From the Center for Action and Contemplation
July 10th, 2022
For Franciscan Father Richard Rohr, Francis of Assisi (1182–1226) is a shining example of someone who “practiced the better.” Instead of relying on judgment and criticism, Francis understood the power of simply living a better way:
Francis lived in the pivotal period when Western civilization began to move into rationality, functionality, consumerism, and perpetual war. [Emphasis added.] Francis was himself a soldier, and the son of a cloth merchant; he came from the culture he critiqued, and he challenged these emerging systems at the beginning of their now eight centuries of world dominance. Rather than fighting the systems directly and risk becoming their mirror image, Francis just did things differently. …
Francis was born as people started measuring time by clocks instead of church bells. When Christian leaders started counting, Francis stopped counting. He moved from the common economy of merit to the wondrous economy of grace, where God does not do any counting, but only gives unreservedly. …
As Europe began to centralize and organize everything at high levels of control [and] when Roman Catholicism under Pope Innocent III (1160–1216) reached heights of papal and worldly power, Francis answered, “There is another way that is much better!” When people began a style of production and consumption that would eventually ravage planet Earth, he decided to love Mother Earth and live simply and barefoot upon her. And Francis did it all with a “perfect joy” that comes from letting go of the ego.
Francis didn’t bother questioning Church doctrines and dogmas. He just tried to live the way that Jesus lived. In The Legend of Perugia, one of the earliest accounts about Francis, he reminds the first friars that they only know as much as they do. His emphasis on action, practice, and lifestyle was foundational and revolutionary for its time and is at the root of Franciscan alternative orthodoxy. Francis and Clare fell in love with the humanity and humility of Jesus. For them, Jesus was someone actually to imitate and not just to worship.
The early Franciscan friars and Poor Clares wanted to be gospel practitioners instead of merely “word police,” “inspectors,” or “museum curators” as Pope Francis calls some clergy. Both Francis and Clare offered their rules as a forma vitae, or form of life. They saw orthopraxy (correct practice) as a necessary parallel, and maybe even precedent, to verbal orthodoxy (correct teaching). History has shown that many Christians never get to the practical implications of their beliefs. “Why aren’t you doing what you say you believe?” the prophet invariably asks. As the popular paraphrase of a line from Francis’s Rule goes, “Preach the gospel at all times. When necessary, use words.”