Franciscan Quote of the Day

Prayer raises our minds and hearts to God, and shows us from this elevated point of view the vanity of the goods and pleasures of this world; it fills us with light, strength, and consolation, and gives us a foretaste of the peace and joy of our heavenly country.

~  St. Rose of Viterbo

The lives and writings of the Franciscan men and women in this volume demonstrate the adaptability of Francis’s vision across cultures and throughout history. Each entry underscores the poverty at the crystal center of Francis’s spirituality. If nothing material matters, then only the immaterial—the spirit living within each and every one of us—is what must be most revered and reverenced. Then and only then will the promise of Franciscan spirituality—universal brotherhood and peace—be recognized and received.

~ Regis Armstrong, The Franciscan Tradition (Spirituality in History)

As you announce peace with your mouth, make sure that you have greater peace in your hearts, thus no one will be provoked to anger or scandal because of you. Let everyone be drawn to peace and kindness through your peace and gentleness. For we have been called to this: to cure the wounded, to bind up the broken, to recall the erring. Many who seem to us members of the devil will yet be disciples of Christ.

~ St. Francis of Asissi

I counsel, admonish, and exhort my brothers in the Lord Jesus Christ not to quarrel or argue or judge others when they go about in the world; but let them be meek, peaceful, modest, gentle, and humble, speaking courteously to everyone, as is becoming.

~St. Francis of Assisi, The Later Rule

Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies. At the end all his disciples deserted him. On the Cross he was utterly alone, surrounded by evildoers and mockers. For this cause he had come, to bring peace to the enemies of God. So the Christian, too, belongs not in the seclusion of a cloistered life but in the thick of foes. There is his commission, there is his work.

~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, via OH……….. FRANCESCO

‎How necessary it is – both for the lives of individuals and for the serene and peaceful coexistence of all people – to see God as the center of all there is and the center of our personal lives.

~Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus Address, Munich, Germany, 10Sep06 via St. Francis of Assisi – Poverello (Facebook Page)

Never be in a hurry, do everything quietly and in a calm spirit. Do not lose your inner peace for anything whatsoever, even if your whole world seems upset.

~St. Francis de Sales

The distracted mind is running wild with things of the world: fame, fortune, passion, possessive love, alcohol and drugs, sex, riches, and out-of-control emotions. Out of this distraction, craving and desire emerge, and the mind is disturbed. The mind is attracted by what it sees, giving birth to cravings, and subsequently the desire to satisfy those cravings. Slowly, the forces of earth become stronger than the forces of Heaven. Yet, out of our worldly desire and craving, stress and anxiety emerge, and the peace of heaven is hidden. This may all sound over-simplistic, yet out of this notion arises the understanding the saints had of the importance of detachment.

~Gerry Straub, Unplugging My Television

A Franciscan approach to ministry must always be rooted in a life of lived prayer. Those who adopt a Franciscan approach to ministry are not just people who pray, but people whose whole life serves as a prayer by their words and actions. Lived prayer is the openness to ongoing conversion that allows God to enter one’s life and transform it from the preoccupations of worldly concerns and triviality to an expression of authentic Gospel living – following Christ’s footsteps and working as God’s instrument of peace today.

~Francis of Assisi and the Future of Faith by Daniel Horan OFM

Anxiety and frustration invariably follow when the desires of the heart are centered on anything less than God, for all pleasures of Earth, pursued as final ends, turn out to be the exact opposite of what was expected. The expectation is joyous, the realization is disgust. Out of this disappointment are born those lesser anxieties which modern psychology knows so well; but the root of them all is the meaninglessness of life due to the abandonment of Perfect Life, Truth, and Love, which is God.

Peace of soul comes to those who have the right kind of anxiety about attaining perfect happiness, which is (found only in) God. A soul has anxiety because its final and eternal state is not yet decided; it is always at the crossroads of life. . . As St. Augustine has said, “Our hearts were made for Thee. They are restless until they rest in Thee, O God.

Ven. Fulton J. Sheen, Peace of Soul

A Franciscan voice will insist on loving one another as God has loved us to an extravagant and foolish degree because it is how, as Francis explains in his Canticle, we give glory back to God. Having been created in the image and likeness of God, unlike trees or flowers or fire or the moon, we are most fully human when we love, forgive, and work toward peace. To be violent, vengeful, or selfish is to be un-human!

~Francis of Assisi and the Future of Faith by Daniel Horan OFM

Human beings are called to love, to forgive, and to work for peace just as the purpose of fire is to provide heat and light and the wind is to be serene and provide the weather. To worldly wisdom, this might seem absurd. Isn’t the purpose of being a human to earn lots of money or be successful in the business realm? Shouldn’t people strive to care for their families? What do love, forgiveness, and peace have to do with being human? Francis answers in the way of Christ: it has everything to do with being human.

~Francis of Assisi and the Future of Faith by Daniel Horan OFM

Preaching love, forgiveness, and peace is a dangerous and risky business for those who have forgotten (literally do not have a memory of) what it means to bear the name of the Prince of Peace. But this is the business of the Franciscan voice nonetheless.

~Francis of Assisi and the Future of Faith by Daniel Horan OFM

The reason that following the Gospel is so challenging, that engaging the world from a Franciscan perspective is so difficult, is that in a world that organizes its thoughts and responses according to the logic of violence and the possible, the Good News of Jesus Christ is communicated in the poetics of the Kingdom of God, which is an expression of the impossible experience of love, forgiveness, and peace.

~Francis of Assisi and the Future of Faith by Daniel Horan OFM

Peace is not the absence of affliction, but the presence of God.

~Author Unknown

Happiness is the sense of peace and joy that stems from knowledge of and union with the One Who created us and Who loves us infinitely. We will attain it fully in heaven, but we can achieve it to a significant extent beforehand by battling our desire to remain independent of God, ignoring the voices that label religion boring and unnecessary, and better acquainting ourselves with Truth through study and prayer.

~Mary Anne Marks quoted in “God and Woman at Harvard“

You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of him who gives and kindles joy in the heart of him who receives. All condemnation is from the devil. Never condemn each other. We condemn others only because we shun knowing ourselves. When we gaze at our own failings, we see such a swamp that nothing in another can equal it. That is why we turn away, and make much of the faults of others. Instead of condemning others, strive to reach inner peace. Keep silent, refrain from judgment. This will raise you above the deadly arrows of slander, insult and outrage and will shield your glowing hearts against all evil.

~ St Seraphim of Sarov via Mind in the Heart

We’re terrified of not having the answers, and sometimes assert an incorrect answer rather than make peace with the fact that we don’t know.

~Kathryn Schulz (via Ad Dominum)

While you are proclaiming peace with your lips, be careful to have it even more fully in your heart.

~St. Francis of Assisi

Go forth in peace, for you have followed the good road. Go forth without fear, for he who created you has made you holy, has always protected you, and loves you as a mother. Blessed be you, my God, for having created me.

~St. Clare of Assisi