when skies are grey : Day #70 in Orvieto

May 3, 2013 – Friday

We all met at Piazza Cahan at 8:30, climbed into the three vans, and then drove to Assisi! While it was nice to be in a car instead of a train, the roads were so twisty and everyone felt a little bit car sick and definitely relieved to arrive in Assisi about an hour and a half later. We started our day at the church San Damiano, which is where St. Francis of Assisi decided to rebuild that literal church and the entire church as a whole. Prof Doll gave us a brief introduction to St. Francis and explained that a lot of young people love St. Francis because according to the story, he was always misunderstanding his calling and he thought he wanted to be a knight at first. St. Francis has also been described as “liberal and hilarious” which was funny to me because it’s easy to think of people such as St. Francis as being really stoic and reverent sometimes. But it was funny to think of him in that way.

For my last class, we read The Life of St. Francis by Bonaventure and it was cool to be able to see the places where St. Francis was. So we saw San Damiano (which is now the motherhouse of the “Poor Claires” – the female equivelent of a Franciscan friar), then we travelled up to the caves in Assisi where St. Francis and his brothers would go to pray. We saw where the slept and walked through the woods. We then went to San Chiara and saw St. Claire’s tomb, her cloaks, and other relics.

It was fun to walk through Assisi because there was a medieval festival going on and everyone was dressed up in medieval clothing, even the little kids (although they didn’t look too pleased about it). As we made our way to the next destination, Prof Doll and Alessandro stopped and told us that they were going to buy all of us gelato! It was so hot and we were all tired from walking, so this was actually the best news ever. So they bought us all gelato and we made our way to San Francesco, where we saw the fresco cycle by Giotto (this was on my Renaissance Narrative exam!), we saw the tomb of St. Francis, his shoes and cloak, and the “Approval of the Franciscan Rule” which is a document from the Pope to St. Francis that approved his Franciscan order in 1226. So that was cool – like seeing the Declaration of Independence… but it was 500 years older.

After a few hours in San Francesco, we went down to our final site, which was another church in lower Assisi. This was another church that Francis built (although since then, they’ve built a bigger church around his smaller one). We also saw his rose garden and a few more paintings or his life and the life of St. Claire.

While it was a busy day of different churches, relics of saints, and other significant sites for the Catholic church, it can sometimes be strange for a group of twenty Protestant students to see and understand why they’re so significant. Prof Doll is always wonderful at explaining different things even though we might not have grown up knowing all of these saints and how important they are. Prof Doll reminded us that St. Francis was a man who was simply “a heart seeking other hearts,” and I thought that was important to remember, because St. Francis gave up all that he had to serve and live among the poor. Here is part of the prayer of St. Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

Where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is doubt, faith;

Where there is despair, hope;

Where there is darkness, light;

Where there is sadness, joy.