The Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

The story of St. Francis of Assisi has always amused me.  As I understand it he was a rich kid who returned home, bereft and depressed, after living a life of dissipation and self-gratification.  He spent time growing his faith until he reached a point that his teachings drew some attention, so much so that he became a celebrity.  So . . . what happens?  The same thing that happens to so many teachers who become famous: churches are built and edifices constructed and styles adopted that grow monstrously until the point of his message is overwhelmed by the trappings of celebrity.  I was lucky enough to visit Assisi in Central Italy and . . . man . . . I was laughing.  The cathedral was massive and ornate and there were trinkets and tstchokes being sold everywhere and the monks and brothers and priests were dressed to kill.  We strolled into one shop stocked with robes and clothes for these people and . . . man . . . it looked like the dressing room for The Funkadelics.

"What the hell is this?" I twittered.

"It's for the monk impulse purchase," SuperK quipped.

We thought that monks were supposed to be dressed in coarse sackcloth and hair shirts.  Who knew?

Francis himself grew weary of the luxury and retired to a cave-like structure outside of town for his remaining years.  I'm amazed that you rarely hear religious figures bring up all of the times Jeebus downplays the worth of stuff.  People don't want to hear that they should give away all they own and follow the Master.  They don't care in principle for the story of the Master deflecting criticism of the poor widow who drops a mite into the offering box while the wealthy ostentatiously giving large sums - sums that are nothing to them while the widow is giving all she had.  The parable that suggests that the rich man has as much chance of getting into heaven as a camel has getting through the eye of a needle.  This is all in the Bible, folks, but it doesn't play well in your average suburban church.  They prefer the Gospel of Prosperity which - in case I'm mistaken - is nowhere to be found in the texts.

Here's the famous prayer of St. Francis of Assisi:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace: where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. 

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love.  For it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.  Amen.

Now, c'mon, that pray kicks ass.  I'm done with the rote memorization of prayers of my youth where I repeated words and phrases mechanically without any consideration of their meaning.  The content of many prayers are fine - it's my inattention to the content that is lacking.  I will say that in my Quiet Time prayers I do ask each day that I try to understand and to love with no regard for my own well-being.  For some reason I canNOT remember the consoling part.  There are three things to remember and I can only get two of them.  In my defense they're the best two parts unless you need consoling.  Obviously.