Members of the community built around Greensboro’s Franciscan Center gathered for a Mass celebrated by Father Louis Canino, OFM at St Mary Church. The center has moved to a new, smaller location after years of taking St. Francis’ missionary spirit to the streets of the city. (Lisa M. Geraci | Catholic News Herald)GREENSBORO — Franciscan Friar Father Louis "Louie" Canino, OFM, presided over an emotional tribute Mass for St. Francis of Assisi Oct. 31 for supporters of his ministry.
“I didn’t want the year to go by without honoring St. Francis, not just his Feast Day but we had to celebrate the 800th anniversary,” said Father Louie. “What was problematic was that simultaneously we had to leave our own place.”
The Mass hosted at St. Mary Church in Greensboro had more than 200 in attendance. It was the first Mass the group had celebrated since July, when their almost four-decade streak of Wednesday Masses at the Franciscan Center on Greene Street was put on hold.
It was then that the group received notice from Elon University that the center’s lease would not be extended. The Franciscan Center is where Father Louie ran a gift shop, offered Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, and presided over Wednesday Mass for the past 36 years.
While running the center, he became available for whatever spiritual needs his inner-city neighbors brought to him – a confessor to the sinner, an advisor to the stressed, a waiter to the hungry, and a comforter to the broken.
Drawing from that experience, Father Louie focused his homily on how St. Francis is relevant today.
“If this legacy of St. Francis was emblazoned on the hearts of legions of people today, our community and our world would be in a better place,” Father Louie said. “It would resemble the Kingdom of God here on Earth.”
The Franciscan Center regulars in the pews understood because they strive to follow that legacy.
“We have been practicing what St. Francis has said and we live up to it,” said Mike Bohen, who admits to tearing up during the emotional Mass. “We need somebody that aspires to do more than go to Church and go home. Father Louie inspires us in our faith.”
In his homily Father Louie said, “St. Francis’ spiritual family grew and grew so much that three orders were founded by him.”
In a similar way, the community of Franciscans in the Triad grew from Father Louie starting an experimental storefront in 1990.
Father Louie’s street ministry was accessible to people who may not reach out to a parish priest but would open a shop door to converse with the humble man in a hooded brown habit.
Kathleen Zeller, a parishioner at St. Pius X, met Father Louie after she decided to return to her Catholic faith and visited the gift shop for a Bible.
“He reminded me so much of a missionary priest I spent a lot of time with when I was growing up. It was really nice,” Zeller said. “It was like a transformation for me. I begged him to let me volunteer … and we have been together every Tuesday ever since.”
Some came to the center as Father Louie said St. Francis might have.
“In his early youth, Francis would be by no means considered a saint. He was forever consumed with the values of the world,” he shared in his homily.
God changed that in St. Francis, and Father Louie has witnessed similar changes in those who have battled addiction.
“Over 36 years we have held meetings every day,” Father Louie said. “I have seen thousands – even today some of the AA people came.”
The humble priest does not take credit, as he said in his homily message, “Francis’ transformation … came from God and not from his newly adopted lifestyle.”
As he left the ambo, Father Louie told the story of a man he hitched a ride from while he traced the path of St. Francis. He never forgot the reason the man, who wasn’t a Catholic, told him he was in Assisi.
“I want to catch the spirit of St. Francis,’”he repeated, fighting back tears, and then instructed his group. “I want you and I to have the same burning desire to catch the spirit of St. Francis and continue to live his legacy here and now.”
The Mass served as a welcome breather for the community, a reassurance that they will move forward as they transition from the former storefront to new second floor office space on Friendly Avenue.
“We ended up moving the 15th of September and last week was the first time it looked like it was put together again,” Zeller said. “It is going to be good, and maybe he will slow down a little bit because he works as hard as he needs to work.”
Father Louie admits that though the downsizing was unexpected, God has His own plans.
“Moving from over 5,000 square feet to a little over 700 square feet was a challenge,” Father Louie said. “It truly was, but it all worked out. I didn’t plan this at all, but God planned it.”
The gift shop will remain closed and the AA group has moved to Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, but at 82, Father Louie has found another calling modeled after St. Francis.
“After enduring a horrific year in prison and then being released, his state of desolation caused him to seek help,” he said earlier in his homily. “What is remarkable and also providential is that he sought help from a divine agent.”
Father Louie is now guiding prisoners to that divine agent.
“I felt like I needed to reach out to prisoners,” Father Louie said. “That is one corporal work of mercy I have never done, and I want to do that.”
Father Louie has spent his life showing others the way of St. Francis, and his community plans to continue gathering at the new center for spiritual counseling, confessions and fellowship.
“Some people say we don’t need heroes. I think we do. Father Louie is that for us in this community,” Bohen said. “He makes you proud to be a Catholic. And we are supposed to be living out these corporal works of mercy.”
— Lisa M. Geraci