Spirituality Classroom Blog
Do You Want to Love and Forgive Your Enemies?
A month ago, we celebrated the day that is set aside each year to remember St. Francis of Assisi. His Feast Day is always October 6th. He loved animals as part of God’s Creation. The way we celebrate St. Francis’ Day where I am, is to host a Blessing of the Animals. People bring their beloved pets and participate in a service that we conduct in our church courtyard. In one part of that liturgy, I lay my hands on each animal and give them a blessing.
There is a prayer that is associated with St. Francis. You may be familiar with it. I pray it every morning as part of my morning devotion. It’s a lovely prayer. If we were to successfully spring it into being in our own life, we would be one of the saints, for sure.
But it’s so packed with difficult challenges that few of us attain even a small part of it consistently. Living that prayer becomes more difficult when we have been spiritually or...