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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Fr Dermot Preston

The Saint

Good morning.

In the autumn of 1219, a European army was camped on the north coast of Egypt, just outside the city of Damietta.

The Crusader and Muslim troops had fought themselves into a bloody standstill. A grim scenario into which strolled Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone – known to history as St Francis of Assisi.

Francis had determined to take the Good News to all corners of the known world and his simple approach was both disconcerting and effective: he would walk or beg passage on a ship in the direction of conflict. Hence his unexpected arrival at Damietta.

Francis’ charismatic cheerfulness and dishevelled sackcloth bemused the armoured Crusaders, but their bemusement turned into alarm when Francis declared his suicidal intention to cross no-man’s-land to talk to the Muslims.

Francis crossed the neutral-zone and presented himself at the city gates. As one historian noted, ‘the guards were at first suspicious, but soon decided that anyone so simple, so gentle and so dirty must be mad, and treated him with the respect due to a man who had been touched by God.’

Indeed, the Sultan of Egypt was charmed with Francis and although Francis made no converts in Damietta, that single act of courage laid down a marker in the history of Muslim-Christian relationships – to this day, through centuries of invasions, occupations and wars, it is the Franciscans who uniquely have been entrusted with the custodianship of the Christian sites across the Middle East.

So, on this the feast day of St Francis of Assisi, let us pray: Lord, in the conflicts and tensions around me today, give me the courage and imagination to risk an unexpected hand of friendship.

Amen.

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