After 800 years, why do we still treat St. Francis as a glorified garden gnome?

One of the first things I did when we moved into our semi-furnished rental last year was place a 12-inch concrete statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary — one of the few possessions I’d recovered from the ashes of our house in the Palisades — by the front door.

I thought the place needed a brazenly Catholic touch to counteract the tasteful Westside L.A. “spirituality” already on display: the Native American kitsch, the Henry Miller quote in the powder room, the reclining Buddha in the garden by the front door.

The closer Francis drew to Christ, the more intensely Catholic he became.

Never mind that next to the Buddha the owner had already put one of the Church’s most famous saints: a tonsured St. Francis of Assisi, cradling