Memoriale Propositum
St. Francis knew how to see the lights and shades of his century also in the Penitential
Movement, which he himself entered, and he continued to help it with the gift of a gospel norm of
life rather than a juridical one: the first version of the “Letter to the Faithful”. The Spirit works in
this movement and in the Church through Francis. Afterwards a more juridical help will arrive to
resolve many problems that arise with the civil authorities of the Communes, and also with the
ecclesiastical Hierarchy. In this he will have the collaboration of Cardinal Hugolino, and in 1221
the Memoriale propositi or Regula antiqua Fratrum et Sororum de Poenitentia will be published.
The document from May 20, 1228, would come down to us once Hugolino became Pope Gregory IX. In
Memoriale propositi the penitential-gospel spirit proposed by Francis remains but, somehow, enclosed
in a cage of juridical norms...
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