Exactly one year before the 800th anniversary of the approval of the Rule of St Francis by Pope Honorius III, the Franciscan family gathered around 200 religious on 29 November 2022 for a pilgrimage on foot from Fonte Colombo, the Shrine of the Rule, to the city of Rieti.
"Each time we go back on the road, we know that the spark that drove us to follow the Gospel is rekindled". The words of Minister General Br Massimo Fusarelli, who opened the pilgrimage of about two hundred Franciscans (friars, nuns, seculars) who responded to the invitation of this event. It is only the first of many events with which the Franciscan world inaugurates the two 800th anniversaries of the Later Rule and the representation of the Nativity scene, which took place in Greccio also in 1223.
The mobilisation was significant. The municipal administration, local authorities, religious from various Italian provinces, Minors, Capuchins and Conventuals gathered in the central Italian city to walk together in the footsteps of the Poverello.
In Rieti, Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça, Prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education, presided over the Eucharistic celebration, which about eighty priests concelebrated in St Augustine's Church packed with the faithful. Bishop Domenico Pompili, Bishop Emeritus of the diocese and current Apostolic Administrator, also participated in the celebration. The Cardinal, ever closer to the Franciscan world, expressed his lively interest in the path that has just begun. In his homily, he wished to give the audience three "highlights" of our charism that need to be promoted, starting from passionate obedience to the Gospel:
"St Francis lived the Gospel as if its truth was actually true," says Tolentino. "The Gospel is to be followed to the letter; the great temptation is to put the Gospel in the drawer and live by other words. It is not to be lived as an ideal but as true life.
The Cardinal then talked about poverty: "We need to recover freedom before possessions, which will generate models of existence that are truly alternative to the dominant culture. That is why we must not be afraid! Do not be afraid to build minorities. The economy that kills must be countered with the culture of the common good. Money is illusory security that easily kills justice and beauty. Therefore the most urgent thing that Christianity must preach in the face of wealth is its desacralisation. Today religion is easily desacralised while money is considered a sacred space".
The third and final emphasis is the reminder that our treasure is in heaven: "The way Francis chose to live on earth and with creatures urges us to seek the Creator. Interestingly, beauty and call in Greek have the same root: life is the profound listening to the beauty of this call of God. Francis is a teacher for us. Today we have many experts but few masters capable of creating new narratives, masters of the risk of faith, of the poetry of the Gospel. Wisdom gives life its foundation, that is, the overall view of our existence, seeing what we have been and will be".
So, everything is ready to start three years of anniversaries in the knowledge and commitment that it will not all be reduced to merely a celebratory act, a few plaques to be inaugurated, but an opportunity for evangelical and sincere renewal. This was the Minister General's commitment to the Pope during his earlier meeting with the organising group.
From the website: https://www.fratiminorifrancescani.org
