Today, we also gather to commemorate a remarkable event in the life of Saint Francis of Assisi: the stigmatization of our beloved saint. This feast, celebrated on September 17, invites us into a deeper understanding of the profound mystery of Christ’s suffering and a call to embrace our own crosses in our daily lives as we seek to imitate our loving Saviour.
Let us first take a moment to reflect on the historical context of this event. The stigmata of Saint Francis was given to him by God in 1224, two years before his death. Saint Francis, already known for his deep devotion to Jesus and His passion, retreated to Mount Alverna for a period of prayer and reflection. There, in the solitude of this sacred place, surrounded by nature and enveloped in silence, Francis had an extraordinary vision of a six-winged seraph. This apparition, filled with the divine presence, imparted upon him the marks of the crucified Christ—marks that would forever indelibly mark his body and soul with the pain, love, and redemptive suffering of Jesus.
The stigmata were not merely a personal affliction but rather the embodiment of Francis’s intense love for Christ and his profound desire to share in the sufferings of his Lord. As the Franciscan sources tell us, these physical marks were not only visible and unique in the history of such phenomenon which would follow this the first recorded stigmata in the history of the Church, but also transformative. They were and will always remain unique because the wounds that were formed in his hands did not just leave holes, but his very flesh also formed the nails that had been driven through the hands and feet.
Therefore, the stigmata drew Francis deeper into the reality of Christ’s passion, allowing him to experience, in a mystical sense, the weight of sin and the depth of God’s love for humanity. His very body became a living testament to the Savior’s suffering.
As we reflect on this gift given to Francis, we must remember that it was not intended to be a one-time event reserved for the saint alone. Rather, it serves as an invitation for all of us to contemplate our own relationship with the cross of Christ. The stigmata calls us to recognize our own sufferings, trials, and tribulations as moments where we can truly unite with Jesus and His passion, where our pain united with his, becomes redemptive. The Apostle Paul beautifully expresses this in his letter to the Colossians when he says, “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of His Body, that is, the Church” (Colossians 1:24).
The world we live in often seeks to avoid suffering at all costs. We are conditioned to find comfort, to pursue pleasure, and to shy away from pain. Yet, as disciples of Christ, we are called to embrace our suffering, to see it not as a burden, but as a pathway to sanctification. The stigmata reminds us that true love often requires sacrifice. When we bear our own sufferings with hope and faith, we transform our pain into an instrument of grace that can touch the lives of those around us.
Moreover, Saint Francis embodies humility and simplicity. The visible stigmata he bore were a sign of his inner transformation. He did not seek out attention or glory; instead, his life was a reflection of the humility of Christ, who took on human flesh and suffered for our sake. We are told by biographers that Francis hid his stigmata from the friars for as long as he could. In a world often obsessed with status and recognition, let us look to Francis and strive to live lives characterized by simplicity, service, and an unwavering commitment to love.
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