The Wounds of Saint Francis

How and for What?

Abstract

On the occasion of the 8th centenary of the impression of the signs that Christ's nails and spear left on Francis of Assisi, we approach the possibility of understanding that event as a Christian mystical experience. The Franciscan tradition follows the pattern of the first biographers (Thomas of Celano and Saint Bonaventure) and of the pictorial representations of Giotto in the Basilica of the Sacred Convent of Assisi. They are external approximations that must be situated in Francis' life experience around the year 1224; a time of renunciations and misunderstandings on the part of the brothers about a life project to be done. We see the depth of Francis in his Writings, in the Letters, in which he follows the thread of the night of Gethsemane, in which Jesus delivers his work into the hands of the Father. Does this serve to show and explain to our contemporaries what a mystical experience is? Does it help us Christians to configure ourselves and resemble, at this moment in history, Christ?