Authors-choice: Hope & Revival

I was reading the story of Dolores Hart, a very successful actress who left

Hollywood to become a nun. Wondering what could make someone do such a thing, I breezed through the pages until I came to the part that best explained her eventual decision to become a nun. According to her, the highlight of her career was her part as Clare, in the movie Francis of Assisi, directed by Michael Curtiz.

[This movie is about 1 hour long, but worth everything minute of your time]

Set in the 13th Century, the movie revolved around the life of two young people, Francis and Clare who loved each other. But Francis, the son of rich cloth trader, felt a voice calling him for something higher beckoning him to leave Clare the pretty daughter and all the worldly luxury of his fathers house. He followed the voice, stripping himself of everything to become a beggar friar. Clare rather than flaring up and throwing a tantrum, sought to understand him. She not only let him go, but joined him on his way to God. Thus was born St Francis and St Clare of Assisi. Two people who change the world.

Another character in the movie, a friend of Francis and a knight, lusted after Clare. But rather than keep his love for her sacred, when he realized she was giving her life to God, he took to drinking and having sex with other girls.

Clares steadfast love for Francis, and his undying love for her, even when they knew that they could no longer belong to each other, is a good example for many young people today who are often lost, swept away by the putrid tide of impure lust lashing against them. Many think it is impossible to remain a virgin and keep a boyfriend. This film offers us a clear vision of what true and perfect love looks like. The pure love of youthful Francis and for his pretty girlfriend, Clare opened his eyes to an even greater love, the love of God.

Guys and girls should understand that true love, rather than being an occasion for premarital sex and all sorts of immorality, frees the heart to see the other as a gift and above all to see through the other to gaze on God, the creator, whose love surpasses all.

Girls in romantic relationships, if they can, should go and visit Santa Chiara, the Gothic church that contains the tomb of Saint Clare. Her 708-year-old body was laid out in a glass coffin. It was a wonder to see, uncorrupted and amazingly beautiful. There they will see what pure love has preserved and that the gift of physical beauty is only enhanced when it is used in service of God

As for Dolores, her part in that movie brought her in close contact with Clare. The life of the saint she was about to play could not but make her feel like a false image of the real thing.

“I caught my reflection in a mirror, she said, and I thought, Im the caricature, a dressed-up form of this lady who existed.

Soon after the movie ended, Dolores opted for the real thing and left all that success to enter the convent as a nun and she has now lived there for more than 50 years.

Thanks to 20th century Fox who took great pains to ensure the film was historically and geographically accurate.

By Chinwuba Iyizoba

The Editor