Yo

On the vocation of humankind

Coinciding with the season of Lent, which prepares us for and leads us to the celebration of the Passion and Easter of the Lord, and almost as a metaphorical image through which I see nature participating in an allusive synthesis of the atmosphere of the ecclesiastical calendar, the large west-facing window that illuminates the desk where I write from the left allows me to enjoy the contrasting and varied changes of the dense grove, composed especially of mahogany trees ( Swietenia macrophylla ) that grow on the sidewalks and on the long central median of the avenue. With the dazzling peculiarities of the intense tropical sun, and according to the light received in each space and the corresponding and variable shadows that fall throughout the days of the year—curious circumstances that alter the expectation of a supposed synchronization in the natural processes of growth—the trees simultaneously present different states in my field of vision: the foliage of some mahogany trees is still green; Others have already opened their woody, ovoid fruits and are scattering their seeds in the shape of a surprising fin or propeller blade, spreading their message in a joyful and swift swirling flight. Those closest to the window, persevering in their annual deciduousness, just a couple of days ago completely lost their leaves, stripping their branches bare, and today they dawn with the new growth of their many small brown leaves that will soon turn green again, like an awakening of smiles that herald renewal. Faithful to the DNA carried by their seed, the mahogany trees fulfill each year the seasonal cycle that includes the intense greenness, the appearance of the tiny yellowish-green flowers, and the subsequent announcement of the fruits; later, the dispersal of the volatile seeds—a spectacle that always amazes me like a child’s game—and the complete shedding of the leaves, resembling drought and the death of the plant. Finally, and just two or three days later, the annual burst of new foliage occurs once again, announcing the restart of life.

But perhaps we could extend the meditation suggested by this botanical contemplation a little further. The mention of the seed and its DNA, which, from one perspective, is equivalent to its essence and its vocation, leads me to think of the images I share with students as a kind of reminder when we talk about the three theological virtues. Of course, the words  vocation  and  virtue  are necessarily associated with the very definition of what it means to be human, but in an exercise of imagination, perhaps we could better understand the intimate connection between them and the being of every person. Each seed—let’s take the mahogany seed, for example—in order to truly fulfill the definition of its being encoded in its specific DNA, possesses what we might distinguish as three “virtues,” fundamental elements that make germination possible. Dare we, for a moment, playfully imagine the seed with a consciousness that discerns what these virtues are? Accepting this convenient image, and if we manage to continue the game, we can see that the seed, in order to truly and effectively be a seed,  believes , has memory, and knows with absolute certainty that it comes from a mahogany tree and that this  faith  inextricably links it to the tree of its origin, a bond that also extends to the legacy of the species for which it is responsible. Such certainty results in the unequivocal confidence that, through its being as a seed, through its potential, a new plant will originate, another mahogany tree will be produced, which shapes its mission and its vocation: this is its  hope . But, to confirm and crystallize this hope in the future, the seed must relinquish its preservation and cease to remain in the initial state that identifies it in its form and appearance. In order for it to truly be a seed in its fullness that gives rise to a new plant and not a sterile member of the collection in any old container, it must shed its structure and components in the soil that receives it; It must surrender itself and cease to be: it must die like a seed so that the germ within may live, grow, and transform. This self-denial, this complete surrender of oneself for the good of another life, does it not similarly describe what we know in essence as  charitable love?In that decision of renunciation that truly activates and confirms the being of the seed so that it may give life, we find, for our useful reminder, the inseparable link between faith, hope, and charity united in the manifest vocation of the seed. However, this reflection arises from a useful and chosen didactic metaphor, for we must bear in mind that the true fullness of the human being, as a result of the loving gift of self, demands the conscious and free will of self-giving as a gratuitous gift of love that is also directed to a specific and personal recipient. In a unique, intimate, and paradigmatic way, Jesus did this by incarnating himself and thus fulfilling the will of the Father to save humanity and each one of us; Christ “loved me and gave himself up for me,” Saint Paul tells us precisely (Galatians 2:20). I then think of how Jesus used the same image of the seed with the most luminous clarity to announce his own necessary Passover and also his Glory: “Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed; But if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:24). The announcement is also an invitation to follow the path He traces and to discover in each chosen step our intimate vocation, so similar to that of the seed. Once again, Saint Paul completes the metaphor of sowing the seed, identifying it with the promise of our resurrection and divine blessedness (1 Corinthians 15:35-58).

When discussing vocation, I once again draw upon experiences I like to draw upon. Frequently, in the context of the reflections that arise in the courses I offer students to encourage reading and literature, particularly through the imagery of Arthurian legends in light of Don Quixote, and also in the context of service when teaching lessons for specific Franciscan formation, I almost always, as a natural corollary to the dialogues, end up sharing a questioning statement that, in a playful spirit and without aiming for originality, I try to encourage a moment of reflection to savor the meaning and scope of the words: “What is the vocation of humankind?” I ask. By responding concisely with “to be human,” without altering the phrase but focusing on the verb into which the noun of the preceding question has been transformed, I aspire to foster an awareness of the inescapable essential purpose that calls to us and that each of us, in our particular existence, must attain: to be human, to be fully human, to find human fulfillment; a fulfillment that we invariably associate with good. However, perhaps at this moment the old and traditional aphorism “to err is human” may come to mind, as if making mistakes constituted the fundamental substance of humanity and that this very fact defined the vocation to which I refer, a kind of excuse and condemnation in the acceptance of limitation. However, what this maxim truly reveals is a tendency towards error associated with our fragile condition, so that statement is complemented by another, more stimulating assertion in one of the variants of the phrase: “but to amend or rectify is wise”; and that amendment is undoubtedly aiming to bring us closer to the necessary path of life, to follow an ideal of what is truly good.

It would seem clear that in order to achieve and maintain one’s individual human vocation—which at the same time finds expression in the shared experience of community, especially given the awareness that human beings “cannot find their own fulfillment except in the sincere gift of themselves to others” ( Gaudium et spes , 24)—the prudent and unceasing cultivation of the faculties and potentialities of human nature itself is required, encompassing the spiritual, the intellectual, the sensitive, and the biological. Human vocation is thus defined between limitations and potential, and for this purpose, the cardinal virtue of prudence, defined in Christian ethics as wisdom in action, asks us to act in accordance with reality; the same ethics that are identified with the true image of the human being to which every person is called: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27). Thus, the  Catechism of the Catholic Church  (No. 1877) precisely explains who offers the contours of this image of the human vocation to true fullness: Jesus, the Son of God, and God with the Father (Matthew 11:27 and John 10:30; 14:9-11). The vocation to fullness is intrinsic to the faith bestowed by the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3) and which contemplates the “I am” of the Son (John 8:58) in harmony with the voice of the Father (Exodus 3:14). This will be the conviction of Francis of Assisi, who will see the human vocation not only in the proclamation of the Gospel message of love, but especially in the concrete and explicit form of that love manifested in the ultimate gift and offering of Jesus Christ, from the Incarnation to the sacrifice of his death, which will culminate in the fullness of the glory of the Resurrection.

II

“Welcome, my sister death.”

The chosen and immeasurable self-emptying of Jesus, the stripping away of his divine nature to come exclusively to serve and give himself to humanity through dispossession, the  kenosis  so fascinating to  the Little Poor Man of Assisi,  will constitute the key to the logic he follows in his journey to fulfill the commandment of love through humility and in embracing poverty for himself, which is affirmed in complete detachment. I never cease to admire the clarity with which Francis of Assisi understands, in his daily life and from the deepest interiority, from a knowledge that is at once a real taste of the body—for it merges understanding, intuition, and sensitivity—this truth that manifests itself in existence and in the universe, as well as in the guidance of his actions, of his path as a pilgrim of life, which he attempts to translate in his preaching and in his few writings. He truly loves God “with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his mind and with all his strength” (Mark 12:30; Deuteronomy 6:5), and this same love, in the recognition of his sonship to the Creator Father, binds him in loving and universal fraternity with all human beings without distinction and also with every creature of the Lord who shares our Common Home. The composition of the  Canticle of Brother Sun  or  Canticle of the Creatures  (FF 263) in the final stage of his life takes place at the culmination of the revelation of the being who finds his fullness in complete self-giving. And this illumination can only manifest itself in the irrepressible celebration of this truth of Creation and in the knowledge that one belongs to it, a singular and conscious being that also presupposes the knowledge and acceptance of temporal finitude on earth, the reconciled dwelling that needs to be expressed in order to also be possible:  song is existence , as Éloi Leclerc formulates it, quoting the lucid and suggestive verse of Rainer Maria Rilke. And Francis, assuming himself to be a minstrel of God alongside his companions in adventure, with the memorable, or rather, almost inseparable image of his living with the joy that consists of adoring and loving, thus sings of the wonders of the existence of all creation, which in itself shows us the goodness, truth, and beauty of being, in affirmative harmony with the smiling gaze of the Creator Father who “saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). He achieves this by living the poverty he has chosen following Jesus, in the most complete dispossession that leads him to see, appreciate and receive everything as a gift, even that which is mysterious to us, that which we do not understand and even causes us fear: he trusts in receiving everything with grace of spirit and also as a received grace that thus acquires a full meaning.

I have just written this  with complete understanding  , and I feel that, although true, I am almost doing so as if it were a ready-made formula, expressing a mere acceptance that I cannot ignore. Therefore, perhaps I should dwell a little longer on this exploration. It is curious that the final stanzas that complete the  Canticle of the Creatures  were not only composed to respond to different moments, but also that the praises to the Lord no longer focus solely on pointing to the elements of Creation that astonish our senses with the gift of their existence, such as the sun that bestows upon us its light, its heat, and splendor; the moon with its evocative phases and the crackling stars that silently offer us their beauty in the night sky; the ever-changing wind that carries the air at all times, the same wind that fills the interior of our bodies so that we can breathe, an unmistakable conscious sign of our being; the most useful and refreshing water, whose tangible encounter in thirst and need provokes almost indescribable joy; Fire and its radiant, ever-changing forms, a warm and luminous energy akin to festive joy; and the earth that welcomes and shelters us, yielding the varied fruits that sustain us when we seek to care for and cultivate it with our labor. As a necessary coda that reveals to us the central theme of the  CanticleIn what could be seen as the concluding stage related to human life within Creation, Francis mentions in two of the three final stanzas the praises to the Lord precisely for that which arises from the experiences of suffering, illness, and death—which, to paraphrase Rilke again, in our daily lives present themselves to us with the terrifying face of the inevitable “dragons” of existence. As humans so deeply connected to life and to the fear of what we do not know and what awaits us, we know that these dragons are there; we accept their concepts perhaps with a somewhat stoic and unyielding attitude; at times we regard them with coldness and distance, as if in alienation. And in the context of faith, unless one has had a real experience of God in life that transforms one’s vision, all that remains is to follow an obedient resignation to their mysterious meaning in the promise of hope. We generally avoid speaking of those dragons as if this precaution could somehow ward off their encounter and confrontation, attempting to postpone and distance them in time. In our natural self-love and instinctive attachment to life, the perception of the moment of death presents itself to us with a perhaps impenetrable opacity—even more so when we consider deaths resulting from injustice or the absurd and accidental ones that provoke our natural rejection and lead us to question why they happen. When we focus our gaze on our own particular situation and reflect a little on death, we admit its inevitability, even though we almost always do so with an external awareness, with a preconceived and forced concept learned from the outside rather than truly embraced, because there is no possibility of prior personal experience, even if we have suffered the anguish of acute grief or perhaps the strange, paralyzing stupor when a loved one dies or we are direct witnesses to this event in someone about whom we know very little. But that same perplexity, which is also accompanied by a consequent sadness and often the pain of that departure, so constant in every experience, may perhaps change its usual sign with another light that shines from within. Although as humans all definitive explanations ultimately elude us, could these mysteries not also be seen as gifts, indistinguishable at first glance because we have only followed the inertia of affliction, strangeness, or futile denial? Are not the “valleys of the shadow of death” (cf. Psalm 23:4) also gifts? What can those passages reveal to us, passages we traverse for a time and that seem so dark because we cannot glimpse their end? Rilke alludes to the dragons of myths who, in the supreme and sudden instant of generous surrender in the constancy of the heroic, are transformed into princesses.And so he astutely adds in one of his pieces of advice to the young poet: “Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses waiting only for that, to see us once beautiful and brave.” Francis of Assisi did not initially possess this clarity of vision when, in a fickle aspiration for heroism and nobility, he desired to be a knight in his thwarted adventure that was cut short in Spoleto around the summer of 1205, a turning point that began his conversion process to become the saint of universal brotherhood we know. Near the end of his life, some twenty years after that episode and after an intense pilgrimage not without serious ailments and illnesses, Francis reveals to us and shares with us, in his trusting experience of “letting God be God,” the illumination of his Final canticle  ; we appreciate how he embraces with inspired naturalness the ever-present dragons as gifts that inspire his praise and gratitude: the being manages to clothe his soul in beauty and courage to receive with surprising warmth “our sister / bodily death, / from which no living man / can escape.” The endearing fraternal title addressed to death leaves no doubt of his affirmation of surrender to the whole, with its mystery and its strange and paradoxical complex simplicity when it contrasts with the living, and which is thus recognized as grace, because Jesus in his most generous  kenotic way  (Philippians 2:6-8) also died on the cross and likewise conquered death with the resurrection and transformed it for us through the sure promise of the fullness of glorious life.

The  Legend of Perugia , also known as the  Assisi Compilation  and composed before 1246, tells us that in the autumn of 1226, while lying ill and being cared for in the episcopal palace of Assisi by a physician friend from Arezzo, Francis exclaimed “with immense joy, both inward and outward,” upon receiving the diagnosis of his incurable illness: “Welcome, my sister Death.” The same biographical text recounts how  il Poverello , “to comfort his spirit and to prevent his courage from being despondent due to his many and varied ailments,” frequently invited his companions to sing the  Canticle of the Sun , an expression of his intense joy, initially inconceivable to those closest to him, including the bewildered Brother Elias, vicar general of the order. For this reason, he also told the physician attending him: “I am not a coward who fears death.” The Lord, by His grace and mercy, has united me so closely to Him that I feel as happy to live as to die” ( Legend of Perugia , 99-100; FF 1638). I believe it is important to note this fact, in which Francis had the blessed grace of knowing the imminence of his departure from this world, for it allowed him to prepare himself humanly and spiritually in his final moments, both in life and in death, as we read in the valuable source of the  Perugian Legend . How might we understand these happy steps of his pilgrimage toward his final earthly destiny?

III

Accounts of the passing of Francis of Assisi

With subtlety, Friar Pietro Maranesi, in his book *  La via di frate Francesco . Gli ultimi tre anni della vita del santo: introduzione ai centenari francescani  * (2023), distinguishes between the fundamental biographical sources on the saint two different perspectives that show us how Francis met “Sister Death.” On the one hand, the *  Legend of Perugia* , a collection of texts that gather the testimonies of his most constant companions (“We who lived with the blessed Francis and have written these things about him, bear witness…,” is a phrase we can read in fragment 14), presents perhaps a closer and more human vision of what could be considered “the death of a Christian man” by describing details that reveal greater spontaneity and also a taste for and love of life, as well as a remembrance of what it has offered. On the other hand, the biographies recognized as official—that is, the first  Life  of Tommaso da Celano, commissioned by Pope Gregory IX in 1229 shortly after the canonization of Francis, and particularly the  Major Legend , completed around 1263 by Saint Bonaventure, which became the definitive conciliatory text to establish a common observance of the Rule and thus end the internal tensions of the time in the Order of Friars Minor—carefully depict the image of a man on the verge of perfection, a Christian hero freed from all carnal and earthly ties, already embarked on beatitude in preparation for his final departure, seeking to emulate on his own scale the stages of the Passover of Jesus crucified; in short, they attempt to show “the death of a Christ-like saint.” I believe that the contrast between the texts bequeathed to us by tradition allows us to consider the diverse interpretations that both perspectives highlight, as well as their complementarity: they certainly bring us closer to those very human steps in Francis’ individual vocation, who aspires to follow in the footsteps of his beloved Jesus Christ and who becomes an ideal model focused on the spiritual. But, in addition, we appreciate the same  Poverello,  in love with Christ, yet who aspires to the very end to be in a real and concrete fraternal feeling that is necessarily imbued with earthly life alongside his friends and fellow pilgrims.

In reading the  Legend of Perugia  (5, 7-8, 12-13; FF 1546-1548, 1555, 1558), reviewing only the passages that appear in the narrative of our ailing protagonist’s stay at the palace of Bishop Guido of Assisi, we find allusions both to Francis’s understandable inclination toward despondency due to his accumulated physical and spiritual ailments, and to his need to encourage himself and also to try to comfort the natural sorrow and concern of his beloved companions in the  afterlife of Christ , who already sensed the imminent death of their spiritual father. Undoubtedly, the contagious joy of the praises for the brotherhood of Creation expressed in the  Canticle  —including the final verses dedicated not only to “Sister Death,” but also to those who suffer and those who build peace and forgive out of love—would offer particular consolation. But I believe there is something more. I always keep in mind what Josef Pieper points out about consolation and how its meaning can be understood as a tacit definition that goes beyond its perceptible or immediate manifestation: it is a silent joy, the most intimate, which truly signifies a  yes  to life, the implicit affirmation of existence. Despite suffering pain, particularly the pain of loss, we receive that quiet, fraternal, and at the same time consoling embrace, and we think: with and through this sincere affection, “life is worthwhile.” Although the phrase is often seen as an overused cliché, its full formulation never grows tiresome: it is true in every word, for it consists of an inner knowing that we tend to express whenever its particular hardship emerges, a conviction that is almost like a small reflection of the smile of God the Father in Genesis when He contemplated what He had created and “saw that it was very good.”

In Francis, the detail of farewells is equally striking, ratifying fraternal affection through the gift of dedicated attention with the human meaning of goodbye in separation, while at the same time suggesting a kind of personal recapitulation of the initial journeys of his following of Jesus, as when a few months before he dictated the  Testament  (FF 110-131) for his followers and mentions precisely what changed his existence to opt definitively for the Gospel: the Lord led him to practice mercy and tenderness with the lepers, and that free expression of fraternal love towards the most excluded produced his total conversion, because what before seemed bitter to him turned into sweetness of body and soul. Knowing that his departure from this world was very near, Francis chose to leave the episcopal palace, which would now be incompatible—and therefore, we might infer, uncomfortable—with the chosen poverty of his way of life, and proceeded to return to the vicinity of Santa Maria della Porziuncola, the beloved little place where the expansive movement of the Franciscan Friars Minor began. On the path that descends to the valley from the hill where Assisi is located, his companions carried him to his destination on a stretcher due to the intense weakness that consumed his body, and for a few moments they stopped in front of one of the leper colonies that had been the object of his first work of loving care and dedication, San Salvatore delle Pareti. From there, Francis, slightly raising himself from the portable bed, turned his almost blind face toward his beloved hometown to say goodbye, offer a prayer, and bestow a special blessing. Likewise, back in the humble convent of small huts that housed his friars near the chapel of Santa Maria degli Angeli de la Porziuncola, he remembered the first of his friends who had followed him in 1208 on the extraordinary evangelical adventure, the knight and noble doctor Bernard of Quintavalle, with whom he also wished to share a delicious sweet treat he so enjoyed and which I will mention later. He summoned him to bless him, and during their encounter, something occurred that we might consider one of those involuntary and amusing mishaps or jokes that suddenly happen in very serious moments to make us smile: due to his eye ailment, Francis could not see Bernard, and so he extended his hand to touch his head, but instead touched that of Brother Giles, who was standing beside him. Francisco immediately realized his mistake and exclaimed, “This is not Brother Bernard’s head!” He insisted again on wanting to bless the firstborn of the Friars Minor, which he finally managed to do, and with whom he was able to talk for a while.

He also longed to send words of comfort, blessing, and farewell to Clare of Assisi, his beloved and cherished “little plant” and spiritual sister, the first woman to follow him on his path of fidelity to evangelical poverty. So he dictated a message, which he sent with one of the brothers to the Convent of San Damiano, where he lived in cloister with his community of Poor Clares: “Go and take this letter to Clare. Tell her not to suffer or be sad because she cannot see me now; but to be assured that before her death, she and her sisters will see me, and I will bring them great comfort.” And so it happened. The morning after Francis died, his body was carried in procession through the entire town of Assisi, amidst hymns and praises, to San Damiano, where Clare and the other sisters could mourn him closely and bid him farewell.

Such were the farewells of those we might consider the most beloved representatives of the First and Second Franciscan Orders. But, likewise, the order that would later be known as the Third Order, comprised of lay members, featured a singular episode with Jacopa dei Sette Sogli (also known as Settesoli), whom Francis affectionately and affectionately called “Friar Jacopa” or “Brother Jacoba,” a curious and exceptional nickname signifying the  Poverello’s closeness  to this noble lady who so greatly supported the Friars Minor movement in Rome. Francis, destitute, wished to inform her of his impending death and also request two peculiar favors. The first was that she send him a “monastic cloth of ash-colored fabric” with which his brothers could make a tunic for his burial shroud after his passing; The second favor was intended to please his palate in the time he had left: that Jacoba prepare some  mostaccioli , his favorite sweets, a type of cookie made “with almonds, sugar or honey, and other ingredients.” What a curious, small, and tender treat Brother Francis wanted to indulge himself with on the eve of his passing to the Lord, and which he asked of a follower so close to his heart! This Francis, who practiced fasting for five Lents a year—more than 200 days, if we include other important dates—at the end of his life asks forgiveness of his body, the “brother ass” that endured his sacrifices and so many pains and sorrows, and agrees to please it with this very special indulgence. Thus, his companions prepared the letter for Brother Jacoba (FF 253-255), and when they were about to send it to Rome, the gentle lady, inspired beforehand by the Holy Spirit, was already at the entrance of the convent, longing for the consolation of saying goodbye to Francis. Anticipating the inevitable, she had brought the cloth the sick man had requested, along with candles and incense, and the ingredients for the  mostaccioli . The legend continues, recounting   how the Roman friend prepared the delicacy that Francis so loved. “But he ate little, for his body was growing weaker each day due to his very serious illness and drawing near to death… And it happened that, according to God’s will, within the same week that Lady Jacoba came, the blessed Francis passed away.”

“A brotherly man is always a witness to the Father. Whoever sees him, sees the Father,” writes Éloi Leclerc, recounting a deeply painful episode: the death of a friar on the prisoner train leaving the   Nazi concentration  camp of Buchenwald in April 1945.  This event led him and his fellow Franciscan friars, also prisoners in the same carriage, in a spontaneous gesture only explicable in the surrender of faith, to raise their voices in the  Canticle of Brother Sun. Leclerc attempts to explain that which cannot be fully understood or expressed, telling us that in “the dark night of the soul,” in moments of pain and darkness, of suffering and anguish, the manifestation of patience and care, of love and friendship toward others has such immeasurable value that it becomes a ray of light, miraculously illuminating our fragility in hardship and misery: “It gives us back our faces, it recreates us. Suddenly, we know again that we are human.” And we can add to this awareness that we are beloved creatures of the Father, and that we open our pure eyes once again to celebrate every detail of the wonders of Creation and how human beings of goodwill contemplate them and try to care for them. That surprising event, which Éloi Leclerc recounts in the afterword to his book  *The Canticle of the Creatures  * (1970), he doesn’t even dare to compare with the experience of the  Poverello ; he merely attempts to highlight the necessary reflection on building fraternity even in dark times. Let us also remember that, after his public mission fulfilling the Father’s will and proclaiming the Good News, Jesus also experienced the most intense agony on the night of Gethsemane, the eve of his Passion .  In this sense, the fraternal expressions found in the anecdotes surrounding the life of Francis of Assisi, so full of life, friendship, and flavor, lead me to relate certain elements to some features that can be distinguished in what are called  signs. These miracles, highlighted by Saint John in his Gospel, revealed the glory of Jesus and unveiled him as the Son of God. Thus, beyond the theological significance of each miracle, the human perspective evident in Jesus’s tender attention, loving consideration, and compassion completes each event: the transformation of water into magnificent wine during the wedding at Cana; the remarkable healings in Capernaum and Jerusalem so that those healed could return to their daily lives; the multiplication of the loaves and fishes to feed a multitude; the walking on the Sea of ​​Galilee to reunite with the apostles; the healing of the man born blind so that he could finally see the wonders of Creation and the Messiah himself, the Son of God; the resurrection of Lazarus, the beloved and mourned friend whom he restored to life, thereby foreshadowing the future fullness and transcendence. Each of these joyful miracles is imbued with a deep concern and care for human life. Thanks to the Incarnation, Jesus, our elder brother who reveals the Father to us and who followed the path of passion and the cross in his love for each of us, also seeks the details that truly nurture fraternal relationships here in this world he shared with his humanity. I am thinking at this moment of some verses I have selected from a poem by Jorge Luis Borges entitled “John I, 14,” which belongs to the book  In Praise of Darkness (1969):

I, who am the Is, the Was, and the Will Be,
once again deign to use language,
which is successive time and emblem.
He who plays with a child plays with something
both near and mysterious;
I wished to play with My children.
I was among them with wonder and tenderness.

(…)

I was loved, understood, praised, and hung on a cross.

(…)

Sometimes I think with nostalgia

in the smell of that carpentry shop.

The loving closeness of Jesus, the Word of God who made his dwelling among us, and that final verse about “the smell of that carpentry shop” that transports us to his home in Nazareth, living with Mary and Joseph—the Holy Family who inhabited it—as well as to the intense and distinctive aroma that evokes manual labor and wood, belonging to the community, and also the passage of the workday that any man would experience, I believe are related to those delicious  mostaccioli  prepared by Brother Jacopa and the tender farewells of Bernard and Clare that recalled the years in Assisi, their friendship, and their travels along the roads proclaiming the ” Franciscan novitas  ” of conversion and fraternal love. In such images, fraternity and the everyday human experience, a being present in life, are closely intertwined. I believe this leads us once again to so many passages in the Gospel, and in particular to the description of the Last Judgment, which summarizes the works of love and also underscores the specific attention given to those in need of food, water, shelter, clothing, a visit, and comfort (Matthew 25:31-46). Francis of Assisi, in his constant preaching, clearly captures this transcendent concern, inviting us to the fraternity of all, to fulfill the will of God the Father and trust in his mercy, and to prepare ourselves before the inevitable arrival of “Sister Death.” And regarding this last point, he warned of the need for a change of attitude and way of life to save our souls. He explicitly recalls this in the two versions of his  Letter to the Faithful  (FF 178 and 179-206) and in the specific stanza of his  Canticle of Brother Sun , whose final verse alludes once again to the examination we will have in the future life and which is read in Scripture (Revelation 20:14-15; 21:8) when we will be asked about faithfulness in love:

Praised be You, my Lord, for our sister bodily death,
from which no living man can escape.

Woe to those who die in mortal sin!
Blessed are those whom I find in your most holy will,
for the second death will not harm them!

Saint Bonaventure, in his  Major Legend  (XIV; FF 1239-1243), which is based on the  First Life  written by Tommaso da Celano (VIII, 109-110; FF 509-512), seeks to continue along this path that requires us to examine our human vocation of transcendence toward God. He thus narrates the final stages of Francis’s journey at the headquarters of the fraternity, just a few meters from the small chapel of the Porziuncola. Each aspect he chooses to describe is perhaps more solemn, so to speak, as they seem to form a kind of paraliturgy and a spiritual agape with three significant steps in which Francis, faithful to self-denial and kenosis  in  his following of the poor and crucified Jesus, surrenders his entire being to the Lord. Francis knew his final hour was approaching, and in complete trust in the Lord’s mercy, sustained by the love of his brothers, and further emphasizing his devotion to the virtue that defined him, “holy poverty,”  the Little Poor Man  renounced his simple, patched habit of sackcloth. He stripped it off, lying naked and without his own clothes on the earth, as if wanting to merge with it, with the dust and ashes, accepting the destiny of the human body. With his eyes turned to heaven and his left hand upon the stigmata on his right side, he surrendered his soul, completely free of all bonds, into the hands of God the Father. Furthermore, Francis earnestly requested that when he died, he be left to lie naked on the ground for a short time before his burial. His brother, the custodian, then asked him, out of holy obedience, to borrow the sackcloth of another brother, so that he might remain faithful and happy in his love of holy poverty. Then, as his departure was imminent, he asked all the brothers present to gather around him. He consoled and blessed them, advising them to remain in the love of God and Holy Mother Church, finally entrusting them to the grace of the Lord. Then, wishing to echo Jesus’ farewell to the apostles, whom he called “friends” with his immense love, and as if preparing for Easter, Francis requested that chapter 13 of the Gospel of John be read aloud. This chapter recounts the instructive washing of the feet and proclaims the commandment of love. Following this, he recited Psalm 141, in which King David cries out and places his absolute trust in the Lord: “You are my refuge and my portion in the land of the living.” And Saint Bonaventure writes: “Having finally fulfilled all the mysteries in Francis, his most holy soul freed from the bonds of the flesh and immersed in the abyss of divine light, this blessed man fell asleep in the Lord.” This occurred on the evening of Saturday, October 3, 1226.

Saint Paul instructs us precisely: “For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him” (1 Thessalonians 4:14). Therefore, we celebrate the passing of Francis of Assisi to the Father’s dwelling place and understand the meaning of “our sister bodily death” if we seek to remain on the path of life in the worship of the Triune God and, consequently, in the building of fraternity. We may very well not know when this unique sister will visit us. It then occurs to me to paraphrase, with an even more Christian meaning, a phrase by Michel de Montaigne. The French Renaissance essayist believed that to philosophize is to prepare oneself to die well, which is equivalent to living well; that is, to work as much as possible in cultivating love, so that when death arrives, it finds us without fear in the work of sowing, and even more so in our imperfect garden that is never fully completed. Once again, the stanza that Francis of Assisi prepared to close the  Canticle of Brother Sun  summarizes a more precise proposal that invites loving service:

Praise and bless my Lord,

And give thanks to Him and serve Him with great humility!

These four actions, inseparable for a follower of Christ, in turn constitute the foundations that translate into genuine concern for one’s neighbor, building a more fraternal world, as well as the driving force that propels us in the pursuit of true peace. Saint Bonaventure recalls in the same  Major Legend  how  the Little Poor Man  exhorted his brothers with these words to continue the mission of the Gospel: “Let us begin, brothers, to serve the Lord our God, for we have made very little progress until now.”