In this Sunday's Gospel, Jesus tells those present who John the Baptist is and how, in the Kingdom of God, the least is greater than him.
Sacred Scripture then reveals how Wisdom from above forms friends of God and prophets.
Francis, the Poor Man of Assisi, transformed by the power of the Spirit after his conversion, received the gift of prophecy and became, by Grace, «a prophet [...] and much more than a prophet» (Lk 7:26).
Perfect unity with God had transferred to him the characteristics of a true messenger, like John the Baptist.
Like the Precursor, in the period in which he lived and beyond, he prepared the way for the Lord, becoming the forerunner of a new and authentic way of living the Word, proclaimed with simplicity and boldness.
What Jesus said of John also applies to Francis:
«What did you go out into the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind? [...] A man dressed in soft [garments]?» (Mt 11:7-8).
Francis, in the desert of this world, was not a creature in luxurious clothes, but the Herald of the Great King who cried out at the top of his voice against the clerical and civil squalor of his time.
His Abruzzese biographer, Celano, says:
"No one should be surprised if this prophet of our time was distinguished by such privileges: his intellect, free from the dense fog of earthly things and no longer subject to the temptations of the flesh, rose lightly to heavenly heights and immersed itself purely in the light.
Radiating in this way with the splendour of eternal light, he drew from the uncreated Word what echoed in words.
Oh, how different we are today, we who, enveloped in darkness, are ignorant even of the necessary things!” (FF 640).
And the Sources continue:
“No one was as greedy for gold as he was for poverty, nor was anyone more concerned with guarding a treasure than he was with the gem of the Gospel.
He felt particularly offended if he saw anything contrary to poverty in the friars, either at home or outside.
And in fact, from the beginning of his religious life until his death, his only possessions were a single habit, a cincture and trousers: he had nothing else.
His poor appearance clearly indicated where he accumulated his riches.
For this reason, happy, confident, agile in running, he enjoyed having exchanged it for a good that was worth a hundred times the riches destined to perish" (FF 641).
The Saint had made his home in God, living with his brotherhood in a poor church, later restored by the friars: St. Mary of the Porziuncola.
And Clare of Assisi, in her Testament, recalls:
"Our most blessed father Francis, following in his footsteps, chose for himself and his friars this holy poverty of the Son of God, and never, as long as he lived, did he stray from it in any way, either in word or in life" (FF 2837).
Third Advent Sunday (year A) (Mt 11:2-11)
