Act III scene 1

ACT III

 Scene 1  “Clare and the Second Order”

Setting:  the home of Favorone family in Assisi;the church; forest near San Damiano.  Set the home on the left side of the set, the forest in the centre, and the Benedictine monastery on the right side of the set.

(CURTAIN REMAINS CLOSED)

(WOLF & FRANCIS STAND TOGETHER AT THE SIDE OF THE STAGE)

WOLF: So far yours has been a story with only men in it.  Aren’t there any women in your villages and towns?  All right.  There was Pica, your mother, who rescued you from the cellar.  But weren’t there any women who followed you?  I mean, you aren’t all that ugly.  A bit ragged and not very clean.  But when you were cleaned up and in your fancy clothes, I’m sure you had lots of girlfriends.  Did they all drop you when you weren’t rich anymore?

FRANCIS: That’s not very fair to the lovely ladies of Assisi.  The fact of the matter is that when I was young and rich and well-dressed and, as you point out, clean, the young women of Assisi were kept indoors and away from young rebels like me.  They would stay in with their mothers and sisters and aunts, away from all men, young and old.  Especially young single men.  They were guarded against even meeting us.  The only time we saw these beautiful girls was in church.  There, they were surrounded by fathers and brothers.  We might smile at each other, and nod.  But that was all.  We could learn one another’s names and maybe some gossip, but only from married men who knew the fathers and brothers.  The girls, I suppose, learned about us from married sisters and aunts.  

WOLF: That’s all very well, protecting the women and girls.  After all, human girls don’t look very strong.  Certainly not like girl wolves.  I can fight every bit as well as my brothers.  Your girls don’t look like they could hold their own in a battle.

FRANCIS: Not like wolves, perhaps, but the women aren’t all that weak.  You should have seen my mother when she got angry.  I stayed out of her way then.  But remember, there are lots of differences between wolves and people.  We don’t fight the same way.  And we don’t live the same way.   The women of Assisi  are expected to become wives and mothers, not warriors. 

WOLF: But if you never meet, how can you marry?

FRANCIS: Our parents arrange that.  Of course, they have to be of the same social level and both families have to have enough money to make an agreeable arrangement.

WOLF: Oh!  That sounds terrible!  That’s business, not romance.

FRANCIS: Who said anything about romance?  We’re talking about marriage.  These days, in the modern thirteenth century in the Christian country of Italy, marriage is all about business.  At least, that’s true of the upper classes like my family and friends.  That’s one reason I fell in love with Lady Poverty.  I don’t like commerce, remember?  I’m no good at business.  Besides, these days in this country, romance is left to peasants and shepherds. 

WOLF: So, there are no women among your followers?  It’s a men’s club?

FRANCIS: I didn’t say that.  There is one very special woman.

WOLF: I know.  Lady Poverty.  You’ve told me about her.  I mean real people-type women.

FRANCIS: Haven’t you heard about Clare?

WOLF: Oh, yes, but I’ve never seen her.

FRANCIS: You won’t.  She’s secluded, along with her followers.

WOLF: Can’t she come out here and introduce herself like your other followers.  I mean, if she came with her followers, too, wouldn’t that be all right?

FRANCIS: It might be all right.  But she won’t do it.  She and her followers live in San Damiano now, and they stay there all the time.

WOLF: I guess her parents don’t care if she goes out alone.  Or is she a peasant?

FRANCIS: Her family is very rich and influential.  She had heard me speak outside the church, I think.  And had heard from her married girlfriends what my teachings were all about.  She was as devout as she was beautiful and rich.  So, when she learned that her father had found a husband for her, she escaped from the house and came with a lady friend to our house.  Did I tell you the Benedictines gave us a house to live in?  Anyway, we had it all planned, how we would greet Clare.

WOLF: Planned?  You knew she was coming?

(OPEN CURTAIN TO REVEAL ONLY THE CHURCH)

FRANCIS: Someone told me that she wanted to join our little group.  Of course, she couldn’t possibly live among us.  It wouldn’t be proper.  So, we approached the Benedictines who had given us the house for our community.  They agreed to be prepared to receive Clare.  *It started on Palm Sunday.  Clare had wanted to just come to us, but I sent her a message to go to the Palm Sunday service to get her holy palm.  So she did.  She and the other women of her household dressed in their finest clothes and entered the church joyfully.  But when the moment came for them to approach the altar to receive their blessed olive palm, Clare was suddenly seized with shyness and held back.  So, the bishop actually came down the steps and put the palm in her hand.   When I saw that, I knew that the Bishop was on our side.

WOLF: How was that?

FRANCIS: It was the way he looked her, and then glanced at me. 

WOLF: When did she leave her home, though?

FRANCIS: It was the next night, when the family was all in bed, Clare and her lady companion slipped out the side door.

(CLOSE CURTAIN ON CHURCH; OPEN CURTAIN ON FAVORONE HOME TO SHOW SIDE DOOR AND THE FOREST WITH SANTA MARIA DEGLI ANGELI AND THE MONASTERY; MOVE CHURCH TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SET.)

WOLF: The side door?  I thought no one ever used the side doors in the big houses.

FRANCIS: That’s almost true.  The side door was kept barred and bolted and was opened only when there was a death in the family.  The death door, you might call it.  It was dark out, of course.  So some of the friars were there to help her through the difficult path from the house and down to Santa Maria degli Angeli.  The friars were all there waiting for her, singing hymns of praise and thanksgiving.  She stood in front of the altar of the Porziuncula and made her holy vow.  She said, “I want only Jesus Christ, and to live by the Gospel, owning nothing, and in chastity.”  Then I cut off her hair.  We had some simple clothes for her to change into, replacing the fine silks with coarse wool.  Her lady companion removed Clare’s lovely white veil of chastity that all unmarried girls wear.  Clare put on the coarse black veil of penance we had for her.  The Benedictine convent at Bastia was ready to welcome her immediately, until we could prepare San Damiano for her.

(Clare removes white veil, and put on black veil)

WOLF: Very exciting, very dramatic, very beautiful...

FRANCIS: Yes.  All of that, and very frightening, too.  Her family was not pleased about this, you know.  In fact, they were furious.  As soon as they learned that she was missing from home, all the men of the family set out to look for her.  It didn’t take them long to figure out that she had come to join me.  Somehow, they found out that she was at the Benedictine convent.  

(men enter with swords)

MEN’S VOICES (off stage, very loud and very angry): Clare!  Come out!  Francis!  What have you done with our daughter?  Clare!  How can you shame us like this?  Come home right now!  How dare you disgrace your family!

FRANCIS:  They went with swords drawn against the nuns of the convent.  Can you imagine?  Shouting at them, demanding she be returned to her home and family.  They said it was a disgrace.  She had shamed the family.  Can you imagine?  How can you be a disgrace when you are giving your life to Jesus Christ?  How can this level of devotion be shaming your family?  Their behaviour was outrageous.  And very frightening.

WOLF: What did you do?  Do you have swords?  Could you fight them off?

FRANCIS: Swords?  What would we do with swords?  I’d had enough of that sort of thing when I was a youth.  We tried to form a barrier between Clare’s relatives and the entrance to the convent, but it was no use.  I think they would have killed us.  We couldn’t fight them.  They forced their way inside.  Clare was brave.  She ran to the altar and clung to it, screaming that she would never go back home.  She was promised to Jesus.  Of course, her family couldn’t understand it.  Or if they understood, they couldn’t accept it.

WOLF: Wait a minute.  I thought they were Christians.  Didn’t they go to the church on Palm Sunday with Clare and the others?

FRANCIS: Yes.  Well, you know, there are Christians and then there are Christians.  Some Christians just like to go to church, maybe because their friends go there.   I’m not saying that’s what the Favorone family was like, but maybe their idea of Christianity did not include such deep devotion as their daughter showed.  And, I understand that Clare’s father had selected a very eligible man to be her husband.  A rich man of a noble family, who would bring more honour and more wealth to the family.  Leaving such a prospect for a life of poverty in the church isn’t a good choice when you have worldly ambitions. 

WOLF: What convinced them to go away?

FRANCIS: Clare’s clinging to the altar wasn’t enough, apparently.  That is, not until she pulled off her black veil of penance and revealed her shorn head.

WOLF: Shorn?  You mean like a sheep?  I know all about sheep, you know.  Shorn!  That’s cut really short.

FRANCIS: Well, I would have given her the tonsure, only I didn’t think that would go over so well in the convent.   You know, this bald circle we friars have?  Clare could be a sister, a nun, but she could never be a brother.  You agree?

WOLF: I suppose so.  It’s obvious why she had to wear that veil.  Shorn!  Really!   Did her family leave her alone after that? 

FRANCIS: Yes.  But we couldn’t be sure that they wouldn’t come back when no one was ready for them, so we moved Clare to another Benedictine convent in another town.  I didn’t like having to do that, but we had no choice.  Her safety was most important.  Still, it was not good having her so far away.

(Clare moves to stage right, to the Benedictine monastery altar.)

WOLF: All right.  So you have one woman follower.  But she’s with the Benedictines.  How can she be a Franciscan?

FRANCIS: Oh, she’s a Franciscan all right.  And she isn’t the only female Franciscan.  Would you believe it?  Soon after Clare joined us, right behind her came her younger sister, Agnes. 

(enter Agnes)

(FRANCIS continues): And again we had the invasion by her relatives, screaming to have the girls returned home.  This time, the men knew that her head would have been shorn, so that wouldn’t shock them into flight.  And Agnes didn’t think to cling to the altar.  But after all, that hadn’t helped Clare last time.

WOLF: Did they take Agnes home with them?  Or, did something else stop them this time.

FRANCIS: This time it was prayer that stopped them.  You’d think that a few strong men would have no trouble lifting up a fifteen-year-old girl and carrying her off.  But Agnes was on her knees praying fervently that God would intervene, if it was his will.  And, I suppose it must have been God’s will to keep the girls, because the men soon gave up trying to lift Agnes.  They just went home empty-handed again.  By this time, San Damiano was ready to house Clare and her sister, so we moved them there right away.  And the others came, too.  San Damiano soon became a lively place, full of devout women.

(enter several nuns)

WOLF: The Benedictine nuns?

FRANCIS: No.  Didn’t I tell you?  Clare’s mother came and joined her, and then several other ladies of Assisi came along, too.  I believe Clare will someday have her rule approved by the pope, but I might not live to see that.  The pope doesn’t like the idea of women living in poverty.  Clare loves Lady Poverty almost as much as I do.  The rule of living in poverty and chastity suits her very well.  In fact, they love poverty so much that they took it in their name.  You’ve never heard of the Poor Clares?

WOLF: Oh!  She’s THAT Clare!  Of course!  I’ve heard of the Poor Clares.  They are very holy women.  So, they are also Franciscans?

FRANCIS: Yes.  They are the Second Order of Franciscans.

WOLF: So, you have two orders.

FRANCIS: Three, actually.

WOLF: I can see there’s more to this story.

CURTAINS CLOSE