Franciscana Pax

The Spirit of Saint Francis

Throughout history, the saints have been Christ’s witnesses of this holy peace, some in especially striking ways, like Saint Francis. Amid “the age of so-called holy wars” (notes the Decree for this Year, p. 2) and in a culture where petty feuds between cities were the order of the day, Francis urged his brothers to avoid quarrels and forgive all offenses, and even spoke about the love of Jesus to a Muslim leader, with whom his fellow Europeans were fighting in the holy wars. Catholics, other Christians, and non-Christians alike know and love the “Peace Prayer of Saint Francis,” which, while not composed by Saint Francis, is reasonably linked with him for its reflection of his spirit.

It would be hard to deny that witnesses for peace are as sorely needed today as in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The Decree puts it bluntly: “Disagreements and social violence are part of everyday life and peace becomes more insecure and distant every day” (p. 2). In such a time, what can we learn from Saint Francis about being, as the famous prayer says, channels of God’s peace?

Remedies for Peace

To understand remedies, one first needs some understanding of the disease. All war, violence, and discord come from human sin. We find in the Letter of James a scathing rebuke of the selfishness that leads to violence: “What causes wars, and what causes fightings among you? Is it not your passions that are at war in your members? You desire and do not have; so you kill. And you covet and cannot obtain; so you fight and wage war.” (Jas 4:1-2) Ultimately, all wars and violence are a reversal of the Christlike, self-giving love by which Francis lived: a placing of one’s own desires before the needs of one’s neighbor, even to the point of harming or, in some cases, destroying the neighbor.

So long as that Christlike love is lacking, little progress is made. Our world suffers so much, as the Decree says, in part because “Christian charity languishes” and even “those who exalt concord among peoples do so more out of selfishness than out of a sincere Christian spirit” (p. 2).

Peace Prayer

What, then, can we do to bring even a little of Christ’s healing peace to such a world? Saint Francis offers a simple but radical answer: let Him fill us completely with His self-giving love. A soul of love is a soul of peace—not merely warm, mild sentiments toward everyone, but a true, deep desire for others’ good, fostering generosity and forgiveness and giving strength to resist destructive impulses.

Jack Wintz, OFM, reflects on the many ways Saint Francis exemplifies the wisdom of the Peace Prayer: sowing love in response to hatred, offering pardon to injury, faith for doubt, hope for despair, light for darkness, and joy for sorrow. This simple but demanding Gospel wisdom informed both Francis’s own conduct and his counsel to his brothers. “Everyone who is able to read and understand these words,” Wintz comments, “readily sees that they communicate the heart of the Gospels and capture what is most essential in the world’s great religions.”

In the beginning, Francis was one isolated man, without property or family inheritance, and widely considered insane. He had no particular worldly influence, nor any great plan of his own. He simply lived a radical adherence to the Beatitudes. That life, by God’s grace, indeed channeled His peace throughout the world and across the centuries. If we think of ourselves as too insignificant to make a difference, the example of Saint Francis offers an encouragement and a challenge: God wants to make us His instruments of peace in a world of turmoil, if only we are willing to live by His love.