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

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THE WRITINGS OF ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI sins, if they will have made the sacrifices necessary to observe humbly and faithfully the penance enjoined upon them. · If indeed they could not find a priest, 423 let them confess to their brother, as the Apostle James says: "Confess your sins to one another" (Jm 5:16). · Nevertheless let them not on account of this leave off having recourse to a priest, because the power of binding and loosing has been conceded to priests alone. 424 · And thus contrite and having confessed, let them receive the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ with great humility and veneration, remembering that the Lord said: "He who eats" My Flesh "and drinks" My Blood "has eternal life" (cf. Jn 6:54); · and: "Do this in My commemoration" (Lk 22:19). Chapter XXI On the praise and exhortation, which all friars can give And this, or such an exhortation and praise, all my friars can announce whenever it will have pleased them, among whatever men, with the blessing of God: · Fear and honor, praise and bless, "give thanks" (1 Th 5:18) and adore the Lord God Omnipotent in Trinity and Unity, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Creator of all. · Do penance (cf. Mt 3:2), produce fruits worthy of penance (cf. Lk 3:8), because soon we will die. · "Give and it shall be given unto you" (Lk 6:38). · "Forgive" and it shall be forgiven you (cf. Lk 6:37). · And "if you would not forgive men their sins" (Mt 6:14), the Lord shall not "forgive you your sins" (Mk 11:25); "confess" all "your sins" (cf. Jm 5:16). · Blessed are they who die in penance, because they shall be in the Kingdom of Heaven. · Woe to those who do not die in penance, because they shall be "the sons of the devil" (1 Jn 3:10), whose works they do (cf. Jn 8:41) and they shall go "into the eternal fire" (Mt 18:8; 25:41). · Beware of and abstain from every evil and persevere in good until the end. 425 Chapter XXII On the admonition of the friars Let all of us friars attend to what the Lord says: "Love (dilectio) your enemies" and "do good to those who hate you" (cf. Mt 5:44), · because Our Lord Jesus Christ, whose footsteps we must follow (cf. 1 Pt 2:21), called His traitor 'friend' (cf. Mt 26:50) and He offered Himself willingly to His crucifiers. · Therefore our friends are all those who unjustly bring upon us tribulations and difficulties, shame and injuries, pains and torments, martyrdom and death; · whom we ought to love greatly, because from this which they bring upon us, we have eternal life. 426 from any doubt." 423 St. Francis prescribes this humiliation to help dispose the friar to receive the extraordinary grace of a perfect contrition, which with a firm desire to receive the Sacrament of confession as soon as possible, can obtain the forgiveness of even mortal sins; concerning this final quote from the Apostle, see Peter Lombard, Sent. IV, dist. XVII, ch. IV: Quaracchi ed. (1916), p. 853. 424 cf. Mt 16:18-19; Jn 20:21-23; 2 Cor 5:18-19, as well as the Council of Trent, Denzinger 670, 753, 920. 425 On this final phrase, see fn. 84. 426 cf. Adm IX. Page - 96
THE WRITINGS OF ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI And let us hold our body in hatred 427 together with its vices and sins; because by carnal living the devil wants to bear off from us the love (amor) of Jesus Christ and eternal life and to destroy himself in Hell together with everyone; · because 428 we through our own fault are stinking, wretched and opposed 429 to good, but prompt and willing to evils, because, as the Lord says in the Gospel: · From the heart proceeds and goes forth wicked thoughts, adulteries, fornications, homicides, thefts, avarice, iniquities, grief, incontinence, an evil eye, false testimonies, blasphemies, foolishness (cf. Mk 7:21; Mt 15:19). · "All these evils proceed" from inside the heart of a man (cf. Mk 7:23) 430 and "it is these, which completely befoul a man" (Mt 15:20). Now however, after we have abandoned the world, 431 we have nothing else to do, except to follow the Will of the Lord and to please Him ourselves. · Let us beware much, lest we be as the ground along the road or (as) the rocky or thorny (ground), according to what the Lord says in the Gospel: · "The seed is the word of God" (Lk 8:11). · That which however "fell along the road and was trampled upon" (cf. Lk 8:5), "are those who hear" (Lk 8:12) "the word and do not" understand it (cf. Mt 13:19); · and "very hastily" (Mk 4:15) "the devil comes" (Lk 8:12) "and snatches" (Mt 13:19), "what was sown in their hearts" (Mk 4:15) and "takes the word from their" hearts, "lest believing they be saved" (Lk 8:12). · That which "however fell upon rocky (ground)" (cf. Mt 13:20), "are those, who when they have heard the word, immediately with joy" (Mk 4:16) "receive" (Lk 8:13) "it" (Mk 4:16). · "However when tribulation and persecution arise on account of the word, they are at once scandalized" (Mt 13:21) and these have no root in themselves, "but last only for a time" (cf. Mk 4:17), because "they believe for a time and in the time of temptation they retreat" (Lk 8:13). · "However that which fell upon thorns, are those" (Lk 8:14) "who hear the word of God" (cf. Mk 4:18), "and the solicitude" (Mt 13:22) and "hardships" (Mk 4:19) "of this age and the deceit of riches" (Mt 13:22) "and the concupiscence concerning (what they) left behind, entering in, suffocates the word and" makes it "without fruit" (Mk 4:19). · "However that which upon good ground" (Lk 8:15), "was sown" (Mt 13:23) "are those, who hearing the word in a good and perfect heart" (Lk 8:15) understand it and (cf. Mt 13:23) "retain it and bring forth fruit in patience" (Lk 8:15). · And on that account let us friars, as the Lord says, leave "the dead to bury the dead" (Mt 8:22). And let us greatly beware of the wickedness and subtlety of Satan, who wants, that man not keep his mind or heart on God. 432 · And going around he desires to seize the heart of man under the appearance of some wage or aid and to suffocate the word and precepts of the Lord from his memory and wanting to completely blind the heart of man by means of secular affairs and worry and to dwell in him, as the Lord says: · "When an unclean spirit has gone forth from a man, it walks through arid" (Mt 12:43) "and dry places seeking rest; and not finding it, it says: · I will go back to my house, whence I have come forth" (Lk 11:24). · "And coming it finds it empty, cleaned with a broom and decorated" (Mt 12:44). · "And it goes about and it calls in" seven other "spirits worse than itself, and having entered they dwell in him, and the last state of 427 For this idiom see fn. 100. 428 Here St. Francis returns to the reason why "one should hold his body in hatred." 429 By vice an individual is indisposed to receive and cooperate with God's graces. 430 K. Esser's text has Mk 7:73, incorrectly, at this point; cf. op.cit., p. 503. 431 St. Francis uses "world" here in the geographic sense, to emphasize that the religious should have his heart set on God, who transcends time and space; cf. fn. 145. 432 cf. the subsequent elaboration of this common theme in religious discipline, St. John of the Cross' "The Precautions," and "Counsels to a Religious on how to reach Perfection." Page - 97
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