Dante Alighieri, one of the great literary geniuses of all time, was also a man of action, committed to social justice and the affairs of his native Florence. But he was at the same time a man of deep faith, a visionary and a prophet, who judged the world and the Church by the light of the Gospel and the radiance of eternity. All these factors combined in The Divine Comedy to create an artistic, as well as spiritual, masterpiece.
Florence in Dante’s time was bitterly divided between rival factions, one favoring the temporal power of the pope and the other committed to the autonomy of the city. Influenced by the radical Spiritual Franciscans, Dante opposed the papal claims to temporal power – particularly the worldly statecraft of the reigning pontiff, Boniface VIII – and urged a return to the evangelical ideas of poverty and simplicity. When the political tide turned against him, he was forced to flee Florence. His enemies invented charges of corruption and he was sentenced, in absentia, to be burned at the stake should he ever return. As a result, he spent the last twenty years of his life in exile. As he later wrote, “I have been truly a ship without sail or rudder, carried to many ports and straits and shores by the dry wind blown by grievous poverty.”
In these years, Dante wrote his Divine Comedy, the record of an imaginative pilgrimage from the depths of hell, up the mount of purgatory, and finally to the ethereal rapture of paradise. The poet’s journey involves his own progressive conversion, preparing him to endure the increasingly rarefied atmosphere along his spiritual path until he is drawn into the presence of “the love that moves the Sun and the other stars.”
There is conflicting evidence about whether Dante himself was a member of the Third Order of St. Francis. There is no doubt that his spiritual vision was deeply shaped by the Franciscan movement. St. Francis himself makes a significant appearance in Paradiso, the third volume of the Comedy, where he models the poverty and humility that Dante, the pilgrim, must learn to adopt. (Dante also contrasts the saintliness of Francis with the corruption and compromises that, he believed, had overtaken his order.)
Dante died in Ravenna in 1321, far from the city he loved. He was buried in the Franciscan church.
On the bright fall morning of September 11, 2001, firefighters across New York were summoned to a scene of unimaginable horror: Two hijacked airlines had crashed into the twin towers of the World Trade Center. As firefighters rushed into the burning buildings, they were accompanied by their chaplain, Fr. Mychal Judge. Hundreds of them would die that day, among the nearly three thousand fatalities in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. Fr. Judge would be among them.
In the days that followed, the story of his life and his sacrifice would become known around the world: how he had joined the Franciscans at the age of fifteen, how he had acquired a wide reputation for his ministry among the poor and homeless, alcoholics, and people with AIDS, and his outreach to the gay community and to others alienated or marginalized in the Church. There were stories about his own struggles with alcohol and his recovery with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous, and stories of his love for the firefighters, his courage in joining them on the front lines, his support as they coped with stress and sorrow. There seemed to be special meaning in the fact that Fr. Mychal was listed as the first certified casualty of 9/11.
A photograph of his fellow firemen carrying his body from the wreckage to a neighboring church became an icon of that day: an image of loving service and sacrifice, a hopeful answer to message born of fear and fanaticism.
The short life of St. Rose was set against the background of turbulent ecclesial and political conflicts in which, even as a child, she played a significant role. From her earliest years she had displayed remarkable spiritual gifts, including, at the age of nine, a vision of Our Lady, who instructed her to enter the Third Order of St. Francis.
In 1247, Rose’s hometown of Viterbo was occupied by the forces of Emperor Frederick II, who was attempting to conquer the Papal states. Though only twelve, Rose took to the streets. Dressed in the simple tunic of the Third Order and carrying a crucifix, she called on growing crowds to defend the pope and to rise up and expel the usurpers. Not surprisingly, her actions incurred the wrath of imperial party. Though denounced as an enemy of the emperor, she escaped the punishment of death. Instead, she and her parents were merely banished. Rose responded by prophesying – correctly, as it turned out – the emperor’s imminent death. When, after a matter of weeks, this prophecy was fulfilled, the papal party was restored to power and Rose and her family were able to return home.
Rose spent her remaining years in prayer and seclusion in her parents’ home. Though she wished to enter the Poor Clares, she was turned away for lack of dowry.
She died in March 1252 at the age of seventeen; she was canonized in 1457.
Bernard, one of the wealthiest young men of Assisi, became intrigued by reports about one of his peers—Francesco di Bernardone, previously known as something of a dandy and carouser—who had recently aroused wonder, as well as ridicule, by his ostentatious embrace of poverty. His curiosity piqued, Bernard invited Francis to dine with him and spend the night in his home.
During the course of the night, he was so moved by the sound of his guest’s ardent prayers that he confronted Francis the next day and asked his help in discerning God’s will. Opening the missal at random, Francis alighted on the text, “If you wish to be perfect, go and sell all you own, and give it to the poor.” A second time he opened the book and found, “Take nothing for your journey.” On a third attempt, he found, “If anyone would follow me, let him deny himself.” “This is the advice that the Lord has given us,” Francis proclaimed. “Go and do as you have heard.” Taking these instructions to heart, Bernard disposed of his property and adopted Francis’s way of life.
Becoming one of Francis’s most trusted companions, Bernard accompanied him on many journeys. He established a house in Bologna and undertook a special mission to the shrine at Santiago de Compostela. When Francis was on his deathbed in 1226, “like the patriarch Jacob, with his devoted sons standing around him, grieving and weeping over the departure of so beloved a father,” he asked, “Where is my firstborn son?” Placing his hand on Bernard, he bestowed a special blessing, and enjoined him to “be the head of all your Brothers.”
Bernard himself died around 1241 and was buried near his spiritual father in the Basilica of Saint Francis. His last words were, “I find this in my soul: not for a thousand worlds equal to this one would I want not to have served Our Lord Jesus Christ…. My dearest brothers, I beg you to love one another.”
Eugenia de los Dolores, to use her baptismal name, was born in Cordoba in Argentina. Drawn from an early age to religious life, she dreamed of staring a religious institute for the care of poor and abandoned children. Her path, however, was convoluted. Staring as a Franciscan tertiary, she was persuaded to join a Carmelite convent. When her health failed, she left and joined a convent of the Visitandine Sisters. This too proved too rigorous for her constitution.
Finally, with support from a Franciscan priest, she returned to her original plan. With two companions, she founded the Franciscan Tertiary Missionaries of Argentina, dedicated to providing religious education for poor children. Her congregation flourished.
Maria died on August 25, 1885. She was declared blessed in 2002, becoming first Argentinian woman to be beatified.
