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Shortly before he died, Lenin is supposed to have said that if the Russian revolution were to take place over again, he would have asked for ten Francises of Assisi rather than more Bolsheviks. He eventually realized that something imposed by domination and violence from above only creates the same mirrored response from below. It is just a matter of time. He realized that the only communism that would ever be helpful to the world was the voluntary and joyous simplicity of a Francis of Assisi. (As a Franciscan, I am indeed a “communist” as we share all things equally and from a common purse.) That element of the practice of the early church (Acts 2:44) and of Jesus (John 13:29) was never expected of the rest of us. (One does wonder why some things become mandated from one mention by Jesus, and other things are totally forgotten?)
Voluntary simplicity was normally not lived by the clergy—certainly not the higher clergy—and therefore why would we, or could we, ask it of the rest of the church? Jesus was training the leaders first, because you can only ask of others what you yourselves have done. He was initiating them as spiritual elders, much more than ordaining them as “priests” (which is an Old Testament word never used for his apostles) or church ministers. Francis tried to correct that by refusing ordination and also by his rush toward simplicity.
Once we saw the clerical state as a place of advancement instead of downward mobility, once ordination was not a form of initiation but a continuation of patriarchal patterns, the authentic preaching of the Gospel became the exception rather than the norm—whether Orthodox, Catholic or Protestant. The first human “demon” that normally needs to be exposed is the human addiction to power, prestige, and possessions. These tend to pollute everything.
Once we preach the true Gospel, I doubt if we are going to fill the churches.
Adapted from A Lever and a Place to Stand:
The Contemplative Stance, the Active Prayer, pp. 95-96
(See also
A Lever and a Place to Stand:
The Contemplative Stance, the Active Prayer (CD))
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