«War is not a destiny, peace begins with us», says Cardinal Matteo Zuppi in the homily of the mass in the Upper Basilica of Assisi on the occasion of the feast of Saint Francis, at which the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella is also present. And the head of state, in his speech outside the Basilica, commemorates the 800 years since the death of Francis, recalls the words of the Pope and links them to the lesson that the patron saint of Italy left us. «In these times marked by senseless and cruel wars, by so much violence, manipulation and arrogance, as Leo XIV said, the hope is that the sun of Francis can illuminate the world, convert minds hardened by hatred and show the way to peace».
He says "sun" because, in the previous passage of his speech, he had recalled the great poet of Italy, Dante, who in the eleventh canto of Paradise, speaks of Francis as «a sun that has risen for the whole world so much so that Assisi should be called Ascesis, like the East». It reaches the most essential point of the lesson of Francis and Chiara - whom Mattarella nominates as his "disciple, friend and sister in choices", eliciting applause from the people present in front of the Basilica - because it is something that concerns us closely today. From too close. In fact, he says that "terrible conflicts bloodied many parts of the world and even in some parts there is a return to blessing weapons and placing armies under religious insignia", and this is where the living example of the saint must be brought, in recognizing that "there is no greater sin than that of killing other men in the name of God".
And Francis risked his very existence to follow the path taught by the Gospel, that an enemy is first and foremost a child of God. It is a point that Mattarella is keen to highlight when, even in detail, he recalls that meeting in 1219, during the fifth crusade, when the saint "crossed the lines and managed - risking his life - to meet al Malik al Kamil, he ardently desired to convert him". There was no such outcome but the sultan was struck by that man who spoke of peace and who left his mark even today because, says the head of state, "with that journey of passionate invocation, Francis left a great mark: before an enemy before an infidel, he had an interlocutor in front of him, a son of God and therefore a brother". In essence, that gesture did not erase violence or war but «designed an extraordinarily original attitude towards dialogue and respect».
And these 800 years since the death of Saint Francis (and another great saint, Catherine of Siena), the centuries have not faded the charisma in Italy and abroad because it remains "prophet of peace, of love and respect for Creation". Furthermore, the canticle of the creatures «the highest of the first poetic expressions in the vernacular contributes to the beginning of our literature». Just as the Franciscan communities bring for the first time "religious life outside the solemnity of the monasteries and insert themselves into the social fabric, embodying an evangelical ideal".
«Francis rightly appears to be a precursor of the social saints», observes Mattarella who invites us to reflect on «an apparent paradox». As was written in an important biography, "Francis did not offer a political response to social injustices but only asked to live in poverty, peace and joy with his brothers and sisters following Christ, living the message of the Gospel." It is for this "radical, shocking" choice that he became one of the most significant figures. Even though his path was not simple and that radical gesture of abandoning his wealth was initially "misunderstood" and he himself was "mocked" because it was so distant "from common feeling". A gesture that reflects the coherence of a man who was "anything but accommodating", with a humility that had "nothing naive" but came from "a demanding thirst for truth". In short, the patron saint of Italy is not only "an ecologist, pacifist and charitable worker ante litteram" but with Chiara he was the protagonist "of a religious and civil renewal".
