On Becoming Franciscan
Numerous people have asked me what the Tau Cross I now wear signifies. I explain it is a mark of being a member of the Secular Order of Franciscans, and that it marks those wearing it as belonging to God. On a deep level I have chosen to live out the Gospel Message as best I see it.
While I am explaining this, I listen to myself and the answer always leaves me unsatisfied. Don’t we all belong to God?? Don’t most of us try and live out the Gospel? Of course!! Is it really necessary to join a group to accomplish this?
For two months I have spent much of my writing time trying to compose a coherent explanation for why I made a decision to join the Franciscans. All I produced was lots of recycling. The problem was that I was describing an event, as if it were a single moment with a before and an after. Like a wedding. I was not married and then after December 21, 1968 I was. But there is a gigantic difference between a wedding and a marriage.

When I asked Kathryn to marry me, there were lots of reasons. I liked her ---- for some silly reason she seemed to like me, and she was really attractive. Most of all, I thought moving through life with this person would be “cool”. 42 years ago I would have used the word love instead of like, but 42 years later I realize the person I was, had no idea what real love was. Love grows and deepens with work and shared joys and shared suffering until the point is reached where there is no way to tell where you end and the other person begins.

It would be wonderful to be able to “go it alone”, to seek and find “the inner self”, the soul by myself. But I have discovered I am like the wheat seed that falls on good ground and flourishes, only to be overcome by weeds. By joining a group with the same goals, I have other people to keep me growing, weed free. Part of Franciscan teaching, is that conversion is daily, that each and every day is a new chance to grow closer to God. And that growth is always paradoxical.
Francis and Clare took vows of poverty, but it was not money they were giving up, but power. They choose to accept complete powerlessness, and in so doing became incredibly powerful. They choose what most people would see as a dour, confined life and became joyful and free. By seeing God in every part of creation, they were free to see God in themselves.

We all agree we are part of the body of Christ. But most people see themselves as the Aorta, or the brain stem, or something viewed as “important.” But if we are a complete body, someone has to be the toenail. On the surface, that seems like a disgusting picture, but anyone who has damaged or lost a toenail understands how taken for granted this body part is, until it is lost. What I most love about Francis and Clare was their total willingness to be the toenail of the body of Christ, if that was what was required. And to do it with total Joy.
I believe that becoming Franciscan is like being married. The wedding was good, but the journey was wonderful. C. S. Lewis always talked about putting on the cloak of Christ. Some mornings it slips on easily, some mornings it is a struggle. Then one morning they reach for the cloak and it is not there. They search until they realize they cannot find it because they never took it off.