I should catch my breath and reflect a little on last week's pilgrimage to Italy. The hightlight was a 3 day stay at Assisi where we studied the life of St Francis.
The day before we had been in the crazy city of Rome. Legend has it that Romulus, whom the city was named after, drew a line and killed his brother for crossing over it. Legend, of course, but it seems very connected with the history of Rome and also the church, who drew a line and told the world who were on the right side of it. The Latin word for line is something like "paga' (I didnt study Latinbut I did hear that the word pagan was reserved for those outside the "line" of civilzed Rome.
Anyway, what a difference to visit Rome and see the life of Francis, a man who also drew a line between the aristocrats and the poor. And then he crossed over the line and became poor, just as Jesus crossed over from glory to humanity (Phil 2) for us.
My son Samuel followed jesus in teh way of Francis for about 6 months of his life. He was about 7 years old. Samuel went barefoot, wore a brown robe and even had a tonsure cut on his head. Pretty unusual for a 7 year old American kid but the life of Francis had made a huge impact on him and it was his way of walking it out. Needless to say, it was a huge thrill for Samuel (now 11years old) to be in the city of his hero.
I found a book on Francis written by my friend Steve Rabey and Michel Talbot. We bought a stack of books.
Here is something I didnt know - Francis was an installation artist. Let this be written in the history of alternative worship. St. Francis the Installation Artist. He took the story of the birth of Christ to a new level when he recreated the scene at his church. His creche, or nativity scene, kicked off a movement in nativity scenes and even today we set up our own versions of Francis's creche every Christmas.
Francis was also responsible in part for the birth of Gothic art and of course a brand new structure of monasticism that totally changed the way monks followed Jesus. Monasticism became either pre-Franciscan or post-Franciscan. Huge influence.
My gut feeling is that a movement will happen here in Italy. It will be bigger that Protestantism and somewhat owned by the Roman Catholics, perhaps in the same way that the Franciscan movement was owned and blessed (perhaps begrudginly) by the institution here in Italy.
Italy is a country LOVED by God. You have to be here to feel it. He really loves Italy. One of his favourites. The sun, the food - oooo the food, the landscape, the ocean, the wonderful friendly people, the history of blessing, the redemptive gift of protection over the weak. There is so much here - we need to come back and keep coming back until God has His way with this country and thousands of young Italians are bringing the great story of Jesus to the nations and with it a new way of church that is far more integrated with life and family and business than its counterparts in the western nations.
Enough said. Like my picture? Video camera is broken again and i only get pieces of images - enough to make a collage though.
