Saint Francis of Assisi

Francis was born in Assisi in 1181 or 1182, the son of the cloth merchant Pietro di Bernardone. After a year as a prisoner of war and a long illness, he turned from his old life. His early Lives tell that in the ruined church of San Damiano he heard the crucifix say, “Francis, go and repair my house”; when his father took him before the bishop, he gave back even his clothes. With his first companions he received oral approval of a rule of Gospel poverty from Innocent III about 1209: so began the Friars Minor. In 1219 he crossed the lines at Damietta to meet Sultan al-Kamil. His Lives tell that in 1224 he received the stigmata. He died at the Portiuncula on 3 October 1226 and was canonized in 1228.