What Can Francis of Assisi Teach Unitarian Universalists?
In Unitarian Universalist tradition, Francis of Assisi is perhaps the most beloved of the Catholic saints. Granted, we UUs don’t generally have a straightforwardly admiring relationship with Catholic saints, but with Saint Francis it seems much of that complication is put aside. I mean, really, what UU doesn’t melt when asked to cultivate peace in the world, as our reading this morning asks us to do? Our seventh principle, “Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part,” explains why we so love the hymn we sang this morning, which is attributed to Francis. And this hymn pretty much sums up what UUs know about Francis: He loved peace, he considered the birds and the bees and the sun and moon to be his brothers and sisters…sounds like a UU superhero to me, right, what do you think? In reality, Francis was deeper and more complicated, and today I’d like to look at some of these deeper lessons that Francis offers and see how they relate to the tenets of Unitari
