Francis Flourishing Easter
In order to follow Christ, Francis of Assisi committed himself to a path of total destitution. Turning back to wealth and power, he rather chose the exodus: a route with a humble and poor Christ.
But what sets him apart in this way is not so much the radicalism of his poverty - which was also the case in many of the sects that were thriving in the 13th century - as much as his welcoming soul. The more he renounces the idea of owning and dominating the world, the more he opens himself to creation, as if his own renunciation freed him from everything that separated him from the splendid and immense reality.
His poverty got transformed into a new, ever wider and deeper relationship with other beings and things. There is one word that essentially characterizes this new presence in the world: «fraternity». Not only does Francis give all the elements and all beings the name of "brother" or "sister," but he actually experiences fraternal feelings for each of them.
Surprisingly, the creatures paid him back with the same coin, having for him a real friendship: the birds of the sky suspend their throat to listen to him, a pheasant does not want to leave him, and the fire won't burn him. Saint Francis' life is full of these miraculous and wonderful facts that form the legend.
This wonderful side is not the essential of the new reality that is established between Francis and the creatures. The essential lays on another plane: the world ceases to be a set of dark and blind forces for Francis and becomes an open book. Beings and things become God's signals. They say something to him: something essential that interests the destiny of man. They become a language he understands and lives on.
Francis rediscovers the luminous sense of creation. He wanted to be "an outsider and a pilgrim in this world"; and this is where this world reveals itself and becomes part of his life, as an impulse towards the Most High. Francis goes to God accompanied by all creatures, led and comforted by them. With them he takes each step, with them he celebrates the Lord's Passover.
But this re-found creation is, more than a reality given to contemplation, an intimate and total becoming. Francis rediscovers the sense of creation from an inner experience that is a new genesis, a new creation. He seemed "a new man, a man from the other world," writes Thomas of Celano (1 Cel. 82). Precisely becoming this new man is how Francis meets the depth of creation. But there is no new man without the creation found again.
Francis' whole life is taken by a great impulse toward God. "Grant us... to come unto you, Most High," he writes as the conclusion of his Letter to the whole Order (CtaO 52). Now, this impulse that seemed to have to separate it from the earth and return it completely to the contemplation of the Ineffable, implies in it a fraternal communion with all creatures. In it lies the originality of his life, as well as that of his Song.
There is in the life of Francis an immense thirst to feel the sunlight, breathe fresh air, drink and eat water and greenery, a constant search for the place that puts him in direct contact with nature: the forest, the mountain, the lake... A real Franciscan experience is linked to a series of places that exude a wild scent of wood, water, grass and rock: Rivo-Torto, La Foresta, Fonte-Colombo, Poggio-Bustone, Mount Della Verna ... Each of these places means a loving pursuit of nature.
But this return to nature has little to do with modern naturism. His celebration of the sun has nothing epidermal; it is not in any way confused with the cult of tanning or camping. Communion with nature takes place in Francis on another level.
The elements of nature are the rude companions of his life as a poor man. When, after his conversion, he begins to restore with his own hands the churches of the Assisi countryside, he knows that he was a delicate and refined citizen, the stone, the wood, the water, the sun and the wind in a way. Very different from how he had met them through ballads of troubadours.
And when, then, he walks at any time along the routes of Italy or retires to a lonely place on the mountain, he leaves defenseless to the wild reality: the scorching sun or the icy wind; sleep on the rock or on the bare earth. Living this way, in a rude and holy obedience to things, is how he becomes a brother of the sun, the wind, the water, the grass and the stars: a man who cordially discovers and accepts a secret kinship with each other and the elements of nature.
We approach here the deep sense of his diving into things. Fraternizing in this way with the creatures, Francis is placed among them: he recognizes that he himself is a creature. To consider as brothers to the humblest cosmic elements, it is equivalent to admit that we come from the same Origin and that we exist together, they and we, depending on the same Source. Before the "Most High," of whom "no man is worthy of mention," Francis stands, with great humility, among the creatures, thus confessing that only God is God. His fraternal communion with the creatures is part of his attitude of worship.
This fundamental humility that brings him so close to material things, impels him to strip himself of all will of power over them and any act of annexation. For this very reason, he frees in him the sources of sympathy and welcome. No superiority complex, no aggression clouding its emergence. Francis sympathizes with everything that exists and everything that lives. To his brothers who are going to cut wood in the forest, Francis forbids them to cut the log, so that it can produce new foliage; one has to allow life to restart and reboot.
This is not a mere sentimental reaction. Francis perceives the value of all life and every being. The current of sympathy between him and creation is set at this level. And this current is so deep that it joins the creative love and coincides with it. St. Bonaventure writes: "Impelled by the affection of his extraordinary devotion, he tasted the original goodness of God in each of the creatures, as in so many other streams derived from the same kindness" (LM 9,1).
Francis finds, then, creation in its emergence, as an immense and unique impulse of love. And we live it not as a fact that lies far from us in the past, but as a present reality. For him, creation does not cease to sprout. And he not only perceives this love that brings all beings into existence, but actively participates in it. Sympathy, from the moment it goes back to its beginning, loses its character of passivity and partiality, and becomes active communion with the value of being and of life, wherever this value is found. From this fraternal man, the friend of all creatures, a force and a warmth come forth that reach all beings, penetrate them and make them brighter, more true, more peaceful. Also more transparent. Thomas of Celano writes: "With the sharpness of his heart, the secrets of the creatures penetrated, eminently and unknown to others" (1 Cel 81).
Hence, things and things are not for Francisco mere objects to be used. Each creature reveals an extraordinary density of being. From the humblest to the most sublime, each of them expresses something of the very being of God. All creation becomes a profound mystery. The beings are, each in their own way, according to the unique and unique nature that God has conferred upon them, reflections and signs of an "infinite and not coveted" splendor and overabundance.
«In beautiful things he recognizes the Most Beautiful; how good it is, "What he has done for us is the best". By the imprints imprinted on the things follows everywhere the Beloved, he makes with all a staircase by which he ascends to the throne ”(2 Cel. 165; cf. LM 9,1). He was fascinated by the light. The sun, the moon, the stars and the fire shone in his eyes as the symbols and the appeal of an infinite dawn.
This view of the world, let us bear in mind, does not exclude the use of cosmic elements by man. In the Song of the Creatures Francis praises these elements for their usefulness. They are fraternal precisely because of their ability to meet the needs of men. Brother Sun gives us his light profusely. Brother Wind enlivens all creatures by renewing the air. Sister Water is praised explicitly as very useful. Brother Fire illuminates the night. And our mother Earth mother fills us with her fruits.
The elements of nature, precisely attending to our needs, are the sign of generosity always in action. If the sun is for Francis "the symbol of the Most High" it is because, light source, it is also a source of life, and it is above all. It does not make sense, then, to oppose Francis' fraternal vision and the revaluation of the universe, even if it is carried out with highly advanced technical means. The progress of the sciences and techniques, in releasing the elements of what they possess from the blind and the overwhelming, by making them more apt to respond to the needs of men, cannot but make them more fraternal and more transparent to the mystery of love that inhabits them.
What really separates man from a fraternal worldview and encloses him in his sufficiency, is the will to power and profit, the will to dominate beings and things and to annex them, as if he were his creator. Our industrial civilization has been founded on this idea of man as owner and lord of nature. As a result of the development of techniques, man has become intoxicated with his own power. Prometheus has been believed. Now, this will to power and profit cuts creation into two parts: on the one hand, man, who stands in absolute mastery and no longer counts among creatures; and, on the other, the latter, reduced to the condition of objects and without possessing existence and value more than in relation to a human will for profit and power.
Francis of Assisi denounces and rejects precisely this will. Isn't this the deep meaning of the words of the Song: "Brother Sun", "Moon Sister", "Brother Wind", "Water Sister", "Fire Brother"...? These fraternal images of the elements reject man's false pretenses; they break down barriers, erase borders, re-encounter total reality. They are an overcoming towards the unity of creation. They affirm and sing this unit.
An important caveat is required here. This unity of creation is not that of a primitive nature to which it would be enough to give up in dreams. One does not have to look for it in a mystical past. More than an evocation of the lost past, it expresses the very sense of becoming of the world. It is the creative intention met again and prophetically interviewed in its fullness.
The fraternal vision of Francis corresponds to a world devoted to the task of reconciliation and in which the primacy of unity over all divisions and breakages is affirmed, thanks to the salvation work carried out by Christ. Redemption illuminates Creation here. It gives it its full meaning. Francis' cosmic fraternity is more a hope of forgiveness and reconciliation than a nostalgic reminder of the first innocence. After all, his gaze is that of the prophets announcing the great cosmic alliance: «The wolf will dwell with the lamb, the panther will lie down with the kid, the heifer and the lion will pacify together: a small boy shepherds them. The child will play in the hour of the fast ”(Is 11,6-8).
Thomas of Celano expresses this intuition with depth and simplicity: "For the goodness of the source, which shall be all in all things, is already in all light in this Holy One" (2 Cel. 165). It is, without a doubt, a creative and prophetic vision. To fraternize with the creatures, as Francisco does, is, in short, to opt for a universe in which the conciliation already surpasses the rupture; it is to open and actively participate, above all separation and all solitude, in the impulse of reconciliation and communion which, in Christ, is already victorious.
All this is very easy to say. But how can such a choice really be made? Where to find this impulse of communion in a world torn apart by new violence? Keeping yourself from any hatred is a long way off! How to overcome fear, distrust? Are they not essential in a dangerous world? Nature is cruel. Even more cruel is man. An earthquake produces thousands of dead people. A war begets millions, and with what luxury of cruelty! When one has once seen what man is capable of doing in matters of atrocity and contempt, he is rightly feared and distrustful. How could one continue to believe in the fatal progress of humanity toward fraternity? Human brotherhood and cosmic brotherhood can no less appear as myths. There are days in our existence in which a strange doubt clings to the root of our innermost certainties: Will not the abandoned world be under the law of the strongest?
Should we, then, consider the fraternal choice of Francis of Assisi as a beautiful dream, no more? It is surely a dream, but a dream whose deep roots we must see in existence and which is a force not only of protest, but of creation and overcoming.
Such an option is, in effect, inseparable from the intimate experience that Francis lives with Christ. The luminous and fraternal world that Francis sings, he discovers from what he experiences in himself, becoming, according to the expression of the first biographer, "in a new man and in the other world" (1 Cel 82). At this depth is where Francis discovers the mystery of creation as a mystery of light.
Francis never spoke directly of this intimate experience. Otherwise, such an achievement cannot but be chaste and veiled.
But when this brother of the troubadours wanted to express his joy of being saved, he began to sing; sang to the sun and to all the creatures. And instead he unconsciously reveals the depths of his soul and the secret of his new birth to the world. Trying to penetrate a better intelligence of this song of the creatures we can expect to discover the secret of the re-found creation.
When Francis composes his Song, he is no longer in a position to enjoy the creatures. Blind or almost, it is within himself where he looks at them. More than observed, they are internalized. Thus, the "Brother Sun" is not a mere physical phenomenon. He is a living being. It not only brightens the eyes, but speaks to the soul, places it in relation to the "Most High", whose "symbol" is. Each element is thus associated with the deep life of the soul. The "Sister Water" is "humble and precious and chaste". Such qualifications lack an objective sense. Brother fire "beautiful and cheerful and robust and strong", translates an intimate enchantment, a dream of fire. The element is here imagined, dreamed in depth; encloses a secret life.
Now, all the things of nature in which we like to dream have intimate relations with our deep affection. We experience them as we experience ourselves. They are the mirror of our hidden energies. The dream of the elements opens the avenues of the soul. Through the world of dreamed things, we find ourselves in the darkest of ourselves: all the forces of desire.
If this symbolic dimension of the cosmic elements is admitted, the deep sense of the song of the creatures is presented. But not only the elements are dreamed up here. Also its same arrangement is also linked to the dream in the Song. Indeed, the various elements are not evoked at random and without order, but according to a regular alternation of fraternal couples. Such an arrangement lacks an objective sense. It refers to an intimate story.
Under the guise of a celebration of the world, Francis has to see them with himself, with his own depths. Unconsciously, but really. Dreaming of the "precious" and fraternal substance of things, it fraternizes with the fascinating and dreadful depths of the human soul. The fraternity expressed in the Song does not refer only to the material elements, but to all that these, properly valued in the dream, symbolize before the gaze of the great affective forces of the soul. (Cf. E. Leclerc: Le Cantique des Créatures. Based on a method of analysis inspired by Bachelard and Jung, this work discovers in the Franciscan praise of the creatures, the language of an intimate history and a new presence in the world) .
Francis has opened himself up to the creatures. And behold, these, in response, open it to himself, to the whole of man and his mystery.
The profound experience expressed in this song is, in effect, an experience of reconciling man with his intimate "archeology". Just pay attention to the tone of the work to convince us of it. Light and serenity reign from end to end in the Canticle. No distress, no shadow, no trace of aggression or bitterness. Cosmic elements are stripped of their threatening and destructive character. The great ancestral images of the "Lord Sun" or "our mother Earth", of water or fire, have lost their dreadful appearance and offer a merely fraternal face. The man who fraternizes in this way with the elements no longer feels under his control. It is no longer crushed by the dark forces that represent and symbolize.
This great serenity, let's not forget, comes at the end of a life; it translates into an inner tranquility, a deep acceptance of oneself, a reconciliation between the spirit and the tumultuous forces of life. Francisco has nothing to fear from these savage forces. He has not destroyed them, but tamed them, like the wolf of Gubbio. Isn't this wolf the symbol of aggression that exists in each of us, and that Francisco, for his part, has managed to become fraternal, transforming it into a force of love? This intimate energy is now part of its impulse toward the Most High; she also brings him to the light. Isn't she the one who sings in the images of the "brother of fire, beautiful and cheerful and robust and strong?"
Francis does not only exalt creatures that manifest strength and exuberance, such as the sun, wind and fire. It also exalts the elements that make you dream in a depth of welcome, such as water and mother earth. The Song is made up of an alternation of masculine images and feminine images. To a dream element in the sense of strength and action, a dream element in the sense of intimacy and communion immediately corresponds. This alternation discovers a soul open to all its powers. The Song of the Creatures appears as the symbolic language of a man fully reconciled with his affective wholeness, born to a new and plenary personality in which all the dark forces of life and desire act themselves in the light.
The fraternal vision of nature expressed in the Song of the Creatures is only possible from this intimate experience of reconciliation. This nature, freed from all fearsome and dark aspects, entirely transparent and luminous, is not a mere dream of a poet; it is the testimony and the mirror of a being in which the forces of desire and of life have been unified and clarified in a single and great love. A torn consciousness cannot help but project on the world its own inner rupture. On the contrary, a unified and happy consciousness perceives the deep and ultimate unity of beings; she sees it, sings it and cooperates with it.
It is true that Francis' personality was, at first, more tumultuous, less unified than that of Sister Clare, for example. But the wealth of a being is measured by the diversity of the tendencies that agitate it and by its ability to integrate them. Francis did not achieve this unification without crisis or conflict (cf. E. Leclerc: Wisdom of a poor man). Nothing, however, has been lost from its former wealth. Everything is finally reunified: the sense of the concrete and the powers of sleep, the dynamism of action and contemplative lyricism, the love of the living person, the individual and the singular and the need for a cosmic communion ... This is what makes Francis, besides an overflowing being, a wonderful interpreter of the splendor. His song is truly the song of a unified and universalized man.
"Saint Francis' Flourishing Easter" by Eloi Leclerc
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