St. Francis Reflection- from Fr. Enzo
/Dear friends,
Last year on this very day, the Feast Day of St. Francis, Hurricane Matthew began to slam into the southwestern part of Haiti. I remember the winds blowing fiercely that morning and before Mass I decided to put a statue that I bought in Assisi on the altar.
The statue is very unique, and depicts St. Francis taming the wolf of Gubbio ( a small town not far from Assisi). When I purchased it, I never could have imagined using the statue for a Hurricane. I bought it on a visit to Assissi with Raphael, as a sign and reminder to us that evil will never prevail over good and that, as St. Francis himself said: "all the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle". My thoughts were focused on wishing for peace in Haiti.
The story of the saint and the wolf is that the wolf terrorized the inhabitants of the small Italian town. The wolf not only killed and devoured livestock but it began to attack the people. All attempts to kill the wolf failed and fear took over their hearts. St. Francis heard of this and decided to confront the wolf. The huge wolf rushed toward Francis to attack but he made the sign of the cross, called the wolf “brother” and commanded him in the name of God to stop terrorizing the town.