St. Francis is probably best known for his legendary preaching to the birds. Lesser known is the story of his encounter with “the wolf of Gubbio.” According to the legend, that fearful creature had been attacking both livestock and people in the little Italian town of Gubbio in Italy’s Umbria region. Francis felt called upon to intervene. He then worked out an agreement with the wolf so that that predator would stop the attacking; and, for their part, the townspeople would provide food for the wolf.
What can we learn from this narrative? Probably not much, on the face of it. But think of the uncannily similar situation at the edges of some of some public lands in our western states. Wolves, who have protected status in a number of those areas, sometimes stray over into ranchlands and attack the cattle that undergird the livelihood of the farmers. Are we then to imagine that some modern-day Francis will intervene and tell the wolves not to kill any more cattle? That question answers itself. So much, it seems, for the wolf of Gubbio story.
But let’s not set that story on the list of mere fables just yet. Read aright, it’s instructive for folks like me, who are committed to take the biblical theology of nature seriously. It reveals how the preaching and teaching of the Church about the world of nature requires more than the vision of St. Francis. Beyond the saint from Assisi, we need to contemplate, again and again, the vision of the biblical Job, too, which I’ve written about a number of times. Job encountered “the wilderness” in its stark, often deadly complexities, yet as a world bespeaking Divine glory.
I’m reminded of an account I read once about the world of the snow fox and the snow rabbit high in a western U.S. mountain range. To be themselves, they need each other. The foxes needs the rabbits for food. On the other hand, were it not for such killings by the foxes, the rabbits would overbreed, exhaust their limited food sources, and die out due to starvation. Not exactly a world of Franciscan bliss.
Which brings me back to the wolf of Gubbio. Those of us who would like to consider ourselves to be followers of St. Francis must guard against any romanticizing of nature. We’ll continue to celebrate, for sure, the wondrous world of the birds, as we’ve come to know it, often inspired by Francis. But we’ll also resist the temptation to downplay, even to neglect, the – Divinely created – life of the wolf. Nature, as God creates it, is not necessarily in every respect our friend. Nature can be, and often is, dog eat dog. Or in this case: fox eat rabbit. Nature belongs first and foremost to God and serves God’s often obscure but glorious purposes, first and foremost, not ours.
That’s why, I believe, people of faith need the biblical Job no less than the medieval Francis. In a word: we need to know how to let the wild wolf of Gubbio be a wild wolf and then how to rejoice in that wolfness, as God does. We can then also listen, of course, to the songs of our brothers and sisters, the birds, to our hearts’ delight.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.