Difference between revisions of "Franciscan Order"

Revision as of 17:22, 19 August 2014

The Franciscan Order - its official title is the Order of Friars Minor (Ordo Fratrum Minorum) - is a religious order within the Roman Catholic church. It is a mendicant order, founded in Italy in 1209 by St. Francis of Assisi (?1181-1226), and its members are sometimes known as Grey Friars from the colour of their habits. There are Franciscan nuns as well as Franciscan friars.

A Capuchin friar is a member of a very strict autonomous branch of the Franciscan Order. The Capuchins are so called because of their distinctive large hood or cowl - cappuccio is the Italian word for 'hood'.

Greyfriars (with or without a space between the two words) is sometimes used as a street name, or for other addresses in older towns, where it commemorates a house of the Order. There is, for example, the church of Greyfriars in Edinburgh, a town famous for having got rid of all such Catholic orders during the Reformation. Greyfriars Kirk, on the contrary, was the site of the initial signing of the Scottish National Covenant in 1638. It gave its name to Greyfriars Bobby, a dog famous for loyalty, it having remained close to its master's grave until its own death - for 14 years.

Greyfriars School is a fictional public school, the setting of the Billy Bunter stories by 'Frank Richards'.

White Friars, similarly, are the Carmelites and Black Friars are Dominicans.