The prayer often attributed to St. Francis of Assisi referred to as the “Peace Prayer” includes the words, “Where there is hatred, let me sow love.” Even though it is often claimed that St. Francis did not pen the prayer, it still resonates and penetrates our hearts as if he or someone like him did. And yet, we need to ask what is meant by love. We all have notions of love, but what kind of love does the prayer envision?
In light of the prayer’s second major section, it would appear that for the author of the prayer, the love envisioned has less to do with being consoled as to console, and less to do with being understood and forgiven as with understanding and forgiving.
In light of the tensions presumed and/or real surrounding Christianity and Islam in various contexts today, it is worth noting that St. Francis encountered Islam during the Crusades. As “the knight of Christ,” Francis did not come with a sword, but in peace and armed with Jesus’ love. One account speaks of a transformative encounter for Francis and Sultan Malik al-Kamil. The war between the armies of Christendom and Islam marched on, but this narrative speaks of an alternative and Jesus-honoring alternative drenched not with love, but with respect, peace, and love. The movie Of Gods and Men offers a vision of another redemptive encounter between a group of Trappist Catholic monks and their Muslim neighbors caught in the crucible of the Algerian civil war.
St. Francis and the Trappist monks loved actively, not passively. They loved sacrificially, not selfishly. They loved those whom many of us would discount and despise out of fear of “the other.” All too often, our view of love is to care for those like us, and for those who like us. We might even drape such love in a Christian flag. An extreme nationalistic version might even kill “the other,” or riddle someone’s house or belongings bearing a cryptic note with bullets in the form of a cross (Refer here to the story from a few days ago of a refugee from Iran living in Troutdale, Oregon, whose home was horribly vandalized because he was mistaken for a Muslim; the man is an adherent of the Bahá’í faith).
Also recently, two men from India were shot (one was killed) in Olathe, Kansas: they were told “Get out of my country” (Refer here). While I do not associate these acts with the Christian faith, some might; many have. At least in the former case noted here, the bullets arranged in the form of a cross seemed to suggest a connection in the minds of the hateful vandals. All Christians in America should denounce such acts of hatred, and must do everything possible to affirm and support people of other faiths in view of Jesus’ love. We must not allow a psychology of hate in the name of white nationalism or its equivalent overshadow and even distort the biblical meaning of Jesus’ cross.
Jesus did not enter this world to love those like him, or those who liked him. He came to love a world that was at enmity with God, according to Romans 5. While we were still God’s enemies, Christ died for us to reconcile us to God (Romans 5:10). If this is true, all who bear Jesus’ name as Christians in places like the United States must love the other, many of whom are not at war with anybody; their only ‘crime,’ which is no crime at all, is that they look different, believe differently, and were born in different places across the globe.
Where other people sow hatred, all who pray to Jesus must love as Jesus loved. While others cry out “Get out of my country” to Muslims, Bahá’ís, Hindus, Christians and people of no faith at all, no matter their country of origin, we must welcome them with open arms of God’s love. After all, God opened his arms and kingdom for us, even though according to Romans 5:10 we don’t belong.
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