| Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Saint Francis of Assisi |
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| Saints: Francis of Assisi |
Francis of Assisi (1181–1226), confessor, founder of the Franciscan Order. Born the son of a wealthy cloth-merchant of Assisi, Francis was originally christened John, but called Francesco, i.e. the Frenchman, because his mother was Provençal and he was born while his father was in France. As a youth he assisted his father in running his business, but was also a leader of society in the town. In a war between Assisi and Perugia Francis was taken prisoner for a year and was seriously ill. Soon after, riding fully equipped, he turned back from the war, risking the accusation of cowardice. Already his regard for the poor and for lepers was conspicuous. A little later he heard a voice which seemed to come from the Byzantine-style crucifix in the small, semi-derelict church of San Damiano of Assisi: ‘Go and repair my house, which you see is falling down.’ Francis set about the task, having sold some of his father's cloth to pay for the materials. This led to a prolonged conflict with his father which was only resolved when Francis dramatically renounced his inheritance and even his clothes. The bishop of Assisi provided him with simple garments and Francis began his new life.
The inspiration of this was religious, not social; the object of his quest the Crucified Christ rather than Lady Poverty, to whom he later declared himself espoused, following the vocabulary of courtly love. Nevertheless, he did now experience extreme and deliberately chosen poverty. He rebuilt San Damiano with money begged from his townsmen; he also travelled as a pilgrim, identifying himself with the penniless and tending those who suffered from ‘leprosy’ (as then understood). For two or three years he lived alone, wandering and mendicant. Later seven disciples gathered round him, some of them mature, middle-aged men; together they lived a communal life at the Portiuncula in Assisi near a leper colony. When the appropriate time had come they went out on preaching tours, meeting a mixed reception which gradually became more favourable, especially for Francis himself. One of the things which distinguished them from other bands of Italian poor preachers of the time was their respect for, and obedience to, the Church authorities, and their doctrinal orthodoxy. Francis's Regula Prima (c.1210) begins with a promise of obedience and reverence to the Pope and his successors; most of it is a gloss on the passages of the Gospels which refer to renunciation and to the conditions of life of the followers of Christ, but it continues: ‘all the brothers shall be catholic and live and speak as catholics. If any shall err from the catholic faith and life either by word or deed and shall not mend his way, let him be expelled from the brotherhood.’ This primitive Rule was approved at Rome in 1210. Later the apostolate increased in size and extent; Francis's sermons received popular acclaim. When the preaching tours were finished, the brethren would return to their convent and perform liturgical and private prayer, living in the poverty of labourers, supplemented, when necessary, by begging. Their buildings were simple wattle and daub huts; their churches modest and small; they slept on the ground, had no tables or chairs, and very few books. Only later did they become an Order whose theologians won fame in the Universities. Bonaventure both exemplified and approved this development.
Francis had longed for a wider field of preaching and looked towards the conversion of the Saracens. In 1212 he set off eastwards, but was driven on to the Dalmatian coast. In 1214 he left for Morocco through Spain but became so ill he had to return home. In 1219, with a dozen friars, he sailed from Ancona for Acre and Damietta. Here his illusions about Crusaders were rudely shattered: he denounced the loose-living adventurers, 6, 000 of whom were killed in an attack on the city. Somehow or other Francis passed through the enemy lines and met the Sultan who was deeply impressed but remained unconverted. Francis refused all the rich presents offered and returned to the Christian armies. He then spent a few months on pilgrimage in the Holy Land, until he was recalled urgently by news of changes which had taken place in the Order he had founded.
This had suffered from its own success. The numbers had become large, foundations had been made outside Italy, there was no proper novitiate, no organization, and only the simplest of rules. Their protector, Cardinal Ugolino, wished the whole Church to benefit from their ideals and example, and even for some friars to become bishops. He wished the Order (now 5, 000 strong) to become a well organized body devoted to reform. Francis, having upbraided his friars at Bologna who were living in a stone house and were planning to open a school connected with the University, resigned his office of Minister-General at the General Chapter of 1220, realizing that he was not the administrator or organizer which the Order now needed. He was succeeded by Brother Elias of Cortona. In 1221 Francis drew up another Rule; after certain modifications it was approved in 1223 as the Regula Bullata by Honorius III. This now canalized the Franciscan Order into the Church, but contained concessions which Francis regretted but could not effectively resist. In 1221 he also drew up instructions for ‘Tertiaries’, laymen who followed Franciscan ideals but remained with their families, outside the life of the vows of religion.
To his later years, while he held no official position in the Order, belong some of the most famous incidents of Francis's life: the inauguration of the Christmas crib at Grecchio, prepared by friar John, at which Francis, a deacon until his death, read the Gospel with such devotion that men wept; the canticle of the Sun (1224), written when he visited Clare at Assisi in conditions of extreme illness and discomfort; above all, the experience of the Impression of the Stigmata on Mount La Verna (also in 1224). The scars of these wounds, received in ecstasy, remained on his body, hidden until death. Soon after this experience, he fell ill and the next year became blind. He endured agonies from primitive surgery and other medical treatment and died at last, aged only forty-five, at the Portiuncula, Assisi. He was canonized in 1228 by his old friend Gregory IX, formerly Cardinal Ugolino. Francis was buried in the church of S. Giorgio, Assisi; his relics were translated to the New Basilica, built by Elias to contain them in 1230 and later decorated with Giotto's frescoes. They were rediscovered in 1818 and reburied, first in an ornate tomb, and then, in 1932, in a very simple one. Assisi is a pilgrimage centre for Franciscan devotees from all over the world.
Francis's close rapport with the animal creation, based on episodes in the Fioretti, has often inspired artists. His preaching to the birds was and is a favourite scene from his life. The wolf of Gubbio, tamed by Francis's words, was apparently buried in the church there. This affinity, believed to represent the saint's return to a state of innocence enjoyed by Adam in Eden, is not unique to Francis (examples are found in Lives of several English and Irish saints). They rightly emphasize his consideration for, and sense of identity with, all elements of the physical universe, as seen in his Canticle of the Sun. It is this which makes him an apt patron of natural conservation.
Francis has always had a widespread cult, fostered in the Middle Ages by the early Lives and Legends. These reflect the conflicts within his Order about the inter-pretation of episodes in his life and about poverty. His friars came to England in 1224. They soon established houses in the principal towns, supported by, and recruited from, the merchant class to which Francis had belonged and whose way of life he had rejected. Within 100 years they established fifty houses with 1, 350 friars. They were a powerful influence for reform and exercised a unique apostolate in towns, universities, and through missions in parishes. Later this was partly marred by internal divisions concerning poverty and by quarrels with the diocesan clergy.
The 20th century witnessed a wide-spread revival of interest in Francis, but also a tendency to see in him only those traits which appealed to individual writers (or film-makers). This resulted in caricatures of a sentimental nature-lover or a hippy ‘drop-out’ from society, which omit the real sternness of his character and neglect his all-pervasive love of God and identification with Christ's sufferings, which alone make sense of his life. Francis, depicted in life by Cimabue and other artists, is one of the most attractive and best-loved saints of all time.
Two ancient and many modern English churches are dedicated to him; his feast is in the calendars of York and Hereford. Feast: 4 October; Impression of the Stigmata, 17 September.
Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.
| The Religion Book: Francis of Assisi |
It makes for a wonderful story. Young man returns home from the Crusades a changed man; becomes disillusioned with his father's materialism and exploitation of workers; throws away his privilege and walks naked into God's countryside; draws followers to him by virtue of his freshness and innocence; communes with animals; and eventually, by virtue of his simplicity and honesty, persuades Pope Innocent III to let him begin a new holy order called the Franciscans.
So runs the plot line of the movie Brother Sun, Sister Moon, the story of Saint Francis of Assisi. But like all things historical, the real story isn't quite that simply told.
The basic elements are true, however. Francis (c. 1181-1226) was the son of a wealthy textile merchant and probably did have a rather, at least for the time, carefree childhood. His name wasn't Francis, however. At his baptism he was christened Giovanni. His father, upon returning from a visit to France, gave him the nickname "Francesco"; had he not done so, the Franciscan Order might otherwise be called the "Giovannians."
Well educated, Francis enjoyed an uneventful upbringing until the day he participated, with youthful abandon, in a feud with the neighboring city of Perugia. As a result of his vociferous expression of childhood, an example of "our town against yours" chauvinism, he was arrested and spent the year 1205 in jail.
His downtime must have affected him. Upon his release he made a trip to Rome, after which he had a vision. He believed that God had told him to rebuild the church of Saint Damian, near Assisi. Selling his horse and some of his father's textiles, he gave the income to a priest to start a building fund. His father disowned him. Francis renounced worldly possessions and became a beggar, taking up collections to raise funds to rebuild more churches.
In 1209 Francis heard a sermon based on Matthew 10: 7-10 that changed his life and set him on the course of immortality and sainthood. He felt a call to take up a life of apostolic poverty. He began preaching brotherly love, repentance, and spiritual innocence. The story is told that his followers found him alone and smiling one day, obviously very happy. They asked him what had happened to him. "I've married," he said. "To whom?" they rather anxiously inquired. "To Lady Poverty," was Francis's reply.
By 1212 his short rule of discipline had attracted enough followers for Innocent III to grant approval to the order that then called itself the Friars Minor. The Friars preached and cared for the sick, the elderly, and the poor. Also that year began a sister order for women, called the Poor Clares (named after Clare, their founder, who was an heiress and an early Francis disciple).
The new order grew quickly, perhaps too quickly. It soon became difficult to manage the Friars while staying true to the first, simple precepts. A new order, called Franciscans, was founded in 1223, but it had already begun to move away from Francis's original concepts of simplicity and a love of the whole of creation, a love that might be called naïve were it not such a profound expression of his vision.
Bowing in obedience to his successor, Francis abdicated leadership of the new order in 1223 and spent his remaining years in solitude and prayer. In his remaining years he composed Canticle to the Sun, Admonitions, and Testament. He is said to have received the sign of the stigmata before he died, and he was canonized by Pope Gregory IX only two years after his death.
His last words were reported to be, "I have done my duty. Now may Christ let you know yours. Welcome, sister death."
Saint Francis of Assisi has become a bridge between Catholics and Protestants. People of both traditions-indeed, even nonreligious people-seem equally to revere him. Statues of him are found in gardens and parks where people sit, feed small birds and animals, and feel at peace. And the famous "Prayer of Saint Francis," which may or may not have been written by him, is sung by church choirs everywhere:
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury, thy pardon, Lord.
Where there is doubt, let there be faith.
Oh, Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is despair, let me bring hope.
Where there is darkness, let there be light,
Where there is sadness, let there be joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much
Seek to be consoled as to console.
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love.
Oh, Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
And it is in pardoning that we are pardoned.
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Sources: Douglas, J. D., ed. The New International Dictionary of the Christian Church. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing, 1974. Gonzalez, Justo L. The Story of Christianity. 2 vols. New York: Harper & Row, 1985.
| Columbia Encyclopedia: Saint Francis |
Early Life
His baptismal name was Giovanni (John), his father's name was Pietro de Bernardone; from his birth Giovanni di Bernardone was called Francesco (Francis) [Ital., =Frenchman], because his father was a frequent traveler in France and admired much that he saw there. The name Francis (and its equivalents in other languages) owes its great popularity to St. Francis, for before him it was a name rarely given. Pietro de Bernardone was a wealthy merchant, and his son's early life was ordinary. At the age of 20, however, Francis was taken prisoner in a battle between Assisi and Perugia and spent a year in prison in Perugia.
Conversion
Two years after his return from Perugia, Francis set out for the wars in Apulia, but illness forced him home again. He then underwent a conversion that turned him from the worldly life he had been leading. He became markedly devout and ascetic, began dressing in rags, and went on a pilgrimage to Rome (1206). A series of events at that time revealed strikingly the characteristics that Francis was always to exemplify: humility, love of absolute poverty, singular devotion to others and to the Roman Church, and joyous religious fervor.
Founding of the Franciscan Order
In 1209, as he was hearing Mass, the words of Jesus in the Gospel (Mat. 10.7-10) bidding his apostles to go forth on their mission struck Francis as a call. So he set out, still a layman, to preach; when a small group had gathered about him, they went to Rome to see Pope Innocent III, who gave them oral permission to live in the manner Francis had chosen. Thus began the Franciscan order of friars, an entirely new type of order in the church. They wandered about Umbria and through Italy preaching the Gospel, working to pay for their very simple needs. The expansion of the friars was very rapid. In 1212 St. Clare began to follow St. Francis, and the Poor Clares (Second Order of St. Francis), a cloistered, contempletive order was established. Francis not only sent the brothers abroad but went himself-to Dalmatia, to France, to Spain, and in 1219-20 to the Holy Land. On his way to Palestine he stopped at Damietta and preached to the sultan.
A growing dissension in his order recalled him from Palestine, and after his return (1221) a great assembly was held at the small chapel of the Porziuncola near Assisi, with which Francis's career was closely identified. There the saint gave up active leadership of the order, for he felt it had become too unwieldy to command. He continued his preaching and the composition of his rule and sponsored the Franciscan tertiaries (Third Order of St. Francis).
The Stigmata and His Death
Two years before his death (1224) the most famous event of his life occurred. He received the stigmata; as he prayed on the Monte della Verna, he had a vision and was afflicted with the wounds of the Crucifixion, from which he suffered for the rest of his life. It is the first known appearance of the stigmata, one of the best attested, and the only one that is celebrated liturgically (on Sept. 17) in the Roman Catholic Church. Francis died Oct. 3, 1226. Two years later Pope Gregory IX, who had been his patron and friend, canonized him; his feast is Oct. 4.
Bibliography
The sources for the life of St. Francis are two lives by Thomas of Celano and the biography by St. Bonaventure. Later medieval works are the Legenda trium sociorum, the Sacrum commercium, and the Speculum perfectionis. The Italian Fioretti di San Francesco [little flowers of St. Francis], a series of short anecdotes, has always been popular for its picture of St. Francis and his companions. It exemplifies in simplest form his love of nature and of humanity, a love so great that he preached one time to the sparrows at Alviano (he is often depicted in art preaching to the birds). His spirit also breathes in the Cantico del sole [hymn of the sun], which he may have written, and in the rules for his orders. Artistic and literary representations of St. Francis are innumerable; see L. Cunningham, comp., Brother Francis (1972); biographies by G. K. Chesterton (1924), J. H. Smith (1972), A. House (2001), and V. Martin (2001); study by E. A. Armstrong (1973).
Dictionary:
Francis of As·si·si (ə-sē'zē, -sē, ə-sĭs'ē)  , Saint 1182?-1226. |
| Quotes By: St. Francis of Assisi |
Quotes:
"It is in pardoning that we are pardoned."
"For it is in giving that we receive."
"It is no use walking anywhere to preach unless our walking is our preaching."
"Start by doing what's necessary, then what's possible and suddenly you are doing the impossible."
"Where there is injury let me sow pardon."
"Blessed is the servant who loves his brother as much when he is sick and useless as when he is well and an be of service to him. And blessed is he who loves his brother as well when he is afar off as when he is by his side, and who would say nothing behind his back he might not, in love, say before his face."
See more famous quotes by
St. Francis of Assisi
| Wikipedia: Francis of Assisi |
| Saint Francis of Assisi | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Confessor | |
| Born | 1181/1182, Italy |
| Died | October 4, 1226, Assisi, Italy |
| Venerated in | Catholic Church |
| Canonized | July 16, 1228, Assisi by Pope Gregory IX |
| Major shrine | Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi |
| Feast | October 4 |
| Attributes | Cross, Dove, Pax et Bonum, Poor Franciscan habit, Stigmata |
| Patronage | animals, Catholic Action, environment, merchants, Meycauayan, Italy, Brgy. San Francisco, San Pablo City, Philippines, stowaways[1] |
Saint Francis of Assisi (Giovanni Francesco di Bernardone; 1181/1182 – October 3, 1226)[2] was a Catholic deacon and the founder of the Order of Friars Minor, more commonly known as the Franciscans.
He is known as the patron saint of animals, the environment and Italy, and it is customary for Catholic churches to hold ceremonies blessing animals on his feast day of 4 October.[3]
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Francis was one of seven children born to Pietro di Bernardone, a rich cloth merchant, and his wife Pica, about whom little is known except that she was originally from France[4]. Pietro was in France on business when Francis was born, and Pica had him baptised as Giovanni di Bernardone[3] in honor of Saint John the Baptist, in the hope he would grow to be a great religious leader. When his father returned to Assisi, he took to calling him Francesco, in honor of his commercial success and enthusiasm for all things French.[5]
As a youth, Francesco—or Francis in English—became a devotee of troubadours and was fascinated with all things French.[2][5] Although many biographers remark about his bright clothing, rich friends, street brawls, and love of pleasure,[4] his displays of disillusionment toward the world that surrounded him came fairly early in his life, as is shown in the "story of the beggar." In this account, he was selling cloth and velvet in the marketplace on behalf of his father when a beggar came to him and asked for alms. At the conclusion of his business deal, Francis abandoned his wares and ran after the beggar. When he found him, Francis gave the man everything he had in his pockets. His friends quickly chided and mocked him for his act of charity. When he got home, his father scolded him in rage.[6]
In 1201, he joined a military expedition against Perugia and was taken as a prisoner at Collestrada, spending a year as a captive.[7] It is probable that his conversion to more serious thoughts was a gradual process relating to this experience. Upon his return to Assisi in 1203, Francis returned to his carefree life and in 1204, a serious illness led to a spiritual crisis. In 1205 Francis left for Puglia to enlist in the army of the Count of Brienne. A strange vision made him return to Assisi, deepening his ecclesiastical awakening [2].
It is said that thereafter he began to avoid the sports and the feasts of his former companions; in response, they asked him laughingly whether he was thinking of marrying, to which he answered "yes, a fairer bride than any of you have ever seen", meaning his "lady poverty". He spent much time in lonely places, asking God for enlightenment. By degrees he took to nursing lepers, the most repulsive victims in the lazar houses near Assisi. After a pilgrimage to Rome, where he begged at the church doors for the poor, he said he had had a mystical vision of Jesus Christ in the Church of San Damiano just outside of Assisi, in which the Icon of Christ Crucified said to him, "Francis, Francis, go and repair My house which, as you can see, is falling into ruins". He thought this to mean the ruined church in which he was presently praying, and so sold some cloth from his father's store to assist the priest there for this purpose.[2][8]
His father Pietro, highly indignant, attempted to change his mind, first with threats and then with beatings. After legal proceedings before the bishop, Francis renounced his father and his patrimony, laying aside even the garments he had received from him. For the next couple months he lived as a beggar in the region of Assisi. Returning to the countryside around the town for two years this time, he restored several ruined churches, among them the Porziuncola--little chapel of St Mary of the Angels--just outside the town, which later became his favorite abode.[8]
At the end of this period (on February 24, 1209, according to Jordan of Giano), Francis heard a sermon that changed his life. The sermon was about Matthew 10:9, in which Christ tells his followers they should go forth and proclaim that the Kingdom of Heaven was upon them, that they should take no money with them, nor even a walking stick or shoes for the road.[2] Francis was inspired to devote himself to a life of poverty.[2]
Clad in a rough garment, barefoot, and, after the Evangelical precept, without staff or scrip, he began to preach repentance.[2] He was soon joined by his first follower, a prominent fellow townsman, the jurist Bernardo di Quintavalle, who contributed all that he had to the work. Within a year Francis had eleven followers. Francis chose never to be ordained a priest and the community lived as "lesser brothers," fratres minores in Latin.[2]
The brothers lived a simple life in the deserted lazar house of Rivo Torto near Assisi; but they spent much of their time wandering through the mountainous districts of Umbria, always cheerful and full of songs, yet making a deep impression upon their hearers by their earnest exhortations.[2]
In 1209, Francis led his first eleven followers to Rome to seek permission from Pope Innocent III to found a new religious order.[9] Upon entry to Rome, the brothers encountered Bishop Guido of Assisi, who had in his company Giovanni di San Paolo, the Cardinal Bishop of Sabina. The Cardinal, who was the confessor of Pope Innocent III, was immediately sympathetic to Francis and agreed to represent Francis to the pope. Reluctantly, Pope Innocent agreed to meet with Francis and the brothers the next day. After several days, the pope agreed to admit the group informally, adding that when God increased the group in grace and number, they could return for an official admittance. The group was tonsured.[10]
From then on, his new order grew quickly with new vocations.[11] When hearing Francis preaching in the church of San Rufino in Assisi in 1209, Clare of Assisi became deeply touched by his message and she realized her calling.[11] Her brother Rufino also joined the new order.
On Palm Sunday, March 28, 1211 Francis received Clare at the Porziuncola and hereby established the Order of Poor Ladies, later called Poor Clares.[11] In the same year, Francis left for Jerusalem, but he was shipwrecked by a storm on the Dalmatian coast, forcing him to return to Italy.
On May 8, 1213 he was given the use of the mountain of La Verna (Alverna) as a gift from the count Orlando di Chiusi who described it as “eminently suitable for whoever wishes to do penance in a place remote from mankind.”[12][13] The mountain would become one of his favorite retreats for prayer.[13] In the same year, Francis sailed for Morocco, but this time an illness forced him to break off his journey in Spain. Back in Assisi, several noblemen (among them Tommaso da Celano, who would later write the biography of St. Francis) and some well-educated men joined his order.
In 1215 Francis went again to Rome for the Fourth Lateran Council. During this time, he probably met Dominic de Guzman[1] (later to be Saint Dominic, the founder of the Friars Preachers, another Catholic religious order).
In 1217 the growing congregation of friars was divided into provinces and groups were sent to France, Germany, Hungary, Spain and to the East.
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In 1219 Francis left, together with a few companions, on a pilgrimage to Egypt. Crossing the lines between the sultan and the Crusaders in Damietta, he was received by the sultan Melek-el-Kamel.[1][14] Francis challenged the Muslim scholars to a test of true religion by fire; but they retreated.[1] When Francis proposed to enter the fire first, under the condition that if he left the fire unharmed, the sultan would have to recognize Christ as the true God, the sultan was so impressed that he allowed Francis to preach to his subjects.[1][15] Though Francis did not succeed in converting the sultan, the last words of the sultan to Francis of Assisi were, according to Jacques de Vitry, bishop of Acre, in his book "Historia occidentalis, De Ordine et praedicatione Fratrum Minorum (1221)" : “Pray for me that God may deign to reveal to me that law and faith which is most pleasing to him.”.[16]
Francis's visit to Egypt and attempted rapprochement with the Muslim world had far-reaching consequences, long past his own death, since after the fall of the Crusader Kingdom it would be the Franciscans, of all Catholics, who would be allowed to stay on in the Holy Land and be recognised as "Custodians of the Holy Land" on behalf of Christianity.
At Acre, the capital of what remained of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Francis rejoined the Order's brothers Elia and Pietro Cattini, and then most probably visited the holy places in Palestine in 1220.
Although nativity drawings and paintings existed earlier, St Francis of Assisi celebrated Christmas by setting up the first known three-dimensional presepio or crèche (Nativity scene) in the town of Greccio near Assisi, around 1220.[17] He used real animals to create a living scene so that the worshipers could contemplate the birth of the child Jesus in a direct way, making use of the senses, especially sight.[17] Thomas of Celano, a biographer of Francis and Saint Bonaventure both, tell how he only used a straw-filled manger (feeding trough) set between a real ox and donkey.[17] According to Thomas, it was beautiful in its simplicity with the manger acting as the altar for the Christmas Mass.
When receiving a report of the martyrdom of five brothers in Morocco, Francis returned to Italy via Venice.[18] Cardinal Ugolino di Conti was then nominated by the Pope as the protector of the Order. On September 29, 1220, Francis handed over the governance of the Order to brother Pietro Catani at the Porziuncola. However, Brother Pietro died only five months later, on March 10, 1221, and was buried in the Porziuncola. When numerous miracles were attributed to the late Pietro Catani, people started to flock to the Porziuncola, disturbing the daily life of the Franciscans. Francis then prayed, asking Pietro to stop the miracles and obey in death as he had obeyed during his life. The report of miracles ceased. Brother Pietro was succeeded by Brother Elias as Vicar of Francis.
During 1221 and 1222 Francis crossed Italy, first as far south as Catania in Sicily and afterwards as far north as Bologna.
On November 29, 1223 the final Rule of the Order (in twelve chapters) was approved by Pope Honorius III.
While he was praying on the mountain of Verna, during a forty-day fast in preparation for Michaelmas (September 29), Francis is said to have had a vision on or about September 14, 1224, the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, as a result of which he received the stigmata.[19] Brother Leo, who had been with Francis at the time, left a clear and simple account of the event, the first definite account of the phenomenon of stigmata.[2][19] "Suddenly he saw a vision of a seraph, a six-winged angel on a cross. This angel gave him the gift of the five wounds of Christ."[19]
Suffering from these stigmata and from an eye disease, Francis received care in several cities (Siena, Cortona, Nocera) to no avail. In the end, he was brought back to a hut next to the Porziuncola. Here, in the place where it all began, feeling the end approaching, he spent the last days of his life dictating his spiritual testament. He died on the evening of October 3, 1226, singing Psalm 141.
On July 16, 1228, he was pronounced a saint by Pope Gregory IX (the former cardinal Ugolino di Conti, friend of St Francis and Cardinal Protector of the Order). The next day, the Pope laid the foundation stone for the Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi.
He was buried on May 25, 1230, under the Lower Basilica. His burial place remained inaccessible until it was reopened in 1818. Pasquale Belli then constructed for his remains a crypt in neo-classical style in the Lower Basilica. It was refashioned between 1927 and 1930 into its present form by Ugo Tarchi, stripping the wall of its marble decorations. In 1978 the remains of St. Francis were identified by a commission of scholars appointed by Pope Paul VI, and put in a glass urn in the ancient stone tomb.
Saint Francis is considered the first Italian poet by literary critics. He believed commoners should be able to pray to God in their own language, and he wrote often in the dialect of Umbria instead of Latin. His writings are considered to have great literary value, as well as religious.[20]
Saint Francis's feast day is observed on October 4. In addition to this feast, a secondary feast is still observed amongst Traditional Roman Catholics and Franciscans worldwide in honor of the stigmata received by St Francis celebrated on September 17 called "The Impression of the Stigmata of St Francis, Confessor" (see the General Roman Calendar as in 1954, the General Roman Calendar of Pope Pius XII, and the General Roman Calendar of 1962). On June 18, 1939, Pope Pius XII named him a joint Patron Saint of Italy along with Saint Catherine of Siena with the apostolic letter "Licet Commissa", AAS XXXI (1939), 256-257. Pius XII also remembered the two saints in the laudative discourse he pronounced on May 5, 1949 in the Santa Maria sopra Minerva Church.
Many of the stories that surround the life of St. Francis deal with his love for animals.[21] Perhaps the most famous incident that illustrates the Saint's humility towards nature is recounted in the "Fioretti" ("Little Flowers"), a collection of legends and folklore that sprang up after the Saint's death. It is said that, one day, while Francis was traveling with some companions, they happened upon a place in the road where birds filled the trees on either side. Francis told his companions to "wait for me while I go to preach to my sisters the birds".[21] The birds surrounded him, drawn by the power of his voice, and not one of them flew away. Francis spoke to them:
My sister birds, you owe much to God, and you must always and in everyplace give praise to Him; for He has given you freedom to wing through the sky and He has clothed you... you neither sow nor reap, and God feeds you and gives you rivers and fountains for your thirst, and mountains and valleys for shelter, and tall trees for your nests. And although you neither know how to spin or weave, God dresses you and your children, for the Creator loves you greatly and He blesses you abundantly. Therefore... always seek to praise God.
Another legend from the Fioretti tells that in the city of Gubbio, where Francis lived for some time, was a wolf "terrifying and ferocious, who devoured men as well as animals". Francis had compassion upon the townsfolk, and went up into the hills to find the wolf. Soon, fear of the animal had caused all his companions to flee, though the saint pressed on. When he found the wolf, he made the sign of the cross and commanded the wolf to come to him and hurt no one. Miraculously the wolf closed his jaws and lay down at the feet of St. Francis. "Brother Wolf, you do much harm in these parts and you have done great evil...", said Francis. "All these people accuse you and curse you... But brother wolf, I would like to make peace between you and the people". Then Francis led the wolf into the town, and surrounded by startled citizens made a pact between them and the wolf. Because the wolf had “done evil out of hunger”, the townsfolk were to feed the wolf regularly, and in return, the wolf would no longer prey upon them or their flocks. In this manner Gubbio was freed from the menace of the predator. Francis, ever the lover of animals, even made a pact on behalf of the town dogs, that they would not bother the wolf again. It is also said that Francis, to show the townspeople that they would not be harmed, blessed the wolf.
These legends exemplify the Franciscan mode of charity and poverty as well as the saint's love of the natural world.[22] Part of his appreciation of the environment is expressed in his Canticle of the Sun, a poem written in Umbrian Italian in perhaps 1224 which expresses a love and appreciation of Brother Sun, Sister Moon, Mother Earth, Brother Fire, etc. and all of God's creations personified in their fundamental forms. In "Canticle of the Creatures," he wrote: "All praise to you, Oh Lord, for all these brother and sister creatures."[3]
Francis's attitude towards the natural world, while poetically expressed, was conventionally Christian.[4] He believed that the world was created good and beautiful by God but suffers a need for redemption because of the primordial sin of man. He preached to man and beast the universal ability and duty of all creatures to praise God (a common theme in the Psalms) and the duty of men to protect and enjoy nature as both the stewards of God's creation and as creatures ourselves.[21]
Legend has it that St. Francis on his deathbed thanked his donkey for carrying and helping him throughout his life, and his donkey wept.
For a complete list, see [1].
Paschal Robinson (1913). "St. Francis of Assisi". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Catholic_Encyclopedia_(1913)/St._Francis_of_Assisi.
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