Fundamental Principles of the Capuchin Reform

1 Imitation of the Seraphic Father Saint Francis 2 The Observance of his Testament 3 The Capuchin Constitutions 4 The Importance of these foundations 5 The three religious vows 6 The Franciscan Rule 7 The renunciation of privileges

(1) The coming of many venerable, holy and learned Fathers from the body of the Order brought great advantage to our Congregation. More than learning and fine ways, they shone in their great practical experience of everything that had troubled the observance of the Rule since the beginning and had been very detrimental for them. The Patriarch Noah knew how to tell about what had harmed humanity. He was very well instructed in it. Since humanity was engulfed in all kinds of vice the Lord God could not longer tolerate it on the earth and wanted them to swallowed up in the waters of the flood. He removed their memory from the earth yet while leaving that holy seed in the Ark that had been built. After the universal flood they lived for many years. The Lord God preserved them as an instruction for their descendants. It was just like this with those reverend Fathers whom the Lord God had preserved. Therefore well instructed in a holy and regular life they would begin this holy Reform. They warned their posterity who were in the holy Congregation after them, where there were dark and dangerous phaseswhich could have endangered us easily. They removed from their presence all the obstacles against which transgressors had stumbled. With good regulations and holy constitutions they tried to warn those who would come to the holy Congregation after them. For their teaching they took up the experience and instructions of the Seraphic Father which have been written for general use in the books of our Order. These are in the Conformities, the Chronicles of the Order, the Legends of Saint Bonaventure and that which was written by the Three Companions of the Seraphic Father Saint Francis: Brother Leo, Brother Angelo and Brother Rufino.

This was the reason had such a high regard for these books. And at table, after the reading of the Holy Scriptures, little of anything else was read than of Saint Francis and the Order. From these the derived the shape and way of life and how our Father Saint Francis wanted the habits, houses and other things that his Friars had to use out of necessity. In the early Constitutions those Fathers wrote that the Friars should carefully read and consider all these things.

(2) Furthermore they had as a sure foundation for the perfect observance of the Rule that the Testament of our Seraphic Father had to be observed, without obliging us by profession that we intend to promise the Testament also, much less make a particular vow about it. Rather we should embrace and observe it as a paternal admonition of our Seraphic Father. As such it more than amply shows us the intention of the Father about the observance of the Rule. Hence those venerable Fathers concluded that if anyone wanted to observe the Rule perfectly he needed to observe the Testament. Therefore at the same time they included this in the early Constitutions. Then many years later when the venerable Father Francis Tittelmans came to our congregation, a very learned and holy man, he confirmed the opinion of those early Fathers by affirming that it was impossible to observe the Rule perfectly without embracing the Testament of our Seraphic Father as a guide and norm. That Father affirmed that if there were some difficulty in the Rule where it was not understood in some passages, the Holy Spirit made the gloss of the Testament on our Rule. It is the clearest and most gloss there is to be found, made in the same spirit as the Rule as our Father says himself: “Let the Friars not say this is another Rule, but how the Lord has given me to write the Rule and these words.” By this he wanted to show that by a revelation from God he had written the Rule and the Testament with the same spirit. Since in that Testament our Father commands that no glosses or accommodations be added to the Rule other than the Testament, those venerable Fathers put in the first Constitutions that they renounced all the privileges and glosses that relax the Rule.

(3) Another foundation those venerable Fathers laid was that of submission and reverence, devotion and obedience to the Prelates of the Holy Roman Church. They included this in Constitutions in the same way.

Another foundation was that the Friars avoid every kind of ambition. Another foundation was that the Friars should found themselves on holy poverty, taking it as the surest foundation for all regular observance and from which it depends. If it is removed, every spiritual edifice falls to the ground. Another foundation was that the Friars in no way hear the confession of seculars, nor assume the care of monasteries or of confraternities. Another foundation was that when they established friaries they all had recognised owners and that in every way they avoided storing things, except necessary things and then only for a short time. Another foundation was that they did not go to the dead. Nor did they accept funerals. Another amazing foundation was that the Friars exercised themselves continuously in holy prayers, both mental and vocal, with all humility and purity of heart.

(4) Like wise and expert architects these venerable and holy Fathers founded the beautiful and holy Reform of the Capuchin Friars on these impregnable, solid and perfect foundations. For anyone who thinks about them well they derived from the Holy Spirit and not from men because they build up and fortify our Congregation. For observed well they maintained the perfect little boat in which the Seraphic Father trimmed the sail. However the divine goodness, Jesus Christ our Saviour, takes care of the rudder so that while the Friars stand on these foundations He will bring them without doubt to the port of salvation.

(5) Although all the virtues may be the foundation of all good Christian living, in the Order nevertheless the main ones are the three vows: obedience, poverty and chastity. The whole edifice of religious life is sounded on these. So the Angelic Doctor says: The profession of vows focuses mainly on three things, that is, poverty, continence and obedience. All the other things that Religious observe are ordered unto these three. The Doctor meant that the fulfilment of these three vows depends on these. Going against these things may fall under the debt of mortal sin.

(6) Therefore this was the reason that those early Fathers resolved to observe the Rule perfectly, without focussing more on precepts rather than counsels, but by observing it all – precepts as precepts, counsels as counsels. They resolved to observe all of them for the sake of love, since they felt that doing everything for the sake of love was the rudder of all government and of the whole observance of the Rule. Because they were on fire with the love of God in such strict suffering, what Saint Francis had put in the Rule was enough for them as was whatever was according to the shape of the Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ. This raised them up to such freedom of spirit that they transcended every scruple with the true observance of the Rule. They did not need clarifications on the Rule nor lots of questions nor privileges. Because they simply observed the letter just as it sounded. This was according to what Our Saviour said to those Ministers who went to Fonte Colombo to dispute with the Father Saint Francis so that we wouldn’t make the second Rule stricter than the first. All those Ministers heard a voice speaking in the air, “I want the Rule observed to the letter, to the letter, to the letter.”

(7) Well established on this maxim, when the early Fathers were asked why they left the body of the Order, they answered, ‘in order to observe the Rule to the letter and without privileges.’ This was the reason that they put in the Constitutions that all the privileges and glosses that relax or accommodate the Rule are renounced. However they did not renounce the spiritual privileges granted to the Order so abundantly by Holy Church by means of many Supreme Pontiffs. These augment it in merits and spirit. Rather they only renounced the dispensations regarding poverty, having money and other relaxations. These things removed from the Congregation every danger of going against the Rule because they were quite distant from money and the things that are against poverty that they observed more than what the Rule commanded. Regarding clothing, they didn’t just dress in lowly garments, but the lowliest. The didn’t get involved with money in any way, even though according to the Rule they could have recourse to spiritual friends in certain cases. They strove to meet all their needs by begging, even meat for the sick and everything else, without having recourse to spiritual friends. And as the Congregation has been growing, the Friars have begun to accept the declarations of the Supreme Pontiffs.

In the General Chapter celebrated in Rome when Father Eusebius of Ancona was elected, some Fathers felt in certain cases that the Constitutions were too strict and so they added some things and changed others. The venerable Father Bernardine of Asti said, “Now we have gone as far as we can. Every little thing that goes even further might go against the Rule in certain cases. Until now we have had a great hedge and the Rule was never touched. Now we do just what the Rule allows us where before we did more that what the Rule commands.”