Francis of Assisi: A Revolutionary Life

Rating:
Summary: Francis No Innocent [pun intended]
Review: Adrian House saunters through the life of Francis of Assisi pretty much as I imagine Francis himself traveled the Italian countryside. He is in no particular hurry, he takes time to digest the curiosities of his journey, and on occasion he stops altogether to sing and celebrate what he had discovered. House is deeply respectful of his sources--Thomas of Celano and Bonaventure of the thirteenth century, for example, or Bishop John Moorman of our own day-and he is less skeptical than other biographers of devotional sources like The Little Flowers. He has produced a biography that neither labors under its own gravity nor settles into the bog of ecclesiastical mush.

It is House's periodic detours that also distinguish this work. We get a primer of Italian city-state politics, street life in the towns, the idiosyncrasies of bishops and noblemen, and the temper of contemporary church life and piety. We get a very thorough immersion into the appalling poverty that was the routine lot of most grim souls in the thirteenth century. We get descriptions of the papal court on vacation, the atmosphere of a medieval ecumenical council, and the eccentric sumptuousness of the Sultan's war camp. We learn probably more than we want to know about the horrors of the siege of Damietta during the Fifth Crusade. We also enter into the private musings of the author himself who takes time to speculate on such matters as whether Francis had some premonition of the Big Bang Theory.

House's Francis is a saint in every sense of the word: a humanitarian of historic proportions whose religious commitment to Gospel and Church almost single-handedly redeemed medieval Catholicism as a holy communion. In retelling an oft-told tale, House succeeds in giving us new ways to look at Francis. He attributes to the saint the same quality that Shelby Foote sees in Abraham Lincoln: the ability to stand outside of himself and understand how he looked and sounded to others. Francis was the master of the symbolic gesture: preaching naked, taming animals, singing and dancing. Spontaneous as he was, Francis knew exactly what he was doing and precisely what he hoped to communicate.

Where many biographers find Francis the soul of innocence, House understands that his subject was brilliant. It is no coincidence that Francis cultivated precious relationships with men who could do him much good: Guido, Bishop of Assisi; Innocent III; Cardinal Ugolino/Gregory IX. It was the influence of these men who preserved Francis from the fate of many other like-minded reformers of his time: the brand of heresy. How is it that Francis "happens" to be in Rome for the Fourth Lateran Council to protect the interests of his new order, or at Damietta to serve as missionary-negotiator on behalf of Christian crusaders with the Sultan?

House's interpretation of the "later Francis" is intriguing. In Chapter 21, "The Small Black Hen," Francis chooses discretion over valor. He decides, albeit resignedly, that absolute poverty was not worth the enduring distrust of the Church hierarchy. Perhaps with the idea that he himself would become a marginalized friar free to pursue Gospel absolutes, he decides to let the Church legalize the governance of the now several thousand brothers he had attracted. This change of heart would open the door for permanent friaries, libraries, schools, and a more conventional religious lifestyle. Like many saints, Francis was an autocrat, and his change of heart on the matter of poverty and church authority was a blind side to his feisty co-founder Clare, then engaged in even more intense struggles with the Curia over matters of the rule and financial security. Clare, in some respects, emerges in the final chapters as the strongest but last of the old true believers. The ultimate loser was Elias, who became the target and scapegoat of disillusioned friars in the years after Francis's death.

So who were the enemies of Francis and Clare? House talks about them incessantly [why the need for a "Cardinal Protector"?] but never says exactly who they are or, more to the point, whether their concerns about the nascent religious movement were justified. We come to find, for example, that civil rulers were none too happy about the proliferation of lay followers of Francis, all of whom as professed pacifists refused to bear arms and thus gave weight to church over state. It is also clear that many of Francis's enemies were members of the Roman Curia. House echoes the conventional wisdom that many churchmen perceived the friars as dangerously loose and unstructured and as unsettling to local clergy. Is it possible, though, that some churchmen of vision saw what Francis and Innocent refused to anticipate: an inevitable divisiveness between idealism and reality?

For all of his love for things Franciscan, House does not enter into the tired polemic over the comparative virtues of today's Franciscans vis-à-vis the contemporary intimates of Francis. One gets the sense from this narrative that Francis's distinctive embrace of poverty was a message to the poor as much as to the rich. Francis, master of the religious gesture, understood that his hyperbolic example of poverty was an affirmation that the poor life of the citizenry was a holy one, not a meaningless one. His observance of poverty was about Incarnation, not subjugation. Were Francis alive today, we can conclude, he might have less to say about personal possessions and everything to say about the human experience.

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Rating:
Summary: "An Intriguing Work...A Biographical Monument"
Review: Adrian House's enthralling account of the life of St. Francis is likely to be esteemed a biographical landmark; not a make-shift model only worthy of a few key-points and temporary praise. House captures Francis' life as a total reality - molding society, his friends and loved ones - into one harmony conveying Francis' life as a pilgrimage compelled by the joy of Christ, affection for His Creation, and pashion to meet the needs of others...ultimately living out the example of his Savior. This book also includes the Franciscan Rule of 1223 following the epilogue, and eight colorful illustrations throught the book indicating key features in St. Francis' life. Entertaining and edifying...down right stimuli for the imagination.

Rating:
Summary: In the footsteps of Saint Francis.
Review: I am unable to measure this new biography of Saint Francis against previous biographies, which I have not read. However, in this 297-page biography, House succeeds in bringing his humble subject to life not only with compelling details about the life and times of Saint Francis, but also with the "sights, sounds, smells" (p. xiv) of the Saint's Mediterranean travels. In a book written "without bias for readers of any faith or none" (p. xiv), House reveals that Francis's "song was love and he tossed up society's most cherished possessions--rank, wealth, fame, reputation and power--exposing their flaws, so that their opposites seemed more precious than they" (p. xv).

Saint Francis has been called "a morning star in the midst of the clouds" (p. 7), and House adds that Francis was the "morning star of the Italian Renaissance" (p. 9). Francis was born in 1182, the son of a wealthy Assissi merchant. Although he "wasted his time miserably" (p. 24) in his youth, sinfully carousing like "a frivolous young butterfly" (p. 56), in 1206 he stripped himself naked, renouncing his worldly life for a life of "Poverty, Chastity, Humility, Obedience to God, Prayer, Work, Harmony, and Preaching" (p. 87). We then follow Francis, blessed by beggars, but cursed by his father, as he kisses the hands of lepers (p. 58) on one page, and lifting a worm off the road "in case it was trampled on" (p. 108) on another. House shows that because Francis's "appreciation of the natural world was universal" (p. 178), he has since been named the "patron saint of ecologists" (pp. 10, 182). It is well known that Francis also enjoyed the company of birds and animals, "gladly touching them and seeing them" (p. 180). House allows the fascinating relationship between Francis and Clare to unfold with quiet beauty. Miracles happen in the book's final pages. As Francis declines with old age, we watch him burn brighter with prayer. While on a retreat in La Verna, he encounters a seraph, leaving him marked for the last two years of his life with the stigmata wounds of the Crucifixion (pp. 5, 257-58).

House is the first to admit he is not a scholar (p. xiv), and this may not be the most scholarly biography of Saint Francis. But it succeeds in presenting a picture of Saint Francis that is meaningful and unforgettable.

G. Merritt

Rating:
Summary: Missed Interpretation
Review: I have long admired St. Francis of Assisi. A truly holy man, I was confirmed under his name. And yet, his ideal of living a life of poverty and service is something I could never find the courage to emulate to any significant degree. Still, it is heartening to read of his life. In our modern world, we need all the inspiration we can find. Adrian House has done a good job of using the life of Francis to provide inspiration for us.

One of the main things I like about House's work here is that he provides the story of man who is truly human. I quickly tire of biographers who try to throw only good light on their subjects. This is a particular danger when writing of a person many consider to be a saint. Still, for saints to really inspire, to lead us towards the good, we must be able to see ourselves in them. Like many great saints (Paul, Augustine, etc.), Francis lived the rather loose life of a wealthy young man for many years before the revelation that turned him into the man he became and House is not afraid to show us this. Even better, House recounts instances of Francis losing his temper and making mistakes after his transformation but with the caveat that Francis, unlike most, always tried to make amends for his transgressions. This, in my mind, is what is best about Francis.

The weakness of this book is that is caters a little too much to a modern, ecumenical audience. Francis was a product of twelfth century Italy and we lose a sense of time with all the interspersed quotations from post-Middle Ages, multicultural sources which shed little light on the man Francis was. I love to read Shakespeare, Buddha and the like, but not here. This is somewhat a matter of taste, however. I am already well-versed in the Christian milieu and, therefore, don't need help to connect to Francis. Non-Christians may find this book more palatable because of House's style.

On the other hand, the only really modern writing I want to see is modern scholarship and, fortunately, there is that too. House handles Francis's mystical side very well and I liked the way he points out how the Orders Francis founds get hijacked and turned away from Francis's ideal. People like to criticize modern religions expression but we should take the time to look back at the original spirit of these groups and rituals before decide it has no value. House's book gives us this opportunity.

Rating:
Summary: Missed Interpretation
Review: Read the Saint, Founder and Prophet, the most exhaustive and complete compendium of source documents on the life and spirituality of St. Francis. Adrian House references documents contained in this compendium in his creative interpretation of what is actually known about St. Francis. In particular, his discussion of St. Francis' sexuality bears no resemblance to the source documents from which he says that he obtained his background information. It is true that the Church rushed to canonize Francis and so the Church authorized biography by Thomas of Celano was very one sided and lacking in candor, especially concerning Francis' life before conversion. However, subsequent second hand accounts of Francis' life as well as critical writings and analysis by many scholars and historians have provided perspective, at least sufficient in scope to paint a consistent portrait in key lifestyle areas. Adrian House writes well and his perspective is interesting, but it's very far from a reasonable, scholarly interpretation of the best source information available. His reference to credible sources may lead the reader to believe that what House writes as fiction is supported by historical fact. Read the sources and make up your own mind.

Rating:
Summary: Adds more context than insight to Francis' spirit
Review: The strongest parts of this biography are in House's relation of the changing feudal world around Assisi and Perugia to the papal-German battles in Italy and the rise of the mercantile class into which Francis was born. Also, the chapter that looks into the early spirituality of the first friars adds valuable understanding to what must have inspired many to take up the evangelical and mendicant challenge.

The excursion into the Middle East, especially the siege of Damietta, remains helpful for an appreciation of the never-ending cruelty of warfare in this contentious region, but you do lose sight as a reader of the place of this episode within the immediate experience of Francis' diplomatic apostolate. In later stretches of the narrative, the debate over poverty receives important attention, but the machinations of the friars replacing the discipline of the Order's founder with a more pragmatic system needed further explanation, as did the claim by House that the refusal of the Third Order to bear arms for a lord undermined the whole feudal structure and helped advance the power of the middle class. Certainly, the latter theory deserves much more depth than House gives to it here.

The few photos are excellent. One in particular, near to the life of the saint, shows his face hallowed out like an El Greco figure, if not as elongated, seemingly hunched over and suffering with an individuated expression as if drawn by one who knew him. It speaks eloquently for a man who, while praising nature, punished his Brother Ass of a body into an early death.
Such a contradiction, House only can hint at, stands as his legacy.

Rating:
Summary: Provides a lively reading of his experiences
Review: This biography of Francis is written for all readers, whether religious or not, and covers the life and times of Francis, who lived from 1182-1226. From his devotion to the poor and sick to the relationship between him and Clare and his journey over the Pyrenees barefoot, Francis Of Assisi provides a lively reading of his experiences.

Rating:
Summary: A secular look at a non-secular figure
Review: This book focuses on the historical events of this saint's life without much embellishment on the spiritual nature. Of course, a biography of St. Francis can't ignore the spiritual side of this man entirely and I think the author gives his due respect to his accomplishments.

From a well to do youth to a poverty stricken reformer, this life is one to be admired no matter what a person's background. The book sufficiently discusses the historical events as an outword expression of the transformation of the man, but not necessarily the transformation itself for the student trying to study the method.

If you wan't to learn of the man and the development of his order, this book will do nicely. However, if you want to understand the meaning of the man, you will find this book lacking.

Rating:
Summary: This One Compelled Me to Buy It...'Nuff Said
Review: Usually, a historical text such as this one bores me to death with its "educated" language and more detail than one could ever care about. But today, while searching for a birthday gift for a friend who, like me, has been touched by the piety of Francis, I sat and read for an hour, and was compelled. I usually am especially intrigued by the relationship between Frances and his young protegé, Clare. I was pleased to find a book that admitted that theirs was a love affair, albeit unconsummated, and pretty much in her mind, only; a situation I can relate to, unfortunately, only too well. Finally, here is a text that shows me what Francis was about, but doesn't seek to convert or evangelize. Detailed enough to clear up some things I may have read elsewhere without boring me with too much. When I got to the photographs in the center of the book, it was the photograph of the bones of Francis that brought home to me that this man did exist, and I found myself mourning his loss right there in the bookstore. When a book does that to me, I've got to have it.

Did we need another biography on Francis of Assisi? In my opinion, yes, we did, and this is the best of all of them. This is a book that, once I was able to try it, I bought it. Not at the bookstore in which I auditioned it, but here, at Amazon.com, where it was cheaper.

Rating:
Summary: This One Compelled Me to Buy It...'Nuff Said
Review: Usually, a historical text such as this one bores me to death with its "educated" language and more detail than one could ever care about. But today, while searching for a birthday gift for a friend who, like me, has been touched by the piety of Francis, I sat and read for an hour, and was compelled. I usually am especially intrigued by the relationship between Frances and his young protegé, Clare. I was pleased to find a book that admitted that theirs was a love affair, albeit unconsummated, and pretty much in her mind, only; a situation I can relate to, unfortunately, only too well. Finally, here is a text that shows me what Francis was about, but doesn't seek to convert or evangelize. Detailed enough to clear up some things I may have read elsewhere without boring me with too much. When I got to the photographs in the center of the book, it was the photograph of the bones of Francis that brought home to me that this man did exist, and I found myself mourning his loss right there in the bookstore. When a book does that to me, I've got to have it.

Did we need another biography on Francis of Assisi? In my opinion, yes, we did, and this is the best of all of them. This is a book that, once I was able to try it, I bought it. Not at the bookstore in which I auditioned it, but here, at Amazon.com, where it was cheaper.