It's All About RELATIONSHIPS

May the Lord give you Peace!

St Francis of Assisi models for us all the most important aspect of our human journey - Relationship. To be in relationship with everyone and all creation was one of the central "organizing" values in Francis' life:

- Relationship with the Most High God
- Relationship with his brothers in the gospel fraternity
- Relationship with St Clare and the other women who followed her vision
- Relationship with the poor who represented for Francis a privileged moment of encounter with the living God
- Relationship with those in power who did all they could to stay in power and who kept trapped those living in poverty
- Relationship with leaders of the Church who themselves lost sense of their dignity and the dignity of those entrusted to their pastoral care
- Relationship creatures great and small who bore the various qualities of a God who refuses to be controlled and contained.

Let us reflect on the quality of all of our relationships in our personal and ministerial lives and to allow God to once again infuse these with the dignity and goodness reflective of God's originating grace, a grace that enables us to seek the way of the reconciliation and a new trust.

- from Oct. 4, 2008, letter to the Friars from Michael Perry OFM & Michael Jennrich OFM