Hereditas Franciscana
"This is the Rule and Life of the Friars Minor, namely: to observe the holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ by living in obedience, without property, and in chastity."
(Rule of St Francis, Chapter I.)
Observant Franciscanism
Franciscan Religious Life according to the Papal Declarations and the inheritance of the Seraphic Father is hard to find today. The three orders founded by St. Francis encompass the First Order that of St. Francis himself, the Second Order of St. Clare, and the Third Order of those primarily remaining in the world.
Who is Saint
Francis of Assisi?
"In union with the numerous Franciscan brotherhood call to mind and praise the works, the virtues, and the spirit of the Seraphic Patriarch. While doing this, they must reject that purely imaginary figure of the Saint conjured up by the defenders of modern error or by the followers of luxury and worldly comforts, and seek to bring Christians to the faithful imitation of the ideal of sanctity which he exemplified in himself and which he learned from the purity and simplicity of the doctrines of the Gospels." (n. 1)
"It seems necessary for Us to affirm that there has never been anyone in whom the image of Jesus Christ and the evangelical manner of life shone forth more lifelike and strikingly than in St. Francis. He who called himself the “Herald of the Great King” was also rightly spoken of as “another Jesus Christ,” appearing to his contemporaries and to future generations almost as if he were the Risen Christ." (n. 2)