"Induebar cilicio, humiliabam in ieiunio animam meam, et oratio mea ad sinum meum revertetur." "I wore sackcloth, I afflicted myself with fasting. I prayed with head bowed on my bosom."--Ps 35:13. No Christian life is without suffering, for Christ suffered. Even the most joyful Christian recognizes the necessity of suffering, whether voluntary or no. The Seraphic Father, St. Francis of Assisi, was no different in this regard. Yet so many portray him as solely a lover of God's creation (which he most assuredly was). How many know of his tears, his tears so plentiful that they ran furrows in his cheeks, that they took away his sight? Who knows of his public self-deprecation when he took a spoonful of meat broth while fasting? Who knows of his flight into a thorn bush to conquer the passions of the flesh? St. Francis was not just a man of joy who loved God's creation, but he was a man who suffered for the Lord, who mortified himself for t
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