iRide.2020.05.05 Birdfeeder

I almost missed St Francis of Assisi as he emerged slowly from the shadows. The real person was born Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone in 1181/1182 and died in 1226. It is difficult when we are so distant to resolve the inherent contradictions in his life that we may perceive from the context of our own time. He is predominantly known in popular culture as an advocate for animal welfare, but that should not be conflated with a modern take on that ethical position.

Two paragraphs from an article by a guest writer on the Franciscan Media website (a nonprofit ministry of the Franciscan Friars, whose mission statement is "To spread the Gospel in the spirit of St. Francis") highlights the opposite poles of the saint's attitudes:

On Christmas, Francis wanted the poor and the hungry to be filled by the rich; he said that more than the usual amount of grain and hay should be given to oxen and asses. “If I could speak to the emperor, I would ask that a general law be made that all who can should scatter corn and grain along the roads so that the birds might have an abundance of food on that day of such great solemnity, especially our sisters the larks" (2 Celano, 199–200).

That summarizes the popular view of Francis as an animal lover. It seems that his spiritual passions also took him in another direction:

Francis observed the birthday of the child Jesus with inexpressible eagerness over all other feasts, saying, "It is the feast of feasts, on which God, having become a tiny infant, clung to human breasts." When the question rose about eating meat that day, since Christmas was a Friday, he [Francis] replied to Brother Morico, "You sin, brother, calling the day on which the child is born to us a day of fast. It is my wish that even the walls should eat meat on such a day; and if they cannot, they should be smeared with meat on the outside."

If one accepts the proposition that mankind is the supreme being on earth and has dominion over all other forms of life—a tradition with a long history—then the apparent contradictions fade and what we might think of as capricious irrationality becomes just an expression of speciesism. It's also possible that: "I know you think you understand what you thought I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant." ~ Robert J. McCloskey in a press briefing referenced by CBS reporter Marvin Kalb in TV Guide for 31 Mar. 1984.

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