This evening, after sundown, in friaries and convents and chapels and hermitages all over the world Franciscans come together to mark the Tranistus, the passing to the Lord, of our holy father Brother Francis. In the year 1226, worn our by his labours and knowing his end was coming close Francis asked the brothers to bring him to the little chapel of Our Lady of the Angels, just outside Assisi so that he could pass to the Lord under the watchful care of the Blessed Mother to whom he had entrusted his life and the Order he was leaving behind. Commemorating this event we franciscans gather every year and in song, chant, reading and reflection meditate upon the way of his passing and the teaching it brings. Last year I was asked to preach at one of these gatherings and a number of people asked me to publish the homily I gave on that occasion. I never got around to it but as the feast comes round again it offer the opportunity to make good my promise! So here it is... may it bring benefit and blessing so that inspired by Brother Francis we will all be a little more ready for our own Transitus whenever it comes...
Homily for the Transitus of Our Holy Father, Brother Francis of Assisi
We have
entered into sacred time, into that storied time where past becomes present, as,
once again, we stand at that sacred point between life and death, between this
world and the next, and, in the eternity that is God, we turn our minds and
hearts to that little cell outside the tumbledown chapel of St. Mary of the
Angels as Brother Sun sets and Sisters Moon and Stars rise in the heavens,
clear precious and fair. There the birds quieten their vesper singing and we
take our place with all the followers of the “Poverello”, the little poor man
of Assisi, who gather from all of time and space around him as he breathes
slowly, gently towards his end… and as we vigil with his brothers and with all
of creation we realise that we have forgotten how to die…
Does that
sound strange? After all, die we shall. It is the one definite point in our
existence. We have been born, we shall die.
But…
Tied up in
life and in all of it’s vicissitudes we can begin to believe the great myth of
human ego that this earthly life lasts for ever… and then, when Sister Death
draws near to us, as she will to all of us, we are lost in panic, lost in pain,
we are simply lost… and we hold out against her not knowing that her gentle
purpose is simply to bring us home again…
And so we
forget how to die…
St.
Francis remembered how to die…
He knew
that if we would face the embrace of our sister when it finally comes we must
do so with love, yielding to her, being ushered by her into the Divine Presence;
and for this to happen then in such a gentle way we must practice dying…
We must
die, every day… just a little…
We must die
to our self, die to our false self, die to every part of us that is not us but
is the accretion of property and wealth for their own sake…
We must die
to the use of others rather than to the love of others; die to the holding onto
power so as to dominate and even and especially die to the belief that I am at
the centre of all things and that I am in some way owed my existence, my success,
even my life…
Francis…the
little poor man now lying bare upon the bare earth, has long since died to each
of these…
He has died
to the rich home and sumptuous clothes of his youth and even to the joy a young
man takes in his own vigour and power…
He has died
to the rich young man, who was the toast of Assisi and the centre of attention who was
named “Master of the Revels”…
He has died
to his family’s longing to see him raise their profile and their fortune…
He has died
to the noble knight whose armour was really forged from the ambition of his
father and the myths that filled the head of a young boy who believed war could
ever be noble…
He has died
to a Mother’s love and favour…
He has died
to the pride that saw only the sores of the lepers but never their souls…
He has died
to the embarrassment of the Poor Man who begs for his living from door to door…
He has died
to the rejection of some and the adulation of many…
He has died
to the opinion of Bishops and Princes, Popes and Kings…
He has died
to the fear that the brotherhood would not listen… and would not follow…
He has died
to the desire to be a martyr…
He has died
to the fear of suffering and pain…
He has died
to his own flesh, to the world, to the devil…
He has died
to his own will…
He has died
upon the Cross with Christ…
And in so
doing he has remembered how to die, and now with the last great effort of his
being he teaches his brothers and sisters, present and absent and all those who
will come after him how to die so that one may truly live…
Yes, he has
died so completely, as only the saints truly die in life, that as Death
approaches he recognises her and smiles at her knowing that she is only the
shrouded sister whose touch brings entrance into the only real life there is…
His body is
now only a mere shell that holds a heavenly treasure of mind and heart and soul
so converted by grace, so consumed by Holy Spirit fire, that it can barely
contain it anymore. It already shines radiantly from those five crimson stars
seraph-sealed upon his body, when the deepest desire of his life to be one with
the One who is love was fulfilled upon Alverna’s height…
And so, he
who preached joy to men and beasts, to wolves and women, to birds and children
and saw with Eden sight what seeds of the new creation are already planted in
their souls, now gives to us his last and best sermon, and teaches a world that
grasps greedily on to life and so fears the reaper and the quiet and the last
stilling breath, simply how to die… so that one might truly live…
Absolved
and blessed, and blessing others too he has heard the Gospel with ears now
straining for Heaven’s summons and breathing deeply he looks with dim eyes
beyond into silence…
And then…
He sings…
This poor
man now blinded by tears and weak with sickness borne for humanity’s boon…
He sings…
And the
brothers who had gathered sombrely and sadly, now with smiles newly rekindled begin
to chant with him the song of his illumined heart the canticle of Sir Brother
Son… a song a lifetime of grace in the making…
He, Francis,
sings…
And for a
moment, just for a moment, the Troubadour of peace, the Herald of the Great
King, the one who charmed the birds and the beasts and the fierce men of war
into silence and peace with his songs is amongst them once again…
“Laudato si
mi Signor!” Be Praised my Lord… each verse rises as his farewell benediction…
exulting one last time in the beauty that speaks more eloquently than any
missive or word of sacred writ could ever do of the Love that holds all things
in being and now calls back to itself Francis, its little one and its servant, first
sent into the world to remind it of its beauty, its original blessing, its
redemption and final calling into a communion of love in the Christ who is
Love…
And so he
surrenders himself to Love… singing as he goes upon his last journey, this
pilgrim brother whose songs filled the roads for too short a time… and in his going
he teaches us how to die…
How to
leave behind all that would hold us back…
How to come
empty handed before the One who fills us with His Song of Love holding back
nothing of ourselves for ourselves so that the One who gave Himself totally for
us may receive us totally…
Then… comes
a moment of silence and stillness… the brothers stand in quiet reverence… the
song seems to cease…
And, barely
above a whisper, his last words sound, “Welcome my sister death.”
The echo of
his last breath, his last song, has barely passed and then from hills and
valley and woods all about, in twilight star speckled skies, a mighty rush of
wings is heard as the larks, those truest of his disciples, who own nothing
more than their song, rise like arrows into the air, as brothers flocking
together in the moon light and star light and sing his soul skywards…
His passing
is complete…
He lived
and died a little every day… and so in dying shows us how to live… that we too
would remember to die a little every day until we may greet our Sister Death
with only our own soul song to sing…and with empty hands but full heart enter
into Life…enter into Love…
Let us begin to die... so that we may live.
Amen.
