THE GIFT OF TAU-USA
(This article originally appeared in the TAU-USA Summer Issue #106)
A Testimonial by Thomas McNamara, OFS
It is 7pm Sunday evening. A few hours ago, we got home from our first fraternity meeting after being on hiatus for about half a year. Currently, our fraternity is awaiting visitation from our Region. At that visit, our Regional leadership will determine whether we have successfully regrouped after experiencing the most difficult challenge to our fraternity since its formation. While there have been several challenges over our century of fraternity life, what we experienced a few years ago was truly unique, difficult, and formative. It has been a time of much prayer, discernment, mutuality, and work. We have a new council who have individually and as a team responded well and helped us in more ways than anyone can list.
In our difficulties, we lost about two-thirds of our active membership. Many of our Inquirers decided to look elsewhere for their needs. Back then, no one seemed at all certain whether we had a future as a fraternity. We seemed to be “catching it” from every direction.
But we kept moving forward, driven by something none of us could see but all of us could feel—a sense of purpose that eludes description and a sense of positive learning and growth. Maybe this is the spirit of fraternity. Maybe we found we truly care for each other.
At today’s meeting, we were joined by nearly a dozen newcomers sharing our prayers, instructions and formation. By the end of our fraternity meeting, we were mixing very well, sharing a spirit of community, and demonstrating how, with enough motivation, strangers can always find things to talk about. It was a very wonderful feeling.
What I am most thankful for, however, is the most recent issue of TAU-USA. We received our copies just as we were finalizing plans for our “comeback meeting.” We chose to use the “Fraternity Life” article, which included a letter from Pope Francis, as our focus for our gathering. As we discussed his article, he seemed to be saying exactly what we needed to hear and talk about. We went through half of the reflection questions today and will finish the second half at our next fraternity meeting. We talked about how our vocation to fraternity is a gift. We recalled the Gospel where we hear about the Master giving each of us a gold coin… and expecting us to use it well. Fraternity is that kind of gift.
Our discussions were just what we needed, a blend of hearing each other’s perspectives and of building a common idea about what Pope Francis taught about fraternity life. The TAU-USA couldn’t have come at a better time. We went home with renewed hope and real gratefulness.
TAU-USA is a physical expression of our combined blessings of vocation, fraternity, and conversion. I am very thankful for this wonderful tool from our National Fraternity. Please keep publishing TAU-USA—it works
Franciscan Living – Why After You?
(This article originally appeared in the TAU-USA Summer Issue 2022 #106)
by Francine Gikow, OFS
“Brother Masseo, wanting to test how humble he [Francis] was, went up to him and, as if joking, said, ‘Why after you, why after you, why after you?’ Masseo goes on to say in clarification: ‘I’m saying why does the whole world come after you, and everyone seems to desire to see you and hear you? You aren’t a handsome man in body, you aren’t someone of great learning, you’re not noble; so why does the whole world come after you?’”[1]
Francis’ response to Masseo may not seem to shed much light on this question, however. In fact, Francis states that God has chosen him because of his vileness and insufficiency. Francis expands this thought when he continues, saying: “…so that it may be known that every virtue and every good is from Him, and not from the creature, and no person may boast in his sight. But whoever boasts must boast in the Lord to whom is every honor and glory forever.”
God gave Francis great gifts. He gave Francis, an ordinary person born in the Middle Ages, great gifts of preaching, humility, and courage, not only because Francis made use of them, but also because Francis became a conduit for God’s love for us: The Lord and Creator shone through his creation of Francis. Truly, Francis became an “instrument” for God to work through so He could reach out and touch others through the human face of Francis.
God can work through us as well when he gives us “gifts” to use so that we can attract others to Christ. Thaddée Matura, OFM, warns us, however, “What one must beware of above all is the temptation to appropriate for oneself the good that belongs to God… one must acknowledge the origin of these gifts, rejoice over them, promote them; but once this is done, one must ‘render’ them, restore them to the One to whom they belong in an act of praise and thanksgiving.” [2]
Perhaps one of us has been given the grace to actually “see” God working through us, but detachment from personal ownership of our gifts is needed. We must be fully aware that we have been given everything by our loving God. We cannot appropriate that which is God’s, and we “own” nothing apart from Him.
We can still rejoice over these gifts we have used for God’s benefit, mindful that their Source is our loving God and not ourselves. These gifts are reminders of the intimate care and love of the Father who gives us all good things. He loves us!
We should also promote and use the gifts God has given and not “hide them under a bushel basket,” because it is by these gifts that people can come to know Christ through us. Like Francis, we can become a conduit to God, since these gifts are really God’s gifts, not our own. We can become the “face” of God to others and evangelize by our actions.
Acknowledging the true Source of any of the gifts we “appear” to own, we should return all praise and thanksgiving to the One who is GIFT Himself and the Source of any gift He has given us to use. Instead of accepting accolades for ourselves, we refer to the true Giver of Gifts in rejoicing and praise! Franciscan joy!
People were attracted to Francis because they were attracted to God’s gifts that they saw in Francis. Francis was well aware that he was not the owner of the gifts, but “He [God] has chosen me to confound the nobility and the greatness and the strength and beauty and wisdom of the world…”[3] Do likewise with joy!
[1] LFl:10 in FA:ED II, p. 583
[2] Thaddée Matura, OFM. Francis of Assisi: Writer and Spiritual Master. transl. Paul Lachance, OFM. (Cincinatti OH: St. Anthony Messenger Press, 2005), 49
[3] LFl:10 in FA:ED II, 0.583.