Feast of St Francis at the General Curia

On the 4th October at 11.00 am, a Eucharist was celebrated at the Church of St Mary Mediatrix at the General Curia of the Order of Friars Minor on the Solemnity of St Francis of Assisi. Br. Gerard Francisco Timoner III, OP, Master of the Order of Preachers, presided over the celebration, which friars, religious sisters from various congregations, members of the local Secular Franciscan Order (OFS), and the faithful attended. 

The presence of the Master of the Order of Preachers forms part of the long-standing tradition of fraternity between the two mendicant Orders: on the feast of St Francis, the Dominicans are invited to preach in Franciscan churches, whilst on the feast of St Dominic, the Franciscans render the same service in Dominican churches. 

In his homily, Br. Gerard reflected on five gifts that St Francis continues to offer the Church. Drawing on the experience of San Damiano and the command addressed to the Poverello —The Poor Man of Assisi: ‘Go and repair my house’ — he emphasised how Francis began with what was concrete, repairing the small church with his own hands before grasping the broader scope of his calling. 

The first gift highlighted was the witness that ‘the Gospel can be lived’: Francis allowed the Word to transform his life in a tangible way, making poverty a path of freedom and trust. The second concerned his fidelity to the Church: faced with a house in ruins, he chose neither to abandon it nor merely to issue orders, but instead ‘entered among the ruins and picked up a stone’, contributing to its reconstruction from within. 

The third gift was fraternity. Recalling that Francis affirms in his Testament that the Lord gave him brothers, Br. Gerard presented fraternity as the place where one learns to love even those whom one has not chosen. The fourth gift arose from Francis’s encounter with Sultan al-Malik al-Kamil in 1219: ‘he crossed a border without a sword’, bearing witness through his peaceful presence and recalling the commitment to an ‘unarmed and disarming peace’. 

Finally, the fifth gift concerned our relationship with creation. In the Canticle of the Creatures, the Master of the Order of Preachers recalled that the sun, the moon, the wind, water, fire and the earth are recognised as brothers and sisters, united with human beings in praise of the Creator. 

Bringing these five gifts together, Br. Gerard invited those present not to think first and foremost of the whole edifice that needs to be rebuilt, but of the ‘stone’ that Christ places in each person’s hands today: ‘A brother to forgive. A poor person to see. A stranger to meet. A responsibility to take on. A corner of God’s creation to receive with gratitude.’ At the end of Mass, the participants shared a moment of fraternal fellowship with the faithful present at the celebration. 

See the photos on Flickr