The Heart of Saint Francisco

It is not exactly true to state that creatures “awakened God” in Francis of Assisi, but that they spoke to him of God. All this literature, brother sun, and star sisters, etc. could be simply an ambiguous play on words, without being realistic or down to earth.

The truth is that Francis of Assisi, before being the saint of creatures, was the man of the caves. To arrive at this conviction, all we have to do is to read his first biographers; even today the truly sacred places of Franciscan’s are in the high mountains.

Whenever Francis wanted to live and truly be with the Lord, he abandoned his sister’s creatures and went deep into the dark caves, where only a small ray of light would penetrate. He would spend hours, days, weeks and even whole months there. From there he would emerge with a heart overflowing with God; it was then that, yes, all the creatures would speak to him of God.

Nevertheless, the reality was not even like that. It was Francis who spread that living God which he carried in his heart everywhere. It was he who robed all the creatures with God. His eyes were the dwelling place of God, and obviously, everywhere those eyes looked was robed with God. Everything spoke to him of God, because God dwelled in his heart and his thoughts were occupied with God.

Extracted from the book “Psalms for Life” by Father Ignacio Larrañaga