LOF4 – The Dream of Knighthood and the Grace of Wisdom – St. Francis of Assisi: His Life and Spirituality with Dr. Anthony Lilles – Discerni

Episode 4: The Dream of Knighthood and the Grace of Wisdom – St. Francis of Assisi: His Life and Spirituality with Dr. Anthony Lilles In this episode, Dr. Anthony Lilles and Kris McGregor continue their conversation on St. Francis of Assisi through St. Bonaventure’s account of his early conversion. They reflect on the dream in which Francis sees a palace filled with arms and military standards, all marked with the Cross of Christ. Francis believes at first that he is being called to earthly knighthood, but Christ begins to teach him a deeper wisdom. Dr. Lilles explains that Francis receives a true grace, even though he does not yet know how to interpret it. His misunderstanding does not mean the grace was false. Rather, as Francis takes action, suffers disappointment, and remains open to correction, Christ begins to form him for another kind of service, one marked by poverty, mercy, and the love of the great King. The conversation also turns to Francis’s encounter with the leper, his love for the poor, and his visit to St. Peter’s in Rome, where he gives his clothes to a poor man and remains among the poor in joy. Through these moments, Bonaventure shows that Christ is already teaching Francis, not only in prayer, but through the poor, through suffering, and through the people placed along his path. Excerpts from Chapters One and Two of The Life of St. Francis of Assisi by St. Bonaventure: Chapter 1 excerpt: "…he was going forth one day, as was his custom, in clothing suited to his state. He met a certain soldier of honorable and courageous bearing, but poor and poorly clothed. Feeling tender and sorrowful compassion for his poverty, he immediately took off his new clothes and gave them to the poor man-at-arms, thus fulfilling at once two offices of mercy by covering the shame of a noble soldier and relieving the poverty of a poor man. The following night, while he was asleep, the Divine mercy showed him a spacious and beautiful palace filled with arms and military standards, all marked with the cross of Christ, to make known to him that his charitable deed done for the poor soldier for love of the great King of Heaven would receive an unspeakable reward. When he asked for whom all these things were reserved, a Divine voice answered him that they were for him and for his soldiers." "When Francis awoke early in the morning, not yet accustomed to understand and interpret Divine mysteries, nor through visible signs to ascend to invisible truths, he thought this strange vision betokened some great earthly prosperity. Therefore, still ignorant of the Divine will, he resolved to go into Apulia, to enter the household of a certain count of great magnificence and generosity who lived in that country, hoping in his service to acquire military honor and renown according to what he supposed to be the meaning of the vision. A little while later, when he had traveled for some days with the count, he came to a certain city. There the Lord spoke to him in the night with the familiar voice of a friend, saying, “Francis, who can do most for you, the Lord or the servant, the rich man or the poor?” And when Francis replied that the Lord and the rich man could do more for him than the poor man, the voice said, “Why, then, do you leave the Lord for the servant, and the God of infinite riches for a poor mortal?” Then Francis said, “Lord, what will You have me do?” And the Lord answered, “Return home, for the vision which you have seen prefigured a spiritual work which you shall bring to pass, not by human counsel, but by Divine disposition.” "Now, as he was riding one day over the plain of Assisi, he met a leper whose sudden appearance filled him with fear and horror. But immediately calling to mind the resolution he had made to follow after perfection, and remembering that if he wished to be a soldier of Christ, he must first overcome himself, he dismounted from his horse and went to meet the leper, that he might embrace him....