Sept 24
Scripture: Galatians 3: 26-29
From his article "Special Year of Saint Francis: A Mirror for Our Age," by Séamus Mulholland OFM
If poverty attacks our materialism, Francis’ humility demolishes our narcissism. We inhabit an age of the self, the curated self, the promoted self, the therapeutic self, the self that demands recognition, validation, and constant affirmation. Our digital platforms are temples to ego, our culture a liturgy of self-celebration. Against this torrent of self-assertion, Francis lived what he called ‘perfect joy’, the willingness to be humiliated, rejected, and considered worthless, finding in this abasement the very footprints of Christ.
The story of Francis preaching perfect joy to Brother Leo remains a shattering rebuke to contemporary Christian culture. Perfect joy, Francis insisted, is not found in performing miracles, converting nations, or achieving great things for God, accomplishments we might post about, monetise, or leverage for influence. In this famous story, Francis found perfect joy in being turned away from his own religious community, left in the cold and mud, bearing insults with patience, because in this he shared most perfectly in Christ’s passion. In his mind, Francis’ interpretation of perfect joy is not masochism; it is the mature spirituality of one who has died to the need for human approval and discovered the infinite approval of God.
The story of ‘perfect joy’ reminds us that many who experience exclusion, isolation, and alienation from their communities and homelands would not have the same interpretation of the experience with Francis: refugees fleeing persecution or conflict, immigrants seeking a better life, those of a different sexual orientation or expressing an identity that does not fit the heteronormative, and other forms of being-in-the-world that we may find challenging. Furthermore, it is not just what we would understand to be marginalised groups, but many Christians are turned away by their own communities, not for lack of faith, but because of their lifestyle, or life situation.
It is not only physical suffering that unites us to the suffering Jesus on the cross. Any suffering does, for his suffering was not simply a physical crucifixion but an emotional and psychological crucifixion too. Betrayed by an intimate companion, rejected by his own people, abandoned by his friends, and forsaken by his God – a nothing and a no one, whom even a robber crucified beside him felt was so beneath him that he could mock him from his own cross. His very soul was pierced with a lance, not just his side. One wonders today to whom the adamantine promise of paradise made by the dying Jesus is being spoken, though we might not be being unreasonable in making the assumption it is not those whose sense of entitlement and privilege would demand that they be with him in paradise.