Entries tagged with “saint francis”.
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Thu 24 Jun 2010
He plunged after poverty as men have dug madly for gold. And it is precisely the positive and passionate quality of this part of his personality that is a challenge to the modern mind in the whole problem of the pursuit of pleasure. There undeniably is the historical fact; and there attached to it is another moral fact almost as undeniable. It is certain that he held on this heroic or unnatural course from the moment when he went forth in his hair-shirt into the winter woods to the moment when he desired even in his death agony to lie bare upon the bare ground, to prove that he had and that he was nothing. And we can say, with almost as deep a certainty, that the stars which passed above that gaunt and wasted corpse stark upon the rocky floor had for once, in all their shining cycles round the world of labouring humanity, looked down upon a happy man.
~G.K. Chesterton, Saint Francis of Assisi
Tags:
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G.K. Chesterton,
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Poverty,
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saint francis of assisi,
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Mon 8 Mar 2010
While he was in this affected state, something absolutely unheard-of occurred. The crucifix moved its lips and began to speak. “Francis,” it said, calling him by name, “go and repair my house, which, as you see, is completely destroyed.” Francis was stupefied and nearly deranged by this speech. He prepared to obey, surrendering himself completely to the project. But since he considered the change in him to be beyond description, it is best for us to be silent about what he himself could not describe. From then on compassion for the crucified one was imprinted in his holy soul and, one may devoutly suspect, the stigmata of the holy passion were deeply imprinted in his heart, though not yet in his flesh.
~Thomas of Celano, First and Second Lives of Saint Francis
Tags:
change,
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crucifix,
flesh,
heart,
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house,
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passion,
saint francis,
speech,
state,
stigmata,
Thomas of Celano
Sat 30 Jan 2010
Then the holy lover of complete humility went to the lepers and lived with them, serving them most diligently for God’s sake; and washing all foulness from them, he wiped away also the corruption of the ulcers, just as he said in his Testament: “When I was in sins, it seemed extremely bitter to me to look at lepers, and the Lord himself led me among them and I practiced mercy with them.”
~Thomas of Celano, First Life of Saint Francis
Tomorrow is World Leprosy Day. You can learn more about this important effort to increase awareness about this terrible disease at their website: http://www.worldleprosydayusa.org/index.php.
Tags:
corruption,
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humility,
leper,
lepers,
saint francis,
sake,
testament,
ulcers,
world leprosy
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