Franciscans of Halifax Language selection: Franciscan Life Home Spirituality Links Pictures Where to find us Who we are Our History Contemplative Life Active Life Franciscan Life Contact “I want my friars to preach always, and sometimes to use words as well.” (St. Francis of Assisi) The term “Charism” directs us to the salvation of God manifested in Jesus Christ, the gift of eternal life, of grace. The expression underlines the free and cost-free character of revelation: God is the one who gives in His mercy. The gifts of God, referred in a particular way to the history of Israel, are defined as charisms as well. Characteristic however is the use of the term in 1 Cor. 12:4,28,30,31 and in Rm. 12:6. In this case, a charism is not salvation itself, but the gift of a life spent in the service of the brothers and sisters. “Each one, as a good manager of God's different gifts, must use for the good of others the special gift he has received from God,” writes St. Peter (1 Pt 4: 10). In faith, the gift of salvation does not become the possession of the individual member of the faithful, as if an individual’s treasure, but a source of gifts. The believer has received a charism of grace in order that he himself is enabled to give and to give himself. The structure of the Franciscan Community, as well as all the other ecclesiastical realities of the Minors, is founded in the times of Francis of Assisi. Among the Franciscans does not exist the concept of an absolute superior, like an abbot or other feudal forms that were based upon the concept of territoriality and upon the figure of one single superior for lifetime. The structures that descend from the feudal idea tend to have something called “consent” and this often is determined by the opinion of the outstanding personalities. Francis, with his Rule, determines the Chapter and the Definitory as verifying instances of the communal path -certain of the guidance of the Spirit- who –through the authoritative voice of the Apostolic See- searches the sense and the ministry of their presence in the Catholic Church of today. Now, chapter and definitory are the real “superiors” of the Franciscan Family, that rather than to base themselves on consent have preferred to base themselves on collegiality, closer to the apostles and farther from the feudal world. It is not only a “college” that directs the family, but the members of these organs normally are renewed every four years, with a maximal mandate of twelve years (always if the base elects them). The chapter defines the “Conventual” life of a single community, while the definitory (with the provincial) defines the life of the province.