Here is the reply to those who claimed the Reform to be unnecessary: that the Rule could be observed in the Order without doing something else new.

31 Natural motion and violent Morton 32 Applications 33 The true Reform of the Franciscan Order

(31) This is answered by saying that all the Orders were founded in order to tend towards perfection. In their beginnings they have had such rigour and idealism that human frailty could only reach it with great effort. But then, gradually declining, they deteriorated so much that there is little difference between Religious and seculars. This has caused many reforms. If they hadn’t reformed they would have totally disappeared. However, since the Lord God does not want the holy Orders to fail, from time to time, as it has pleased His Majesty, he has raised up his servants who drawn them back up to their heights. This happens because our father Adam radically corrupted our life. Since our life has been so wounded, it is harder to do good than evil. That is, our nature is more inclined to decline than to rise to dwell above itself, as the Prophet says, with the mind and heart in the supreme good of the next life. He says it is necessary to rise above oneself to show us that it is not a natural motion to tend towards the things of the next life and lead a contemplative and supernatural life. Because of this, when he speaks of natural and violent movements, Aristotle says natural motion is weak at the beginning and robust at the end. He gives the example of a stone falling from a high tower. At the beginning the stone can easily be caught. However, as it falls it gathers such momentum that if it meets with a beam or something else, the stone might smash the thing completely. The longer the distance, the greater momentum gained, so that even a little stone could kill a man. Violent motion is potent initially, then weak at the end. This is demonstrated to us when a stone thrown by a strong man could kill someone as it leaves the man’s hand. However, when it has finished its course the stone would hardly kill a fly.

Therefore natural movement ebbs. To do good and live a religious life in a state of perfection is a violent movement. We see that this motion has always been known in the Church of God. In the beginning, the primitive Church began in a high way in that soaring movement of spirit that is violent to our nature. Then, as the natural motion gained, the Church and all Christianity deteriorated to such a depth that if it hadn’t been raised up again by holy men with that violent motion at different times, we would be totally lax. There would no longer be any semblance of Christianity. However with good reason our Lord wanted his gospel preached continuously in his Church. Moreover he orders Bishops and Prelates like farmers to rid their sheep of burrs. To be ever attentive to reform is the greatest and the most important responsibility that there is in pastoral care. So from the beginning the Church has always plied Sacred Councils to restore on high the true teaching of Christ and purge it of the false teachings of heretics. If the faith of Peter hadn’t been purged in this way it would have been lost completely, if this were possible, since no power governed by Christ can fail.

So then the founding of all the holy Orders was violent motion. Full of the Holy Spirit, the holy founders began with so much austerity, strictness and poverty in the things needed for the sustenance of our nature that they seemed more like angels than men. The gospel life was so resplendent in these founders and they showed the world the apostolic life, and how Our Lord wanted His followers to live. To those humble minds the founders made quite explicit how He wanted the suffering and death of Our Lord exemplified in the world. So effective was their example that countless others followed them and within a very short time the world was filled with many holy men. These enlightened the whole world with their example, teaching and miracles, enriching heaven and earth. Their benefit to the Church of Christ was such that even today we see it supported by these columns. The Church is purified with their teaching and defended from the perfidious heretical doctrines sown by Lucifer in many carnal and lax men. As long as the holy Orders have preserved themselves on high with that violent motion, they have always produced fruits that are pleasing to and worthy of His Majesty. However, when the holy Orders have taken up natural movement again, having left aside the rigour of penance and high contemplation and taken up self-love, they have become wrapped up in themselves. Little by little they have become so debased that good fruits and merits are no longer seen but instead scandals and bad example for the world. They become so self-absorbed with natural motion that what our Lord said through the Apostle Paul can be repeated, They all seek their own things and not those of Jesus Christ. This is the reason for so many reforms. For if the holy Orders had not been drawn back to their heights with violent motion and beautiful reforms they would have disappeared entirely. However, since Our Lord wants them to persevere for the benefit of his Church, He has raised up holy men from time to time as has pleased Him. With beautiful reforms they have restored the Orders to the perfect observance in which they were begun by their Founders. To reform something means nothing other than to restore it to its proper shape again.

(32) With the whole affair guided by the Holy Spirit, the beginning of his holy Order by our Seraphic Father Saint Francis was a violent movement when he himself together with his Companions and all those first Fathers began the holy Order with such a lofty life. Even though many reforms have occurred in the Order itself, none has yet been able to achieve that spirit, fervour and perfect observance of the Holy Gospel so evident among those early Fathers. They dwelt in small friaries built of brush and mud and mostly used straw for bedding. They slept on the bare ground with a block of wood for a pillow. They dressed in coarse, rough and common cloth which served better as sackcloth than to warm their frail flesh and mortified bodies. They always ate tasteless food, though more often they fasted on bread and water. They went barefoot in summer and winter. They were such enemies to themselves that Christ possessed their hearts entirely. Perfection and true observance of the Holy Gospel so shone out in them that they all looked like men from the hereafter.

Not much later, when the Order took up that natural motion, it deteriorated so much that often, if he had not been comforted by Christ, the Seraphic Father would have regretted starting it. This is quite apparent from the Legend of the Three Companions and other books that speak about him. Thus, thirty years after death of the Seraphic Father, in fact when Blessed Giovanni da Parma became General, that great servant of God knew the Order had reached such a low point that it needed complete reform. This venerable Father was elected General at the Chapter gathered in Rome in the year of the Lord 1248. He governed the Order nine years. During the second year of the Pontificate of Alexander IV, John resigned from office. Because he tried very much to reform the Order during his leadership, as the Cronica Antiqua says, he roused anger against himself from all those early Fathers of the Order. The reason was this. Frate Giovanni spoke about and preached publicly on how the Rule had to be observed. He spared no one. With words and kindly chastisement he corrected those who went against the Rule. With many persuasive arguments he pointed out the decline which the whole Order had undergone. He said, “Since the state of gospel perfection we have promised is very high, the Lord our God requires of us the highest observance of the Holy Gospel, as well as a great faith and a great charity and lofty deeds. Just to keep away from sins is not enough since all Christians should keep away from them. Rather, it is necessary to do the works of perfection, to live the apostolic life that the Friars themselves have promised. Therefore God requires of the Friars the highest poverty, the deepest humility and an ardent and continuous prayer-life. And the same goes for the other virtues. They should not desire any worldly or earthly thing. Gazing upon the naked Christ, let them carry the naked cross after him instead, living evangelically – dead to the world and living only for Christ. But you know, my beloved sons and brothers, how the Order has lapsed. By their actions Superiors preach that is permissible to live on their own. They do not explain to the novices the true intention of our Father Saint Francis that they should distribute their goods to the poor, as found in the Rule. Quite the opposite. They tell and encourage the novices to keep things in order to buy books, build walls, or for the other needs of the Friars. They go against the Rule and despise the commandment of the gospel. They are less than happy with two tunics, made of rough and lowly cloth and patched with sackcloth and other off-cuts, as the Rule imposes on them. Against the precept of the Rule, they don’t want these any more. They want to use fine cloth. They judge those who speak against this to be fanatics and hypocrites.”

Like a holy man enlightened by a prophetic spirit he spoke about and clearly predicted our Reform. “In the spirit of our Founder, the Reform of the Order will be carried out under the pure and simple observance of the Rule and Testament. To do this, it is necessary to make a division between those who want to live according to the Rule and Testament and those who want to live according to the privileges and declarations they have obtained. However, before this is fulfilled, twice there will be a battle over words and quibbles about doctrines. After this there will be a dispersion. Then in the third place, after the dispersion, there will be a Congregation of poor saints. God will visit that Congregation with His light and they will be sure about what they must do. From this then they will be sure concerning the way of Reform. Everything necessary for the true observance of the Rule will be clear and apparent to them. There will be no more disagreement among them. They will all be united in holding the same aim. They will carefully apply themselves to the ascent towards perfection. They will not seek what they want, but what God wants.

Fra Giacomo da Massa, a great contemplative, said, “The way of the Reform won’t be like the original foundation. It will be very different in every way. Without any effort, without any example and without their being called, the Holy Spirit will choose young, untalented, simple, disregarded and unassuming persons and fill them with a holy fear and the pure love of Christ. When he has multiplied the number of simple men in the Order and filled different places, he will send them a shepherd and captain who is completely saintly, holy and innocent and quite Christlike. Because John the Baptist first made disciples and then taught them, Our Lord acted in the same way. He chose simple disciples and filled them with the Holy Spirit and made them like himself in a real scorn for the world and in sublime poverty. Given by God to that Reform at the end, that is what the holy shepherd will be like.

(33) Therefore it is quite obvious how, until the ultimate Reform, the Order had to become altogether lax and holy men had to come along at different times and make various reforms and raise the Order back on high with that violent motion; not all the Order but only part of it. We Capuchins hope that ours is the ultimate reform since it is has been carried out in the spirit of the Founder. It has not been made by holy leaders like all the other past reforms where there has been a saint initially. According to the prophecy, however, this saint will come last, as we hope. Be that as it may, we say ours is the true reform because in clothing and everything else this reform has been like the beginning of the Order when Father Saint Francis founded it. Although there have been many reforms, these have quickly lapsed by taking up that natural movement. Nonetheless God will miraculously raise the ultimate reform to such heights that it will endure until the coming of the Antichrist, as I often heard from many holy men at the beginning of our Congregation. According to the Abbot Joachim there won’t be another reform. Rather, a new Order will emerge which he called the Order of Catenati. They will dress in sackcloth. Their perfection will be greater than ours and all the others, but it will only last a short time.

Therefore the Capuchin Reform was necessary and the will of God. Let this suffice in reply to those who say the Reform is not necessary since the Rule of the Order could have been observed without starting something new.