Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone (3 October 1226), known as Saint Francis of Assisi, was an Italian mystic, poet and Catholic friar who founded the religious order of the Franciscans.
Born into a wealthy family in Assisi, Italy, he was inspired towards a life of poverty and religious devotion as a young man and began his efforts by repairing chapels and caring for the sick in his hometown. Soon after, he gathered a band of followers in the city who joined in his lifestyle, and following a journey to Rome to meet Pope Innocent III, he received approval for the foundation of the Order of Friars Minor, which is commonly known as the Franciscan Order.
Under his leadership, the order rapidly increased in size. Notable events in his religious career include his meeting with Clare of Assisi, who founded the Second Order of St. Francis commonly known as the Poor Clares, his journey to Egypt in 1219 in an attempt to convert the sultan Al-Kamil and put an end to the conflict of the Fifth Crusade, and his arrangement of the first live nativity scene as part of the annual Christmas celebration in Greccio. According to Christian tradition, Francis displayed stigmata resembling the wounds on the hands and feet of crucified Christ during the apparition of a seraphic angel in a religious ecstasy in 1224 and died two years later in 1226 at the age of 44.
One of the most venerated figures in Christianity, Francis was canonized by Pope Gregory IX on 16 July 1228. He is commonly portrayed wearing a brown habit with a rope tied around his waist, featuring three knots symbolizing the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Francis is associated with patronage of animals and the environment and, along with Catherine of Siena, is patron saint of Italy.
Names Francis (; ) was named Giovanni by his mother. His surname, di Pietro di Bernardone, comes from his father, Pietro di Bernardone. His father was in France on business when Francis was born in Assisi, a small town in Italy. Upon his return, Pietro took to calling his son Francesco ("Free man" or "Frenchman"), possibly in honour of his commercial success and enthusiasm for all things French.
Biography
Early life Francis of Assisi was born , one of the children of an Italian father, Pietro di Bernardone dei Moriconi, a prosperous silk merchant, and a French mother, Pica di Bourlemont, about whom little is known except that she was a noblewoman originally from Provence.
Indulged by his parents, Francis lived a high-spirited life, typical of a wealthy young man. As a youth, he became a devotee of troubadours and was fascinated with all things Transalpine. Francis was handsome, witty, gallant and delighted in fine clothes. He spent money lavishly. Although many hagiographers remark about Francis' bright clothing, rich friends, and love of pleasures, his displays of disillusionment toward the world that surrounded Francis came fairly early in his life, as is shown in the "story of the beggar". In this account, Francis was selling cloth and velvet in the marketplace on behalf of his father when a beggar came to him and asked for alms. At the end of his business deal, Francis abandoned his wares and ran after the beggar. When he found him, Francis gave the man everything he had in his purse. Francis' friends mocked him for his charity while his father scolded him in rage.Chesterton (1924), pp.40–41
Around 1202, Francis joined a military expedition against Perugia and was taken as a prisoner at Collestrada. He spent a year as a captive, during which an illness caused Francis to re-evaluate his life. However, upon his return to Assisi in 1203, Francis returned to his carefree life. Two years later, Francis left for Apulia to enlist in the army of Walter III, Count of Brienne. A strange vision made him return to Assisi and lose interest in worldly life. According to hagiographic accounts, thereafter Francis began to avoid the sports and feasts of his former companions. A friend asked him whether he was thinking of marrying, to which Francis answered: "Yes, a fairer bride than any of you have ever seen", meaning his "Lady Poverty".
On a pilgrimage to Rome, Francis joined the poor in begging at St. Peter's Basilica. He spent some time in lonely places, asking God for divine illumination. Francis said that he had a mystical vision of Jesus Christ in the forsaken country chapel of San Damiano, just outside Assisi, in which the Icon of Christ Crucified said to him, "Francis, Francis, go and repair My church which, as you can see, is falling into ruins." Francis took this to mean the ruined church in which he was presently praying, so Francis sold some cloth taken from his father's store to assist the priest there.Chesterton (1924), pp.54–56According to the Franciscan Order, Francis of Assisi personally experienced the Trinitarian indwelling for more times during his earthly life. See . Also available in Spanish: A. Spirito (franciscano conventual), Guglielmo (1 de enero de 1994). El cielo en la tierra. La inhabitación trinitaria en s. Francisco a la luz de su tiempo y de sus escritos. Varia (2). Miscellanea Francescana. p. 312. When the priest refused to accept the ill-gotten gains, an indignant Francis threw the coins on the floor.
In order to avoid his father's wrath, Francis hid in a cave near San Damiano for about a month. When he returned to town, hungry and dirty, Francis was dragged home by his father, beaten, bound, and locked in a small storeroom. Freed by his mother during Bernardone's absence, Francis returned at once to San Damiano, where he found shelter with the officiating priest, but Francis was soon cited before the city consuls by his father. The latter, not content with having recovered the scattered gold from San Damiano, sought also to force his son to forgo his inheritance by way of restitution. In the midst of legal proceedings before the Bishop of Assisi, Francis renounced his father and his patrimony. Some accounts report that Francis stripped himself naked in token of this renunciation and the bishop covered him with his own cloak.
For the next couple of months, Francis wandered as a beggar in the hills behind Assisi. He spent some time at a neighbouring monastery working as a scullion. Francis then went to Gubbio, where a friend gave him alms, the cloak, girdle and staff of a pilgrim. Returning to Assisi, Francis traversed the city, begging stones for the restoration of St. Damiano. These he carried to the old chapel, set in place himself, and rebuilt it over time. Over the course of two years, Francis embraced the life of a penitent, during which he restored several ruined chapels in the countryside around Assisi, among them San Pietro in Spina (in the area of San Petrignano in the valley about a kilometre from modern Rivotorto, on private property and once again in ruin); and the Porziuncola, the little chapel of St. Mary of the Angels in the plain just below the town. This later became Francis' favorite abode. By degrees, he took to nursing lepers, in the leper colonies near Assisi.
Founding of the Franciscan Order Order of Friars Minor (OFM) One morning in February 1208, Francis was taking part in a Mass in the chapel of St. Mary of the Angels, near which he had by then built himself a hut. The Gospel of the day was the "Commissioning of the Twelve" from the Book of Matthew, in which Jesus' disciples are commissioned to go and proclaim that the Kingdom of God is at hand. Francis was inspired to devote himself to a life of poverty. Having obtained a coarse woollen tunic, the dress then worn by the poorest Umbrian peasants, Francis tied it around himself with a knotted rope and went about exhorting the people of the countryside to penance, brotherly love and peace. His preaching to ordinary people was unusual as Francis had no license to do so.
Francis' example attracted others. Within a year, he had 11 followers. The brothers lived a simple life in the deserted leper colony of Rivo Torto near Assisi. They spent much of their time wandering through the mountainous districts of Umbria, and through their earnestness toward people they encountered, often deeply impressed them.
In 1209, Francis composed a simple rule for his followers ("friars"), the Regula primitiva or "Primitive Rule", which came from verses in the Bible. The rule was "to follow the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ and to walk in his footsteps." He then led 11 followers to Rome to seek permission from Pope Innocent III to found a new religious order.Chesterton (1924), pp.107–108 Upon entry to Rome, the brothers encountered Bishop Guido of Assisi, who had in his company Giovanni di San Paolo, the Cardinal Bishop of Sabina. The Cardinal, who was the confessor of Pope InnocentIII, was immediately sympathetic to Francis and agreed to represent Francis to the Pope. After several days, the Pope agreed to admit the group informally, adding that when God increased the group in grace and number, they could return for an official audience. The group was tonsured.Galli (2002), pp.74–80
Seeking the pope's authority was important because it demonstrated Francis's recognition of the Church's authority, preventing his followers from accusations of heresy, as had happened to the Waldensians decades earlier. The pope initially hesitated, but after he had a dream in which he saw Francis holding up the Lateran Basilica, he endorsed his order via oral approbation. Per tradition, this occurred on 16 April 1210 and constituted the official founding of the Franciscan Order. The group, then the "Lesser Brothers" (Order of Friars Minor also known as the Franciscan Order or the Seraphic Order), were centred in the Porziuncola and preached first in Umbria, before expanding throughout Italy. Francis was later ordained a deacon, but not a priest.
Poor Clares and Third Order From then on, the new order grew quickly. Hearing Francis preaching in the church of San Rufino in Assisi in 1211, the young noblewoman Clare of Assisi sought to live like them. Her cousin Rufino also sought to join. On the night of Palm Sunday, 28 March 1212, Clare clandestinely left her family's palace. Francis received her at the Porziuncola and thereby established the Order of Poor Clares.Chesterton (1924), pp.110–111 He gave Clare a religious habit, a garment similar to his own, before lodging her, her younger sister Caterina, and other young women in a nearby monastery of Benedictine nuns until Francis could provide a suitable monastery. Later, he transferred them to San Damiano, to a few small huts or cells. This became the first monastery of the Second Franciscan Order, currently known as Poor Clares.
For those who could not leave their affairs, Francis later formed the Third Order of Brothers and Sisters of Penance, a fraternity composed of either laity or clergy whose members neither withdrew from the world nor took religious vows. Instead, they observed the principles of Franciscan life in their daily lives. Before long, the Third Order – currently titled the Secular Franciscan Order – grew beyond Italy.
Missionary work during the Fifth Crusade In the late spring of 1212, Francis set out for Jerusalem, but was shipwrecked by a storm on the Dalmatian coast, forcing him to return to Italy. On 8 May 1213, Francis was given the use of the mountain of La Verna (Alverna) as a gift from Count Orlando di Chiusi, who described it as "eminently suitable for whoever wishes to do penance in a place remote from mankind".Fioretti quoted in: St. Francis, The Little Flowers, Legends and Lauds, trans. N. Wydenbruck, ed. Otto Karrer (London: Sheed and Ward, 1979) 244. The mountain would become one of his favourite retreats for prayer.Chesterton (1924), p. 130