<\/p>\n
Brother Francis was impulsive. While reflecting on the destitution and humility of the Crucified Christ, he had discovered, by way of contrast, the motivation behind human behavior. But he never shared his conclusions with anyone, and, in doing so now, he felt relieved, as though a tremendous weight had been lifted from his shoulders.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s elaborate,\u201d he continued, \u201con a theological treatise in order to lay the foundations of the Christian Republic, and to say in the end: It deals with exceptional and divine interests. When the papal forces triumph, we say right away: God is victorious. Our mouths fill with resounding words: effectiveness, productivity, organization, interests of the Church, results. These are our value judgements and criteria for action. And to the degree to which these values change, so does our degree of satisfaction. It\u2019s a horrendous and strange type of mixture,\u201d said Brother Francis in a very low voice, so that Giles could not overhear. \u201cWe all want to triumph, and shine, and we do it in a consecrated but profane manner, mixing personal desires with the interests of God. When I think of this, I just want to cry.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cMy son, we forgot about the Cross. It\u2019s difficult to free oneself of something. To make oneself poor is no easy task. No one wants to be little. We think we can and we think we should do something: redeem, organize, transform, save. Only God saves, my beloved Giles. At the hour of truth, our plans for salvation, our apostolic strategies tumble down the slopes of frustration. There are many recent examples of this but we never learn from them. Believe me, my son, it\u2019s infinitely easier to mount a successful apostolic<\/p>\n
campaign than to make oneself little and humble. We\u2019re like the apostles when, on their journey to Jerusalem, the Lord spoke to them about Calvary and the Cross. \u2018They didn\u2019t understand a thing,\u2019 they didn\u2019t want to know, and they looked the other way. My son, in our initial emotional reactions, we feel intense repugnance toward the Cross.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is why,\u201d Brother Francis said in conclusion, \u201cat the sight of the Cross we instinctively close our eyes, justifying our anxiety about conquest and victory with rationalizations. To make oneself little: therein lies salvation. Let\u2019s begin by acknowledging that only God saves souls, only he is omnipotent and needs nothing from no one. If he were to need, it would be from insignificant slaves, poor and humble, who imitate his Son in submission and obedience, capable of loving and forgiving. This is all we need to do. The rest is God\u2019s doing.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Little by little Brother Francis, approached the conclusion of his colloquy. They were both profoundly moved and were silent for a long time. Giles did not feel the need to ask for clarification. Everything was clear.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They spent most of the night looking silently at the stars, and thinking about the poor and Crucified Christ. They were extremely happy.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Extracted from the book \u201cBrother Francis of Assisi\u201d, by Fr. Ignacio Larra\u00f1aga<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
En la festividad de San Francisco de As\u00eds, octubre 4, compartimos este hermoso texto tomado del libro \u201cEl Hermano de As\u00eds\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11560,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-noticias"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11558"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11571,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11558\/revisions\/11571"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/home.tovpil.org\/en_US\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}