As a Franciscan, I am often asked, "exactly what is a Franciscan; are you a monk? While not a monk nor ordained, I am a chaplain and lay theologian; I am active in lay ministry, and I'm a member of an 800 year-old religious order founded by Francis of Assisi, then no saint but a devoted disciple and apostle who discovered, quite separately from his privileged upbringing, the compassion for people through the joy of Christ. Francis, and to be a Franciscan, embodies the spirituality of Poverty, Humility, Incarnation, Love, & Simplicity. It is to fully embrace the gentle nature of Christ's Galilean ministry of that very early church which was then known as the Way. Over the course of my time in immersion at a hermitage house in urban Bridgeport, Connecticut which I created, and flowing from my time in postulancy, novitiate and then as an Associate / Companion in this religious order, I prepared weekly missives for our faith community, each revealing a distilled, almost sermon-type, message on Franciscan Spirituality as I have come to understand it. Francis is a moving target in trying to corner his universal ideals into modern, daily, practical deployment...to isolate tenets we can grasp, improve our own hearts, and by some miracle, improve the world.
