ARTICLES
The Spirituality of Itinerancy
The word itinerant comes from the Latin word ‘iter’ which means “way” or “journey”. Such is the life of a friar. The ‘iter’ of a friar involves continuous conversion as he experiences daily a personal encounter with the Lord in everyone and in everything,...
“What A Person Is Before God, That He Is and No More”
Many of us pray to St Anthony when we lose things, and we may even call him “Doctor of the Church” and not know why. Well, Anthony had a licence to teach (licentia docendi in Latin) because Francis realised that his friars needed to study theology in order to be...
While Treasures Lost Are Found Again, When Young and Old Aid Implore
"St Anthony, please help me, I cannot find my keys!" How often have we found ourselves reaching out to St Anthony for something like this? You may even have a story about how your misplaced items were miraculously found. Many of us have also entrusted St Anthony with...
Franciscan Spirituality in Easter
Following the example of St Francis, each friar (and indeed everyone) is called to a life of conversion. As such, it is easy to relate Franciscan spirituality with a spirituality of the Cross, of Christ’s passion. But is not Franciscan spirituality fundamentally...
A New Way of Looking at the World
St Francis of Assisi is well known for his love of poverty, but he was not born into poverty. In fact, he was born into wealth and privilege, and dreamt of glory on the battlefield. He thought these would bring him happiness. It was not until he encountered the leper...
The Incarnation Is Not About Christmas
The Incarnation The seasons of Advent and Christmas offer us the possibility of doing things in other ways. The Pope speaks of the Church as a “field hospital”. God, he says, is not found in “neat, orderly places and things, distant from reality”. As we set out our...
Reflecting with St Francis before the Christmas Crib
St Francis and Christmas Crib The story of St Francis and the Christmas Crib at Greccio shows what was really important to Francis – the poverty of Jesus and his mother, and the discomfort felt by the little baby. For Francis, the external poverty of Christ’s...
In Conversation with Friar Dan Horan, OFM
Join Friar Gerald Tan, OFM as he moderates the ZOOM session conducted by The Franciscan Young Adults with Friar Dan Horan, OFM as the main guest speaker. Friar Dan Horan, OFM is a new generation Franciscan theologian who has written and spoken on Franciscan theology,...
Transitus of St Francis of Assisi (3rd Oct)
The Final Prayer of St Francis of Assisi – in celebration of St Francis’ freedom from the earthly world, we explore the Transitus of St Francis, his final transition from the world to heaven's realm. Just as St Francis said at the end of his life, “The Lord has shown...
Finding the Divine Good in Creation
On 29 Nov, 1979, Pope John Paul II in his Bull Inter Sanctos, proclaimed St Francis of Assisi the patron of ecology. St Francis is best characterised as an ontological poet and a nature mystic who discovered the inter-relatedness of all beings through a spiritual...