Devotion, Determination, Discipline . . .

Today's was somewhat of a 3D experience - as though the whole picture can only be seen when the object is viewed in 

three dimensions.

I started with a walk down to San Damiano. Most of the place does not open to the public until 10.00am, but before the hordes arrived it was possible to sit in total silence in the chapel where Francis received his call from God to renounce his former life and "rebuild my church". That it was during a time of devotion to our Lord that this happened is no coincidence. When our hearts are open to God in offering ourselves devotedly, it is much more likely that we will be attuned to hear His voice, in whatever form it comes to us.

Of the rest of the complex, I was most taken with the nun's refectory. Here are the very tables at which Clare and the sisters would have sat for their meals, and entertained amongst their guests Francis and the brothers. There was a simplicity about the whole room with its stark reminders on the wall that "SILENZIO" was the order of the day!

It is here too, in the upstairs dormitory, that the place of Clare's death is marked by a cross on the wall and, always, a vase of fresh flowers on the floor where she had lain.

Like Francis, she had shown a dogged determination to escape initially the ties of her family; ties which were made in a new and fresh way later as her sister and mother joined her in the sisterhood.

From San Damiano it is downhill all the way to my next stopping place - Rivotorto. It was here in 1208 that Francis and his first companions found an old hovel which they began to use as a place in which to live. They were determined not to take advantage of anyone, especially those who were poor, so it took a lot of discipline a year or so later to vacate the hovel when an old peasant arrived one day with his donkey and told them that the hovel belonged to him.

So they upped sticks and moved on to The Porziuncula, a small broken-down church building some miles away along the valley floor.

And, today, so did I.

But I made a bit of a detour in location, time and spirit by stopping at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery just outside Rivotorto towards Santa Maria degli Angeli.

Here lie the remains of some 949 commonwealth servicemen who lost their lives in action in the Italian campaign in 1943-44. The contrast between Francis, the man of peace, and these men of war could not be more stark here, nestled under the city on the hillside overlooking it, yet they too were devoted, determined and diciplined. They too wanted peace and, like Francis, had to risk all to attempt its achievement.

The Porziuncula became a very special place for Francis and the brothers, so much so that, as he approached his death, he asked the brothers to take him back there for his last days on earth. Like Clare, the place in the rudimentary infirmary where he died is marked always with flowers.

That The Porziuncular is still intact today is solely due to the fact that a massive basilica was built around it and its environs in the 15th century. I'm not sure what Francis and Clare would have made of all the glitz that now surrounds the memorials to their lives, but I suspect it would not have been very complimentary!

However, I hope that the many visitors will be inspired by the 3 Ds that are clear for those who are on the lookout for them, to the extent that they will endeavour to make them part of their lives for the sake of Christ too.

Francis was known for being on the lookout for unexpected and simple joys. For me that came about today at an otherwise uninspiring statue of St. Francis in a corridor connecting the basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli to the Rose Garden Chapel, where a family of doves has taken up residence in the open basket of the statue, and the mother was, with devotion, detemination and discipline sitting on her eggs.