Christian History Home > Issue 42 > A Time to Be Poor
A Time to Be Poor
In Francis's day, abandoning possessions was seen as a key to holiness
Dr. William S. Stafford is professor of church history at Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Virginia. He is author of Domesticating the Clergy: The Inception of the Reformation in Strasburg, 1522–1524 (Scholar's Press, 1994). | posted 4/01/1994 12:00AM
Although Francis and his Order of Friars Minor celebrated poverty with a new intensity, voluntary poverty was hardly new in Christian tradition. Luke’s Gospel emphasized Jesus’ call to renunciation, and his Acts of the Apostles idealized the Jerusalem community in which “none claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common” (Acts 4:32).
In the third century, hermits like Antony began selling all their possessions and regarded money as a demonic snare. The monastic Christianity that soon followed was likewise founded on vowed poverty.
By the eleventh and twelfth centuries, new tides of devotion led Christians to yearn for the “perfect life”—a life that would mirror Christ’s and not compromise God’s perfect will. Bernard of Clairvaux, for example, considered possessions an intolerable distraction from the love of God.
The Gross Gap
As Duane V. Lapsanski, in Evangelical Perfection, has shown, the century before Francis, monastic writers and wandering ... To view this item, you must be a member of ChristianHistory.net.
|
If you ARE a member
of ChristianHistory.net…
Please login:
| |
If you are NOT a member
of ChristianHistory.net…
Please click here to see our membership options. As a member, you will be able to have access to all of the content on ChristianHistory.net.
|
|
Browse More ChristianHistory.net
Home | Browse by Topic | Browse by Period | The Past in the Present | Books & Resources
| |
|
