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Audio Course: St. Francis of Assisi: A New Way of Being Christian
Blog Author: Br. William Short
To supplement the Franciscan audio course with this blog, let’s now explore St. Francis’ theology and how it relates to Franciscan spirituality, which has even more profound meaning for us in this time of Lent. Francis was a theologian in the ancient sense, “one who speaks of God.” Rarely expressed in dogmatic form, Francis’ theology reveals itself in praises, letters, scraps of sermons, blessings, admonitions. Traits called characteristically and authentically Franciscan derive from this source.
Over the centuries Francis’ theological vision has received more systematic presentation in the works of such disciples as Bonaventure and John Duns Scotus.Here we will interweave pieces from various parts of the Franciscan theological tradition, presenting a God who is good. Here is one possible beginning for Franciscan theology. God’s goodness has special force because it is eminently real. The goodness of God the Creator (fontalis plenitudo for Bonaventure) is fully self-aware, this awareness being so real that it is personal, and is called “the Word” (exemplar omnium). The bond between the fullness and the exemplar is likewise eminently real and personal, and is the Spirit (cogeneratus).
The very life of God is one of goodness expressing itself generously, fully. This divine goodness lives in personal communion. God is interpersonal and relational.This communion has at its center the Word, the core or middle of God’s life as Trinity. Wishing to express overflowing goodness, God wishes to pour out an expression of the divine life.God’s desire to share goodness is expressed as creation. But creation is not merely to receive some partial, limited sharing in God’s goodness and life. God will actually give away even the very heart of the divine life, the Word.With this in mind, the will to give away the very core of divine life, God forms the world through the Word.
Since the Word will be the crowning glory of the creation, God makes light and darkness, trees, stones and fish, all the creatures, according to the Word as model, or blueprint or form. The human person, man and woman, resembles most closely the model that God uses to create. Since the Word is to come among human beings, as one of them, they resemble the Word very exactly.In all this work of creation God shows one of the divine characteristics—outpouring of what is within, giving away all that is inside. This we may call the bowing over of God, the gesture typical of one who offers. We may also call this the humility of God, divine condescension. God gives away all, holds nothing back as property: this is the poverty of God, showing in the visible things of creation the invisible and constant self-giving which is the life of the Trinity.
The world mirrors, now clearly, now obscurely, this inner, divine life of unending bowing over in generosity.The universe and all creatures reflect God, speak of God, reveal God because they are made according to a pattern, the model of God’s own heart, the core of the Trinity, the Word. The human person, coming at the completion of creation, gives voice to the praise of all creatures for the Creator.The creation is fully understandable at the birth of Jesus. Here is the “missing link,” always present, now visible. The core, the middle, the center of God’s own inner communion comes, in order to be a creature.
With the coming of the Word as one of them, creatures find their model enfleshed. Christ is no alien in a strange universe: he was from the beginning the reason and the Creator’s blueprint for every particle of matter, for all things visible and invisible, for everything and everyone.Whatever is beautiful reflects his beauty; whatever is living, lives because of him; whatever is true discloses him who is true; whatever is, is in him. “Everything was made in him, and without him was made nothing of that which was made” (John’s Gospel, Prologue).In his well-known love for creatures, Francis acts out this recognition of God’s presence. He delights in the world of creation, and simply the touch of a creature can leave him enraptured. Francis continually exhorts every person and thing to “praise, bless and magnify the Creator.”
He treats them with deference and reverence, reminding his followers to be subject to every creature out of love for God. He calls every creature “brother” or “sister,” and shows toward them, not simply curiosity or interest, but a tender affection.Here is the full expression of God’s identity: complete bowing over to offer the innermost reality of God as a gift. God’s complete generosity is revealed in the Incarnation—nothing is held back, nothing is “property” to God, all is given away, God’s true identity is communicated as poverty, holding on to nothing.The religious world that humans developed cannot contain this mystery: God does not come as an angel, or as a burst of light, nor even as an idea or a vision—God comes as a baby. And the Word, incarnate, comes to a place and to people marked by poverty, because these are most fitting to express the mystery—the surprising revelation of who God really is.These theological reflections were not systematized by Francis, yet they help us to understand the importance of certain gestures and phrases of his.
The feast of Christmas recalls that great humility and self-giving of God. Francis celebrates the feast dramatically, composing a living scene of animals and people in a cave at Greccio—recreating in his gesture the mystery of God’s poor love.Jesus shows in his life this identity of God, in his choices, his words, his friends, his enemies, his gestures and signs. In the suffering he endures, and most fully in his Passion, Jesus reveals the unexpected identity of a God bowing over to give away all.Even as he prepares to leave his friends, at table with them, Jesus continues to reveal this identity, so hard for them to accept.
According to John’s Gospel, he removes his outer garments, binds himself with a towel and bows over to wash their feet. Here is the true image of God. In the Synoptics, he takes the work of peasants’ hands and gives away his own life as a cup of wine and a piece of bread.These gestures are anticipations of the great giving away, the bowing over of death. Stripped of everything, pouring out his own lifeblood, water and blood flowing from his opened side, breathing forth his spirit, completely broken and emptied, suffering physical agony and spiritual desolation, Jesus at the moment of his death gives away God’s own life.Francis speaks of the “crucified poor man,” Christ, and knows that his death is the great act of God’s loving graciousness. And in the Eucharist Francis recognizes the continuing gift—the Lord Jesus Christ gives himself fully as bread and wine.
This divine life is given, eternally and irrevocably, for creatures.The Trinitarian life of God, fully revealed and fully given away, shines with glorious joy in the Resurrection of Jesus, the glorification of Christ who becomes the first of creatures to be born into God. God’s generosity now has opened the arms of the Trinity to every creature. Their full destiny is revealed— not only were they conformed to the Word in their origins, they are to be transformed in the Word as their fulfillment. All that God has given away begins its return to that personal and generous communion, glorified and transformed.God’s self giving is a gift, freely given.
The very life of God is a continual giving of self in the Trinity. The divine gift of life and communion is poured out through the Word. The Word, born as a creature, a person, is the full gift of God’s own self.In the life of Jesus, in his death, and his being raised up, the creation can finally, fully return to God as a gift, the gift of the Word. This circle of giving, in which Creator and creatures give all and receive all, rests on a single premise: that one does not hold back what has been given. When this happens, the gracious circle is broken, the exchange of gifts is interrupted, the whole creation risks losing its meaning and its very life.
In Franciscan terminology, this is a definition of sin—the sin described in Genesis, and the sin that follows: refusing to give away the gifts one has received.For some Christian authors, the primary sin of Adam and Eve was pride, for others, it was disobedience. For Franciscans, it was the will to possess.Reading the Genesis story in this light, we see the man and the woman are made “in the image and likeness of God.” They receive all from God as a gift, and they give away all to God as praise and loving thanks. The serpent comes and proposes to offer them something, the fruit “that will make them like God.”
The offer is ludicrous: they are already like God. (The Father of Lies is at work, with a trick as old as civilization—selling you what is already yours). The difference, of course, is that this time it will not be given as a gift, it will be taken, grasped, held onto.And in this moment, the circle of the gift is broken. Harmony in creation fails. The image of God is obscured.We begin to see here the reason for the preeminence of poverty and gratitude in Francis’ vision. They are the two faces of this holy exchange of gifts: gratitude acknowledges that everything has been given to us, and poverty gives it all away.
Regarding the Franciscan ‘take’ on the Original Sin - a keen insight (thank you) and so true. There is clear tendency to take from God’s hands what should be received as a gift. There is a difference between faithful and persistant supplication vs. attempting to bend Gods Will over to our way of seeing reality.
BTW, are your post available for Formation Material. Specifically, would you allow this to be inserted into a SFO Fraternity monthy newsletter?
Comment by Tausign on February 7, 2008 at 1:52 pm
Would you allow this to be inserted into an SFO online newsletter with credit back to your site as the source? http://pearlsontheriver.blogspot.com/
Thank you for this great material.
Comment by Ouida Tomlinson, SFO on February 18, 2008 at 12:57 pm
well,
i woke up wondering what the difference between the friars minor, and i suppose the friarette’s, your description of complete conduct that is absolute giving is most excellent. thank you.
Comment by ben on March 30, 2008 at 7:20 pm