Why is Francis of Assisi the World’s 2nd Most Popular Saint?

From the humble backyard birdbath to the splendor of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, images of this Italian cloth merchant’s son can be found almost anywhere. His followers now number nearly one million in more than ninety-six countries, lay and religious, men and women.

But who was St. Francis? Why do so many of us find him such an attractive Christian and human figure? What is fact and what is fiction about his life, his teaching, and his impact on global society? What do you most want to know about this gentle saint?

Now you can trace the amazing story of Saint Francis' life and work with this exciting new 24-lecture series by renowned Franciscan scholar Brother William Short, former President of the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley.

800 Years of Innovation

Learn how Saint Francis founded, not one, but three Orders in the Catholic Church. How did he become a guest of the most powerful Islamic ruler of his day, right in the middle of the Crusades?

Francis founded a group of brothers, and then he accepted a sister named Clare. And he welcomed lay men and women into a new Order designed especially for them. During a time of shocking clerical misconduct, he did his level best to improve their formation.

Though an uneducated man himself, he formed a young priest known as Anthony of Padua. Personally drawn to a deep contemplative life, he wrote the first instructions for a missionary Order in the Church. Enduring resistance and opposition, he pioneered a new way of being Christian, claiming that God had revealed to him that the Gospel was to be his life. Enshrined in the Rule he composed, that way of life celebrates its 800th anniversary in 2009.

In this series of lectures presented by Franciscan brother William Short, you can learn more about this simple and profound man, the Orders he founded, and their influence among common people from Tuscany to Tibet, on university professors in Oxford and Paris, and on civic governments in Europe. The main point of interest will be Francis himself, since so much of the later Franciscan movement grows from the amazing contradictions of his own life. The 13th century, known as the century of Francis and Clare, will receive the most attention, but the story of Franciscan missions stretches well into the early 16th century.

The Legacy of Francis

Some have defined the gift of Francis to the Church as "a difficult inheritance," and there is good reason for this. His love of poverty provoked sharp divisions among his later followers, and even led to the rebellion recounted in Umberto Eco’s novel, The Name of the Rose. His successor as head of the Lesser Brothers, or Order of Friars Minor, was St. Bonaventure, classmate of St. Thomas Aquinas, the determined leader who rewrote the story of Francis in the midst of fierce opposition to the Franciscans in many Church circles. His era, in the late 13th century, will take the listener into the world of the medieval universities, and the rapid expansion of the Franciscan influence from Europe into the Holy Land, Central Asia, China and Tibet. Few people realize that a Franciscan Archbishop was conducting a Chinese choir in Beijing in the 13th century! Or that one of his brothers was visiting the Palace of the Dalai Lama in Tibet at the same time. Or that Franciscans have been in the Americas since Columbus’ second voyage in 1493. These stories and more round out the topics of this series of lectures, giving a good reason for Francis to be called "The Universal Brother."

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Br. William Short, O.F.M., is a Franciscan Friar and Professor of Christian Spirituality at the Franciscan School of Theology and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. He holds a M.A. in Philosophical and Systematic Theology, along with S.T.L. and S.T.D. degrees from the Gregorian University in Rome. He has served as the Vice-Rector of the International Franciscan College, the Particular Secretary of the Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, and as an Academic Dean and President-Rector of the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley.

He has dedicated his scholarly work to a retrieval of the Franciscan tradition of spirituality and theology. He is a co-editor of the three-volume series of English translations of all the documents written by St. Francis of Assisi and his earliest biographers, Francis of Assisi: Early Documents. Br. Short is author several works, including The Franciscans and Poverty and Joy: The Franciscan Tradition. His work also includes translations from Italian, Spanish, Latin and French, primarily in the area of medieval spirituality. He currently serves as the Guardian (superior) of the Franciscan fraternity at Mission San Miguel in central California, where he is also a novice wine-maker, collector of California native plants, and instructor of novices.

Speaker Photo by Scott Anger

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• Francis of Assisi: The Popular Image

• Growing Up in Assisi (1182-1200)

• Rich and Poor in the Early 1200s

• Dreams of Knighthood (1205-1206)

• Beginnings of a Conversion (1206-1209)

• The First Brothers Arrive (1209-1210)

• The Call of Creatures (1210-1225)

• The Poor Ladies (Poor Clares) (1212-1253)

• Preaching the Gospel (1209-1226)

• A Journey into Egypt (1219-1220)

• Trouble at Home: Explosive Growth and Problems of Adaptation (1220-1221)

• The “Great Temptation” (1221-1223)

• Discovering Christmas

• Signed with the Marks of the Passion (1224)

• Sister Death

• The Glory of a New Saint

• “Spirit and Life”: Francis’s Reading of the Gospel

• The Incarnation, the Eucharist and the Church

• Poverty as Revelation

• The Order of the Lesser Brothers: Growth and Crises (1250-1280)

• The Needs of the Church (1230-1250)

• Franciscan Theology and Mysticism: (1250-1450)

• Friars in Dissent (1280-1320)

• Friars on a Mission: From Umbria to Asia

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