St. Francis Day Sermon

What do you think St. Francis preached to the birds?
Here's what I preached to people, dogs and cats during our celebration of St. Francis day in 2009.

Transcribed from a sermon

Given on the feast of St. Francis

October 4, 2009

By Rev. Valerie Ann Hart

At St Barnabas Episcopal Church

Arroyo Grande, CA

Matthew 11:25-30

One day St. Francis was walking along and saw a huge flock of birds.  Now, Francis couldn’t help himself, he had to preach the Good News.  So, he preached it to the birds and he said to the birds, “Oh birds, you are so loved by God.  You are so special in God’s sight. God knows everything about you.  God cares about you, and loves you, and thinks that you are wonderful.  And, oh birds, sing and praise God because that’s what you are made to do.  Praise God because you are so loved and so cared about.” 

This is what Francis preached to people as well - that we are incredibly loved by God.  Now, we’re not sure that he actually preached to the birds.  That is one of those stories that you’re never quite completely sure of because saints develop stories around them.  But it is a wonderful story.  And we know that Francis loved creation -all of creation.  So, we can imagine him preaching to the animals. 

He also loved what he called ‘sister poverty.’ It is a way of living a simple life while owning nothing.  Of course he didn’t start out that way.  This was a choice he made.  His father was a wealthy entrepreneur.  He was a merchant in the city of Assisi and sold cloth.  They had a huge home, wealth, power, beautiful clothes, everything you could want growing up.  His father was a little worried about Francis because he was a dreamer and his father wanted him to be brought up to take over the business. On the other hand, his mother, who also had a spiritual dreamer side, encouraged her son and his dreaming. 

But, he was a pretty typical wealthy young man. He was handsome. He played the flute very well. And the girls loved him. The young men followed him for he was obviously very charismatic. He had a group of young men that would follow him around and they would do whatever he wanted to do.  He had it all.  He was at the top of his form. He was what every young man in our culture would say they would want.  Then he decided he wanted adventure and glory.

So, in order to get some adventure and glory, he joined the army.  His city was in an ongoing constant war with another city. So Francis got some armor to become a kind of knight.  He went off to war, to this glorious thing.  What he discovered is that war was not that glorious an adventure. He saw the pain and the suffering. Then he was taken prisoner.  He was in prison for a number of months in a small cell at the bottom of a castle where he was ill and miserable. When he came out, he had a different attitude about what was important and what wasn’t important. 

He was trying to figure out what he was going to do with the rest of his life.  He was praying in a church where some of the walls had tumbled down, a very old church.  As he was praying in front of the crucifix, he heard the crucifix saying to him – “rebuild my church”.  Francis took it literally, thinking that Christ wanted him to rebuild this physical structure.  He started rebuilding it and put all his money into it.  He used up all his money.  Then he started taking money from his dad and his dad got tired of paying for rebuilding this church.  So Francis started begging for bricks.  And even though he had never done physical labor before, he was physically rebuilding the church.

Then he went a step further, realizing that he needed to renounce his wealth.  But, I get ahead of myself… He had a choice between living the life that the culture said was good and living a different kind of life. 

On Friday night this week, I went to see the Michael Moore film, Capitalism: A Love Affair.  Whatever you feel about Michael Moore, I’m not going to go into the politics of it - but there was one thing that I found very interesting.  He was asking the question – “Is capitalism Christian?”  And, “What would Jesus think of capitalism?”  He made his point by taking some clippings from a movie about Jesus. These clips present different images of Jesus.  We have the rich young man coming up to Jesus and saying, “What should I do?”  And, Michael Moore dubs in a different statement then you’d expect.  Then, the young man says, “How do I have eternal life?”  Jesus goes up to him, takes his face in his hands, looks directly in his eyes and says, “Maximize your profits.” 

I think that made the point very clearly that Jesus is probably not concerned with our profits.  Jesus actually said, “Sell all you have and give it to the poor.”  Jesus is not concerned about our profits.  He’s not concerned about our 401K.  He’s not concerned about our retirement.  He’s not concerned about our new car.  He’s not concerned about any of that.  That’s not relevant. 

Now, Francis heard this story of Jesus and the young man, where Jesus said, “Sell all you own and give it to the poor.”  Once again, Francis took it literally and went out and sold everything he had.  He went to his father and his father was upset.  So, he said to his father, “Here take all my clothes.” and he stood naked.  He gave it all up and embraced poverty.

I remember when I was in high school and I read my first book about St. Francis.  I got to that point and I was very disheartened because I knew I wasn’t about to give it all away.  I still haven’t gotten to the point where I can give it all away.  There aren’t too many saints like Francis.  And, even the Franciscan brotherhood, by the time Francis died, had given up absolutely poverty, the idea of owning nothing and had started to own their own homes.  Francis’ ideal of absolute poverty frees one, but it takes a very special kind of person to do that. 

In the reading that we have today in the gospel, Jesus says, “Come ye who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, for I am gentle and humble of heart.”  This is an animal image.  When two animals are yoked together, they do everything together.  They eat the same food.  They go to the same watering hole.  They pull the same load.  It is all shared. 

So, if we yoke ourselves with Christ, Christ shares our burdens and helps to carry them.  All that Christ has, and all that Christ is, becomes ours.  Christ, the creator of the universe. If we are tied in with him, what is there to worry about?  What is there to be afraid of?

Those of you who have been in the church for a long time and used to use the “old prayer book”, the 1928 prayer book might remember growing up and hearing these words every Sunday, “Hear what comfortable words our savior Christ says to all that turn to him.  Come onto me, all that ye who travel and are heavy laden and I will refresh you.”

When we trust Christ, when we offer ourselves to Christ, our burdens are lightened and our worries are less.  We may not be saints like Francis who can give it all away, but, when we are yoked to Christ, our priorities change and it’s easier to be generous, and to be fearless, and to be joyous.  Amen.