit of life and be clothed in the light of My splendor. – When human beings are easy in their circumstances, they are naturally enemies to innovations.
25
Those who despise it shall be wrapped up in darkness and shadows, and they shall be worse off than other men for they will have fallen from a higher state and calling.” – Christians are supposed not merely to endure change, not even to profit by it, but to cause it.
26
What he requested seemed very difficult, almost impossible, for the weakness and tepidity of the men of his day, so the Supreme Pontiff urged him to accept some order or rule that was already approved. But he insisted that he had been sent by Christ to request this life, not another, and remained firm in his petition. – When people shake their heads because we live in a restless age, how would they like a stationary life and do without any change.
27
Then Lord John of Saint Paul, Bishop of Sabina, and Lord Hugo, Bishop of Ostia, moved by the spirit of God, stood by Saint Francis, and in the presence of the Supreme Pontiff and the cardinals offered many reasonable and very effective arguments for the things he was asking. – There is no mortar that time will not loose.
28
Meanwhile, that night, the Supreme Pontiff saw in a dream a man identical in every way to Saint Francis, supporting on his shoulders the Lateran church, which was leaning so far that it would fall, and kept it upright by his strength. – To change and to improve are two different things.
29
And the next day Saint Francis, instructed by the spirit of Christ, presented before the pope a parable about a poor and beautiful woman who conceived and bore sons resembling the king; and she raised them in the desert. Sometime later, passing through the area again, the king recognized them as his offspring, placed them at his table, and made them heirs and kings of his kingdom. – What Jesus asked is not that we give up anything, because that is loss, but that we exchange what we have for something better.
30
The Supreme Pontiff understood that what he was asking came from Christ and not from man, and giving thanks to God, granted his requests, and by his authority made them preachers of the Gospel, and promised in the future that if they asked for something he would do it generously and graciously. – Nothing surpasses the greatness or dignity of the human person.
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on June 4th, 2023 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
June 2023
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis,
In the Sacred Heart of Jesus
Through the Immaculate Heart of Mary
May you enter the loving embrace of the Father
Whose Holy Spirit fills us with Life and Love.
The Cross, earth’s greatest pulpit, raised our King for all to see in the glory and majesty of his infamy and humiliation. The Heart of Jesus unloved by those loved by Him must have felt such deep sorrow and pain that words cannot fathom, much less explain. His words cut deeply into the hearts of those who stood by. The words of the bystanders to the Cross were filled with anger, ridicule, blasphemy. Jesus responded with words from the Cross filled with understanding,
compassion, forgiveness, surrender, and LOVE.
The Cross-Road of Calvary offers a challenge to all who look upon the Crucified. It indicates a needed directional change “upward” and beyond. Jesus, exhausted and weak, musters up the strength to say It is finished (John 19: 30). If we only would reflect and understand the powerful meaning and impact of these few words, how our lives might change! While the English translation is good, it is the Latin expression that so powerfully expresses the deeper significance of the words. They speak of the completion of a mission, the fulfillment of the Promise God made to our first parents, as well as of all the prophecies up to that time regarding the Messiah. Nevertheless, they also speak of the intimacy and fruitfulness of the greatest act of God’s love: consummatum est! – It is consummated! (John 19: 30) When an agreement is consummated, when a love is consummated, the total surrender of one to the other is made without reserve, and from the two a new way of being emerges, unique in its own personality, but similar to those whose agreement and love have allowed it to be. Jesus totally surrendered His Will and existence to the Father and thus also to all humanity.
We are the children of that consummated act of love that introduced humanity once again to the loving embrace of the Eternal Father. In the Blood of the Savior, and His love for us, we are re-born into a new creation and receive our status as children of God, (cfr.1 John 3: 1) in the blood of Christ. We are unique in our individual personalities but are one with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, through the Blood of Christ. The Easter Proclamation of Light Service chants: What good would life have been had Christ not come to us as our Redeemer! Father, how wonderful your care for us! How boundless your merciful love! To ransom a slave you gave away your Son. It is this same Incarnate Son Who completed His mission on earth by being “consumed” upon the cross. It was this consummation that brought an end to the earthly life of Jesus and began a new Life for us.
The completion of His mission from the Father was the beginning of our being sent forth as His “backup plan” as His Mystical Body in time. This awesome responsibility and trusting mandate of Jesus continues for the sisters and brothers of the Poverello of Assisi who responded with their “yes” to live the life of the Gospel. The Gospel is the “Good News” and the Good News is the person of Jesus the Christ, Son of God, Word Incarnate. He continues His life-giving ministry of presence and power through us, a compassionate presence of powerful love.
The Divine Heart of Jesus burned with love for everyone. The crown of thorns was a sign to mock Him as Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews. (John 19: 19) His majesty was marked by the throne of the cross, the crown of thorns, nails for jewels, and a beaten body covered in blood for a royal robe. The image of the Crucified Savior and His pierced Heart is a constant reminder that Love is not loved. St. Francis of Assisi weeping profusely often repeated this phrase so that others might consider the Love of Christ that is so often taken for granted, or “not taken” at all.
Many great Saints have promoted devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Devotion to the Sacred Heart is not some emotional expression of pious prayers intended to excite our feelings, as some seem to believe. All true prayer should be able to arouse within us a sense of the Divine Presence. Prayers help us feel good and trusting in what we believe God will respond to our needs according to His Will. However, when we speak Cor ad Cor (heart to Heart) to the Lord, the relationship deepens and we move from feeling to becoming. The Sacred Heart of Jesus is a symbol for us to focus upon that reminds us of a love unequaled and always desired. Prayer keeps the loving relationship alive and, hopefully well, with the Source of all we are and are called to be.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart offers us the image that society uses to express the transparency of truth (cross my heart and hope to die – used by children), unquestionable integrity (put my whole heart and soul into it), and the depth of limitless love (I love you with all my heart). We use the heart to confirm and seal many a relationship we desire to establish with others. The heart is mentioned not just as an emotional symbol but as a verifying reality of the depth of a person’s desires and availability. The heart conditions the thoughts and actions that people often express. The following of one’s heart reveals a great deal about who a person is, or desires to be.
The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, following The Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi), is the crowning celebration of the liturgical year. All the other liturgical celebrations originate and revolve around the great Paschal Mystery of the Passion-Death-Resurrection of Jesus. More often than not they concern some truth of our Catholic Faith that we accept and believe as “Catholics”. The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus may not be a dogma of faith, but it summarizes in this image the love of Jesus for humanity. In a sense it explains everything we believe as God’s continued act of Eternal Love. It becomes the ultimate explanation for all the events celebrated during the year by reminding us of their origin in God’s Love, their development and progression in God’s Love, and their ultimate fulfillment in God’s eternal Loving Embrace.
Reflection and meditation on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, our Lord and God, Crucified Savior, Pierced Redeemer, invites all to come to the Throne on which hung the Savior of the world (cfr. Veneraton of the Cross Liturgy of Good Friday). Ascending to the right hand of the Father He bears with Him the “engraved” signs of His love for His family redeemed in His sacrificial offering on the Cross. The nail prints and open side are eternal reminders for us of the love of God Who became one of His own creatures, the condescension of compassion as St. Leo the Great refers to the Incarnation. For all eternity He bears the marks of His indelible unity with creation and the length He was willing to go as one of us to seal an unbreakable bond with the Father. In Jesus, the bond between time and eternity is made sure and we are offered the undeniable road that leads to the fullness of Life. God devised the way in Jesus, and the Sacred Heart of Jesus reminds us of the solid connection that leads to Life.
The human Heart of Jesus is one with the Eternal Love of God and the two who are one call us to seek first the kingdom of God and His holy operation (Scripture and St. Francis of Assisi) Come, let us adore Him! As we do, our eyes are open to see, our minds to understand, and our hearts to receive the message of love and compassion we are called to continue. Unless we can open our hearts to envelop others in love, our love remains stale and life-less, or better, love-less. As our Mother St. Clare of Assisi wrote to a spiritual daughter St. Agnes of Prague: Gaze upon the Lord. Gaze upon His Face. Allow the image of the Crucified and His pierced Heart to enter your soul through the windows of your eyes and experience the love that emanates from that image.
The Love of Christ forgets our sins and remembers only His mercy. Jesus makes his voice more clearly audible in our hearts when we focus in prayer and gaze upon the Lord. St. Francis knew that love is recognized in the daily crosses of our lives. It is as though Jesus is saying Courage! Do not be afraid! (Mark 6: 50) I have conquered the world! (John 16: 33) The love of Jesus and the images of that Love in the Crucified and the Sacred Heart empower us to be courageous in proclaiming, faithful in living, and thus at peace in our trust in the One Whose Love can never fail. The moment of His greatest defeat, was the moment of His victory.
Franciscans of any obedience strive to embody for deeply the charism of our Seraphic Father. We are called to disarm our hearts as Jesus disarmed His Most Sacred Heart. Through His ultimate sacrifice to death we are able to rejoice in our restored nature to grace and new life. Faith in Jesus empowers us with courage rooted in an active hope that conquers hearts and the world. After the battles of life comes the serenity, peace and joy that can only be lived and not even imagined. We are consumed by love for God and love for neighbor. God is continually fixed in our mind and imprinted in our heart. We can never lose sight of Him. We feel nothing except the desire to have and want what God wants. How overpowering it is to live by the heart! It means living at every moment a death to our egos that never kills the body, but energizes and enlivens our spirit, our soul. Who will set me free from this consuming fire! (cfr Hebrews 12: 29)
St. Francis of Assisi lived in the presence of God and was consumed by God’s love. The more he lived in God, the more he was aware of the concerns and needs of his sisters and brothers. How can we speak of love of God in our hearts, when we have no love for our sisters and brothers?! Love is not always materially fruitful. In fact, some may think us foolish, others may think us exhibitionists, others may call us hypocrites. We may be ridiculed by those who cannot understand a forgiving heart. Some may think us weak because we have disarmed our heart towards those who may oppose or offend us. Others may fail to recognize us now that we have unmasked our fears and are willing to stand courageously and trustingly before one another in the Name of Jesus.
True devotion for the Love of Jesus in His Sacred Heart is found in its epitome in our love for the Hidden Prisoner in the Tabernacle. This love is a transforming antidote to all that affects us in spirit and often even in the body. Jesus, I trust in You! (Prayer of Divine Mercy) We trust in Jesus, because Jesus has shown us the depth of his trust in us, to the point of being pierced that we might be healed. Through His wounds you are healed (1 Peter 2: 24).
It is most obvious how the Poverello of Assisi lived the image of the Crucified. A few years before he died his body received the visible stigmata of the wounds of Jesus. Hearts were rekindled in their awareness and love for the Passion-Death of our Savior. It was in the wound of the heart however, seen by only a privileged few, that Francis could say I have died, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ Who lives in me (Galatians 2: 20). The holy heart of St. Francis, empowered by the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Whose image he was gifted to be, could now say with St. Paul: I rejoice in what I am suffering for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s sufferings, for the sake of his body, the church (Colossians 1: 24). Now he understood, the words of the Cross of San Damiano: Francis rebuild my Church for as you see it is falling in to ruin. The consuming love that filled the heart of our Seraphic Father was one with the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the spirit until the mystery became fullness of reality for eternity.
As Spiritual Children of St. Francis of Assisi, the Crucified of La Verna, how much we still have to learn about Love! The Sacred Heart that pulsated from the womb of Mary until it was pierced by the soldier’s lance as Jesus hung upon the Cross keeps reminding us that Love is not loved. Can we ever learn to love God for God’s Love’s sake without looking for return?! When we can love without fear, though we recognize our sins and failures that never seem to leave us, then it is that we can truly say Jesus I trust in you.(Divine Mercy prayer) Redemption was sealed with the last drop of blood and water from the Sacred Heart of Jesus spilled on the cross at Golgotha by the soldier’s lance. This gift of redeeming and forgiving love is repeated whenever we celebrate the sacrament of Reconciliation with sincere loving repentance. The Love of the Sacred Heart of Jesus knows no limits, His love is everlasting (Psalm 136). Do not let human inconstancy, foolish fear, and senseless shame keep you from the well of Jesus’ Love that is overflowing for all to drink from the richness of His Most Sacred Heart. And may that forgiving Love lead us to the uniting and empowering Love of the Eucharist that allows us to be one with Him as He is in the Father.
May the Good Lord bless you; Our Lady and good St. Joseph, guide, guard and protect you; and may our Seraphic Father St. Francis and holy Mother St. Clare watch over you, their Spiritual Children and all your loved ones, with loving care.
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, OFM Cap
Regional Spiritual Assistant
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on May 5th, 2023 May 2023
Hail, O Lady, holy Queen, you are the virgin made church
and the one chosen by the most holy Father in heaven
whom He consecrated with His most holy beloved Son
and with the Holy Spirit the Paraclete,
in whom there was and is all the fullness of grace and every good.
Hail, His Palace! Hail, His, Tabernacle! Hail, His Home!
Hail, His Robe! Hail, His Servant! Hail, His Mother!
And hail all you holy virtues which through the grace and light of the Holy Spirit
are poured into the hearts of the faithful so that from
their faithless state you may make them faithful to God.
(Salutation of the Blessed Virgin)
(below: first quote from Franciscan sources THE TRIBULATIONS –
second quote from various spiritual writers)
Prologue
1
The life of Francis, poor and humble man of God, founder of the three Orders, has been written by four estimable persons, brothers brilliant in learning and holiness, namely John and Thomas of Celano, Brother Bonaventure, minister general after blessed Francis, and a man of marvelous simplicity and holiness, Brother Leo, the companion of Saint Francis. – To expect God to do something while we do nothing is superstition not faith.
2
Anyone who reads and diligently examines these four descriptions or histories will be able to know in part from the matters told in them the vocation, way of life, holiness, innocence, life, and first and last intention of that seraphic man; and how Christ especially loved him and was kind and familiar with him, cleansing, illuminating, and forming him; drawing him after Himself to follow the footprints of His perfection, appearing to him crucified. He so transformed him into Himself, that from then on he lived not for himself but, fully crucified, for Christ. – Live with people to know their problems and live with God in order to solve them.
3
To him Christ was substance, impulse, sense, light, and life; he was imprinted by fire in his memory, intellect, and passion; he was united and secretly conformed to the cross deep within his marrow. And all that he was, all that he desired, thought, spoke, and did, he received from Christ, and he vigilantly, humbly, and blessedly arranged and perseveringly fulfilled all according to Him and on account of Him. – The hottest place in hell, says the poet Dante, is reserved for those who in a moral crisis maintain their neutrality.
Christ Instructs Francis
4
Jesus Christ found him faithful, obedient, grateful, simple, upright, humble, in accord with His heart; and revealed to him the first and last perfection of His evangelical life and that of His mother, His apostles, and the evangelists. He opened his ears and trained him with a powerful hand in the incorruptible and perfect works of heaven, and placed Himself in his heart, his mouth, and his arms. – A Christian must resemble a fruit tree whose fruit grows on it and not a Christmas tree whose gaudy decorations are only tied on.
5
Christ said to him: “Take from my hand the scroll, the law of grace and humility, of poverty, piety, charity, and peace; the form of life which I kept with my disciples, a life-giving rule for a spotless life and fullness of grace, the sure acquisition of glory for the soul directing in action and in thought the possession and ascent to heavenly and divine things. This I created substantially in the saints from the beginning and showed it to be the form of perfection. – Faith is the power that you and I have to move mountains if we are not too proud to push a barrow.
6
“Naked, being born of the Virgin in a way words cannot describe, I was wrapped in the swaddling clothes of poverty, and lay in the manger of humility, because I did not want to have a place in the inn, so that, in a mystery, I might show poverty to be the sure way to the kingdom of heaven, and I might confirm in words and deeds the humble lovers and observers of poverty to be heirs and kings of that same kingdom, ordained by my Father from eternity. – Let one do good deeds and then ask God to explain His Law.
7
“A powerful angel, in spirit and power the prophet Elias, herald of my advent and incarnation, John the Baptist, I sent before me to prepare my ways and to make straight the paths, to preach penance and, in deeds and in word, to give knowledge of salvation for the remission of sins. Thus, through him, all might believe in me, and for believing, loving, and observing the perfection of my poor, meek, and humble way of living and most divine life, all wishing to come after me might have a pious and most sure director, guide, and patron from this point until the end of the world. – First act like good an upright people then ask for wisdom.
8
“For this reason, giving to those choosing to come after me escape from the shadows of error and the damnation of eternal confusion and death, and entry to the kingdom of God, reborn of water and the Holy Spirit, as soon as I was baptized by him I was led into the desert by the Holy Spirit. In fasting, vigils, and prayer I consecrated by example the period of forty days, teaching through this that the lifetime of the baptized ought to be consecrated fully and perfectly to divine worship; and so those following me, by my power might conquer the prince of death, ruler of the world of this darkness, and dead to the world and all things which are of the world, they might live for God alone, seeking and minding things that are above, not those on earth. – When we have grasped the way of humility then we can ask God for understanding.
9
“I preached penance and the kingdom of heaven, like a swift runner, covered with one tunic and a cheap cloak, opening up the ways of life to my disciples, going along together with them without money, sandals, bag, or purse. Lacking a roof, I who made the heavens had no place to lay my head, so that I might show to those imitating me that the world and all things which are of the world must be accounted as loss and dung and despised. – When someone says they have rights that usually means they are suffering wrongs.
10
“I spent the night awake in prayer before God, by day teaching in the synagogues and the temple hatred of the world, desire, greed, hypocrisy, and of lies, pride, and malice. And so that they might recognize Me as the Messiah promised to our forefathers, God made human, Emmanuel, and might accept Me for salvation, curing by My power all illnesses and infirmities, I cast out demons, cleansed lepers, raised the dead, and forgave sins. – When you begin to ignore human dignity you will eventually begin to ignore human rights.
11
“I made those whom I chose from the world otherworldly, Brother, by both My word and the example of My poor, humble, heavenly life. I did not lose any of them, but they remained with Me in My trials, and I sanctified them. Leaving the world, I commended them to the Father, because they were Mine and not of the world. By My example they were to be supernaturally victorious, and to preach through the whole earth to Jews and Gentiles hatred and contempt of the world on account of My name, and profess faith in Me and the eternal glory and honor of My kingdom, which is not of this world. – Justice impels us to desire and to insist that everyone receives what we all have a right to.
12
“I confirmed My preaching in My blood through death on the cross, naked, outside the gate hanging in the midst of thieves, abandoned to insults and the most bitter sufferings, boundless and innumerable, so that, redeemed by the price of My blood and the power of My death, I might raise up those corrupted by pride, vanity, and carnality, those rightly condemned to a double death; so that I might make them most ardent lovers of My pains and death and cross, overcoming themselves, the world, and the devil. – The challenge to Christians is to respond to the Word of God as present to us through human beings who have specific needs and strive to affirm their humanity.
13
Just as I laid down My life for the salvation of humankind to the honor and glory of the Father, so they, redeemed through Me, might lay down their life, to the glory and honor of My name, holding fast to the means of My death and the cross, by which the world, with the prince of death, is conquered, grace is possessed in the present, and glory in the future. – Glory is perfected grace.
14
“I conformed them to My death, sharing My pains and suffering, so that they might understand the beginning of the opening of the book of life and, in it, the inscription and message of My infinite love, the door leading into the brilliance of My wisdom, and the key opening the secret splendors of My works, words, precepts, counsels, sacraments and promises, and the sure revelation of the blessings of my glory, by which the children of light and My grace are separated from the children of darkness and sin, and the citizens of the kingdom from the citizens of Babylon and Hell.” – We cannot seek grace through gadgets.
15
This Benjamin, Francis, along with Paul, the least of the saints, learned and received all the things which he wrote in the Rule and the Testament and in his letters and admonitions, neither from men nor through a man, but by revelation of Jesus Christ appearing to him, seraphically dwelling in him, and speaking to him in the form of the cross. These things he preached blatantly in very clear, brief words, and perfectly fulfilled them in faithful deeds. – Don’t let go of me. God hold on a bit longer.
16
He was so ignited by the fire of the Holy Spirit when Christ Jesus appeared to him as if nailed to the cross, that after the example of Christ Jesus the redeemer, who hung on the cross naked in the midst of thieves and died, he firmly proposed that, naked and separated from the world, unrecognized by all men, as we read about Mary Magdalene and many other saints, he would serve Christ even unto death, or he would offer himself to any harsh tortures and martyrdom to preach the faith and witness to Christ Jesus among the Saracens or other unbelievers. – We ride with ease when we are carried by the grace of God.
17
Turned toward Christ, he begged with devout prayers and burning desires, to be enlightened about his direction and reassured by Him from whom every good thing and every gift is freely given to all and without whom nothing pleasing to God can be accomplished. – We are drawn to God by loving attractions and holy inspirations.
18
Appearing to him, Christ Jesus, our Savior, said: “Francis: follow Me, and hold to the footprints of the poverty and humility of My life. To be conformed and united to Me in the senses, intellect, and action is the goal of My every promise and fulfillment of grace and glory. For if you cling to Me with your whole heart, your whole soul, your whole mind, and your whole strength, so that your every thought is in Me and about Me, all your words are from Me, for Me, and with Me, and all your works are done always on account of Me and for the honor and glory of My name, you will be My servant and I will be with you, and I will speak through your mouth, and whoever hears you, hears Me, and whoever receives you, receives Me, and whoever blesses you, will be blessed and whoever curses you, will be cursed. – Go only asks from you what he gives you the power to do.
19
“You and all your brothers whom I will give you are to live in My likeness living, as strangers and pilgrims, dead to the world. Ground yourself, your rule and life on the poverty and nakedness of My cross, because My substance of all communicable riches of grace and glory is grounded and based on poverty, and the infinite blessed enjoyment of all My goods is possessed in striving toward My humility. For the depth of humility is immense, and in those who truly love and possess poverty and humility is the look of My happiness and the resting-place and dwelling of My favor. – Grace justifies me and sets me free from the slavery of sin.
20
“Therefore the congregation of your brotherhood will be called the religion of lesser ones, so that from the name they might understand that above all they are to be truly humble of heart; since humility is the cloak of My honor and praise, and anyone passing from this life with this habit will find the gates of My kingdom open. – Man is born broken; he lives by mending. The grace of God is the glue.
21
“I asked My Father to grant Me in this last hour a little poor people, humble, and meek, and mild, who would be like Me in all things, in poverty and humility, and who would be content to have only Me; I would come to rest and remain in this people, just as My Father rests and remains in Me: and this people would rest and remain in Me just as I remain in the Father and rest in His Spirit. My Father gave you to Me, along with those who with their whole heart and with unfeigned faith and perfect charity cling to Me through you; and I will guide and nourish them, and they shall be sons to Me, and I shall be a father to them. – Grace is nature’s perfection.
22
Whoever receives you, receives Me; and whoever persecutes you, persecutes and despises Me: and My judgment will come upon your despisers and persecutors; but My blessing will remain upon those receiving and blessing you. “Let My Gospel be your Rule, and My life be your life, My cross your repose, My charity your life, My death your hope and resurrection. – A balanced soul, filled with the light of inner grace, is not afraid to look at the darkness outside.
23
Let the reproaches, blasphemies, and mockery against Me be your honors, blessings, and commendations; let your life, joy, and glory be to endure death and torments for Me; let your portion and riches be to wish to have nothing under heaven; let your distinction, consolation, and triumph be to be humbled beneath all and to rejoice to be afflicted and vilified on account of My name. – Grace is the free gift of Almighty God to needy humanity.
24
“The places in which the brothers will live as strangers and pilgrims to worship and praise Me, shall be vile, poor little buildings, made of mud and wattle, set apart from the vanities and tumult of the world, and lacking ownership and rights. With the obedience, permission, and good pleasure of bishops and clerics they shall accept the buildings as strangers and pilgrims, staying in them only as long as the owners of the places wish it and it pleases the bishops, always prepared to leave there willingly and thankfully when their hosts ask them to leave. They shall be like Me and conformed to Me when they spend time in worshiping Me, living in these places as strangers, preaching My name in deed and conduct; and as strangers and pilgrims they shall leave very willingly when asked, showing perfectly by such a glad and humble gesture that they hold onto nothing there and did not wish to hold onto anything.” – God and ourselves can only be bridged by God.
25
Therefore in his Testament, which he made near his death, he says: “After the Lord gave me brothers and companions, no one showed me what I ought to do, but the Most High Himself revealed to me that I ought to live according to the pattern of the Holy Gospel. And I had this written down simply and in a few words, and the Lord Pope confirmed it for me.” And for the pure and Catholic observance of this life, in the end he made his Testament, in which he showed that he received the beginning, development, and end of his conversion through revelation from Jesus Christ. – If you have seen your brother, you have seen God.
26
The faith and obedience of the Roman Church and of all the priests ordained by the same Church, though sinners, are to be venerated, so much so that, if he had as much wisdom as Solomon, he would not preach in their parishes against their will and obedience. Enlightened by Christ he taught them to respect, love, and honor the ministers of the sacraments of the Church as their lords, and above all that these sacraments and divine words and all masters and doctors of sacred theology must be venerated and honored because, he said, through this we share in spirit and life through their ministry. – To be Church means to live as part of a family aware that we need others.
27
They should perform the Office according to the custom of the Roman Church. The brothers should be content with one tunic patched inside and out for the sake of the true observance of poverty, and not wish to have more, but be sincerely subject to all, showing the lesser state of humility in their way of life and work, working with their hands for the sake of example and love of virtue, to avoid idleness, and to provide for the needs of their bodies and of those of their brothers in an evangelical way; showing that it is great humility, ineffable dignity, and participation at the table of the King of glory Himself to have recourse to the table of the Lord and seek alms from door to door when they are not paid for their work. – God did not spare His only Son, and He is not going to be soft on His adopted ones either.
28
Blessed Francis had learned from Christ that it is a great dignity and incomparable honor according to God and man for the evangelical poor to seek alms for the love of the Lord God, because all things created both in heaven and on earth cannot be compared to the love of God, for all things which the heavenly Father created for human use out of love for His beloved Son, after sin, have been given, free, as alms, to the worthy and the unworthy. Therefore, what is asked and given for the love of the Lord God and the love of Christ Jesus His Son, who became poor for us so that by His poverty He would make us rich in present grace and sanctify us as blessed in future glory, can be called the bread of angels rather than the food of the body. – I am a part and parcel of the whole, I cannot find God apart from the whole of humanity.
29
Thus, according to what he received from Christ, Francis says in his Rule: “Let the brothers not make anything their own, neither house, nor place, nor anything at all; but as pilgrims and strangers in this world, serving the Lord in poverty and humility, let them go seeking alms with confidence; and they should not be ashamed because, for us, the Lord made Himself poor in this world. This is that sublime height of the highest poverty which has made you, my most beloved brothers, heirs and kings of the Kingdom of Heaven, poor in temporal things, exalted in virtue. Let this be your portion, which leads into the land of the living. Giving yourselves totally to this, most beloved brothers, never seek anything else under heaven for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” – Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and you will help them to become what they are capable of being.
30
In order to preserve purely and completely the perfection of the highest evangelical poverty revealed to him by Christ, Francis, in the strength and certitude of the spirit of Christ, strictly orders: “Wherever they may be, they are not to dare to ask any letter from the Roman Curia, either personally or through an intermediary, whether for a church or a place, or under the pretext of preaching or the persecution of their bodies; but wherever they have not been received let the brothers flee into another country to do penance with the blessing of God.” He adds at the end that his Testament is not another Rule, but an exhortation or remembrance of both his first and last intention, revealed to him by Christ, a testament which he made for his blessed brothers, that they might observe the Rule they promised the Lord in a more Catholic way, because the Catholic, faithful, and pure observance of the Rule, which he received from Christ, was contained in the literal understanding of the Testament and Rule. – No wise man wants a soft life.
31
Therefore he strictly commanded by obedience that they were not to place glosses on the Rule and Testament, saying: “They should be understood in this way.” But as the Lord granted him to speak and write the Rule and Testament simply and purely, they were to understand them simply and purely without gloss, and observe them with a holy activity until the end. Therefore anyone who possesses the truth of the faith and charity of Christ knows how many absurd and inappropriate things are said by those who attempt to void or nullify Saint Francis, his Rule and Testament, things against Christ, the apostles, their disciples, the evangelists, anchorites, cenobites, heads of churches, founders of all the orders of perfection and, in fact, even against the Roman Church itself. Christ was familiar with Francis, like a father with his most beloved son. He informed him of the good pleasure of His will; and showed him what was useful, fit, and helpful at the moment, and for coming, foreseen tribulation. He showed through him and in him the preparations for the final perfect state of contemplation in the heaven of the Church. But his own did not accept him. – They can be no wisdom disjoined from goodness.
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on May 5th, 2023 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
May 2023
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis of Assisi,
The Lord grant you the gifts of Easter Joy,
given on the first Easter Sunday to those gathered in the Upper Room:
The Paraclete of Divine Presence
The Pardon of Divine Mercy
The Peace of His abiding Divine Life-giving Love within and around you…and
The ever-present warmth of motherly love of our Mother Mary
Who accepted us as Her children at the foot of the Cross
Our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi tells us so much of his love for Mary and his awareness of Her place in the mystery of our salvation. His love for Her was undeniable. Francis saw the Mother of God and our Heavenly Mother always in relationship to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and, because of that, to the Church.
Holy Virgin Mary, among the women born into the world,
there is no one like you.
Daughter and servant of the most high and supreme
King and of the Father in heaven,
Mother of our most holy Lord Jesus Christ,
Spouse of the Holy Spirit,
pray for us with Saint Michael the Archangel,
all the powers of heaven and all the saints,
at the side of your most beloved Son, our Lord and Teacher.
The Easter Season calls to mind the great truths of our Faith celebrated in this most holy period. The Incarnation of the Word in the womb of Mary is the beginning of the fulfillment of the Father’s Promise to humanity. Human nature is redeemed on Calvary, assured of salvation for those who live in the light and truth of the Resurrection of Jesus, and is raised up with Jesus and glorified in His Ascension. The last Sunday of this month celebrates the Coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and heralds the birth of the Church and its coming of age to Proclaim the Gospel to every creature. (Mark 16: 15-16). The Holy Spirit continues this action of restoration and sanctification of creation down through the ages. And Mary is an integral protagonist at every moment in this Drama of Redemption and Theater of Salvation from the beginning to the fulfillment of God’s Promises.
Our Blessed Mother Mary, the mere mention of Whose name speaks of the ‘Yes’ with which she responded to God’s offer to become His earthly Mother, is a powerful yet gentle reminder of the eminent role She fulfills in the mystery and history of our salvation. Throughout the liturgical year Our Lady is always present as the Church celebrates the mysteries of Her Son. True devotion to Mary, our Mother and Queen, whose Immaculate Heart envelops all Her children with tender loving care, always leads us to Jesus, Her Son, and to a greater love and trust in God.
With the passing of time, many ‘obvious’ remembrances are institutionalized as feasts or celebrations of some sort, so that we do not forget their significance in our journey of faith. The further away we move in time from the actual events and persons we habitually celebrate, the more they can become a mere memory of the past rather than a living experience for us today. When we celebrate God and His saving action in and for humanity, the experience and relevance are always actual and timely. There can never be a time or occasion when God is not relevant or necessary. If God does not build the house, in vain do the laborers labor. If God does not watch over the city, in vain does the watchman keep vigil. (Psalm 127: 1)
It is this active presence of God that demands we return to our origins to re-discover the relevance of God’s Word and the impact His Word must have on our daily life. If we could see the events of our Faith with the heart of those who had seen and walked with Jesus, before and after His Passion-Death-Resurrection, things could be drastically different. If we only allowed the events of our lives and how God manifests Himself to us to penetrate our hearts as Mary did! She kept all these things in Her heart. (Luke 2: 19) If we could only remember that we as Franciscans are called to live the Gospel, and thus reflect – keep in our hearts – upon the words of the Word and take them to ourselves, how different our response would be to the challenges of openness, compassion, understanding, patience, acceptance, detachment, transparency, obedience, Franciscan fraternity … LOVE! That little word “if” packs a wallop when it is taken seriously!
With the eyes of a Faith convinced and committed, we can experience the same zeal and enthusiasm of the first followers. We too can be excited, enthused and encouraging not only about our Catholic Faith in general, but also about our Franciscan vocation in particular, and all that envisions and expects of us who profess to be Franciscans. As a faith-filled Jewish woman, Mary knew what collaborating with God usually entails: to put it in Franciscan terms, “Perfect Joy”. The “joy” was in knowing that everything that would be asked of Her was a part of God’s Plan to restore creation to its original grace-filled beauty. The “perfect” part was accepting a central collaborative part in the process of faith-filled dependence on God’s will with a hope-filled acceptance of all that is asked, regardless of how much is totally understood or desired. Only Love, and true love, can so completely abandon oneself with serenity to the unexpected, unknown, undesired, and say “yes” with such trust, that a God could become human, without every losing anything of His Divinity, and humanity could actually share in the Life of God Himself. Wow! What more can anyone ask! All this is thanks to a young virgin who said “yes” to the impossible, because God asked Her permission and assistance!
The Holy Spirit that descended on the first followers is the same Holy Spirit that we receive at Baptism and Confirmation. The distinction is seen in the effects of the Spirit’s presence based on the availability of the person ‘gifted’ by the Holy Spirit. Our Faith, founded on the Passion-Death-Resurrection of Jesus, would be of no value had it not been for the empowering of the Spirit in those first followers whose availability to His prompting allowed them to be led by the Holy Spirit of God that they might lead others. We are called to lead others to know, love and serve God in the Gospel Life proclaimed by Jesus. In the Spirit, we remember, we celebrate, and we believe Jesus to be the Incarnate Son of God and Redeemer of humanity. This Faith will bring us to a deeper and more meaningful relationship with Jesus, and consequently with one another, just as it did for the first followers of Jesus. Mary, once again, is the prime exemplar; She believed the unbelievable, was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, (Luke 1: 34-35) and the impossible happened! The Creator became one with His creature; divinity and humanity became one through the total surrender in Faith of Mary to the Father’s will.
The first and most excellent of all the faithful was Mary, our Blessed Mother. Faith accompanied Her into the divine plan that made Her Mother of the Christ, Mother of the Christian, Mother of the Church. The depth of Faith of the Mother of God, expressed so powerfully at the foot of the Cross of Jesus, was enhanced with the added ministry entrusted to Her by Her dying Son. He called Her to become the Mother of all the Faithful: Woman, behold Your son; Son, behold Your Mother. (John 19: 26-27) Infinitely less than Jesus and eminently greater than all humanity, Mary makes the ultimate sacrifice in offering Her Son to the Father with the same availability to the Father’s Will with which She offered Her first ‘yes’ to become the Mother of the Savior. She manifests Herself to be, in the words of our Seraphic Father St. Francis, the Virgin made Church.
The Church maintains the living presence of the Savior, most especially in the great gift of the Eucharist – the living Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of the Savior. This same Church continues, with Mary, to offer Her Son – our Brother, Lord, Savior, Word Incarnate, GOD – to the Father, in that one perfect Sacrifice perpetuated through the ages in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We are that Church! We, like Mary, offer ourselves each day in loving response to God’s tremendous and extravagant love for us in Jesus. And we are spiritually transformed by the graces that flow to us from Jesus through Mary. We are offered the challenge and opportunity to become the living image of the One whom we consume, as He consumes us, JESUS.
Mother of the Redeemer, She excels in the example of total surrender to God’s Will. Her Faith is an active and essential element of Her very being. Faith is not just a static acceptance of some theological truth. It is living life in the light of what we have come to believe. St. Augustine tells us that faith is believing what you do not see, and seeing what you believe. Thus, ‘believing is seeing, not vice versa as we are accustomed to presume. Believing God’s Word, we see God’s almighty power and providence at work in our lives, and thus we can confidently yield to all the Father requests of us. This same Faith places Mary in a position of total trust in God and profound love for all His children, now entrusted to Her motherly care by Jesus. She stands as the Advocate for all Her children before the Majesty of the Blessed Trinity. Truly She is, as St. Francis of Assisi acknowledged: Daughter and Servant of the Most High and Supreme King and of the Father in heaven, Mother of our most holy Lord Jesus Christ, Spouse of the Holy Spirit. (Antiphon Office of the Passion) Her intimate relationship with the Triune God enables Her to be our most powerful Advocate in heaven.
Present in prophecy, present in history, and present in the expectations of all God’s People, Mary is a life-giving presence that speaks of the power of God working in human history. Mary is a sign of hope for a waiting world. She reverses the obstinacy of creation in Eden and accepts wholeheartedly to cooperate with all the Father asks of Her. She becomes the Mother of all the Faithful Who enter into a New Covenant with the Father in the Blood of His Son, conceived in Her by the power of the Holy Spirit. Mary’s loving response and daily re-commitment to that response encourages us to respond to the Father and to ask that Jesus come alive in our hearts through the same Holy Spirit working within us.
Mary was the first to practice the Gospel in all its perfection before it was written. May Her example and prayers enable us and stimulate us to follow that example. We must make every effort, like many elect souls, to follow invariably this Blessed Mother, to walk close to Her since there is no other sure path leading to Jesus – the Way, the Truth and the Life – except the path followed by our Mother. We cannot afford to refuse to take this path, we who want to reach our journey’s end “successfully”. With Her, close to Jesus, we can proceed confidently through life in the midst of whatever we may encounter or must bear.
As Followers of the Poverello of Assisi, we strive to live the Faith we profess and to see in Our Heavenly Mother a sure Advocate Who pleads our cause. We open our hearts to the Spirit we have received and we listen to God Who speaks to us in the silence of our hearts. Francis encourages us to foster an ever-growing love for our Mother Who stands to intercede for us at every moment. Mary’s life was one continual ‘yes’ to God. Following Her example, let us gratefully accept sorrows, hardships, fortune, and all life offers and/or demands with the same ‘yes’ Mary offered to God. Her response to God’s invitation allowed the Eternal One to be enfleshed in Her life. During these trying times we have been experiencing, we continue to entrust ourselves to our Mother’s “almighty intercession”. May Her Son Jesus hear the plea we make through Her, and grant this world the peace, stability, and faith in God it so desperately needs to bring an end to the political, social, economic, international, religious, spiritual, moral, and more, confusion and fear that affects the whole world.
With every best wish for you during this season of new birth and new life, I pray we all live as the ‘People of the Resurrection’. In the midst of the world’s uncertainties and global threats, let us pray earnestly that God bless our earthly home with healing and freedom from the evil one and the evil that has and continues to affect all creation. May our lives be a song of praise to the God Who creates, redeems and sanctifies. He gave us Mary, His daughter, His mother, and His spouse as our intimate companion to help us come closer to one another as Her children, as She leads us ever closer to Jesus Her Son. May we confidently respond, as our Blessed Mother Mary did with a determined ‘Yes’ to all the Father asks of us, and thus become more like Jesus in Whose image Scripture tells us we are created. Let us all be open to the working of the Holy Spirit, first gift of the Resurrection, Whose descent upon the early Church gathered together with Mary in the Cenacle, we celebrate this year on the last Sunday of May. May the Holy Spirit inflame our hearts as He filled Our Mother Mary and all the first followers.
God bless and keep all of you safe; Our Lady and good St. Joseph guide, guard, and protect you; and may our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi and our Holy Mother St. Clare watch over each one of us, their Spiritual Children, with loving care.
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, O.F.M Cap.
Regional Spiritual Assistant
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on April 1st, 2023 April 2023
Wherever we are, in every place, at every hour, at every time of the day, every day and continually,
let all of us truly and humbly believe, hold in our heart and love, honor, adore, serve,
praise and bless, glorify and exalt, magnify and give thanks
to the Most High and Supreme Eternal God, Trinity and Unity,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
Creator of all, Savior of all who believe and hope in Him, and love Him, Who,
without beginning and end, is unchangeable, invisible, indescribable, ineffable,
incomprehensible, unfathomable, blessed, praiseworthy, glorious, exalted,
sublime, most high, gentle, lovable, delightful,
and totally desirable above all else for ever.
Amen.
(Prayer of Saint Francis taken from the Earlier Rule, chapter 23)
My Resurrected Jesus, my Lord and my God,
I join with all creation in celebrating the feast of Your victory over sin and death.
The light of the Resurrection gives meaning to all life.
Death and suffering no longer have the last word.
You have conquered all that darkens our lives and have introduced us to the New Day.
May the joy of the Resurrection fill the hearts of all whom you have redeemed in your Blood.
May Your Holy Spirit, first Gift of the Resurrection, be with us always,
that we may be renewed and filled with Life as we seek to be Heralds of the Great King
proclaiming Your Resurrection and New Life to all the world.
The Morning Sermon on Saint Francis
Preached at Paris, October 4, 1255
1
Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. These words from Saint Matthew’s Gospel were spoken by the greatest follower of Christ, Saint Francis, and they are taken from the gospel which is read on his feast day. – Carry the cross patiently, and in the end it will carry you.
2
But whether on the lips of Christ or Saint Francis, they are a short and succinct saying, which in concise and plain terms expresses the sum total of gospel perfection. – Kindness is loving people more than they deserve.
3
The saying is concise, so that nobody can claim ignorance of it because of scarcity of books, and plain, so that nobody may be excused from understanding it through lack of schooling. The saying has two parts: a preliminary statement and a word of instruction. The first is to encourage the hearers, the second to inspire them. – Trust in the Lord with all your heart.
4
To encourage us he says: Learn from me, and to inspire us he adds: for I am meek and humble of heart. In other words, be meek and humble like me. – To repent is one’s way of looking at life.
5
Learn from me . . . The words Learn from me have two meanings, both of which can give encouragement: Take me as your model of discipleship and embrace my teaching. Both can be applied to Saint Francis, the first on account of the life he led as a result of his conversion, the second because he attained perfection. – To repent is to take God’s point of view instead of my own.
6
The former made him a true disciple, and the latter an excellent teacher. Because of the life he embraced at his conversion, Saint Francis can say: Learn from me, that is, take me as your model of discipleship, for I am a true disciple. – Jesus will be Lord of my life if only I will let Him be.
7
The essence of true discipleship of Jesus Christ, which was singularly realized and shone in Saint Francis, consists first of all in separating oneself from the company of evil people, as Proverbs says: A friend of fools shall become like them. This is the meaning of those words about Christ that privately to his own disciples he explained everything where “privately” signifies well removed from wicked people and away from the crowds. This shows that the disciple of Christ must keep away from evil and divisive company. – The Gospels do not explain Easter. Easter explains the Gospels.
8
Realizing this, Saint Francis, under God’s inspiration, immediately left the company of the young people who had been his comrades in sin, for it was evil company. He also stopped associating with merchants, which was worldly company, and went off alone to a secluded place, knowing that Christ explained everything to his own disciples privately. – To be controlled by human nature results in death. To be controlled by the Spirit results in life and peace.
9
That is what anyone must do who desires to be a perfect disciple of Christ: he must withdraw from evil and worldly company. At the least one must withdraw from evil company, which the call to perfection demands, even if one has no desire to relinquish worldly company. – Lighthouses blow no horns; they only shine.
10
We are told of the Israelites: They mingled with the nations and learned to do as they did. They served their idols which became a snare to them. “The nations” in this text refer to those who lead an ungodly life and “to mingle with them” means to associate with them in such a way as of necessity to copy their evil ways. – It takes years to make an overnight success.
11
The Book of Sirach tells us: Whoever touches pitch will be defiled and whoever associates with a proud man will become like him. Proverbs advises us: Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare; and the Psalmist warns us: With the perverse you will be perverted. – That which you do not let go of you cannot possess; it possesses you.
12
Second, it is essential for true discipleship to free oneself from useless cares in the affairs of life. Anyone who is anxious about useless things cannot give attention to those that are profitable. As Saint Matthew’s Gospel says: the cares of the world and the delight in riches choke the word and it proves unfruitful. Thus it is recorded by Saint Luke: Whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. The Lord says this not because there is sin in having possessions, but because it is sinful to be anxiously concerned about them. – Our job is not to do something for the Church; it is to do something with the Church.
13
In any case, it is impossible, or at least very difficult, to have great possessions without being preoccupied with them. And so the Lord stipulates: Whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. Taking this to heart, Saint Francis on hearing God’s voice at once gave everything away to the extent that he did not even keep back a stitch to cover his nakedness. As in his heart he despised all possessions, so outwardly he gave away everything he had. This is what anyone must do who desires to be a perfect disciple of Christ: he must go, sell everything he has and give to the poor. – Sorrow looks back, worry looks around, faith looks up.
14
If one does not have the will to do that, one must at least keep oneself from the cares, anxieties, and vanities that go with possessions; otherwise, one will be a disciple, not of Christ, but of the devil. It is impossible to serve God and mammon at the same time. As it says in the First Epistle to Timothy: Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into many senseless and hurtful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. Not all learn the teaching of Christ; some learn to catch prey as Ezeckiel has it: She brought up one of her whelps; he became a young lion, and he learned to catch prey; he devoured men. – How else by through a broken heart may the lord Jesus Christ enter in?
15
Third, the true disciple must rid himself of inordinate attachments to his loved ones. As Saint Paul teaches, the sensual or unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, and Saint Luke records: If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. The Lord does not forbid us to love our father and mother, for the Decalogue commands that we honor them; what he does forbid is to be inordinately attached to our parents, because inordinate attachment rejects the teaching of Christ. – The effect of our sharing in the body and blood of Christ is to change us into what we receive.
16
Understanding this, Saint Francis, having broken the ties of natural attachment, he abandoned them completely. Anyone who desires to attain perfect discipleship of Christ must forget his father’s house and hate his own life, that is, his natural affections, in order to imitate Christ who gave his dear soul into the hands of her enemies. But if a man does not wish to hate or sacrifice natural affections for his parents altogether, he must at least sacrifice them in regard to women; otherwise, he will not be able to attain knowledge of the truth. – The goal of religion is not to get us into heaven, but to get heaven into us.
17
As Saint Paul writes to Timothy: For among them are those who make their way into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and swayed by various impulses who will listen to anybody and can never arrive at a knowledge of the truth. Fourth, the true disciple of Christ must purify his heart of all that militates against the practice of virtue. As the Book of Wisdom says: Wisdom will not enter a deceitful soul, nor dwell in a body enslaved to sin and as Isaiah admonishes: Cease to do evil, learn to do good. – World peace begins in each heart.
18
In other words, you will not be able to learn holiness from Christ unless you have resolved to eradicate its opposite, sinfulness, just as knowledge cannot be acquired unless satisfaction with its opposite, ignorance, has been uprooted. Acknowledging this, Saint Francis strove with constant sighs of sorrow to root out vice and sin totally from the field of his heart. Nor did he cease to lament up to the moment when he was found worthy to hear from God: Your sins are forgiven. – We find comfort among those who agree with us, and growth among those who do not.
19
In the same way, anyone who desires to be a perfect disciple of Christ, must every night drench his couch with weeping, just as Saint Francis did. If one cannot follow that advice which leads to perfection, then one must at least cease to do evil if one wishes to become Christ’s disciple. Therefore, anyone who does not resolve to abandon his evil ways cannot learn virtue, as Jeremiah reflects: Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? – The hand will not reach out for what the heart does not long for.
20
Then also you can do good who are accustomed to do evil. Here the Prophet is addressing those who from long habit have become stubborn in their malice so that it is well nigh impossible to root it out. They cannot learn virtue because they learned evil habits well enough in their youth. Saint Francis, then, can rightly say: Learn from me, that is, take me as your model of discipleship, for I am a true disciple of Christ. – Defeat may serve as well as victory to shake the soul and let the glory out.
21
Likewise he can say to us Learn from me in the second sense, namely, embrace my teaching, because by being a true disciple, he became an authentic teacher. There are four grounds on which he can address these words to us. First of all, he taught what he himself had learned without error because of the truth of God’s revelation. As Scripture tells us: God is true, and every man a liar. Therefore, the teaching which anyone receives from revelation cannot be other than true. – Rather than ask God to help you, ask God how you might help Him.
22
It is from having learned in this way that Saint Paul commends his teaching to the Galatians: For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through a revelation of Jesus Christ. Saint Francis learned his teaching in the same way. Indeed, one may well wonder at his teaching. How was he able to teach others what no human had taught him? Did he come by this knowledge of himself? – Treat people as if they were what they ought to be.
23
Be assured he did not. The evidence of that is found in the account of his life. When he was instructed by another human or had to prepare something himself, he had absolutely nothing to say. In that, however, he is more to be praised and wondered at than imitated. Hence it is not without reason that his sons attend the schools.- In prayer it is better to have a heart without words, than words without a heart.
24
To arrive at knowledge without a human teacher is not for everyone, but the privilege of a few. Though the Lord himself chose to teach Saint Paul and Saint Francis, it is his will that their disciples be taught by human teachers. – When you find yourself on the side of the majority it is time to pause and reflect.
25
Second, he taught what he had learned without guile due to his fervent love, which directs the whole heart to grasp what is being taught. Speaking of wisdom, Solomon glories that he himself learned in this way: I learned without guile and impart without grudging; I do not hide her wealth. – The only thing necessary for evil to triumph, is for good people to do nothing.
26
That is to say, as ardent love brought me to learn without guile, so it moves me to share without jealousy or grudging envy what I have learned. That is precisely how Saint Francis learned and taught. He so loved what he learned that he accounted wealth as nothing in comparison with that; gold as but little sand and silver as clay; he gave up all the wealth of his house and scorned it as nothing. – The more we depend on God, the more dependable we find God is.
27
He learned with such diligence that he became the teacher of many disciples whom he taught to think of the Lord with uprightness and seek him with sincerity of heart, because he is found by those who do not put him to the test, and manifests himself to those who do not distrust him. – The best mirror is a friend’s eyes.
28
He manifested himself to Saint Francis who, because he had learned without guile, shared what he had learned without envy. Third, he taught what he had learned without forgetting it, because he put it into practice being no hearer that forgets but a doer that acts, and because of that he was an excellent teacher. – Those who wish to transform the world must begin by transforming themselves.
29
On observing the commandments Saint Matthew records: He who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. Sirach praises this method of learning when he says: A man who has much experience knows many things, which he will think on with composure and without blame; and one who has learned many things will speak with understanding, because he did not acquire his knowledge by reflecting in general terms on a limited number of truths, but by individual experience over a wide range of life. – There is no saint without a past and no sinner without a future.
30
That is how Saint Francis learned, but by experiencing sufferings not joys. We can say of him what Saint Paul says of his own Teacher: He learned obedience through what he suffered. At the outset of his conversion Saint Francis experienced derision, beatings, fetters, imprisonment, destitution, nakedness, and adversity. Like Saint Paul he learned to be content in his sufferings: And because the teaching of a true disciple is recognized by his patience, Saint Francis is to be praised and imitated in his teaching and we should learn from him.- An empty meaningless faith may be worse than none.
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on April 1st, 2023 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
April 2023
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis,
The Lord give you His peace and lead you through the mystery of His Passion and Death to the joy of His Resurrection and our renewed Life in Jesus!
The ‘Way of the Cross’ cannot end on Calvary; it must go beyond. It goes beyond into the garden that received the dead body of Christ and, on the morning following the Sabbath, saw the mysterious and joyful encounter between Mary Magdalene and the Lord Jesus, risen and alive. The ‘way’ is precisely the direction to follow, the road that leads, the journey that carries to our ultimate goal. The tragic and triumphant ‘way’ of the Paschal Mystery takes us to a new life in, with, and through Jesus. The ‘way’ is a must for all who call Jesus ‘Lord and Savior’.
Our Seraphic Father not only loved the Crucified Jesus but was privileged to become a living image of the Crucified Savior and Redeemer. The ‘way’ was imprinted on his mortal flesh as an indication of what lay ahead for him who so lovingly sought to feel as far as possible in my soul and body, that pain which You, sweet Lord, endured in the hour of Your most bitter Passion … that I may feel in my heart as much as possible of that excess of love by which You, O Son of God, were inflamed to suffer so cruel a Passion for us sinners. (Fioretti: 3rd Consideration of the Sacred Stigmata) To accept, and even seek, pain for love’s sake is not masochistic or insane. It is the total surrender a person offers to become one with the beloved.
Our Father St. Francis of Assisi knew well that the Cross was the sign of the sublime humility and love of God for all creation. He was well aware that the stigmata he bore indicated the future glory pledged to all who accept the standard of Christ and follow His Way, Who is the Truth, as He leads to the fullness of Life, through His Resurrection. The ‘Way of the Cross’ finds its total significance, value, and effectiveness in the Resurrection. If Jesus had not risen, in vain would have been our faith, and we would remain in our sins, says St. Paul to the Christians at Corinth (cfr 1 Corinthians 15). If Jesus had not risen, His death would have been nothing more than the tragic defeat of just another ‘deluded messiah’. His memory would bear no other fruit than that of the nostalgic remembrance of a good person who helped others, was misunderstood, and was ultimately executed for political and religious subversion. Jesus Himself, the ‘wonder-working rabbi’, would thus be nothing else than a good teacher overcome by history and conquered by evil forces that forever remain superior and invincible to what is good.
In fact, there is no greater ‘subversive’, no greater ‘revolutionary’ than Jesus. His life, words, actions, and the witness of His Passion and Death hit at the very core of the human heart. He aimed at challenging His hearers to change from the very depths of their hearts and to come back to what they were constituted to be when God created human beings at the beginning of time, and Who took the initiative with Abraham promising that he would be the Father of many nations. God’s ‘subversive’ attempts aimed to reach and affect the very foundation, the core (let us remember that “core” means “heart”) of the matter. All aimed to turn people back to the Father’s Will. This is at the heart of the Gospel Message. True gospel subversive and revolutionary tactics are those that lead us into the depths of our hearts to regain our original ‘childlike innocence’ through God’s mercy. Is that not what is expected of us as Franciscans?! Penitents recognize what impedes achieving the goal and do all possible with the help of God to correct and redirect life to God.
The Gospel life, if lived personally and preached well by example, is an effective witness and ‘tool’ in changing the face of the earth. What happened?! Have we forgotten the power of the Gospel and the strength with which our fraternal life gifts us, so that together we may forge forward as sisters and brothers distinct yet one?! Perhaps we have stopped at the tomb, or remain closed in the Upper Room, as the disciples did immediately following the execution of Jesus. Each was closed in his own fears and doubts. We comfortably remain closed in and with ourselves, often for fear of being challenged to live what we profess. Yet, that is where the significance, value, and effectiveness of our professed lives as Franciscans is fulfilled. When the disciples saw the risen Lord, touched His wounds, and recognized their own brokenness, they became an encouragement and support for one another.
The Way of the Cross cannot stop at the tomb, even if within that tomb there seems to be life. Life hidden behind the stone sealed and guarded speaks nothing to the world. We must walk the entire road that Jesus traveled. It is the road that knows the pause and silence of that Sabbath after the excruciating sadness of Friday, but that explodes the next day into His glory. The glory of His Resurrection in our lives does not blind by its brilliance but brightens the darkness of difficulty and doubt. The glory of the Resurrection does not traumatize with fear and foreboding, but liberates the soul from doubt, the heart from anguish, and the mind from uncertainty. The glory of the Resurrection does not condemn the sinner with no place to turn, but rekindles hope and trust in the Father’s mercy and forgiveness. The glory of the Resurrection does not sentence to death, but makes all who accept the mystery sharers in the Life of God Himself! It enables them to be a life-giving presence for others!
Jesus rose as He had promised, nevertheless His own could not believe. Even the women, who loved Him so dearly, were on their way to the tomb to anoint the body, not to encounter the Lord alive. What response was given Him by His closest friends? None of the first followers expected to see Him alive again, notwithstanding His promises and assurances, and not even when some had seen and Jesus gave them the ‘appointment’ to meet Him in Galilee.
– Thomas…one of the Twelve…said to (the Apostles), ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe’ (John 21:24-25)… Pessimism and Disbelief
– The two disciples, speaking with Jesus whom they did not recognize as they journeyed on the road back to Emmaus from Jerusalem, said: We were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel … Some women from our group … reported that indeed they had seen a vision of angels … but him they did not see (Luke 24: 13-25)… Disillusionment and Discouragement
– When Mary of Magdala told the disciples she had seen the Risen Lord and that he was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe (Mark 16:11)… Cynicism and Skepticism
– Even when the disciples followed the command to go to Galilee where they would see Him before He ascended to the Father, When they saw Him, they worshiped, but they doubted (Matthew 28:16-17)… Hesitancy and Doubt
Thomas, Cleophas and his traveling companion, the Apostles after hearing Mary Magdalene, and many of the followers who saw Jesus on the Mount in Galilee at the Ascension, all had difficulties and even understandable doubts concerning the ‘impossibility’ of a person rising from the dead … of his own power! What a motley crew! Are we really any different? The power of the Holy Spirit had to shake the disciples free of fear, doubt, complacency, so they could see and believe. They loved and believed in Jesus, but it took an eternal power and a ‘real presence’ to lead them into the light of a new Life, rooted in a Person Who overcame execution on a cross and was alive, so they could believe Him in all things, even His resurrection! The death of Jesus sealed the Covenant God made with humanity; and humanity, in Christ, consummated the covenant, fulfilled the prophecies, and set free all who accepted the Gospel Message that God so loved the world that He sent His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might have eternal life. God did not send his Son to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him (John 3: 16-17).
The Resurrection was and still is hard for many to accept, among whom are also those who call themselves Christian! The condemnation and death sentence of Jesus inflicted a mortal wound on the hearts of His followers, as well as on those who still seek to understand and believe today. Their hearts and minds cannot as yet make the ‘quantum leap’ of faith into the certitude of the ways of God. Jesus sought to prepare the disciples for this momentous experience, and they still doubted.
The material world, the ‘here and now’, becomes the only security and ‘certitude’ some know. It is a world so obviously frail and prone to ruin either through natural causes or self destruction. The death of Jesus is a fact for some with seemingly no hope, no way out. These persons admire, revere and love Jesus, but they remain standing before the stone that seals the tomb and cannot go beyond the coldness of death. Their minds cannot understand, so their hearts refuse to believe, thus their lives wander through life without real direction and hope. How sad!
Suffering and pain are real! They cannot be rationalized away. We experience them often in life. The lives of some are in constant pain and continual suffering, whether spiritual, physical, psychological. Unless faith takes over and hope is kindled within their hearts, the love of God that conquers all things is the deepest desire of their heart but the furthest sensation they feel. Serenity and inner peace become just pious words and deep desires. They may hear words of encouragement, but they are overwhelmed by their own broken body and tired spirit. Even our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi went through moments like this, but he could pray Blessed are You Lord my God (Canticles of the Creatures). His feet were well-planted in the realities of life and his own physical and spiritual burdens, but his heart was one with His Lord alive and well. The human condition is common to all the children of God, saint and sinner alike. How we deal with the circumstances of life, how we allow the Paschal Mystery to affect our life, will determine the ‘way’ we will follow.
The Passion and Death of Jesus speaks to us of the extravagant and limitless love of God for all humanity. The Resurrection of Jesus gives meaning and encouragement to life. The Eucharist is the Real Presence of the Glorified and Risen Lord Who journeys with us at every moment. It re-presents the whole Paschal Mystery and offers us the opportunity to be with the Risen Lord, Whose Sacrifice we enter, celebrate, and with Whom we seek to become one in Holy Communion. The presence of Jesus transforms lives. His bodily presence on earth centuries ago gave Him the opportunity to raise people from the dead, to heal the sick, to give hope to the downtrodden and outcast, to reassure the marginalized, to care for the various needs of those whom He encountered. His sacramental presence raises and heals souls dead and/or weak through sin, speaks to the depths of the heart of those who listen for/to Him in the silence of their hearts, and strengthens us with the grace of His Body and Blood to accept the demands of life.
Faith in the living Lord helps us to realize we are not alone. We live and move and have our being with the Giver of all good gifts. He walks and works with and within us. His ‘Presence’ is truly ‘Real’. His is a ‘tangible presence’ that makes Himself felt according to our willingness to see with the eyes of the heart and not the head alone. The living presence of the Lord in the Eucharist urges us to see and believe as John and Peter, to touch and acknowledge as Thomas, to go and proclaim that Jesus is Lord as the disciples who had gathered on the Mount of Olives.
Without the ‘Way of the Cross’ we can never arrive at the Resurrection. Until we open our eyes and our hearts to see the brilliance and power of Jesus and hear and listen to the depth of His words, there is no way for us to enter the marvelous and mysterious reality of Christ Who lives today with us. Ultimately, if Christ is risen and lives today for me and with me, He is here in my personal life and in that of the whole world, just as He promised. How then can we hesitate to cooperate and collaborate with Christ who calls us to follow Him? Follow Him to encounter Him in His word, in His Sacrament, and in His sisters and brothers who have seen the Lord on ‘the way’. As we meet Jesus on the way in the Word, the Church and Her sacramental life, in our sisters and brothers, even more intensely in the poor, marginalized, alienated, and also especially our sisters and brothers in our Franciscan Family, may we be able to say with the disciples on the road to Emmaus: Were not our hearts burning within us while He spoke to us on the way? (Luke 24: 32) Filled with the Easter grace and joy of the One Who was dead and now lives, we can recount to others what has taken place on ‘the way’ we traveled, and deepen our unity and love for all in the breaking of the bread. (cfr. Luke 24: 32-35)
May the light of Christ’s Resurrection shine in us that we might have life, and have it in abundance (John 10:10). May the profession we made to God and one another be a true expression of our fraternal love that has its source in the Resurrection. May the Risen Lord Jesus shower you and your loved ones with peace, joy and abundant blessings for a Happy Easter. Mary, Mother of the Redeemer and our Mother, help you to live with Jesus in the light of the New Life His Resurrection offers us. Our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi and our holy mother St. Clare of Assisi watch over each one of us, their Spiritual Children, with loving care.
With a promise to keep all of you affectionately in my Easter Masses and Liturgies, I wish you and your dear ones a very Happy and Joyous Easter.
Alleluia! Christ is Risen! He is truly risen! Alleluia!
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, O.F.M. Cap.
Regional Spiritual Assistant
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on April 1st, 2023 What Has Gotten In Your Way?
God knows its not always easy to attend to our spiritual life but I had a very powerful reminder from Acts, Chapter 6.
It is not right for us to neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables.
That verse smacked me right in the face. Wasn’t that exactly what I was doing? Wasn’t I being the Martha and taking care of every detail before I sat at the feet of Jesus? Can you imagine having Jesus sitting in your living room and you are in the kitchen doing dishes? Mary chose the better part. She was right in the living room sitting with Jesus and listening to His every word.
We have chosen the better part, too. We have chosen to be Franciscans and with that choice comes obligations.
Our Franciscan Pledge tells us With God’s grace, we will participate as fully and as often as possible in the Mass, the Sacraments (especially Reconciliation), and the official prayer of the Church. We will spend a portion of time each day in personal prayer. And we will be involved in the monthly meeting as an act of worship and a building of community.
We will be involved in the monthly meeting…. There surely will be times when something interferes with your plans. But that should be the exception, not the rule. We have chosen the better part; not the easier part. Our obligation to our Franciscan Life comes before all the other things that get scheduled for a Sunday afternoon. Before other parish functions, before other organizations meetings,
I know I am preaching to the choir, because….you are present at your monthly gatherings. If all of our members made the effort, the rooms would be filled. We have chosen the better part. At our professions, we embraced the Franciscan Life, willingly. What has gotten in the way of that?
When God comes looking for you, do you want Him to find you in the kitchen doing dishes with Martha, or sitting at the feet of His Son?
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on March 3rd, 2023 March 2023
Our Father most holy: Our Creator, Redeemer, Consoler, and Savior…
You, Lord, are Supreme Good, the eternal Good, from Whom all good comes…
Holy be your Name…That You may rule in us through Your grace…
Your will be done…that we may love You…with our whole heart…soul…and mind…
Give us this day…Your own beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Forgive us…through Your ineffable mercy…and make us, Lord, forgive completely.
And lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil.
Amen
(Prayer Inspired by the Our Father – abbreviated)
(Tree of the Crucified)
Chapter Five
[The Angel of the Sixth Seal]
1
Let us return to the seraphic Francis, who received such authentication from the seraphic apparition of Jesus that we must regard him as “the angel of the sixth age.” For what John writes to the angel of Philadelphia, in the third chapter of the Apocalypse, befits him and his descendants. – Trust, like the soul, never returns once it is gone.
2
Now, Philadelphia is interpreted as “preserving steady attachment to the Lord.” Oh, how accurately this holy Order and its most holy father match this Philadelphia and its angel! – God is faithful. Serve Him faithfully.
3
For here is preserved the heritage of the life of Christ and a complete attachment to His cross. All that is said to the angel is most fittingly applied to Francis, although there is no time to expound everything. – Better to suffer wrong than to do it.
4
However, let us take his triumphant victory. It is said: He who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God; never shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name. – When a train goes through a tunnel and gets dark, you don’t throw away your ticket and get off. You sit still and trust the engineer.
5
When Jesus, here and elsewhere, speaks of “my God,” or says something similar, he is doing so on behalf of His humanity only, in which He is subject to the Father, to His own divine Person, and to the Holy Spirit, as to His God of whom He is the purest worshipper. – The one who trusts in himself gets lost.
6
It is in view of the prize given for the victory He speaks of, that He has in mind Francis as the one who proves victorious, for he is the celebrated victor of whom it is sung that “he overcomes the world and sin, having already conquered himself.” – Trust in God and you can do all things.
7
The text, therefore, refers to two things about that prize: the first is the victor, likened to a pillar, gaining access to the temple; the second is what is written on that pillar. – God is full of compassion and never fails to help those who trust in Him.
[The Mystical Temple of God]
8
The seraphic soul thus enters into God, after the manner of a pillar firm and straight that is brought in as one of the roof’s supports. Commonly it would be either round or quadrilateral, and is enclosed in the circular space around the inside of the temple. – It does not matter how long one lives, but how well.
9
If, however, temple was understood as a material church, then pillars would support and adorn the temple and stand in the middle of it. Francis, and any of his sons, too, stand in this manner in the holy Order and in the Church of God – The ultimate evil is to leave the company of the living before you die.
10
Just as they stand in their proper manner in the celestial court, where higher ranks are supportive of the lower, and their humble simplicity and simple spirituality relate to the lower, less united, more dispersed ranks, as the center to a circle’s circumference, or spirit to body. – Death is the golden key that opens the palace of eternity.
11
And the character of the temple shows this, in occupying a greater amount of space than a pillar. As the foundation of the Church on the first Apostles was in faith, so in these [later apostles] is the Church built up and her final perfect state of high contemplation underpinned. – Life levels all men; death reveals the eminent.
12
For this reason is it said in Francis’s regard: Never shall he go out of it. Neither apostasy nor any earthly preoccupation would draw him away from this temple which embraces the love of poverty most high, something he would never want to go out of by any means. – Death is the great adventure before which all other experiences pale in insignificance.
13
Now, regarding what the text says is inscribed on him, know that in a soul like his, three things are written. The first is the most lucid vision and delightful contemplation of the three Persons of the Divinity and of the beatific glory they enjoy together. – Live in such a way so that when you die even the undertaker will be sorry.
14
This is indicated by: I will write on him the name of my God. For this is how the glory of God enters the soul and makes it supremely happy; it is rejoicing over the happiness of God. – True holiness consists in doing God’s will with a smile.
15
The second inscription is a perfect affinity with all in God’s City and the company of the saints, whether on life’s journey or hereafter . . . Now this city is said to come down from God out of heaven; for the full gladness of the saints springs from the immensity of God, signified by heaven, although this be inferior to God, who is infinite. – May the outward and inward person be as one.
16
In another sense, it comes down from heaven through humility, not only with respect to God, but even with respect to its special place in heaven, from which it comes down, regarding itself as unworthy. – Do not try to be a person of success but rather one of value.
17
As it is here that the sixth status reform occurs, the new Jerusalem signifies this stage’s peaceful contemplation of God and its renovation of the world through a thorough disdain for worldly things; hence it is called new, a fresh gift given by God. And this City’s name can especially be said to be inscribed on Francis and on men like him, since with them all the renewal is inaugurated, established and sustained. – To be biblically holy is to face up to the totality of life, in the power of the Cross.
18
The third inscription is the contemplation of Christ in His humanity and as Redeemer and Mediator. This is indicated by and my own new name; called new, because of the unique existence of His humanity in a divine Person, and also because in Him and through Him consists the complete renewal of the elect. – The more we discover ourselves the way we truly are, the more we feel the need of God, and the more He reveals himself.
19
And notice how his name is mentioned lastly: this is to show the complete circuit of contemplation, descending from God into the City of the saints and returning in Christ Jesus, to rest in Him in an embrace of delight. – The glory of God is man alive, supremely in Christ.
20
Thus, is completed a glorious circle, starting out from God, moving through the saints, into the God-Man, the Holy of holies. Observe now how to the sixth status is given an extraordinarily clear knowledge of God and of his entire City, and an extraordinary opening into and knowledge of the work of our redemption and of Christ Jesus. – To know God and to live are one and the same thing.
21
But it is upon this blessed man, Francis, that the name of God the Father is written, because he is being made the spiritual father of a worldwide religious Order. The name of the new Jerusalem is also inscribed on him, his soul being made worthy, by the sweetness of love, to be called Christ’s spouse and gracious mother, bringing forth Jesus as offspring. – With God we should feel like a child in its mother’s arms.
22
Christ Jesus’ new name is inscribed on him, when the figure of the Crucified is carved, not only into his soul, but on his body. Thus, of all Christ’s members, among whom he holds primacy, he, by antonamasia, is called “anointed.” Of such it is said, Do not touch those I have anointed. – The Eucharist is the silence of God, weakness of God.
23
Observe also the orderly manner in which our text treats of the endowments given the holy father on this sacred mountain. The first is a complete conquest of the world and of himself. The second is a foundational initiation into a contemplation that is joyous, deep, and stable. – A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.
24
The third is the promised expansion of flawless descendants. The fourth is that splendid engraving of the wounds and name of Christ crucified. The first is referred to by He who conquers: he fully overcame himself and the world, as he fasted and prayed in this bleak and lonely place. The second is indicated by, I will make him a pillar . . . the name of my God: – Invite the Holy Spirit into your heart and into your home.
25
Francis was placed upon the firmest of rocks, as a new pillar in the temple of God—even bodily and quite literally, here on this sacred mountain. And in that sublime apparition of Christ he was wonderfully enlightened with a knowledge of God and was confirmed for ever in the state of unifying grace and poverty. – None can be eternally united who have not died for each other.
26
For this reason, we read, he felt happy at the gracious way Christ, in the form of the Seraph, looked upon him. He himself added that the One who appeared to him told him things which he would never reveal to anyone as long as he lived. – Man cannot break the laws of God, he can only break himself against them.
27
To be sure, these concerned great things of a prophetic nature which are not for full hearing by human ears. The third of the endowments is referred to in and the name of the city, etc. It was then he was promised that his Order would endure to the end of the world, and then also was revealed to him the death and resurrection of his Rule. – Jesus was himself the one convincing and permanent miracle.
28
And one astonishing thing came to my own ears, which with no brashness I aver, but in all seriousness shall recount for those sincerely interested. What I heard from the holy man Brother Conrad, and from several others who are trustworthy, was that the blessed Francis, after his glorification in heaven, revealed to the holy brother Leo—and to some others as well, they say—that in the apparition Christ foretold to him the tribulations his foundation and the Church would face, the rejection and corruption of his Rule, and how greatly upset the minds of spiritual men, and of those who came after them, would be at this universal assault on the Rule. – God will do nothing without man. If God works a miracle, he works it through man.
29
And that therefore, for their comforting and enlightenment He, Jesus, out of his extreme goodness, would raise him up again, in a glorified body, and cause him to appear visibly to those aforesaid children of his. The outcome of this is something that may be awaited with devotion, so long as it is not avowed with indiscretion. – The person who cannot wonder is a person who will not see.
30
However, this is where devotion is strongly supported by reasoned argument. For Francis was so remarkably like Christ Jesus in respect of His passion, that he might also, more than others, resemble Him in an anticipated resurrection. – Let each day and night not pass without recognizing with gratitude what the Lord has done.
31
Above all, His being raised would strengthen the fidelity and sincerity required for the gospel life, which He wished to renew in Francis. That gospel life suffered under an unregenerate Church, as shall be shown further on, in the same ways that the Person of Christ suffered under the Synagogue; and therefore, it would revive if Francis were raised again. – The road to heaven is made up of resolution made, broken, and renewed.
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on March 3rd, 2023 St. Katherine Drexel Regional Fraternity
Regional Spiritual Assistant
St. Francis Renewal Center
1901 Prior Road
Wilmington, Delaware 19809
tel: (302) 798-1454 fax: (302) 798-3360 website: skdsfo email: pppgusa@gmail.com
March 2023
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis,
May the Lord grant you peace!
Throughout his life, St. Francis regularly sought the solitude of forests, mountains, islands. His Canticle of the Creatures gives us an insight into his love and reverence for all creation as gift from the One Great Creator and Father. Nonetheless, often he would retire for weeks on end from this wonderful Theater of Redemption, away from ‘the world’, the people, and the circumstances that enveloped him each day. Why? If all is a gift and everything is so wonderful, why leave? If God is everywhere, why go as far away from ‘civilization’ as possible to be able to ‘touch God’?
Good, legitimate, enjoyable, and even necessary persons, places, and things – even religious things! – can ‘possess’ us so much that we can risk losing our God-centered perspective, and confuse our priorities. They become the end rather than the means to deepen a relationship with God Who is ‘the Other’. God is not His creation, yet God can be seen in all things, because He is My God and My All as St. Francis prayed.
The spirit immersed in God can often become distracted and even depleted of its inner strength by the constant barrages, cacophony, seductions, allurements of our society, and also from just frenetic running around ‘in four directions at once’ without taking time for healthy rest in the Lord. The various ‘lents’ that St. Francis practiced during the year responded to the canons of the Church for all Christians, or were devotional “Lents”, such “la Benedetta” from Epiphany for 40 days, and the “lent of St. Michael from the Assumption until the feast of St. Michael and all the angels. They were part of his own particular devotional life and spiritual needs. They afforded him the silence and solitude to ‘recharge’ his spirit, deepen his relationship with God, for Whom St. Francis believed himself to be the ‘Herald of the Great King’. They also helped to clarify his view of the world that surrounded him by viewing life from the perspective of God.
In solitude and silence our Seraphic Father sought to hear the voice of God Who spoke to him from the Cross of San Damiano more clearly. The voice from the Crucifix had entrusted him with a mission to rebuild My Church for as you can see it is falling into ruin. To fulfill this commission St. Francis understood he had to begin by ‘rebuilding’ himself. Like any edifice that needs revamping, remodeling, restoring, in order to be ultimately renewed, he had to check the structure, clean out the rubble, prop up and strengthen the tottering and fragile, fix the broken, discard the corroding that was affecting and infecting the rest of the healthy structure. Once this was done, he could begin the ‘job’ of rebuilding with quality updated strong material to make the structure solid and welcoming.
It is not always necessary to tear down to renew, particularly when the treasures of time and the human spirit are intimately involved and are vital components. When our faith foundation is solid and deep, the visible ‘structure’ of our lives will be strong and solid once revisions and repairs are completed. Thus, what others see after we have worked at ‘rebuilding’ the inner spiritual structure and ‘refinished and renewed’, the outer appearance will attract, welcome, and challenge others to do the same.
Initially, our Seraphic Father understood the voice from the Cross of San Damiano literally. He began rebuilding the physical structures of several of the churches of Assisi with stones and mortar. No doubt Francis’ merchant’s skills were able to eventually even get some of the townsfolk to help this affable eccentric in his ‘pro bono’ enterprise. Following this image, we too can speak of rebuilding the moral and spiritual structure of the Church. We begin with an evaluation and restructuring of our own personal church, the Temple of God each one of us has become through Baptism. St. Paul tells the Corinthians: Are you not aware that you are the Temple of God, and that the Holy Spirit dwells in you? For the Temple of God is holy, and you are that Temple. (1 Corinthians 3:16-23). The voice from the Cross of San Damiano and the forty days St. Francis spent on the island on Lake Trasimeno offer us some points of reflection as we enter the most solemn season of the Church Year, the Paschal Season (Lent-Easter-Pentecost). The ‘Penitents of Assisi’ as the first followers were called, were a prophetic presence among the people and within the Church calling the People of God to re-discover and uncover within themselves a new energy in God’s Spirit. They were encouraged to recognize a Presence that could transform their lives and restore harmony between them and all creation.
Ash Wednesday heralds the beginning of this sacred season, the “joyful” season of Lent. Lent encourages us through the imposition of ashes to remember that: You are dust and to dust you will return (look at everything in life from the perspective of eternity), and Repent and believe in the Gospel (give yourself over to God’s Will and live Jesus and His words). During these forty days we enter the Christian pilgrimage of faith and walk in the way of true conversion. We renew our commitment to rebuild and strengthen the Temple of God we are, making use of the ‘weapons’ our faith affords us.
Several days before the end of February, Ash Wednesday introduced us into the holy and joyful season of Lent. One of the opening prayers of the Eucharist for Ash Wednesday, we read these words: O God our Father, grant that your Christian people may begin this fast as a journey of true conversion, that the weapons of penance may make them victorious in the battle against the spirit of evil. (free translation) This prayer introduces the beginning of the Season of Lent, springtime of the Church Year. It offers a simple and effective process we can follow on the forty-day itinerary ahead of us. The prayer mentions: conversion, journey, battle, weapons, victory. We are also reminded of a constant ‘accusing’ presence on this journey through life, ‘the evil one’. The words are powerful and forceful. They speak of decisiveness and determination. Reflecting on them and acting on them can make Lent a spiritually beneficial time for all who acknowledge their value and seek to implement them.
The process applies to a person of reasonably good faith, who truly wants to do what is good and right, even when the human spirit seems to be weak, tired or even full of faults. Sincere awareness of our weaknesses leads to a desire and spirit of conversion, a ‘turning back’, to the intention of God in creating us and how we became when we were baptized – filled with sanctifying grace in God’s love. Acceptance of this basic need urges us to take the first step of a journey that lasts a lifetime. The journey is filled with pitfalls, detours, U-turns, and ‘full-steam-ahead’.
On this spiritual journey, just as in the experiences of everyday life, we encounter friend and foe, success and failure, joy and sorrow, virtue and vice, grace and sin. We are called to wage ‘war’ and do ‘battle’ against the enemies of our soul. We must first acknowledge and recognize them. Then we seek the “energy” of grace from God and the basic assistance God offers us through Sacred Scripture, the Church and Sacraments, Tradition, the Magisterium, the good and holy people we follow as our spiritual friends and guides, and one another. The weapons of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving keep our souls centered on the ultimate purpose of our existence – God! Thus, we are enlivened to confront the ‘evil one’ and the effects of his subtle and flagrant instigations in our daily lives
Prayer keeps our relationship with God strong, and makes us always aware that God is truly with us, and we with God.
Fasting places all things in right order and, so that our possessions, even the spiritual ones, do not possess us.
Almsgiving helps us to discern our wants from our needs, and helps us to be more aware of others and their gifts and needs. Thus, we realize our common bond as children of God.
The three suggestions help us to live the command: You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart – (Prayer), with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind – (Fasting), and your neighbor as yourself – (Almsgiving) (Luke 10: 27).
St. Francis often experienced his bouts with the ‘evil one’, sometimes directly, and more often, as with most of us, intensely through the temptations and allurements of the world around him or the ‘demons’ that lurk in the recesses of the innermost part of even saintly people. It is a given fact that the holier a person seeks to become, the more he/she will be assailed by the ‘spirit of evil’. When we feel assailed and worried that we are unable overcome the enemy, remember that there is only one God, and no one and nothing can equal God in any way, no matter how strong. Let us not forget the great Defender of God’s People, St. Michael whose name means Who like God? Who is like God?! No one but God Alone! It is the Evangelist St. John who encourages us on our journey. When the early Church was experiencing so many persecutions and, St. John reminded our sisters and brothers, and us today: Greater is the One within you, than the one who is in the world (1 John 4: 4). If He is within me (us), why fear what surrounds us?!
Blow the trumpet in Zion! Proclaim a fast, call an assembly; gather the people, notify the congregation; assemble the elders, gather the children and the infants at the breast; let the bridegroom quit his room, and the bride her chamber. Between the porch and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep, and say, ‘Spare, O Lord, your people, and make not your heritage a reproach…! Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is there God?’ (Joel 2:16-17) To avoid the devastation that an infestation of locusts was causing Israel, Joel calls the people to prayer and penance. From the terrible reality of the devastation of Israel to the great promise of the outpouring of the Spirit of the Lord, the people experience the blessings God offers them. I will pour out my Spirit upon all mankind. Your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions … I will work wonders in the heavens and on the earth … Then everyone will be rescued who calls on the name of the Lord… (Joel 3:1-5) God is shown as both vindicator of His people and the source of all their blessings. Lent is the time for us to re-confirm our Covenant with God in the Passion-Death-Resurrection of Jesus.
Our need and desire for personal conversion compel us to take the first of many steps on a journey on which we encounter friends and foes of our spiritual lives who must be embraced in love or fought in a spiritual battle with the weapons of faith (prayer), hope (letting go and trusting in providence to fulfill our needs), and charity/love (disarming our hearts to others as we seek to assist them however possible). Once we have embarked on this journey, guided by the Spirit of God, following in the footsteps of Jesus, there is nothing less to expect than Victory!
Yes! We are victors in the Victim! We walk the road of the Cross. Though there are many difficulties we must overcome, our victory is basically a victory over ourselves. We overcome that part of ourselves that hesitates or refuses to let the Holy Spirit work in and through us. The journey of Lent leads to a victory so often misunderstood. It is a victory whose trophy is a blood-stained Cross and a mangled, tortured, derided Person, executed as a common criminal Whose crime was truth, compassion, and love. The paradox of the Cross is the glory of the Christian. The sign of contradiction becomes our sign of commitment. We commit to Life through death to ourselves, so that it is no longer I who live but Christ Who lives in me (Galatians 2: 20). Jesus Himself said, when I am lifted up, I will call all people to myself (John 12: 32). Eventually, at the end of our Lenten journey we come to the foot of the Cross, not as vanquished victims, but as conquering victors who bear the brandmarks of Jesus in my body, therefore let no one bother me (Galatians 6:17).
Let us strive to do good and become better as we enter the Season of Renewal. To do what is good is to do what is of God. To do what is good is to strive to be good. To be good is to live in God’s grace. To live in God’s grace is to have begun our heaven on earth. Lent is the beginning of our journey from Ashes to Palms, leading us from Palms to Calvary. From Calvary we move on to the empty tomb. The empty tomb, reminds us that St. John arrived at the empty tomb and bear the brandmarks of Jesus in my body, therefore let no one bother me and ultimately rejoice in the Empty Tomb that introduces us to the fullness of Life. Lent is not a time for slackers. In the words of one of our Capuchin saints: You don’t go to heaven in a taxi! Let us be serious about our ‘return to the future’, a phrase taken from the title of a movie that reminds us we are called not to be someone else in the future but to be who we were created to be from all eternity. Thus, we must recapture and grow in the image of God and Christ in whom we were created, that the future prepared for us may be assured.
As Spiritual Children of our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi, let us not forget that in the beginning we were called the ‘Penitents of Assisi’. Let the true spirit of penance take hold of us this Lent. We are called to reflect, reform, renew our lives that we may re-establish a deeper relationship with God and all creation. Like Advent, Lent is a Season of joy-filled expectations. We live in the reality of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus. Lent is not a sad time of regrets, and penitential practices for the past. It is a joyful season of ‘reconstruction’ and rebirth for all who seriously take advantage of the spiritual opportunities available. At the end of this brief yearly journey of renewal, the ‘edifice of the Spirit’, ‘the Temple of God’ we are ‘comes alive’ in the Resurrection of Christ Jesus.
May God bless you; may Our Lady and good St. Joseph guide, guard, and protect you; and may our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi and our Holy Mother St. Clare, watch over each one of you with loving care.
Happy Lent!
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, O.F.M. Cap.
Regional Spiritual Assistant
Posted By Kate Kleinert, on February 1st, 2023 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
February 2023
Dear Sisters and Brothers in St. Francis,
The Lord give you peace!
At the beginning of the month dedicated to the Hidden Life of Jesus we celebrate the Feast of the Presentation of Jesus and the Purification of Mary in the Temple. The spirit of this occurrence is capsulated in the words of Simeon to Mary and Joseph: This Child is destined for the rise and fall of many in Israel, a sign that will be opposed; and to Mary he says, and your soul also a sword shall pierce, so that the hearts of many may be laid bare (cfr. Luke 2: 22-40). Simeon “sees” the faith of Israel fulfilled in this infant. His words of prayerful praise and gratitude envelop the Mother and Child in a prophecy that has begun its course to involve all creation. His personal experience of God’s goodness to him urges Simeon to touch the lives of others in prophecy and praise. Anna also cannot contain within herself the joy she experienced when she beheld the Infant Jesus. She too shared her encounter with God with all whom she met.
The adoring parents are reminded that the humility of the Incarnation and Birth must eventually lead to the selfless Love of the Cross if this Child is to fulfill His purpose for entering our human history. The life of Jesus, from the hovel of Bethlehem to the hill of Calvary, always has the Cross as a constant and faithful companion. The wood of the Crib that enfolds Him securely foreshadows the wood of the Cross that will hold him up securely for the world to behold. So that when I am lifted up, then I will draw all people to Myself (John 12:32). The intimacy of the moment between the elderly “watchers” and the young parents inevitably leads Simeon and Anna to prophesy, Mary and Joseph to reflect and respond, and the Infant Jesus to continue to be the humble sublimity and the sublime humility (words of St. Francis of Assisi) of the God of Israel. He has already begun to change the course of time and fulfill the hopes of the faith-filled “watchers”.
Scripture says that He grew in size and strength, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon Him (Luke, 2: 40). Jesus lived in eager anticipation of the fulfillment of the Father’s Will. Jesus’ ever-present intimacy and oneness with the immensity of God, His Father, did not keep Him in an ecstasy of a “glorious-do-nothing”. The years, months, weeks and days had begun to lead to that most solemn moment of His life, acceptance of the Cross. The instrument of our salvation, was also the altar of that profound and most Solemn Eucharist where Christ was and still is Priest and Victim. We are victors with the Victim when we accept to live in the revealing light of the shadow of His Cross.
We share in the saving effects of the Passion-Death-Resurrection of Jesus, and accept the “gift” of the Cross with gratitude and availability. The Cross thus becomes a symbol of our life immersed in God, and in God with all humanity. The vertical beam reminds us of our relationship through faith and prayer with God. We raise our hearts and minds to the One from Whom all creation comes, and with Whom we are called to live eternally – Faith. The horizontal beam reminds us of our common bond with all who share life with us and with whom we have a particular relationship as children of the One great God and All-providing Creator – Hope. The point where the two meet and find balance forms the Cross on which Christ hung – Love. There He calls us to Himself and reminds us that There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (John 15:13). Thus, unless our relationship with God spreads to encourage us to touch others with the love we have received from God, through Christ in the Spirit, our prayer is only partially effective, and bears little fruit.
God’s goodness bestowed on us encourages us to offer this gift to others. Here is where the balance of the two beams is found and there, in the middle, is Jesus. Gratitude and availability of this type do not come quickly or easily. Human nature seeks to evade and/or avoid anything that challenges us to go beyond the natural tendencies for survival and pleasure. Just think how people seek to beautify their bodies for a short span of years, and will undergo dangerous surgery, questionable drugs, or painful, lengthy, stressful aerobic programs, oftentimes engaging costly “qualified trainers”. The timeless competition between time and eternity are ever challenging us for undivided attention.
On the other hand, when it comes to our spiritual life, the health of our souls, and our growth in grace, we look for ways to cut corners. We even call the traditional centuries-old proven practices “old-fashioned”, “outdated”, “no longer of relevance to a modern and intellectually advanced society”, such as we deem ourselves to be. For a Christian, there seems to be something intrinsically wrong with this kind of reasoning. Since every person coming into this world is a totally new creation of God’s infinite love. No two persons are ever exactly alike. What a wonderful interchange and exchange of God-given gifts life could be! The Canticle of the Creatures of our Seraphic Father could be a wonderful prayer to reflect upon as it speaks of the beauty and harmony found in all creation. Special mention is the praise to God for those who forgive, and for Sister Death from whom no one can escape (from the Canticle of the Creatures of St. Francis of Assisi). Both forgiveness and relinquishment humbly offer the gift of oneself in loving acknowledgment of personal fault towards another and loving acceptance in all things “to let go and let God”. Everything and everyone tells of the wonders of God. We find the “message and messenger” at the juncture of the two beams of the Cross with the Crucified.
Life is full of experiences and encounters that ultimately are determining factors in a person’s disposition, character, direction in life, and, more often than not, the ultimate choice for eternity the person has decided to take. Every child born has: eyes to see, ears to hear, mouth to speak, hands to touch, feet to walk, mind to think, and heart to extend itself. What determines the course of that life is: On what do those eyes gaze? To what do those ears listen? What words emanate from the mouth as an expression of what the mind thinks and the heart desires? How and to whom do those hands reach out? Where do those feet go? What thoughts are harbored and fostered in the mind? And, whom, what and how does the heart love?
Children of the Poverello of Assisi, we continue to strive to grow into a holiness and integrity that only God’s grace can produce. How can we accomplish this task? It is a lifelong daily journey. We are similar to a piece of marble in the hands of the sculptor, or cloth in the hands of a tailor, or plant in the hands of the gardener. We allow ourselves to be chiseled into a work of art, cut, shaped and put together into the proper garment suited to us, and nurtured and nourished in order to grow into the new life we were created to be. It is through our senses that our life becomes truly a continual act of adoration. We adore the Source and Ultimate Goal of life, God! The experience transforms as it challenges. The Apostle Saint John tells us: This is what we proclaim to you: what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked upon and our hands have touched … What we have seen and heard we proclaim to you so that you may share this life with us (1 John 1:1-3). You can note the excitement in his words, reliving, after many years, the freshness of his encounter with Jesus. Jesus was always here and now with John! Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13: 8). What about us?
Through nature we “feel” God as we adore Him in all we do. We concretize our experience in our response to one another. Sharing with others we are always being “tweaked”, transformed. Here is the reason we must daily live our Franciscan lives, not just at meetings and special gatherings. We are a leaven! Our lives must be guided by the Gospel, the Magisterium of the Church, and the Rule and Constitutions we have promised to live. Be true apostles! We cannot be closed in on ourselves. The Franciscan fraternity is not a small closed orchard. It is not a little garden to be jealously protected. Give! Share the fruits the Lord has given you! Be generous with everybody. Extend the “vehemence” of love to all with the spiritual gifts and their fruits concretized in our corporal and spiritual acts of mercy. Love can never be diminished of itself. Spread it everywhere you go.
Prayer is the unique strength of all good souls, it moves the world, renews consciences, sustains the (sick and infirm), comforts the suffering, heals the sick, sanctifies labor, raises up, gives moral strength and Christian resignation to human suffering, it overflows with the smile and blessing of God on all sluggishness and weakness (Padre Pio 5 May 1966). Pray! But more, as was said of St. Francis, “become prayer” in all you are and do. Prayer is an action that can change the world itself!
Prayer is a strength and leaven that transforms those who pray with their heart and life. True prayer is never a personal static experience but one that of its very nature throws open the heart of the one who prays to allow all to enter into an embrace of universal brother/sisterhood. Pray with God’s Holy Word, particularly the Gospels where Jesus speaks to us with His life. Let the Word enflesh Himself, as it were, in your lives ever more deeply, so that it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20). Let the Word be the strength and source of your prayer and God’s transforming grace within you.
We will enter the holy and joyful season of Lent the end of this month. Prayer, penance and almsgiving are the recommended essential elements that make for a fruitful Lenten experience. When prayer is true, sincere, and complete, the other elements are never missing. Our Father’s love redeems us in Jesus through the Spirit. God’s love encourages us to work daily towards an ongoing change of mind and urges us to open our heart to others: prayer (God relationship), penance (metanoia ongoing change of heart), almsgiving (sharing God’s gifts received with others). Here is a workable and actually quite simple program for celebrating the forty day pilgrimage from ashes to the empty tomb.
May God bless you; Our Lady and good St. Joseph guide, guard, and protect you; and our Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi and our holy mother St. Clare intercede for you and your loved ones, with loving care.
Peace and Blessings
Fr. Francis A. Sariego, O.F.M. Cap.
Regional Spiritual Assistant
|
|
Comments are closed 
