The Writings of St. Francis of Assisi - + Saints' Works

THE WRITINGS OF ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI
listened intently to the priest, as he read the Gospel: "Take nothing with you on the way, neither
gold, nor silver...". After Mass St. Francis asked the priest to explain the meaning of this reading.
Thereupon the cleric described to him the life Christ taught to the Apostles. At this St. Francis
exclaimed, "This is what I want; this is what I long for with all my heart!"
From that day St. Francis began living simply and literally the religious life which Christ
taught in the Gospel. Soon devout Catholic men joined him and they began preaching penance to
the people throughout central Italy, France, Spain, Germany, England, Palestine, and Hungary.
He himself went on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela during these early years. And later in
1219 A.D., moved by a desire for martyrdom, St. Francis journeyed to accompany the soldiers of
the Fifth Crusade (1218-1221 A.D.) at Damietta, Egypt. On his return, he did much to improve
the discipline of his fledgling order, and in 1223 A.D. retired to the hermitage of Fonte Colombo,
in Italy, to write the Rule of the Friars Minor.
St. Francis is particularly noted for the extraordinary and singular grace which Jesus
Christ gave him on the morning of September 14, 1224 A.D., while he was at prayer on Mt.
Alverna, in Italy. He saw a Seraph come down from Heaven, bearing the Image of the Crucified,
from the five wounds of which beams of light shone forth upon his own hands and feet and side.
It was then he received the stigmata, which bled profusely for the next three years of his life. Of
this extraordinary gift, St. John of the Cross, the Carmelite Doctor of the Church, writes in the
second redaction of the Living Flame of Love (1586-91 A.D.):
Let us return to the work of the Seraphim, for he truly inflicts a sore and wounds
inwardly in the spirit. Thus, if God sometimes permits an effect to extend to the
bodily senses in the fashion in which it existed interiorly, the wound and sore
appears outwardly, as happened when the Seraphim wounded St. Francis. When
the soul is wounded with love by the Five Wounds (of Christ), the effect extends
to the body and these Wounds are impressed on the body and it is wounded, just
as the soul is wounded with love. God usually does not bestow a favor upon the
body without bestowing it first and principally upon the soul. Thus the greater the
delight and strength of love the wound produces in the soul, so much the greater is
that produced by the wound outside on the body, and when there is an increase in
one there is an increase in the other. ( II,13)
St. Francis passed to his eternal reward on Saturday, October 3, 1226 A.D., during the
recitation of Vespers. Both in life and death he worked a great number of miracles, especially for
the infirm and those overcome by sudden disasters.
In his short life St. Francis founded three religious orders: one for religious brothers and
priests, the Order of Friars Minor; one for religious women, the Poor Clares; one for lay men and
women who wished to sanctify their daily lives in a spirit of Christian poverty and prayer, the
Third Order. In his own day more than 5,000 men had joined the Friars Minor. Today the
number of men who observe St. Francis' Rule numbers over 35,000; the number of Poor Clares
is over 1,000; and the number of laymen and women in his Third Order is well over 1,000,000.
St. Francis also was responsible for introducing and fostering many devotions and
practices that have characterized Roman Catholicism for the last 800 years: Eucharistic
Adoration, devotion to the Immaculate Virgin Mary, the Christmas crèche and Christmas carols,
devotion to Christ's Passion, public preaching, and the promotion of the life of devotion and
good works among the laity.
The Popes have made St. Francis patron of Catholic Action, of Italy and of the
Page - 5