Born in 1181, St. Francis of Assisi lived a short life which has gone on to affect all ages. His death occurred on October 3, 1226. Some writers have called St. Francis of Assisi’s youth idle, but it is humorous how his own best friend referred to the life he’d lived before his profound conversion.
Thomas of Celano Writes the First Authoritative Life of St. Francis of Assisi
After explaining the times in which St. Francis of Assisi was born and lived; a time of debauchery, arrogance, vanity, excess, lewdness – Thomas of Celano calls his generation "slaves of sin." According to this examination of the times of St. Francis' early years, Thomas of Celano writes:
“This is the wretched early training in which that man who we today venerate as a saint – for he truly is a saint – passed his time from childhood and miserably wasted and squandered his time almost up to the twenty-fifth year of his life. Malicious advancing beyond all of his peers in vanities, he proved himself a more excessive inciter of evil and a zealous imitator of foolishness.” Thomas of Celano
St. Francis of Assisi’s Vain and Naïve Youth
His father was a cloth-maker by trade and very wealthy. Throughout his youth, St. Francis saw no problem with this situation. He followed the ways of his friends in attending to drinking in bars and disrespecting women – with the exception of one – Clare.
Clare and Francis were friends from an early age and would together become one of the most holy duos in Christian history.
St. Francis of Assisi’s Call to War
When the freedom of Assisi was threatened by the usual aristocracy, St. Francis gathered his friends and convinced them that they must fight for their freedoms. In his naivette, he felt very proud and full – even bringing into the battle a young boy who had not even reached the age of majority. But he felt so certain of his cause that there was no stopping his conviction, and he was so popular amongst his friends, that they all followed him into what would become an unsuccessful, bloody and horrific war.
St. Francis of Assisi’s Conversion Began on a Battlefield
Watching many die senselessly and horribly on the battlefield, St. Francis’s conversion began – but would not come to completion for quite some time – on that battlefield. He realized that he had made a profound error in judgment and many people had died because of it.
Perhaps only by the grace of God, the majority of his loyal friends survived their injuries. But St. Francis was presumed dead.
St. Francis of Assisi Spends Years in Prison
St. Francis of Assisi Receives his Call
Sources: Saint Francis – A Film by Michele Soavi, Francis of Assisi Complete Writings in Three Volumes, The Saint, The Founder, The Prophet – Compiled by Regis Armstrong, O.F.M. Cap., J. A. Wayne Hellmann, O.F.M. Conv., William J. Short, O.F.M., The Little Flowers of St. Francis – By Raphael Brown, Saint Francis of Assisi – By Thomas of Celano, God’s Fool: The Life and Times of St. Francis of Assisi, By Julien Green, Clare of Assisi, The Lady – Translation by Regis J. Armstrong, O.F.M. Cap., Francis and Clare: The Complete Works, Translation by Regis J. Armstrong, O.F.M. Cap., and Ignatius C. Brady, O.F.M., Clare of Assisi: Her Spirituality Revealed in her Letters – By Claire Marie Ledoux
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