Embracing Lent like St. Francis

Br. Jim Sabak, OFM, collects crèche Christmas scenes, with over 100 in his collection. This hobby connects to his Franciscan vocation, since the crèche as an Advent symbol is traditionally linked to Francis of Assisi. 

But don’t shortchange Lent, says Br. Jim, the director of the Master’s in Theological Studies Program at the Franciscan School of Theology in San Diego and chair of the American Franciscan Liturgical Commission. Lent can be a time of celebration as well as penance, emphasizes the friar. 

That’s true even if the 40 days marking the Church’s preparation for Easter hold a far different reputation. 

“For most people, Lent is the time of the great penitence. Deny yourself, focus on sinfulness, hope that God forgives,” notes Br. Jim. 

That model of Lent can be seen in the life of St. Francis of Assisi. Francis honored the traditional 40-day Lent before Easter, as well as additional Lenten periods in summer and early fall, devoting himself to extended prayer, solitude and abstinence. He focused on seeking forgiveness. 

A sign of Francis's joy 

In the Franciscan tradition, Lent was more than 40 days of penance and repentance. Br. Jim points to Francis’ Canticle of Creation, which celebrates the environment, as a sign of the joy Francis felt. Not everything was dour for the saint who awakened environmental consciousness and celebrated the wonder of God’s work in the natural world. 

“If we want to follow Francis into Lent, we need to embrace something more about him and let this lead us through the Lenten Season. We need to remember that while Francis engaged in a variety of penitential practices and had his suspicions about the human body and our needs and desires, these were all the product of his time,” says Br. Jim. 

“What is extraordinary about Francis was that consciously or subconsciously, Francis sought to overcome the suspicions the Church was beginning to formulate about creation, our humanity and our ability to connect with God on a personal level,” he says. 

Through his time devoted to the austere virtues of Lent, Francis continued to point beyond. 

“Francis yearned to move beyond many of the contrived truths about humanity's relationship with God and Christ, based often on human imperfections and finite sense of who we are. Francis may have engaged in penitential practices, but he did not deny the goodness of creation and of our humanity at the center of creation,” says Br. Jim, noting that a Franciscan vision maintains that we are to do more than focus on repentance. 

“We are capable of beauty and wonder and joy, and these need to be unlocked from the fears and anxieties that all too often hold us bound unjustly and unfairly. Even though he was constrained by the world and culture he lived in, Francis fought to remember who we are and to whom we belong as creations of an extravagantly loving God,” he says. 

What it means to believe 

Br. Jim suggests this Lent we look beyond our failures and weaknesses. 

“Lent is about memory and hope, and finding ourselves planted amid these realities, which enables us to give witness that the destiny of humanity is not one of dread and fear, but of promise and fulfillment. And this is really what Lent has always oriented us toward – our God wishes us to remember year after year what it means to believe in a world of doubt and confusion, and why we should believe in the first place.” 

A Franciscan vision, he said, cautions against despair. 

“Following Francis' many struggles and disappointments, we see that he never despaired to the point of giving up on God, on faith, and on himself. Lent each year reminds us to do the same. As we recall once again this Lent the great events that won for us so great a salvation, we are called and challenged to see and experience the true way to live as a believer in the world as Francis did, with a determination to do what God shows us – that we must do as God showed Francis.” 

This article was originally published in The Franciscan Way, a publication of Franciscan Friars Charities, the charitable arm of the Province of Our Lady of Guadalupe.   

The image atop this story is from the painting “Saint Francis in the Desert," by Giovanni Bellini. (Image courtesy of Wikipedia)