St. Francis of Assisi
Founder of the Franciscan Order,

born at Assisi in Umbria, in 1181 or 1182 -- the exact year is uncertain;

Died there, 3 October, 1226.

FRANCIS, THE INSPIRATION FOR
ST. FRANCIS CHILDREN’S CARE ORGANIZATION

O Divine Master,
grant that I may
not so much seek to be consoled
as to console,
to be understood
as to understand,
to be loved
as to love.
For it is in giving
that we receive,
it is in pardoning
that we are pardoned
and it is in dying
that we are born to eternal life.

Francis of Assisi (1181-1226)

The most devilish temptation facing anyone seeking a spiritual life, a life of making a difference, is not the drama of flamboyant sin conquered, but the quiet seduction of self-centered isolation.

We feel the pull of retreating from the world – from other people- of finding a haven of gentle, uninvolved serenity, the ultimate “warm and fuzzy.”

“Excuse me, please while I crawl inside myself and call it holiness.”

God looks like a way of getting away from it all.

But “making a difference” is not an escape route, not life in a cocoon, but an insistent ongoing demand to move outside ourselves, to reverse the direction of our lives from hiding to involvement, to doing for others what we are tempted to reserve for ourselves.

It is not basking in the warm luxury of being understood but reaching out to understand, especially those we prefer to be invisible, not so much seeking consolation but reaching out to console, pardoning others, all others, when the soft side of our souls would like to settle for being pardoned.

Francis calls the choice by its right name: dying. We’ve got a lot of dying to do if we are to have the lives our souls hunger for, a lot of entering into the great mystery of death and resurrection.