Sts. Cosmas and Damian
Though we celebrated it last Saturday, today is our official titular feast — the feast of Sts. Cosmas and Damian. Twin brothers born in the third century in what is now Turkey, Cosmas and Damian were physicians who combined their medical skills with a profound faith and commitment to caring for the poor. Refusing to accept any payment for their services, they became known as “the silverless“, offering healing and love out of a deep sense of gratitude for the love of God and the spiritual healing they had found in the Gospel. Their ministry attracted enough attention that it was perceived as a threat to the Empire — radical life flowing from radical love often is — and they were martyred under Diocletian.
Ultimately, we take our name from one of those faithful martyrs — Damian. We use the Italian spelling, Damiano, however, because we take the name immediately from the little church just outside of Assisi where St. Francis spent so much time and had one of his conversion experiences as he prayed before the Crucifix in that place. Thomas of Celano, his first biographer, writing in 1247, tells the story:
Led by the Spirit he went in to pray and knelt down devoutly before the crucifix. He was shaken by unusual experiences and discovered that he was different from when he had entered. As soon as he had this feeling, there occurred something unheard of in previous ages: with the lips of the painting, the image of Christ crucified spoke to him. “Francis,” it said, calling him by name, “go rebuild My house; as you see, it is all being destroyed.” Francis was more than a little stunned, trembling, and stuttering like a man out of his senses. He prepared himself to obey and pulled himself together to carry out the command. He felt this mysterious change in himself, but he could not describe it. So it is better for us to remain silent about it too. From that time on, compassion for the Crucified was impressed into his holy soul. And we honestly believe the wounds of the sacred Passion were impressed deep in his heart, though not yet on his flesh.1
“Go rebuild My house.” Francis immediately set about the business of doing just that — repairing the church of San Damiano, as well as two others in the area. In the process of doing this work and continuing his life of prayer, however, he was taught by the Spirit that the intent of Christ’s call was something much broader. As St. Bonaventure would later write, “the principal intention of the words referred to that which Christ purchased with his own blood.”2 It was not a call to rebuild a church building, but to rebuild the Church itself.
Yet, I believe it was even more. As we look at Francis’s spirituality, particularly as it is articulated in Bonaventure’s theology, it is not too much to understand the house of God to be creation itself. All of creation is the concrete expression of the word of God, who speaks things into being. Every created thing is, then, an incarnation of God’s word — created and sustained by the fountain-fullness of God’s love, eternally overflowing in grace.
Look around you at creation — behold God’s body! And behold what we have done to it! Especially for contemporary Franciscans, living as we do with the consequences of our abuse of the planet, participation in the ongoing call to “go rebuild My house” must include not only the renewing of the Church, but the renewing of entire house of God. Care for creation is no less a part of our spiritual mandate than is the care of souls.
Look around you at creation — behold God’s body!
Care for creation begins by learning to see creation for what it is — the incarnation of God’s abundant, fecund, generative love, which is never exhausted and in which we are invited to participate. When we understand the sacramental nature of everything, we will begin to follow in the footprints of Francis, who sought even to tread gently on the rocks as he walked, and put honey and wine out for the bees to help them through the winter. (That wouldn’t be a bad idea today, given what is happening with our bees. I’m glad to see that the Pope is doing his part to help them out!)
Rebuilding the house of God also requires rebuilding ourselves within — inviting the Spirit to take us apart, stone by stone, and to reconstruct us on a sure foundation. Like Francis, we need that deep interior change which only comes about through daily conversion. On this feast of San Damiano, we would do well to join with Francis in his constant prayer before the Crucifix:
Most High,
glorious God,
enlighten the darkness of my heart
and give me
true faith,
certain hope,
and perfect charity,
sense and knowledge,
Lord,
that I may carry out
Your holy and true command.
______________________
References:
1Thomas of Celano, The Remembrance of the Desire of a Soul, 10, in Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, Volume 2: The Founder, ed. Regis J. Armstrong et al., New York: New City Press (2000), p. 249
2Bonaventure, The Major Legend of St. Francis, 2, in op. cit., 536.