Tuesday, April 18, 2017

The 2nd Elective Provincial Chapter of St. Anthony Province, Goa begins!!!!!!!




 What does Saint Francis's witness tell us today? What does he have to say to us, not merely with words - that is easy enough - but by his life? 1. His first and most essential witness is this: that being a Christian means having a living relationship with the person of Jesus; it means putting on Christ, being conformed to him. Where did Francis's journey to Christ begin? It began with the gaze of the crucified Jesus. With letting Jesus look at us at the very moment that he gives his life for us and draws us to himself. Francis experienced this in a special way in the Church of San Damiano, as he prayed before the cross to venerate. On that cross, Jesus is depicted not as dead, but alive! Blood is flowing from his wounded hands, feet and side, but that blood speaks of life. Jesus' eyes are not closed but open, wide open: he looks at us in a way that touches our hearts.
This decision of Saint Francis was a radical way of imitating Christ: he clothed himself anew, putting on Christ, who, though he was rich, became poor in order to make us rich by his poverty (cf. 2 Cor 8:9). In all of Francis' life, love for the poor and the imitation of Christ in his poverty were inseparably united, like the two sides of a coin.
What does Saint Francis's witness tell us today? What does he have to say to us, not merely with words - that is easy enough - but by his life?







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