Letter of the General Minister
and Definitory
for the Solemnity of Saint Francis

A.D. 2000

Since this summer marked the half-way stage of our ministry, we were concerned to take stock of the last three years and to discern the path we and the Order should follow in the coming three years, the first of the new millennium. We took time out for this purpose in the hermitage of La Spineta at Fratta Todina, not far from Assisi. Bearing in mind that two important international friar gatherings will take place in October - the Congress on Vocations Promotion in Assisi and the Justice and Peace Meeting in Vossenack - we felt that one very important value, basic to our fraternal life, should be strongly emphasized by us and proposed to you in this annual letter: the value of solidarity.

Jesus, God's love incarnate, and Francis, ardent lover of the Incarnation

Solidarity has its beginning when we contemplate God's love for us and for all creation. That love was given a human face in Jesus of Nazareth (cf. Jn 1:14), so that when we look at Jesus we see the face of God. And so Jesus assures us that "the Father and I are one" (Jn 10:30).
But it's not only the face of the Father we contemplate in Jesus. We find every human face in his as well, since Jesus is God's solidarity with humankind. He is the one who sets us free to enter into a new solidarity and communion with one another (cf. Gaudium et Spes 32) so that "we too can walk in newness of life" (Rom 6:4).
Francis, eventually to become the "alter Cristus", passionately in love with the Incarnation (cf. Greccio, La Verna), was unexpectedly jolted into his "newness of life" by meeting with a leper at the gates of Assisi. Embracing the leper was something more than a sudden impulse of compassion: by it Francis recognized and restored to the poor outcast his human dignity - because he had had the blinding revelation that here, standing abject before him, was the very image of God. Just as Jesus by his manner of living unveils for us the face of the Father and compels our solidarity towards humankind, following Jesus inevitably brings Francis to that total solidarity which points out to us the features of Jesus in the poor, who have become for him the sacrament of God (cf. Mt 25). This inescapable path awaits us followers of Francis: to enter into the logic of solidarity to the point of "spending our lives for one another" (cf. Jn 13:34-35).

The dynamic of Solidarity: from the individual friar to the fraternity

By walking with the incarnate Jesus as Francis did we friars can set out on that path of human solidarity, common to all, which offers the only viable future for the planet. The Incarnation event must continue to happen in a new way each day in our lives, because God desires today to live close to people. Our daily experience of being together and sharing our life as brothers is a privileged opportunity to experience God among us: it's here that the Lord consummates a special covenant of intimacy with us (cf. GgCc 40; Ongoing Formation OFM 35; Vita Consecrata 42).
But to what extent do we really cherish this place where God familiarly communes with us? Haven't we often forgotten that here we are offered a holy place of divine solidarity? Do we live and work in our fraternities in such an intentional way that God's presence becomes tangible for us - and for those who come to share our life? Could we confidently say that God's solidarity with our world is becoming visible where we live, gleaming through the pattern of our solidarity with our brothers?
Fraternal solidarity means going surety for each other, mutually sharing our life, avoiding individualism, resisting becoming a loner, guarding against personality cult. It means above all that the fraternity will aim to live like that early community in Jerusalem of which we're told that: "the whole group of those who believed were united in heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything was held in common" (Acts 4:32).

Being united in heart and soul as brothers in our fraternities would in practice involve:

• full participation by everyone in the life of the group as a sign of concrete solidarity with one another;

• interacting kindly and with concern for one another, especially for a tired or downcast brother;

• offering a helping hand to one who is weak, ill or aged;

• sharing the gifts of heart and mind one has acquired over the years with the fraternity, and within the fraternity with the younger brothers;

• busying oneself as a matter of course and without fuss with the domestic chores (cf. GgCc 80.i);

• graciously accepting the requirement that it is for the fraternity to determine our commitments, and that in choosing them "they should prefer especially works that express solidarity with the poor and service to them" (GgCc 78.i; cf. 79.i);

• regularly checking that the life of the fraternity revolves always around its true center and ground of unity: sharing the Word of God together and participating in the Eucharist (cf. Vita Consecrata 42).

In the past three years we have made fraternal visits to many of our fraternities. We mostly found a good spirit of solidarity, but sometimes we came across various degrees of aridity of heart and spirit. To be honest, on occasion we could detect sly forms of discrimination, injustice and discord among the brothers. No doubt these began, as they usually do, with petty envy or jealousy over trifles, or engineering advantages over others or begrudging their successes, or with an inability or unwillingness to think of anybody except oneself. If they fester unchecked, however, they can make the common life of the whole fraternity a purgatory or even a hell. Often the friars seem unable to summon up the courage or strength to draw close to each other, to offer the hand of reconciliation and peace, to try everything possible to rebuild a real fraternity, to speak in a frank and open way that will encourage rather than wound the other.

What is it that inhibits us from being generous towards one another with the spiritual, intellectual and material gifts which we ourselves have received from the Lord and from people who were generous towards us? Are we not aware that we must restore everything to our Creator, not just at the end of our life but at every moment during it? The truth is that we must still begin to learn how to live together as men who are reconciled with ourselves, with our brothers and with God. Solidarity can help us on this learning curve, because its source is openness to reconciliation. The more progress we make in this area the more convincing will become our witness as a fraternity in which the Lord has chosen to dwell.

From solidarity in fraternity to world solidarity

Successful examples of solidarity are today sought out and held up for imitation as never before. Doesn't it stand to reason that we friars, whose whole vocation is to be a fraternity, should have something really persuasive to offer? But how can we ensure that people will come into contact with us? How can we contribute to making the world a haven of justice and peace, and creation a "home" for the human family? Are we among those who are alarmed at the effects being brought about by the globalization of economics, of culture and of the family which are revealing themselves to be increasingly destructive of human life? Have we awoken to the stultifying reduction of individual human beings to standardized 'units' of production and consumption by globalization? Can we stand by as men and women are being deprived of their personality, their identity, and often their livelihood as well - while we bumble along contentedly behind the secure perimeters of our friaries? Does even the poverty right at our front doors not engage us? In short: can we be said in any way to stand with the poor, who long only for us to be close to them?In visiting the fraternities around the world we have met brothers who live and act as "instruments of peace" among people who are at war with one another because of economics, power, hatred or ideology; brothers who strive to create a future for children who are forced to work and cannot go to school to open themselves to life; brothers intent on providing hope and opportunity to those who are persecuted, arrested, condemned and exiled because of their religion or political convictions or vision of the world; brothers sharing the life of the poor and marginalized who have been uprooted from their environment by the savage craze for profit and sucked into cities whose insane growth has turned poverty into miserable degradation; brothers whose gentle presence comforts those who have lost all reference points and sense of life. We reverence and we thank all these brothers for the fraternal solidarity with which they restore to modern-day "lepers" the human dignity of which they have been so callously robbed and stripped naked.And what can the rest of us do? Rather, what must we do so that all may begin to live with justice, at peace in a healthy environment, and reconciled with God and with themselves? One fact stares us in the face: the poor, the marginalized, the migrants, those who are enslaved - all of them demand from us a credible proof of our solidarity. We have to share the life of people today and defend their dignity and their rights. We can do this

• by opening up our fraternities as houses of welcome, especially for the poor;

• by sharing our material goods who those who are less well off than we;

• by joining our efforts with those of all people of goodwill to create a just, free and peaceful society; actively participating in initiatives of the Church for international charity, justice and solidarity (cf. GgCc 96,ii);

• by seeking a genuine dialogue with cultural, religious and ecumenical groups which is deeply respectful of them and seeks to promote a life worthy of human dignity for all;

• by feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, showing hospitality to strangers, clothing the naked and visiting the sick and prisoners (cf. Mt 25:35-36);

• by giving a voice to the voiceless in order to defend and vindicate their human rights;

• by using the earth's resources sparingly;

• by announcing the Good News to the needy while making ourselves vulnerable to being challenged by their condition.

Dear brothers, we are "lesser" ones. This is the identity Francis wanted everyone to embrace when they joined him in following Christ (RegB 1 and 2).
If we want to live in solidarity among ourselves and with others we must make this attitude of Francis our own. It is nothing other than the attitude of the Son of God who pitched his tent among us and made himself the least of all for the sake of the suffering and the weak, in order to restore what they had lost or of which they had been cheated: dignity and respect, justice and peace, reconciliation. Solidarity, when all is said and done, is simply fraternity lived to the full among ourselves and with all of humankind (cf. GgCc 1,2).

With the blessing of Saint Francis, the Brother who walked in solidarity with all creation, and with joyful hearts we greet you and encourage you - and ourselves - to "walk in newness of life".