He conversed with both the pope and the sultan. He transformed a taste for fine things and troubadour poetry into greater loves for poverty and joyful devotion to God. He never intended to found a traditional, religious "movement," but he did. His brothers had to guard him closely as he died in fear that someone would try to snatch the body of this living saint. Who was Francis of Assisi?
Paul Sabatier, a French Protestant and the first modern biographer of St. Francis, sought to find the man beneath the layers of myth and legend. Sabatier portrayed a fully human Francis, much like each of us in our awkwardness, insecurities, and fear, but also a gentle mystic and passionate reformer who desired to live as Jesus taught his disciples. This updated, twenty-first century edition of Sabatier’s biography is supplemented by the insights of many other scholars and writers, from Bonaventure and Dante to G. K. Chesterton and Umberto Eco.
