Michael Calabria — The Sultan and St. Francis

The historic 1219 meeting between St. Francis of Assisi and Sultan Malik al-Kamil during the Fifth Crusade is a powerful (and often overlooked) example of peacemaking and respectful dialogue between Christians and Muslims. While most people only know Francis’s side of the story, the Sultan’s openness and courage were just as important. Their surprising friendship still offers a hopeful model today for bridging deep divisions, reducing polarization, and having real conversations across religious and cultural lines.

Fr. Michael Calabria is a Franciscan friar at the Province of Our Lady of Guadalupe and director of the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies at St. Bonaventure University. With more than 40 years of experience in the Middle East and Islamic world, he first fell in love with the region as an Egyptology student doing archaeological w ...