The Crucifix at San Damiano

Throughout all the time of which we have hitherto spoken, this great servant of God had neither master nor teacher to guide or instruct him, save only Christ our Lord, who, in addition to the gifts already bestowed upon him, was pleased now to visit him with the sweet consolations of His divine grace. For having gone one day into the fields, the better to contemplate and meditate upon heavenly things, he came to the church of S. Damian, which, from its great antiquity, was fast falling into decay, and, by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, he went in thither to pray. As he lay prostrate before a crucifix, he was filled with great spiritual consolation, and gazing with tearful eyes upon the holy cross of the Lord, he heard with his bodily ears a voice from the crucifix, which said thrice to him: “Francis, go and build up my house, which, as thou seest, is falling into ruin.” Then Francis, trembling, and full of fear, being in the church alone, wondered at the sound of that marvellous voice, and as his heart received the meaning and power of the divine words, he fell into a great ecstasy. When he had recovered his senses, and came to himself, he prepared to obey, and set himself at once to fulfil the command which he had received to repair the material church, although the principal intention of these words referred to that Church which Christ has purchased and built up with His precious blood, as the Holy Spirit afterwards revealed to him, and as he afterwards made known to the friars.