Minister's Note for December

A Time to Reflect

Advent is that special time of prayer in preparation for the Incarnation. We can cast our thoughts back to the Christmas of 1223 and Francis, after having spent such time in prayer, arranged for a living nativity scene. The people of the town of Greccio gathered and participated in this beautiful experience of enacting the first Christmas. It gave everyone the opportunity to more deeply experience the birth of Christ.[1]

Thomas of Celano, an early companion of Francis, tells us that it is in the birth of Jesus, where God becomes en-fleshed, that the intimate link between creation and Incarnation become 'visible.'[2]  Francis saw the most profound revelation of God’s love for us in the Incarnation. Through the Christmas scene he created at Greccio, Francis wanted to show the people in a very concrete way how God entered into our everyday world of creation through the Incarnation.[3] The Incarnation made all of creation holy.

To Francis, and in Catholic theology, all is connected: The Incarnation in the form of Jesus, in the Word, and in the Eucharist, and in all of creation. The Incarnation is there at each Mass we celebrate – the amazing God of the universe came into the world in all humility in the form of an infant. The amazing God of the universe come to us at each Mass, in the form of the Eucharist. This advent, let us grow ever closer to the Incarnation!

Giotto - Institution of the Crib at Greccio 1297-1300, Upper Church, San Francesco, Assisi

 
Francis tells us in his Letter to the Order:
     Let the whole of mankind tremble, the whole world shakes, and the heavens exult
    When Christ, the Son of the living God is present on the altar
in the hands of a priest.[4]

Advent Blessings!
Laura, OFS
Minister

[1] Short, Poverty and Joy: The Franciscan Tradition, 85.
[2] Ilia Delio, A Franciscan View of Creation: Learning to Live in a Sacramental World (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure University, 2003), 15.
[3] Delio, A Franciscan View of Creation: Learning to Live in a Sacramental World, 15.
[4] LtOrd 26