Humanity today knows to plunder the world and take it for granted but not to make it a home.
GERRY LOBO OFM
We live in a new phase of history today. Our age is clearly one of transition. Human beings have fallen prey to a sense of emptiness, a lack of meaning and norms. There seems to be a permanent crisis and uncertainty. On looking more closely at our age, we discover that it is an age of reason and production and perhaps a time of high politics, particularly in our nation. There is no more reliance on homogeneous unity of the world and culture, religion and economy, politics and everyday life. Today we live in a pluralistic society which revolves around different and even contrasting poles. However, our country is witnessing the rapid entry of religion, particularly the Hindutva religion into the political sphere. This tendency is gradually destabilizing the secular fabric of the Indian Constitution.
In the context of our world and our nation today, Francis of Assisi (1182-1226), though a medieval personality, and who emerged in a similar context such as ours, would definitely offer to humanity a sense for living. His down to earth choice of life represents the radical understanding of human existence. Perhaps there could be no solution to human predicament created by the modern scientific and technocratic developments other than the one which the Poor man of Assisi believed and lived. Indeed, his ideals and his philosophy go contrary to those prevalent in our history today. He was not a romantic or a pious figure that alienated himself from the socio-economic-political and religious currents of his time. He certainly did not affiliate himself to any political bands of his city. However being fully knowledgeable about the rat-race in the political realm, he demonstrated with his team made of the fall- outs of their society, which human beings are capable of going beyond the games people played to secure their egoic existence.
Being born of a wealthy cloth merchant, Peter Bernardone, the luxuries of the society with its political gimmicks, in which he was raised, made it difficult for him to look at the excluded around him. He loved his life to the full and thought it reasonable to remain in it. He loved his purse and his place in the best society of the town. In his youth he was deeply influenced by the ideals of medieval chivalry and had developed an irresistible attraction for military adventure. Having been disturbed in his conscience at the marginalized of his society, created by the power politics attached to measureless profit, Francis deranged his father’s ambition and entered into the aspirations of people perceiving them through the kaleidoscope of the leper, the scum of the healthy-wealthy citizens.
Quickly a movement around Francis emerged. The men, who integrated themselves into that movement, having distanced themselves from the power politics of Assisi, named themselves, “friars minor”, Lesser Brothers, a name very unusual and also new in the history of humanity after Jesus Christ. Equality, fraternity and liberty were the hallmark of their movement, the very ideals shunned by the political leaders who only garnered votes at election times by proudly bragging about their achievements. Living in communion with one another with absolute limits in terms of any secured comforts which they freely imposed upon themselves, the new movement around the leadership of Francis demonstrated in clear terms that the world belongs to all and no one has any right to usurp the goods of the earth for one’s own selfish ends.
Remarkably, the fall-outs of the society who formed a movement of the “lesser” ones with Francis, were deeply conscious of the Transcendence in their new found life. That Transcendent One was absolute for them and was their sufficiency. Their political involvement was in their closeness to all categories of people because these men themselves had abandoned any class system within them. Setting aside all the human ambitions which would have exalted them as ‘great ones’, Francis by his own life-example motivated them towards the Gospel Beatitudes. Living for no ulterior motives of fame or monetary profit, they drew the attention of avaricious ones towards just and honest dealings with their fellow citizens. Perhaps, these radicals unseated the conscience-less of the society, disturbing them of their deeds.
No one was excluded in one’s service to men and women. Francis and his companions were sent for all, to the entire world. G. K. Chesterton put it: “Francis went through the world as the pardon of God.” He was poor among the poor, a marginalized by the society. It was not enough to love others; one needed to be humble of heart, a ‘lesser’. From the king to the beggar the love was to be lived. Hence Francis consciously and mindfully moved through the world with the only Love, which was God. Having denounced all secure measures he remained close to the created world, men and their condition in contrast to the fuga mundi or the contempt of the world, of the religious tradition. He sought not the isolation of the desert but the buzz and business of the market place. In this sense, Francis was a true politician!
Do Francis and his way of life have anything to offer to this age? Yes, they have. Francis had been a true habitant of the world in which he knew to discover a sense of home and dwelling. He was able to appreciate the gift of life and was able to discover community in the world. Humanity today knows to plunder the world and take it for granted but not to make it a home. Francis teaches us how to live as a citizen of the world not merely by paying tax but also by taking care of the ‘neighbour,’ by being a person of the polis.
History has always dealt with human people by classifying them and thus raising conflict among them. In a multi-cultural context of our nation people are classified, segregated and denied the basic human rights. Therefore, we term people as lepers and healthy, rich and poor, blacks and whites, superiors and subjects, masters and slaves, Brahmins and dalits. What we learn from the philosophy and practice of Francis is that he lived beyond the ‘class-ness’. There was no friend-foe dialectic in him. He used only the foundational category that of ‘brother-sister-mother’ which alone is necessary for living in communion.
In a world which is growing in abundance of everything, while at the same time millions are deprived of the basic human amenities, everything is sold and bought. Everything has been taken for granted and treated casually. One presumes that a thing is there and will be there without knowing its origin and cause. The space for a supreme value is not perceived. Francis, who dispossessed himself of everything and was content with the little and had no desire for anything more, could never go through the world without gratitudinal consciousness. Thanksgiving was fundamental to his existence. It is necessary to discover gratuity today or else we will destroy ourselves.
The exclusion of humanity based on caste, creed, religion, class, is a daily experience in our country. Scientific and technological developments of our time have not redeemed millions from their displaced condition. Humans are suspicious of one another and they keep others at a distance, even though communication systems have facilitated easy approachability of one another. The ‘other’ is still a threat to ‘my’ existence and therefore I keep him/her at a distance. Francis, on the other hand, moved out of himself consciously to the ‘lepers’ in his society and “had mercy upon them.” He shared their life. They were his “Christian brothers.” Francis knew how to embrace others and participate in their life. He did so with all creatures as he epitomized such an experience in his Canticle of Creatures.
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