Overview

St. Francis of Assisi has been, for decades, depicted in illustrations, paintings, and even garden birdbaths as a saint with a love for animals. But he is not the only Christian saint associated with animals. Early Christian martyrs, the Desert Fathers of Egypt, monks and hermits from Ireland to Italy, Belgian nuns, and saintly French noblemen all have fascinating accounts of animals as part of their legends. The tendency is to either naively accept all these accounts at face value, or dismiss them outright as fables. However, neither approach is adequate. In this series of lectures you will approach these stories as hagiography, that is, stories of the saints intended to edify, to communicate a spiritual meaning to their audience. These stories of saints and animals in this course are designed to offer people today an idea of how earlier Christian generations understood their fellow creatures as significant, communicating important messages of their Creator. This course includes a free PDF study guide.

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9781666502916

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Br. William Short, O.F.M, S.T.L., S.T.D., is a professor of Christian spirituality at the Franciscan School of Theology in Oceanside, California. A Franciscan friar, he has dedicated his scholarly work to a retrieval of the Franciscan tradition of spirituality and theology. The co-editor of a three-volume series of English translations of all the documents written by St. Francis of Assisi and his earliest biographers, he has published works on the history of the Franciscan movement and its spirituality. Br. William Short, O.F.M, S.T.L., S.T.D., is a professor of Christian spirituality at the Franciscan School of Theology in Oceanside, California. A Franciscan friar, he has dedicated his scholarly work to a retrieval of the Franciscan tradition of spirituality and theology. The co-editor of a three-volume series of English translations of all the documents written by St. Francis of Assisi and his earliest biographers, he has published works on the history of the Franciscan movement and its spirituality.

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