"One way the Franciscan tradition should shape or influence our lives is to remind us that our relationship with God is not all that different from our other forms of relationship. It takes communication, time, effort, attention, and love. To be in relationship with God means traveling on the two-way street of shared experience, opening ourselves up to God in a way that allows God into our lives. Perhaps most important, relationship with God means that we can't simply live in isolation ('me and God') to the exclusion of others. The love we share with God should spill over into our interactions with all people, building others up and announcing the Kingdom of God with our lives.
"Francis did some amazing things during his life, but it wasn't the extraordinary things that made him a saint and still revered today. Most of Francis's life was lived simply and ordinarily. How he did those ordinary things, the embrace of a marginalized person outside the Assisi walls, the conversation with a leader of another faith, the nonviolent being-in-the-world, the love of all creation, the simplicity of his needs and desires — this is what made him a saint. The way we live our lives, striving to make our whole lives our prayer, is what will make us saints too. Our lives of gospel living, our living the Franciscan tradition in the world, deeply in love with God, begins as so many amazing love stories do: with a first date."
