Francis' Theology of Prayer

Lectio Divina

"Did you receive the holy Spirit?"

Acts 19:2

Library

I did not finish Johnson when I thought I would. Time to return to Friends of God and Prophets with renewed vigor. America and National Catholic Reporter get in the way, though in a good way.

Log

Battling springtime allergies. I am doing much better than I would be at this time in New York and New England -- the climate is dry, the air is clean, and above all the vegetation is different -- but I am still dealing with a hoarse voice and sore throat. Looks like I will be listening to, but not singing with, the schola this evening.

This morning, resumed our classes on the prayers of Saint Francis, that is, those prayers authenticated by Franciscan scholars as having been without a doubt composed by the holy man himself. We are learning how the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church influenced his prayers, and how in turn his prayers have shaped the prayer of the Church.

Know this much about Francis: it was inconceivable for him to follow Jesus Christ without the Church. For all the Church's faults and failures, he was convinced that Christ was known most perfectly and made most truly present through the visible sign that it was and would always be. Conversely, the Church, from the clergy to all the faithful, was not being Church unless its members turned to Jesus Christ in word and deed, acknowledging their poverty of goodness and complete dependence on the surpassing power and intimate justice and mercy of the God of Christ. All of this was for Francis a work of grace, the action of the Holy Spirit in the lives of souls who desire to conform their will to God's will. I have been given good things to reflect on concerning desire and happiness, love and the good.

Now, to keep cool around the friary, and to continue "visioning" theological studies. We have barely two months of novitiate to go.

Weather

How many ways can we say the heat is hot?