Br Giacomo Bini returned to the Father’s House on May 9, 2014. He is remembered not only for the beautiful six years of service he offered to the Order as our Minister General (1997-2003) but also for the witness he continually showed to faith, fraternity, and minority.
“He was a profoundly human person, an authentic Friar Minor who radically lived out the Gospel. He was a true man of God, a father and guide to both religious and lay people. He was a generous missionary and a prophetic voice within the Franciscan Family.” Necrologia di Acta Ordinis 2014 vol. II (pagg. 348-364), edited by Br Vincenzo Brocanelli, OFM. These words from the Acta Ordinis help us to catch a glimpse of the figure of Br Giacomo who undoubtedly made a significant contribution to our contemporary world.
Born in a little town in the Marches of Ostra Vetere (Ancona, Italy) on the 23rd of August, 1938, Br Giacomo was an infant during the time of World War II. At 12 years old, he entered the Seraphic College at Potenza Picena and became a Friar Minor for the Picena Province of Saint James of the Marches. He made Solemn Vows on September 17, 1963, and was ordained a priest on March 14, 1964.
During the years of the Second Vatican Council, a young Br Giacomo caught the spirit of the Council and entered into the advanced liturgical studies that were offered to the theology students at Jesi and the seminarians from Fano. As Guardian at Saint Bernardino of Urbino Friary, he developed a lifestyle with some brand new activities for that fraternity, which included opening the Friary doors to families in need from the parish, in his attempt to “read the signs of the times.” He had a healthy interior discontent which prompted him to always be seeking something more, searching for ways to go deeper, to be more and more authentic and faithful to the Franciscan charism.
It was at that time that he developed his theory that our Franciscan identity could best be understood as “a journey,” a theory universally embraced today. We are works in progress, continually seeking new ways to respond to the call to evangelize with authenticity. “Our existence is one of living out the same Gospel in changing circumstances. We are never outside of history. We belong to the Church, the Order, and our particular Entity and must change by reading the signs of the times, in response to what he world of today needs from us.” He wrote these words which were adopted and proclaimed by the Conference on Missions that took place May 19-28, 2014.
Br Giacomo had a dynamic vocation. He embraced and never turned his back on the “Africa Project” which the General Definitorium had created under Br John Vaughn in 1982.
He spent 1983 to 1989 in Rwanda, where his missionary activity reached its peak. A young Rwandan woman, who would go on to become a Poor Clare sister, writes, “At Kivumu, Br Giacomo lived a beautiful Franciscan life that left a profound impact on that area. His life among our people was rich in minority, simplicity, and all the other Franciscan virtues. The Friars there did not believe in keeping distant. They spoke our language, pursued our interests, ate and drank our food and beverages. They were content with little and helped everyone.”
Br Giacomo had many interests, including that of formation. Always an attentive listener and faithful Friar Minor, he knew that the Friar’s presence on African soil should lead to a planting of the charism of the Order of Friars Minor that would call forth new missionaries and novices from among the local people.
In Tanzania from 1989 to 1992, he was nominated Provincial Minister of the neophyte Province of Saint Francis in the capital of Nairobi in 1992. That same year, he revised and published a Ratio Formationis for the Province which drew from the Order’s Ratio Formationis Franciscanae published in 1991. “Instead of implementing structures that do not fit nor work in the particular culture, the formation we offer must help our candidates to read the signs of the times in light of the Gospel, based on what actually exists in the circumstances in which they find themselves,” he declared during a Chapter of Mats celebrated in 1993 in Nairobi.
Largely a surprise to all, the Assisi General Chapter of 1997 elected Br Giacomo Bini Minister General. He went on to produce many documents in the next six years that actualized that which he declared in his Pentecost Letter from 2000: “Let us dare! Let us dare to entrust ourselves totally to Him, as Francis did!”
We conclude this brief remembrance - admittedly too brief for a figure so important - with Br Giacomo’s own words that were pronounced at the opening of the General Chapter of 2003: “We are called to continually consider who we are and what we do, to ponder the meaning of our life as disciples and apostles sent by Jesus to the ends of the earth. Above all, we must search out with clear vision the seeds of new life, often hidden, and care for them in each context or culture we find ourselves as we move about guided by the breath of the Spirit.”
