Around fifty years ago, during a period of searching for my own path forward, my sister Svetlana gave me a copy of Carlo Carretto’s Letters from the Desert. At that time, my reading list fluctuated between George Orwell, Somerset Maugham, and St. Thérèse of Lisieux, alongside books on law and finance. Yet, it was Carretto’s words that gripped me; I returned to that book more than twenty times, finding myself renewed and deeply moved with every reading.
This initial encounter sparked a lifelong devotion. I collected
every book Carretto ever wrote and closely followed his community's footprint
in India. Last year, that fifty-year journey came full circle. While visiting
Assisi with Svetlana and her family, we transitioned from a meditative time
with St. Francis to visit Carretto’s own final resting place in Spello, nestled
in the Umbrian landscape. It was a deeply moving pilgrimage to the grave of a
man who lived as a devoted follower of Francis, passing into eternity on the
saint's feast day: October 4, 1988.
Why bring you to this intersection of my personal journey
and these two spiritual giants?
As we celebrate the 800th anniversary of the enduring wonder
named Francis of Assisi, I want to invite readers in India to engage with him
in a contemporary mould. To do that, no one serves as a better bridge than the
mystic Carlo Carretto. In his fictionalized autobiography I, Francis,
Carretto boldly adopts the first-person voice of the saint, instantly
dismantling the romanticized caricature of a man who merely talks to birds. He
presents Francis not as a medieval curiosity, but as a disruptive, living
prophet whose radical embrace of the Gospel serves as a direct indictment of
modern greed, urban consumerism, and spiritual complacency.
I offer you these reflections and excerpts from this
profound work, hoping it will prompt you to read the book itself and better
relish the true spirit of Saint Francis.
The Interior Desert: Radical Poverty and Naked Faith
In the book, Carretto’s Francis insists that poverty was
never a mere lifestyle choice or an exercise in philanthropy. As the saint
reflects, "Poverty did not consist in helping the poor, it consisted in
being poor." It was a necessary stripping away of the human ego to
encounter God in absolute vulnerability. Carretto writes through the voice of
Francis: "Poverty is not just a lack of things; it is a lack of self. It
is the vacuum into which God can pour His love."
External lack is merely the beginning, for "true
poverty went to the bottom of things, and touched the spirit." This
perspective resonates deeply with the spiritual heritage of India, beautifully
mirroring the ancient concept of aparigraha (non-possession) and the
ascetic path of the sannyasi. Francis notes that "putting a little
money aside, keeping a larder, buying a house" would have meant a
devastating "lack of trust in my Lord." True spiritual wealth begins
when physical ownership ends, shifting the soul from the "eros of easy
things" to the profound "agape of heroes of the spirit."
Crucially, this path is not a platform for social activism
or systemic restructuring. Francis clarifies that his "choice to be poor,
then, was not a social or political choice, but a mystical one." He did
not set out to organize a political pressure group or engage in standard class
struggle. He recognized that while revolutions fight for the working classes,
"nothing changed, because these people did not change hearts." For
him, the Gospel was a call to look beyond temporal structures: "It is not
enough to change laws. You have to change hearts."
For a reader navigating the hyper-materialistic, upwardly
mobile realities of modern mega-cities like Mumbai or Bengaluru, Carretto’s
Francis offers a sharp wake-up call to look past "a life of easy
pleasure." He models a journey that transcends all human constructs,
civilizations, and conventions, reminding us that true liberation is found not
in what we accumulate, but in what we have the courage to discard.
The Armor of Peace: Non-Violence and Unarmed Love
Just as Francis’s radical poverty was a mystical surrender
rather than a political statement, his response to a violent world bypassed the
conventional logic of warfare and strategic defense. For a modern reader
grappling with global strife or systemic conflict, Carretto’s Francis offers a
timeless pattern of deep, active non-violence. He did not wage war for justice,
even when the suffering of the poor seemed to demand it. Instead, he introduced
a method of combating injustice that relied on entirely different weapons:
humility, presence, and unarmed love.
By stepping out onto the open road without a script or a
shield, Francis showed that the only way to break the cycle of human violence
is to absorb it rather than reflect it back. In a world defined by division,
his life remains a radical blueprint for peace built from the inside out.
Rebuilding from Within: A Quiet Meditation on a Broken,
Beloved Church
For Carretto, this deep interior stripping this radical
detachment from worldly constructs was never meant to drive the believer away
from the community. It was designed to anchor them deeply within it, even when
that community is terribly flawed. The absolute vulnerability born in the
desert of poverty becomes the precise tool needed to face the institutional
Church.
“Repair it.” When the Lord spoke these words to Francis from
the crucifix at San Damiano, Francis first looked at the crumbling stone walls
around him. It takes time for human hearts to understand the vastness of God’s
designs. Francis soon realized the call wasn't just to rebuild a small, quiet
refuge in the woods, but to steady a great Church stretching across the earth
"the one founded by Jesus himself who at Saint Damian had spoken to me,
telling me straight out, 'Repair it.'"
For more than two thousand years, the gates of hell have
targeted the Church, yet they have not prevailed. Yet, anyone who deeply loves
the Church today knows the heavy grief of looking at its wounds, power
dynamics, and the heavy burden of "shameless wealth" and
"involvement with power politics." And yet, like Francis, we are
called to stay, to love, and to labor with an enduring, quiet hope.
Writing with the hindsight of eight centuries, Carretto’s
Francis does not ignore the historical corruption or wealth of the
ecclesiastical hierarchy. He addresses the reality of having "seen no
poverty in the halls of the Vatican." Yet, instead of advocating for a
schism or walking away in bitter anger, Francis models an agonizing, fierce
loyalty. He recognizes a profound debt, asking us directly: "Who would
have handed down to us, across twenty centuries, the teachings of our dear Lord
Jesus? Who would have encouraged us in the truth, reassured us in the path we
had undertaken?"
This is the great mystery we live with: the Church is
simultaneously holy and broken, divine and deeply human "at once
indefectible by divine promise, and capable of scandalizing... by its riches
and its might." When confronted with the flaws of our spiritual home, it
is incredibly easy to become bitter, sour, and judgmental, quick to point the
accusing finger at the festering sores of others.
But Francis heard a softer voice whisper in his spirit:
"Judge not... I have come not to judge but to save." He realized that
if he wanted to have any right to speak, he must have compassion. If we wish to
heal the Church today, we must begin where Francis began: not with criticism,
but with compassion. We reform the body of Christ by allowing Him to reform us,
becoming simple instruments of grace from the very inside of the home He built
for us.
It is here, in this tension, that we find the most poignant
prayer of the modern pilgrim, reflecting Carretto's own deep theological
struggles as a monk addressing the Church directly:
"How much I must criticize you, my church, and yet how
much I love you! You have caused me more suffering than anyone else, and yet I
owe you more than anyone else. I should like to see you destroyed, and yet I
need your presence. You have given me much scandal and yet you alone have made
me understand holiness. ... In a word, I cannot live outside of you, because
outside of you I would no longer have my Christ."
Dr.
Fr. Conrad Pesso s.j.
Director Xavier Institute of Communications
Chairman
Xavier Institute of Management and Research
