The spirituality of St. Francis of Assisi is not so much about the heroic deed as it is about the heroic love with which even the smallest deed is done. That is very clear from the quintessential story of Perfect Joy. 

Francis of Assisi was always a saint, right? Absolutely wrong! In his teens and early 20s, he often found God’s ways to be an obstacle to the generous life for which he would much later be revered.

For St. Francis of Assisi, the impetus for prayer was everywhere around him.

In his writings and in the early biographies of St. Francis, he emerges as a person formed and informed by the Gospel of Jesus Christ. What does that mean? How do we even begin to live the Gospel, as he did, in our own time?