10.5.10 MAY YOU LIVE FOREVER!

it is now tuesday evening and i have just deleted everything i wrote on sunday and hope to type and send tonight.
last week was vacation, the first i've taken other than missions trips. a person might feel that i'm always on vacation and wonder what i do all the time. by vacation here i mean the first time i said i'm going to take time off and not feel guilty about it...and i didn't...except a little around the edges. it was a reading vacation where i read quite a bit of and about st. francis as well as treating myself to another read of 'humor in c.s. lewis' by lindvall which i really enjoy. i allowed myself to buy and consume 3 redner market 5 quart ice cream containers (2 with broken cookies and 1 with a swirl of fudge running thru vanilla ice cream). so all in all it was a good week.

i had just finished a month long job on the preceding saturday which brings the 10 hour a week average to the last week of september. now i am working on patching and covering the drive with a new driveway sealer by rustoleum. what i have covered so far seems to look real good so hopefully it will last a good amount of time. next on the list will be to grind and rustproof the iron fence.

now with only 137 hours to paint (when the last job pays) my mind is going more to what comes after.. i may not begin this part until january 2011 or, if a big job comes in right away it may be much sooner. right now it seems that at least one, maybe two lots may be thrown on that day. the first would ask: do You want me to begin waving my little flag for all the murdered innocents? if that is yes then, by lot, i hope to find the starting date. if no, the second would probably ask something like: do you want me to keep 54? both of these, the first answering 'yes' or the second 'no' would be thrilling. but i am preparing myself for a 'no' and 'yes'. it often seems that God doesn't chose for us to do what we want, but rather to die to self in doing what He wants. i'm trying to learn how to be dead to everything that thrills me. He probably does not want me 'in my element' but have me be a nothing so that whatever happens He gets all the notice.

concerning st. francis, i got what is called an omnibus (web. 1. another name for a 'bus' 2. a group of writings about/by (?) one person 3. a group of things 'packaged' together...something like different legislative items put into an package to be voted on.) of the earliest sources. 2 big paperbacks containing about 150 pages of things supposedly written by francis and aboub 1400 pages of others' writings about him from the century in which he died. (he died oct. 3, 1226) i read:
1. miscellaneous eye witness accounts from the 13th century,
2. st. francis' rule for the franciscan order he founded. there were three rules: a primitive rule he wrote out when he sought pope innocent III's approval to form an order in 1209. (this is lost); the one i read was the rule of 1221 which is thot to be much like the primitive rule with some additions and changes necessitated by the thousands of men who joined the brotherhood by that time; the rule of 1223 was written in legal language to make it possible for the order to become official. it had unofficially been approved but now official church approval was necessary, especially for the order to be accepted in other countries to which the brothers went.
3. two 'lives' of st. francis written by thomas of celano, a brother who had known francis personally. the first was in1229 and the second, i believe, around 1246.
4. a life of st. francis by st. bonaventure, the 7th minister general of the order after st. francis. this was written in 1263. i don't think they were contemporaries.
5. the three companions, written by three brothers who had known francis.
6. a memoir by brother leo, who was francis secretary, confessor and a close friend, one of the earliest brothers ot join the order.

i put a lot of quotes that 'spoke to' or interested me for various reasons into two entries on the blog and was planning to make a couple more...so voluminous the number...but i had a lack of peace about this and so cut out that and any more reading i could have done this week before the interlibrary omnibus was due.

with more time and permission i would have enjoyed reading the last several things:
7. mirror of perfection
8. the little flowers of st. francis

i find that i am of a nature that tends to minuteness of focus, interest and detail. often this trait is at one time both wonderful and frustrating. following the trail further and further in is delightful and sometimes i think that i could never tire of increasingly minute and detailed examination. the frustration is that, in a real sense i never accomplish anything. that may be why i think that jail or rambling would 'fit' because my breadth or range of foci would be restricted.

spiritually, it seems that this tendency which, combined with the trait of 'buzzing around a million different blossoms', is a stumbling block. somehow i sense i need to die to or put to death these character traits...and become kind of like a servant who has no say about what he will do in a day. if this is so i pray that i will chose the servant part and let the other go.

from reading his rule and then reading multiple accounts of him i kind of felt like one who is getting to know a person better. i like francis. to me he is a model in many areas..and yet some of the catholic trappings are a bit off putting. i think there is a bit of thot going on at the subconscious level. at this point.

things that i like and are a model:
1. simplicity of dress: a woolen outer garment, trousers and a rope for a belt. (i'm not sure how the stood 'barefoot' in the snow and winter though)
2. begging food necessary for the day ('take no thot for the morrow' to him meant that he begged every day rather than stockpiling)
3. begging a place to stay for the night...and along with this never owning his own 'home'

4. telling everyone wherever he went to do penance and believe the Gospel. (that is causing a lot of thot for john the baptist and Jesus' words were 'repent and believe the Gospel'. repent with the idea of 'a change of mind' and penance with the idea of pain over sin along with the idea of a change of behavior...are they one and the same think. this was a possibly convicting needle in my heart. do i make too much excuse for myself repeating things that are wrong? was francis, on the other hand, too self-focused in all the continual penance he did which involved self-administered pain until the correct behavior was established? at this point i'm not sure.

5. never receive any money. another method of cutting away the temptation to greed. he seems to follow Jesus' first, and more stringent, commandments when He sent out the apostles...here the commandment about taking no script (a bag for holding money, food and other possessions.) francis seemed to want himself, the brothers, the observing populace, the officials of the church at large to drawn away from a life focused on the things this world has to offer which bring comfort, pleasure and no need to depend on God to a life starkly dependent on God and wholly devoted being His slave, doing what He commanded.

6. don't criticize the officials in the church who are 1. not living as a godly example in the above things and, 2. are not helping the people spiritually. francis said that the brotherhood was sent to fill in gaps, to minister in areas where ministry was obviously needed. they were to support the officials rather than to try to draw people away to themselves. God would take care of any person who did not do what they were supposed to do. i liked this because there was peace...is this the same as Jesus openly pointing out the pharisees' sins and yet not trying to move the people away from them only their misdeeds; telling them that they would be kicked out of the synagogue for confessing Him...but did not try to move them out of the synagogue or to try to change the synagogue...

7. actively help people and do good.

alot of food for thot in francis. it has been good to have a time to meet him.

well, better go here. hope you had a good holiday and have a good week. love, dad