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Clare of Assisi: the Courage of a passionate Women

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

Some 800 years ago, during the night of March 19, 1221, the day after Palm Sunday, Clare of Assisi, all dressed up, ran away from home to join the group of Francis of Assisi in the little chapel of La Porciuncula, that still stands today. Las Clarisas all over the world, and the entire Franciscan family, celebrate this date in commemoration of the founding of the Order of Saint Clare, which has spread worldwide.

Clare, together with Francis –we must never separate them, because they promised each other, out of a pure love, that they «would never again be separated», according to the beautiful legend of the time – are among the most luminous figures of Christendom. It is good to remember this during the month of March, which is dedicated to women. Because of Clare, there are millions of Clares and Mary Clares in the world. She, from the noble Assisi Favarone family, and he, son of a wealthy and influential merchant of fabrics, the Bernardone.

At 16, she wanted to meet the already famous Francis, who was in his 30s. Bona, her intimate friend, said under oath in the canonization papers, that between 1210 and 1212 Clare «went many times to talk secretly with Francis, secretly, so as to not be seen by her relatives and to avoid scandals.» From those two years of meetings was born a great fascination for each other. As one of her best researchers, Swiss Anton Rotzetter, comments in his book, Clare of Assisi, the First Franciscan Woman, (Clara de Asís: la primera mujer franciscana, Vozes, 1994): «Eros in its most proper and profound sense was born in them, because without Eros nothing of value exists, not science, nor art, nor religion. Eros is the fascination that propels a human being towards another, and liberates them from the prison of the self.» (p. 63). That Eros caused them to love and care for each other, but in a spiritual transfiguration that kept them from closing in on themselves. Francis affectionately called her, «my Little Plant.»

Together, Clare and Francis cultivated three passions throughout their lives: a passion for the poor Jesus, a passion for the poor, and a passion for one another. In that order. They planned Clare’s flight to join the group that wanted to live the Gospel, purely and simply.

In its creativity, daring, and beauty, that scene rivals the best love scenes of great novels or films. How could such a wealthy and beautiful young woman run away from home, to join a group very much like today’s «hippies»? Because this is how we can portray Francis’ initial movement. It was a group of wealthy young people given to parties and serenades, who resolved to undertake the option of total divestment and rigorous poverty, following the example of Jesus, the poor. They did not want to give charity to the poor, but to live with the poor and be as the poor. And they did it with a great jovial spirit, without criticizing the opulent Church of the popes.

That night of March 19th, Clare, secretly, ran away from home and reached La Porciuncula. Under flickering lights, Francis and his companions festively received her. And as a sign of her incorporation to the group, Francis cut her blond hair. Then, Clare put on the clothes of the poor, lacking color, more a sack than a dress. After the joy and many prayers she was accompanied to the Benedictine convent, 4 kilometers from Assisi. Sixteen days later, Ines, her youngest sister, also ran away and joined Clare. The Favarone family even attempted to take their daughters back violently; Clare held tight from the mantel of the altar, showed her shaved head and kept them from taking her away. She demonstrated the same boldness when Pope Innocence III did not want to approve the vow of absolute poverty. She fought so hard that the Pope finally consented. This is how the Order of the Clares was born.

Her body, intact after 800 years, shows once again that love is stronger than death.

Maximization versus Optimization

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

There is an underlying ethic behind the producer/consumer culture, which is now in crisis due to the ecological state of planet Earth, whose limits we have exceeded by 30%. It now takes one and a half years to replenish what we extract in a year from the superabundant goods and services that the Earth had until recently. And it does not appear that the consumerist fury is slowing. To the contrary, the current system, trying to save itself, encourages ever greater consumption, that simultaneously requires ever greater production, which ends up stressing even more all the ecosystems and the planet as a whole.

The ethic presiding over this form of living is that of maximization of everything we do: maximizing the building of factories, of highways, of cars, fuel, computers, mobile telephones, maximizing entertainment programs, novels, courses, recycling, intellectual and scientific production. Production cannot stop, if it did, consumption and employment would collapse. In the end, it always is more of the same, with no awareness of nature’s limits of endurance.

Imitating Nietzsche we ask: how much maximization can the physical and spiritual human stomach tolerate? A point of saturation is reached, the direct effect of which is an existential vacuum. It can be seen that human happiness lies not in maximizing, in fattening bank accounts, or in the smount of goods in the basket of consumer goods. The fact is that the human being hungers for other things: for communication, solidarity, love, and transcendency, among others. These hungers, by their nature, are insatiable, because they can grow and diversify indefinitely. The secret of happiness is hidden in them. But in the words of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, quoting Saint Augustine: «we have had to build tortuous paths through which we have been forced to walk with a multitude of hardships and sufferings imposed on the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve».

Logically, we need certain amount of food to maintain life. But excessive, maximized, food causes obesity and disease. The rich countries have maximized the means of life and material infrastructure in such a way that they have destroyed their forests, (Europe only has now 0.1% of her original forests). They have destroyed their ecosystems and a great part of their bio-diversity, in addition to creating perverse inequalities between rich and poor.

We must seek a different ethic, the ethic of optimization. That ethic is founded on a systemic understanding of nature and of life. All living systems try to optimize the relationships that sustain life. Such a system seeks a dynamic equilibrium, making good use of all the ingredients of nature, without producing residues, optimizing quality and including all. In the human sphere, this optimization presupposes a sense of self-limitation, and the search for the just measure. A sober and decent material base makes it possible to develop some materials that are spiritual goods, such as solidarity with the more vulnerable, compassion, a love that undoes the mechanisms of aggression, overcomes prejudices and does not allow differences to be treated as inequalities.

Perhaps the present crisis of material capital, which is always limited, will teach us to start living from the human and spiritual capital, always unlimited and open to new expressions. It will enable us to have spiritual experiences, celebrating the mystery of existence, and gratitude for our place in the gathering of beings. With this we can maximize our latent potential, that which guards the secret of the much sought after plenitude.

Erosion of the “Relational Matrix”

Leonardo Boff1 comentário

Many people in the world today, from very different backgrounds, are concerned by the present crisis, which includes a number of other crises. Each one sheds some light, and all that light is creative. But, as for myself, coming from a background in philosophy and theology, I feel the need for a reflection that goes deeper, to the roots, where the crisis that is now exploding with such virulence developed slowly. In contrast to previous crises, the present one has a singular characteristic: in it, the future of life and the continuity of our civilization are at stake. Our practices contravene the evolutionary course of the Earth. The Earth has created a friendly place for us to live, but we are not being very friendly to the Earth. We wage a never ending war against her, on all fronts, with no possibility of winning. The Earth can continue without us. We, however, need the Earth.

I think the closest roots, (we will not go back to the homo faber of 2 million years ago), are found in the paradigm of modernity that dissected reality, and transformed it into a scientific object and field of technological intervention. Until then, humanity generally understood itself as part of a living cosmos, full of meaning. They considered themselves to be the sons and daughters of Mother Earth. Now, Mother Earth has been demoted to a warehouse of resources. Things and human beings are disconnected from each other, each following its own course. This has produced a mechanical and atomistic conception of reality that is eroding the continuity of our development, and the integrity of our collective psyche.

The secularization of all the spheres of life took from us the sense of belonging to a larger Whole. We are ill-adjusted and submerged in a profound loneliness. The opposite of a spiritual vision of the world is not materialism or atheism, it is an uprootedness, and a feeling that we are alone and lost in the universe, something that is not present in a spiritual vision of the world.

These issues underlie the present crisis. To resolve it, we need to again be enchanted by the world, and recognize that the Relational Matrix, that involves us all, is eroding. We must understand the meaning of the future of humanity within a universe still in evolution/creation. The new sciences after Einstein, Heisenberg/Bohr, Prigogine and Hawking have shown us that everything is interconnected in such a way that it forms a Whole.

Atoms and elemental particles are no longer considered inert and lifeless. The microcosms emerge as a highly interactive world, one that cannot be described by human language, but only through mathematics. They form a complex unit in which each particle has been linked to all others, since the beginnings of the cosmic adventure some 13.7 billion years ago. Matter and mind mysteriously appeared, intertwined, and it is difficult to know whether mind came from matter, or matter came from mind; or if both appeared jointly. The Earth herself is alive (Gaia), containing all the elements to ensure ideal conditions for life. More than competitively, the Earth functions through cooperation of all with all. She shows an impulse towards complexity, diversity, and the appearance of consciousness at ever more complex levels, until her current expression through the networks of global connections within a process of growing globalization.

This cosmovision nourishes in us the hope that another world is possible, starting from a cosmos in evolution that, through us, feels, thinks, creates, loves and seeks a permanent equilibrium. The fundamental ideas, such as interdependency, community of life, reciprocity, complementarity and co-responsibility are keys of learning and nourish in us a more harmonious vision of things.

This cosmology is what is missing now. It has the ability to give us a coherent vision of the universe, of the Earth and of our place in the gathering of all beings, as guardians and protectors of all that is created. This cosmovision will prevent our falling into an abyss, with no return. In past crises, the Earth always came to our rescue, saving us. And it will not be different now. Together, we and the Earth, in synergy, will be able to triumph.

From the Ilusory “Selfish Gene” to the Cooperative Character of the Human Genome

Leonardo Boff1 comentário

Times of crisis of the system such as we are now experiencing favor a revision of concepts and a desire to project other possible worlds that would make reality what Paulo Freire called “a new viability.”

We know that the current world capitalist system is consumerist, viscerally egotistical and a predator of nature. It is leading humanity to an impasse, because it has created a double injustice: ecological, since it has devastated nature, and social, because it has generated immense social inequality. Simplifying, if only a little, we could say that humanity is divided between the minorities that eat to satiation, and those who are mal-nourished. If we were to expand the type of consumption of rich countries to all of humanity, we would need at least three Earths like the one we have.

The current system purports to find its scientific basis in the research of the British zoologist, Richard Dawkins, who thirty six years ago wrote his famous The Selfish Gene (1976). New genetic biology has shown that the selfish gene is illusory, because genes do not exist in isolation, they constitute a system of interdependencies that form the human genome, which obeys the three basic principles of biology: cooperation, communication and creativity. This is the opposite of the “selfish gene.” This is what notable names in biology, such as Nobel Laureate Barbara McClintock, Joachim Bauer, Carl Woese, and others, have shown. Bauer asserted that the selfish gene theory of Dawkins «is not founded on empirical data». Or worse, «it serves as bio-psychological justification to legitimize the individualistic and imperial Anglo-Northamerican economic order» (Das kooperative Gen, 2008, p.153).

It follows from this that if we want to find a way of living that is sustainable, and just for all peoples, those who consume the most must drastically reduce their levels of consumption. This will not be accomplished without strong cooperation, solidarity and clear self-restraint.

Let us pause on the latter, self-restraint, because it is one of the hardest to accomplish, given the prevalence of consumerism, which has spread to all social classes. Self-restraint necessarily implies limitations, so as to respect Mother Earth, to protect the collective interest and promote a culture of voluntary simplicity. It is not about not consuming, but about consuming in a restrained way, in solidarity with, and responsible to, our fellow human beings, to the entire community of life, and to future generations, that also must consume.

Restraint, moreover, is a cosmological and ecological principle. The universe developed from two forces that always limit each other: the forces of expansion and the forces of contraction. Without that internal limit, creativity would cease and we would be crushed by contraction. The same principle functions in nature. Bacteria, for example, if they were not mutually limited, and one were to lose all limits, in a very short time it would occupy all the planet, creating dis-equilibrium in the biosphere. Ecosystems guarantee their own sustainability by mutual limitation, allowing all to coexist.

Then, to emerge from the present crisis we need above all to reinforce cooperation of all with all, communication among all cultures and great creativity, to design a new paradigm of civilization. We must bid a definitive good bye to the individualism that excessively expanded the “ego” to the detriment of the “we” that includes not just human beings, but the entire community of life, the Earth and the very universe.