15 days of Prayer with Saint Clare of Assisi
Marie-France Becker
Pacelli Millane (Translator)
ISBN 9781565483712
ISBN 9781565484054
ASIN B004M18UHS
Last year I stumbled upon a different volume in this series, 15 Days of Prayer with Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati by Père Charles Desjobert, OP, and really enjoyed it. I did some research on the series and this was the thirteenth volume I have worked through. In my research to date there have been at least 40 volumes in this series. Many written in French and then translated, including this volume, this book was first published in French in 2001, the English edition appeared 2011. Then in 2010 the series were rebranded, this is one of only a handful with digital copies currently available. There appears to be a French reprint from 2026 listing it as number 55 in the series.
I believe as of the writing of this review there have been 40 volumes in the series; the earliest I found was from 1999 through to a volume which was published in 2025 in English. Only about a dozen seem to be in print currently and of those only a handful appears to have eBooks. With my dual form of dyslexia this is disappointing. I greatly prefer eBooks so I can change the font, and the colour of font and page to make reading easier. I have added all the eBook editions I could find to my wish list. About the Series we are informed:
“15 Days of Prayer Series
On a journey, it’s good to have a guide. Even great saints took spiritual directors or confessors with them on their itineraries toward sanctity. Now you can be guided by the most influential spiritual figures of all time. The 15 Days of Prayer series introduces their deepest and most personal thoughts.
This popular series is perfect if you are looking for a gift, or if you want to be introduced to a particular guide and his or her spirituality. Each volume contains:
• A brief biography of the saint or spiritual leader
• A guide to creating a format for prayer or retreat
• Fifteen meditation sessions with reflection guides”
The description of this specific volume states:
“To enter into a relationship with Clare of Assisi for fifteen days is to race along carried by the momentum of a woman burning with love. What a paradox: the cloister of Saint Damian -- closed in upon itself -- opens to the infinite. Clare, a pilgrim of the interior adventure, always re-directs her readers onto the road towards the Lord. The loving kenosis of Christ captivates her and incites her to a Passover, brisk as a dance step, on the path of happiness. The love that fills Clare with life springs forth like a fountain in her heart.”
There is no ‘about the author’ section in the book or on the back. But we are informed on the page with the book description that:
“Marie-France Becker, a Poor Clare in the Monastery of Malonne (Belgium) for forty years, is internationally known for her work on the writings of Clare of Assisi. Occasionally, she facilitates conferences or retreats based upon Clare of Assisis spirituality."
The chapters in this volume are:
How to Use This Book
Presentation of Sources
Abbreviations
A Fountain of Light
Become What You Contemplate
1. Receive from Godand Trust in Him
2. Receive God from Others
3. Cling to God
4. Contemplate the Morning
5. Contemplate the Day
6. Contemplate the Evening
7. Desire Jesus
8. Receive Some Persons to Love
9. Allow Yourself to Be Transformed
10. Become Listening
11. Become Love
12. Become Prayer
13. Become Free
14. Become Life
15. Become Blessing
Envoy
Sources to Know Clare of Assisi
Chronology
Also available in the “15 Days of Prayer” series:
I highlighted a few of passages while reading this volume some of them are:
“At the heart of this friendship, which progressively binds them, they share the fire which lives in them: the love of this poor God who came hidden in the history of humanity.”
“But we would like to pass these fifteen days with Clare of Assisi. She leads us, it is true, in a quest of God. To walk beside her, is to begin. And more than a walk! The search for God often takes the pace of a light walk.”
“is not a question to leave the everyday to go to God, but that the everyday is carried into the prayer by accepting that God sends us there and to work as he wishes.”
“It is the astonishment before a Presence who calls us into existence and before a Love who desires to create us by clothing us again with His beauty and benevolence.”
“Praise and thanksgiving place us in the truth of who, sometimes, we are: disfigured creatures, often wounded but loved, while receiving the grace of being and of rebirth each moment.”
““Always remember your beginning,” this will not allow us to waste our life in familiar routines. The footprints of yesterday allow us to pose those of today and tomorrow with confidence and courage to triumph over obstacles.”
“His desire of communion with us makes him, the Poor One. He mercifully makes his way through our desertions, our resistances, our refusals to accord him love for love and to attach ourselves to him in tenderness and fidelity.”
“Can you remember the starry hours of your life? Toward what have they oriented your path? Do you nourish this memory? How? When your steps become heavy, what enables you to find some lightness? How do the words, the life and the death of the Son of God enlighten your own road?”
“The mirror is Jesus, who at the same time, shows us who is God and reveals our unique beauty to us.”
“In her Testament, as she recalls her choice of poverty, she will exhort the sisters to remain faithful out of love for the God Who was placed poor in the crib, lived poor in the world, and remained naked on the cross (TestCl 45).”
“Jesus’ incarnation remains the way chosen by God to tell us the value that we have in his eyes and thus, to reveal to us our own grandeur. From the crib to the cross, the Most High espouses our fragile humanity and rejoins it beyond its incapacity to love.”
“Our prayer, will it cleanse our gaze to discover, even in the most lifeless hours, the luminous shadow of a God of humility?”
“The prayer before the Crucified is an exchange. The charity of the Son of God, during the hour of the Passion and death, is not a reality which we can contemplate while remaining exterior to the drama without taking the risk of simply being engaged there as actors.”
“Our dullness of spirit, our failures as well as our wanderings are not obstacles to our encounter with the Beloved. If, in the daily compost where we live, we hear the desire of Jesus rise in our heart and respond to him in the simplicity of faith, we discover, little by little, the good fortune of the poor whom he fills with his riches.”
“Respect, sweetness and wonder inhabit it and establish it in the course of the journey as a mysterious communion of souls. It is the same when we keep ourselves before Jesus. In the transforming strength born of love, we are recreated and we are reborn to our true being.”
“In the course of the years, with the patience of time and persevering prayer, Jesus becomes closer to us and more familiar. Progressively, we become familiar with the traits of his face. Contemplation carries its fruit.”
“He sometimes read the Sacred Books, and whatever he once put into his mind, he wrote indelibly in his heart. His memory took the place of books, Because, if he heard something once, it was not wasted, as his heart would mull it over with constant devotion (2Cel 102).”
“However, she never yields to the temptation of a rupture. The Church remains the community where she lives her faith and in which she receives the Word and Bread for the road. She wants to be faithful to Jesus in a communion of responsible obedience.”
“He desires us to be partners of a covenant where, risen in received and shared love, we become capable of ordering the values which make us live and grow in the recognition of the Source who gives us existence.”
“In recalling to us the ultimate aim of our life which is to sing of God, Clare sends us back to the body, a humble instrument placed at our disposition and upon which we play beautiful music.”
“Be well, confess the goodness of the Lord by seasoning your asceticism and your renouncements with a grain of wisdom. Dispossession of self in thanksgiving is a sign of spiritual health. Adjust your fasting and privations according to your fragility and your corporal weaknesses. Because the living, the living, alone praise the Lord of life today (Is 38: 19).”
“How can asceticism be in the service of Life? When is it trapped? What connection do you find between spiritual health and physical health? “A happy sobriety”: what does this expression evoke for you? What makes you a truly living human being, standing happy and free? If God awaits a life of praise from you, in what must you be vigilant?”
“Prayer rooted in the goodness of God takes hold of the persons and the things bathed in the ever gratuitous love of the Father of Mercies. It responds in echo to his blessing, making rise toward him every blessing, the song of the poor fulfilled by divine friendship.”
Over the years I have read a number of volumes about Clare and Francis of Assisi. This was a great volume to work through. I enjoyed the many excerpts from Clare’s letters. And the way the volume was composed. But I will state the eBook formatting needs a lot of improvement. Inconsistency in font spacing and size, and that there are no page breaks after the ‘Reflection Questions’ at the end of one chapter and the beginning of the next. The lines for chapter heading even touch those from the end of the mentioned section. Eight of the 13 I have read to date have been digital editions, but this is the only one with the formatting issues.
This is a great volume in an excellent series. Spending these 15 days with Saint Clare of Assisi was inspiring. The written reflections and the discussion questions were engaging. I just really wish all of the 40 volumes were available as eBooks, I would work through them all if so.
An excellent read in a great series!
Note: This book is part of a series of reviews: 2026 Catholic Reading Plan!
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15 days of Prayer with Saint Clare of Assisi - Marie-France Becker
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