Brother Sun, Sister Moon

As I sit here attempting to write my first research paper in five years on the late, great St. Francis of Assisi, I can't help but wonder:

1) Why am I a mediocre stain on the sleeve of humanity?

2) Why are artists never saints?

(It appears they may live artfully like St. Francis, but hey, he's Italian so I think he gets the whole flair for drama thing automatically thrown in. That and the Church can let something like the Nativity Scene pass. But note there are no St. Da Vinci's, St. Shakespeare's, St. Mozart's or St. Michaelangelo's apart from the latter in the Lutheran church... Message? It's ok for us to PAY you to make art, but we'll never actually let you up on OUR purgatory levels. Survey says? Boo. Boo to that!)

3) I want to be a saint.

I mean, I absolutely suck, but I still would like a shot at it. Of course, that goes back to the whole "I suck" part again. Maybe artists are too aware of their sin to stand up for becomming saints!

4) I'd say the whole saint thing is arguably bogus since it appears to be set up by the "approval" of the Church, but how do you refute the stigmata? Tricky. Very tricky.

5) Mostly, I just want the COMMUNION with God that these saints have. I'm not sure how saints lived these lives, and, even more foreign, is how Christ was able to live HIS perfect life.

Guess it's back to the paper... and back to #1.