St. Francis Recieves the Stigmata by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo / Wikimedia Commons
CV NEWS FEED // Father Bobby Barbato, OFM Cap., rector of the National Shrine of St. Francis in San Francisco, has shared a message to commemorate the 800th anniversary of St. Francis of Assisi receiving the stigmata.
On Tuesday, September 17, the Church marks the anniversary of this profound event, which took place on Mount La Verna in 1224.
According to a letter from Fr. Barbato, Francis’s stigmata serves as a reminder that our bodies, created in the image of God, play an integral role in our spiritual lives.
Fr. Barbato wrote that despite the historically recurring temptation for mankind to fall into dualism, or the belief that “the spiritual was good and the material was bad,” it is necessary to “be reminded what it says in the Book of Genesis: ‘God saw everything He had made and He found it very good.’”
Fr. Barbato shared that St. Francis always resisted the temptation to fall into dualism, reminding his followers to ‘“Consider, O human being, in what great excellence the Lord God has placed you, for He created and formed you to the image of His beloved Son according to the body and to His likeness according to the Spirit.’”
According to Fr. Barbato, St. Francis, deeply devoted to living out the passion and death of Jesus Christ, spent his life trying to embody Christ’s message.
During a period of “spiritual and emotional crisis” in 1224, when Francis’s health had begun to “break down dramatically,” Francis prayed intensely that he would “feel in his body something of the pains that Jesus had undergone, and to feel in his heart the love that led Jesus to accept His passion for our sake.”
“The Lord Himself confirmed Francis’ conviction that our bodies also are part of God’s plan when a wondrous thing happened: God imprinted on Francis’ body the marks of the passion of Jesus Christ,” Fr. Barbato wrote, noting that St. Francis is considered to be one of the very first saints to receive the gift.
In his humility, St. Francis, according to Fr. Barbato, attempted to hide his condition. However, it was discovered after his death.
“The Lord wanted to speak to the world through the saint’s stigmata,” Fr. Barbato wrote.
“As we celebrate the 800th anniversary of this marvelous event, the Lord still speaks to us through it,” he continued. “The stigmata of St. Francis reminds us that our bodies, in all their gritty particularities, are indeed made by God and a vital part of His revelation of who we are created to be.”
“I believe Jesus gave St. Francis his stigmata to show us that the Gospel can be lived by each one of us now,” Fr. Barbato wrote.
He concluded that as we celebrate the saint, we must “ask that here and now we can share in the sufferings of Christ and also experience the love which led God to send His only Son into our midst.”
