Such thoughts haunted a long-ago Pope. A medieval mural depicts Pope Innocent III asleep, dreaming the Church is cracking apart. Down the middle of the mural runs an immense crack — so perfectly placed to dramatize the dream that the viewer might think it part of the fresco. But no, the wall itself was damaged by an earthquake in modern times, so the dream of the cracking Church now is part of a cracked church.
That mural, in St. Francis Basilica, Assisi, includes Francis arriving to ask the Pope’s blessing to found his new community. The Pope’s problem was answered by a flesh-and-blood reality, not exactly the reality he expected (or wanted to see), but one he could recognize because he was praying for the Church he was responsible for.
Much legend, embellishment and marketing surround the centuries-old persona of Francis (d. 1226). His image, name and mystique have undoubtedly been used to support many a viewpoint he never thought of. But through the centuries, the Cross he prayed before has witnessed pilgrims of all ages from around the world. Something brings them to it. Something causes them to stop and pray. It’s a sign of Francis’ holiness that his fame draws people to the Cross from which Christ receives and gazes on all who come.
It’s not an ideology, principle or method that Francis embodies. It’s his love of Christ crucified. As a young man, come of age, he’d experienced life’s best and worst: wealth and privilege, war and poverty, illness, corruption. Somehow it all brought him to the old painted Cross in a derelict little stone church outside the city, used as a hospital for the poor. The church was so ruined and neglected that the rain pattered on the face of the Crucified. There, something happened that defies logic, a direct revelation that changed Francis forever. What was it Francis understood, seeing and seen by that face? The depth of God’s condescension, the love that touches humanity and brings God Himself to the Cross? From then on, Francis wanted to be next to the crucified God — starting with the church itself, but leading him onto all kinds of roads.
This moment made his next step clear: repair the church so the Cross is no longer exposed to the rain. And the next step after that: embrace the lepers, the despised and feared people on the outside. Then the next step, and the next.
Francis’ love of God is thoroughly practical. If we don’t see Christ, it’s hard to see sense in what Francis does. If we watch Francis, we might start to see Christ.
The Cross leads him to an ever-greater understanding of the need to be poor, to poverty as the way to be with Christ crucified. He understands poverty not in terms of wealth, but power. No power, no influence, no voice, no visibility. So he is led to learn from the poor.
Francis’ steps eventually led him to create a living Christmas crèche among the villagers of Grecio, with live animals in a real manger. It was God made life-size! St. Bonaventure relates that on Christmas night John of Grecio, a former soldier who loved Francis, “beheld an Infant so marvelous sleeping in the manger, whom the blessed father Francis embraced with both his arms, as if he would awake him from sleep.” No wonder, since Francis gave up everything, and gave everything, to bring Jesus to life among His people. This is the true work of faith.
How can we hear and see each other, amidst the furious forces, except in our shared love of Christ, and Him crucified (1 Cor 2:2)? How can we know the way for the Church in our day except by standing beside Him in His love of the poor, and take the next step we can see to help?
We might find the person we need to see is a beggar, a Pope, a broken but eager young man, an enemy or a friend. We might see Christ born among us, life-sized, beautiful.
(Marrocco can be reached at mary.marrocco@outlook.com.)