[00:00] This great saint we celebrate today is not just a great saint within the Church itself, but particularly for us who belong to the Franciscan Order, because St. Bonaventure of Bagnoregio was always considered so influential in the Seraphic Order, in the Franciscan

[00:31] Order, as to be known as the second founder. St. Bonaventure, as a little child, became very sick, and he was on the point of dying, and his mother knew that St. Francis was preaching in a place nearby, so she brought, well at that time he was in Bonaventure, but she brought this child to St. Francis, and as soon as St. Francis saw him, he cried

[01:03] out, "O Bonaventure," which means great good to come, or blessings for the future, and sure enough, St. Bonaventure at an early age entered the Franciscan Order, and he was under the direction of another great Franciscan, Alexander of Hales, who taught him everything to do with the Franciscan Order, the Franciscan life, and also the beginnings of his philosophy

[01:37] and theology, and he made a comment one time that, you know, who is this Bonaventure, because it seems like between the talents that he has been given by God, and his virtue, it seems like Adam hasn't even sinned in this man, and St. Bonaventure went on to join St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Thomas Aquinas of the Dominican Order, in Paris to complete his studies, both of them received the doctorate at an early age together on the same day,

[02:13] and St. Bonaventure became head of the theology department at 27 years old, and he continued to teach his fellow students, all those who went to the college in Paris. St. Bonaventure was one who emphasized that knowledge comes more through prayer than through study.

[02:43] He also told St. Thomas, when St. Thomas Aquinas came to him one time and said, "Where do you get all this, this knowledge?" and all St. Bonaventure did was point to the crucifix, for he taught his friars that all you need to know, and all the wisdom, and all the light that will be given to you is found in the five wounds of our Lord, contemplating the cross, and allowing your heart to be inflamed, because he also said in a little saying that

[03:19] he has here, "Knowledge without love is sterile, love without knowledge is blind," so we must let our knowledge be enkindled by love, and that we don't just seek knowledge for knowledge's sake, but in order to share it with others, so that what we have been given generously, we will generously give to others, so St. Bonaventure really what he was talking about

[03:50] was the seeking of wisdom, that knowledge which will give us the ability to have a light that shines on our way, almost like a car, the difference between trying to, you may know how to get somewhere, but if your lights don't work on the car, it's going to do you no good, wisdom is like having the lights turned on in your car, so you know the way, and you can see the path to get there, wisdom is knowledge in action, and St. Bonaventure

[04:25] was a master of this, and he taught that it comes primarily through prayer, through devotion and contemplation of the cross, as a place where we will attain the fount of knowledge. St. Bonaventure also was made general, minister general of the whole order when he was only 36 years old, and it was then that he reformed the order according to constitutions, and also he had a big task ahead of him, because at that time he became

[05:03] the minister general at a time where the Franciscan order was at its peak, there were thousands of friars and houses all over Europe, and he was able to divide in order to organize it better, divide the different places into provinces, so that there would be a proper running of the order, he was also one that encouraged the priests to study and to learn about God so that they could share that knowledge, but not as St. Francis said, without distinguishing

[05:38] the spirit of prayer and charity. St. Bonaventure then was also at a certain point commissioned to unite the Greek Orthodox Church with the Roman Catholic Church at the Council of Lyon. Now just before that he was made bishop and cardinal, which he refused a few times until finally the Pope insisted through obedience that St. Bonaventure become bishop and receive

[06:13] the cardinal hat, so there are many things in St. Bonaventure's life that we can point out, but one of the main things was that he wanted to be a true son of St. Francis, a true son of the Church, someone who thought with the Church, someone who did not create division, but created peace and tranquility of order, his whole life was one which he himself preached, that of finding perfect happiness through doing the will of God, finding

[06:47] in one's life the tranquility of order, the true peace, the true definition of peace, then tranquility of order between us and God and ourselves and our neighbor. St. Bonaventure died at the Council, they say there was never a greater celebration of someone's death than at St. Bonaventure's death, that he died amongst all the Pope and all the bishops and

[07:19] cardinals that were at the Council, so his funeral Mass was one of the greatest that the Church has ever seen, because they celebrated it there three days after, and he died right in the middle of the Council, but not before, he actually did accomplish what he set out to accomplish, and at that time the Eastern Church was reunited at the Council of Lyon to the Roman Catholic Church, and then later on it fell away again in schism, but St. Bonaventure

[07:56] must have been a powerful speaker because he was the one that addressed, made the opening address, and it was the Pope that charged him with the running or the overseeing of the Council, and he preached that opening address, and it was that which was instrumental in changing the hearts of those who came to the Council, seeking that union between the two churches, the Oriental and the Roman, so St. Bonaventure practiced what he preached. There's a story

[08:33] that I already said about St. Thomas, first of all, that St. Thomas went to him and said, "Where did you get all this wisdom or this knowledge?" and he pointed to the crucifix. He said that often to other priors that asked him as well, and then once one of his students asked him, "Well we can't, it's impossible to, you seem like you know every aspect of theology, everything, and how are we supposed to become holy?" and he said, "The unlearned

[09:04] man and woman, the farmer in the field and the woman slaving away at making bread can become holier than me," and he said, "Because it comes from love and doing the will of God." There was another time where St. Thomas wanted to go consult him on certain aspects of theology, and what he was writing is his Summa Theologica, which is the famous Summa of Catholic doctrine today, so St. Thomas wanted to go ask St. Bonaventure his opinion on certain theological

[09:36] matters, he brought another prior with him, and at that time, St. Bonaventure was writing the life of St. Francis, so when St. Thomas opened the door, knocked on the door, and opened it up into the chapel to look for St. Bonaventure, he found St. Bonaventure kneeling and being elevated off the ground while he was writing about the life of St. Francis, and he closed the door and he turned to his companion and said, "Let's let a saint write about a saint," and another time

[10:09] when the Pope sent an envoy to give St. Bonaventure the cardinal hat, they came to the convent and there was like an outdoor kitchen where the friars were doing the dishes, and the envoy went to one of the friars and said, "You know, do you know where Bonaventure, the minister general is of the order?" and he said, "Oh yeah, he's right over there," and St. Bonaventure was doing dishes

[10:40] after the meal, so they all came to him and they had the cardinal hat to present to him, and he said, "Just hang it up on that tree, I'll get it when I'm done doing the dishes," and then when the Holy Father sent for him to prepare and be ready to take over the Council of Lyon and make the opening address and work on that union, he sent in another envoy to go get him, so there were bishops and prelates and important people that came to the friary to accompany him to Rome, or to Lyon, sorry,

[11:16] and when they arrived, they all set out. Along the way, St. Bonaventure saw a young man who was sitting at the side of the road, and it was one of his friars, and so he went over to him and asked like, "What's the matter?" and at that time he was having a vocation crisis, he was thinking about leaving the order, and he sat down and talked with him, and then when the envoys came and said, "Bonaventure, cardinal, whatever, your excellency, we have to get going, we're going to

[11:51] be late for the Council of Lyon," and St. Bonaventure looked at him and said, "No, you go ahead, charity asked me to stay here," and he said, "I'll catch up later," so St. Bonaventure, he would never break the rule of charity, that at that moment God was asking him to attend to this young man who was going through a crisis, so St. Bonaventure practiced what he preached. There are

[12:23] many various stories that we can bring out, but one of them of his great humility, he was also commissioned by the Holy Father at the same time as St. Thomas Aquinas to work on Corpus Christi, so all those hymns and all the prayers that we saw the Tantum Ergo, those solitaries, all the great teaching of the Holy Eucharist that we have at Corpus Christi that comes from St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure was also commissioned to write that, and the Holy Father was going to take a look at both of them, so they both went to the Holy Father, and while they were waiting for

[12:58] the audience with the Holy Father, they began reading each other's writings, so St. Thomas read St. Bonaventure's and was amazed at it, gave it to St. Bonaventure, and then St. Bonaventure asked to read St. Thomas's, so he read St. Thomas's, gave it back, took his, ripped it up, and threw it in the fire, so we'll never know exactly what it was that St. Bonaventure wrote, but we know from his other writings, St. Bonaventure also wrote a summa of theology,

[13:30] his summa is called the Breviloquium, the brief word, and his summa, if you read it in Latin, is actually prose, so it all basically rhymes, so it's not just like point and like that, he wrote it, and it actually runs almost like a poem as far as the theology, so we know that he was quite capable of writing something very great, because he wrote many things, he wrote

[14:00] The Mind's Journey to God, all about how we, there's two different roads, there's the road of nature and the road of revelation, that we have scripture revealed truth, but we also have the creation of God, which also we can use in order to raise our mind and hearts to God. St. Bonaventure was one who taught that the love of wisdom should always first be accompanied

[14:31] by a great love of God, and that following God's will is more important than anything else. He once said that seek wisdom at the foot of the cross in prayer, first before learning through books, because it is through the cross that our hearts will be inflamed, and with hearts inflamed with the love of God, we can accomplish anything, and our lives will be

[15:02] made new, because we will be given all the graces that we need in order to become holy, and to help others become holy as well, so let us pray to St. Bonaventure, who spent his life thinking with the Church, and thinking as a son of St. Francis, of becoming one who didn't just think with the Church, or think in the same pattern as his father St. Francis, but he put

[15:39] this into action with true wisdom, with kindness and charity, and he sought that wisdom at the foot of the cross, so we can have an example of where we may be able to find the same knowledge and wisdom that St. Bonaventure had, let us pray to him who became known as the Seraphic Doctor, the Doctor of the Church, who is inflamed with the love of God, burning with that love, the same as

[16:11] the fiery seraphs, who are the closest to that flame of love within, you could say, the heart of Jesus.