Chesterton on St. Francis of Assisi

Our Greater Wichita Chesterton Society group gathers on the second floor of Eighth Day Books this Friday at 6:30 p.m. to begin G.K.C.'s book about St. Francis of Assisi. Dale Ahlquist of the American Chesterton Society comments on the book:

Chesterton’s ten “biographies” are more like commentaries rather than accounts of the life and work of their subjects. Heavy on the analysis, light on the narrative. Even lighter on the facts. His subjects sometimes even appear to be secondary to the larger themes he wishes to discuss. His book on St. Francis, however, is unlike any of his other biographies. There are many more facts. The narrative is quite straightforward and highly dramatic. The analysis is supportive rather than overwhelming. Chesterton’s other biographies are really overwhelmed by Chesterton (which, in most cases, is what we would prefer); this one, however, is rightly filled to overflowing by the great saint of Assisi. Chesterton not only gets St. Francis to speak for himself, he does it in the way the little friar would have preferred: by conveying not his words, but his life. Chesterton describes St. Francis as “a poet whose whole life was a poem.”

This is the first real book written after Chesterton’s reception into the Catholic Church, the others being collections of poems, essays, and mysteries. Yet, we cannot sense much transition in Chesterton’s writing. One reason is that his conversion was the culmination of a long steady process in which he never really changed his way of thinking. It was more of a full flowering of all the ideas he had him. There is another reason, and it has to do with St. Francis. Chesterton had always admired this saint. Francis, he says, and “never been a stranger” to him and was like a bridge connecting Chesterton’s early literary life with the later.

St. Francis is one of the most popular saints and one of the most misunderstood. Chesterton says the world appreciates the saint but not the sanctity.

We are reading the Ignatius Press edition (available at Eighth Day Books) that includes Chesterton's study of St. Thomas Aquinas: at our first meeting we'll discuss the Introduction by Joseph Pearce and the first chapter, "The Problem of St. Francis". Refreshments will be served.

St. Francis of Assisi and the English Franciscans: 1224 to 2016

On this feast of St. Francis of Assisi, who is probably one of the most popular saints inside and outside of the Catholic Church, some background on the Franciscans in England. According to this site:

In 1224 Francis decided to send some friars to England and appointed Agnellus of Pisa to lead a small expedition. On Tuesday, 10 September of the same year, a small boat landed near Dover and nine roughly-dressed figures disembarked, and so the Franciscan Order was implanted in England. The nine friars were led by an Italian, Agnellus of Pisa, who had previously been Custos in Paris. It included three Englishmen who had joined the Order, probably in Paris where many Englishmen of the time went to study, five Italians and one Frenchman. Within seven weeks of arrival they had established friaries in Canterbury, London and Oxford, the ecclesiastical, political and intellectual capitals of England.

The order grew and grew in England, Wales and Scotland, and its members contributed greatly to intellectual developments:

Of all the activities of the Friars in England perhaps it is the Intellectual Tradition which most stands out in the Order. One German historian, Hilarin Felder, said that, apart from St. Bonaventure, all the major contributors to the Franciscan Intellectual Tradition were from the Province of England. The friary at Oxford was founded in 1224 and the friary at Cambridge in 1226. Agnellus of Pisa arranged for Robert Grosseteste (1168-1253), Bishop of Lincoln, to be the first teacher of theology to the Friars. Grosseteste was one of the leading thinkers of his day. The Franciscan involvement at Oxford would change the intellectual face of Europe. The Franciscan Oxford tradition is a veritable Who’s Who of intellectual giants, not just in the Order, but in the history of Western Thought: Adam Marsh (d. 1259), Thomas of York (d. 1260), first Franciscan lecturer at Cambridge, Richard Rufus of Cornwall, (d. c.1260-61), Roger Marston (1235-1303), William of Ware (who may have taught Duns Scotus) (f. 1270-1300), Roger Bacon (1214-1294), John Duns Scotus (1266-1308), William of Ockham (1285-1349), John of Peckham (1240-1292), who would later become Archbishop of Canterbury and is entombed within the magnificent splendour of Canterbury Cathedral. 

Then, of course, came the English Reformation:

The Observants were staunch defenders of Henry's marriage to Catherine and of the Supremacy of the Pope over the entire Church. One of the friars, Elstow, even preached against Henry's divorce in the presence of the King, showing great courage and gaining a spell in prison for his pains. Consequently the Observants were the first religious to be attacked by Henry and, when they refused to be cowed, the first to be suppressed in 1534. Some were imprisoned, Bl. John Forest was martyred and many Observants went into exile to Pontoise, Paris. In 1555-1559, the friary at Greenwich was restored under Queen Mary, who remembered the friars' loyalty to her mother, but this friary was suppressed again only four years later in 1559 by Elizabeth I. In 1559 the Observants scattered to Scotland, Pontoise and the Low Countries, although there were always those who remained in hiding in England to minister to the Catholic faithful in the years of persecution.

And the other Franciscan martyrs:

This missionary spirit was watered by the blood of the Province's martyrs. There has never been any period since 1224 when there have not been Franciscans in Britain, even throughout the times of persecution. The Province has given martyrs to the Church and many confessors who were imprisoned and persecuted for their faith. Bl. John Forest was martyred under Henry VIII, St. John Jones (1559-1598) died at St. Thomas’ Waterings, South London, on July 12th 1598 during the reign of Elizabeth I. In the time of the Commonwealth between 1642 and 1646 Bl. Thomas Bullaker, Henry Heath, Francis Bell and John Woodcock were hanged, drawn and quartered. St. John Wall was martyred in 1679 during the hysteria occasioned by the perjuries of Titus Oates. Several other friars died in prison and many more suffered periods of imprisonment in serving the Catholic population of England during the penal years. 

The order expanded in the nineteenth century after 1850, but then had to retrench so as to make sure "that there are always enough Friars in a house to live an optimal fraternal life": 

At present there are friaries in: Canterbury, Clevedon, Edinburgh (Craigmillar), Glasgow, Stratford and Woodford. Most of these friaries minister to parish communities and reach out from there to the wider Church in collaboration with the lay people of the parishes as well as the members of the wider Franciscan family. At Canterbury the Friars run a Study Centre with an international reputation that continues the intellectual tradition of the Custody.

St. Francis of Assisi, pray for us.
St. Clare of Assisi, pray for us.
St. John Jones, pray for us.
St. John Wall, pray for us.
Blessed John Forest, pray for us.
Blessed Thomas Bullaker, pray for us.
Blessed Henry Heath, pray for us.
Blessed Francis Bell, pray for us.
Blessed John Woodcock, pray for us.

Image: The Ecstasy of St. Francis, Stefano di Giovanni (1392–1450)

St. Martin of Tours versus St. Francis of Assisi

Via Louisa May Alcott:

Rose in Bloom contains an extended discussion of saints and devotion when Rose and her cousin Charlie debate the merits of St. Francis of Assisi and St. Martin of Tours:

"Some of my saints here were people of one idea, and though they were not very successful from a worldly point of view while alive, they were loved and canonized when dead," said Rose, who had been turning over a pile of photographs on the table and just then found her favorite, St. Francis, among them.

"This is more to my taste. Those worn-out, cadaverous fellows give me the blues, but here's a gentlemanly saint who takes things easy and does good as he goes along without howling over his own sins or making other people miserable by telling them of theirs." And Charlie laid a handsome St. Martin beside the brown-frocked monk.

Rose looked at both and understood why her cousin preferred the soldierly figure with the sword to the ascetic with his crucifix. One was riding bravely through the world in purple and fine linen, with horse and hound and squires at his back; and the other was in a lazar-house, praying over the dead and dying. The contrast was a strong one, and the girl's eyes lingered longest on the knight, though she said thoughtfully, "Yours is certainly the pleasantest and yet I never heard of any good deed he did, except divide his cloak with a beggar, while St. Francis gave himself to charity just when life was most tempting and spent years working for God without reward. He's old and poor, and in a dreadful place, but I won't give him up, and you may have your gay St. Martin if you want him."

"No, thank you, saints are not in my line but I'd like the golden-haired angel in the blue gown if you'll let me have her. She shall be my little Madonna, and I'll pray to her like a good Catholic," answered Charlie, turning to the delicate, deep-eyed figure with the lilies in its hand.

"With all my heart, and any others that you like. Choose some for your mother and give them to her with my love."

So Charlie sat down beside Rose to turn and talk over the pictures for a long and pleasant hour. But when they went away to lunch, if there had been anyone to observe so small but significant a trifle, good St. Francis lay face downward behind the sofa, while gallant St. Martin stood erect upon the chimneypiece.

As this site notes, however, St. Martin of Tours did much more than divide his cloak:

He was ordained an exorcist and worked with great zeal against the Arians. He became a monk, living first at Milan and later on a small island. When Hilary was restored to his see after exile, Martin returned to France and established what may have been the first French monastery near Poitiers. He lived there for 10 years, forming his disciples and preaching throughout the countryside.

The people of Tours demanded that he become their bishop. He was drawn to that city by a ruse—the need of a sick person—and was brought to the church, where he reluctantly allowed himself to be consecrated bishop. Some of the consecrating bishops thought his rumpled appearance and unkempt hair indicated that he was not dignified enough for the office.

Along with St. Ambrose, Martin rejected Bishop Ithacius’s principle of putting heretics to death—as well as the intrusion of the emperor into such matters. He prevailed upon the emperor to spare the life of the heretic Priscillian. For his efforts, Martin was accused of the same heresy, and Priscillian was executed after all. Martin then pleaded for a cessation of the persecution of Priscillian’s followers in Spain. He still felt he could cooperate with Ithacius in other areas, but afterwards his conscience troubled him about this decision.

As death approached, his followers begged him not to leave them. He prayed, "Lord, if your people still need me, I do not refuse the work. Your will be done."

Louisa May Alcott, RIP

Louisa May Alcott died on March 6, 1888. I read my first copy of Little Women (actually an abridged edition of  Little Women and Good Wives from Whitman Classics) so much when I was a child that the book fell apart. Sections of it fell out and I had to use a rubber band to keep the book together! (The image above is the cover of a recent Penguin edition.)

I also read Little Men, Jo's Boys, Eight Cousins, Rose in Bloom, Under the Lilacs, Jack and Jill, Hospital Sketches, and An Old Fashioned Girl. Several years ago, I investigated her Gothic novels and other fiction: A Long Fatal Love Chase (guess how that book ends!), Behind a Mask, The Inheritance, and Moods.

In Little Women and a few of the other children's books I noticed how Alcott sometimes used Catholic devotions. If you read Little Women you might remember when Amy has to stay at Aunt March's mansion while Beth is home ill with scarlet fever. Aunt March's French maid Esther tells her a little about the Rosary and urges Amy to set aside a place and take time every day for some meditation and prayer. Amy does pray in her chapel, but certainly does not use the Rosary Esther gives her, "feeling doubtful as to its fitness for Protestant prayers."

Rose in Bloom contains an extended discussion of saints and devotion when Rose and her cousin Charlie debate the merits of St. Francis of Assisi and St. Martin of Tours:

"Some of my saints here were people of one idea, and though they were not very successful from a worldly point of view while alive, they were loved and canonized when dead," said Rose, who had been turning over a pile of photographs on the table and just then found her favorite, St. Francis, among them.

"This is more to my taste. Those worn-out, cadaverous fellows give me the blues, but here's a gentlemanly saint who takes things easy and does good as he goes along without howling over his own sins or making other people miserable by telling them of theirs." And Charlie laid a handsome St. Martin beside the brown-frocked monk.

Rose looked at both and understood why her cousin preferred the soldierly figure with the sword to the ascetic with his crucifix. One was riding bravely through the world in purple and fine linen, with horse and hound and squires at his back; and the other was in a lazar-house, praying over the dead and dying. The contrast was a strong one, and the girl's eyes lingered longest on the knight, though she said thoughtfully, "Yours is certainly the pleasantest and yet I never heard of any good deed he did, except divide his cloak with a beggar, while St. Francis gave himself to charity just when life was most tempting and spent years working for God without reward. He's old and poor, and in a dreadful place, but I won't give him up, and you may have your gay St. Martin if you want him."

"No, thank you, saints are not in my line but I'd like the golden-haired angel in the blue gown if you'll let me have her. She shall be my little Madonna, and I'll pray to her like a good Catholic," answered Charlie, turning to the delicate, deep-eyed figure with the lilies in its hand.

"With all my heart, and any others that you like. Choose some for your mother and give them to her with my love."

So Charlie sat down beside Rose to turn and talk over the pictures for a long and pleasant hour. But when they went away to lunch, if there had been anyone to observe so small but significant a trifle, good St. Francis lay face downward behind the sofa, while gallant St. Martin stood erect upon the chimneypiece.

And later in the same novel, one of Rose's other cousins, Mac, compares Rose to the Blessed Virgin Mary:

"Lead Rosa--I'm going to take this child home, and if Uncle is willing, I'll adopt her, and she shall be happy!" cried Rose, with the sudden glow of feeling that always made her lovely. And gathering poor baby close, she went on her way like a modern Britomart, ready to redress the wrongs of any who had need of her.

As he led the slowly stepping horse along the quiet road, Mac could not help thinking that they looked a little like the Flight into Egypt, but he did not say so, being a reverent youth--only glanced back now and then at the figure above him, for Rose had taken off her hat to keep the light from baby's eyes and sat with the sunshine turning her uncovered hair to gold as she looked down at the little creature resting on the saddle before her with the sweet thoughtfulness one sees in some of Correggio's young Madonnas.

These references to saints and Madonnas coming from a Unitarian Universalist are rather surprising. Certainly when you know more about St. Martin of Tours than Rose (or Alcott), the contrast she and Charlie see between them is confusing. St. Martin of Tours, hermit and then bishop, certainly spent his days after that one gesture in the same efforts as St. Francis of Assisi, whom Alcott mistakenly calls a monk (when he was a friar). Notice too the emphasis on charity and works. Alcott's novels for young girls are filled with calls to charity for the poor, efforts for the abandoned and the orphaned. As this site notes, Alcott's Unitarian background emphasized duty far above the "outward forms and rite of religion":

When Louisa May Alcott was a young woman trying to find work in Boston, she met the Rev. Theodore Parker, a Unitarian minister. He and his wife were very helpful to her. She attended his Sunday Services and his evening discussion groups. Louisa May Alcott's [1888] biographer, Ednah D. Cheney, writes the following about Louisa's religion:

"In her journal at this time she speaks of her religious feelings, which the experiences of grief and despair and reviving hope had deepened. Louisa Alcott's was a truly religious soul; she always lived in the consciousness of a Higher Power sustaining and blessing her, whose presence was revealed to her through Nature, through the inspired words of great thinkers and the deep experiences of her own heart. She never led her life as an isolated possession which she was free to use for her own enjoyment or glory. Her father truly called her 'Duty's faithful child', and her life was consecrated to the duty she recognized as specially hers. But for outward forms and rites of religion she cared little; her home was sacred to her, and she found her best life there. She loved Theodore Parker, and found great strength and help from his preaching, and afterward liked to listen to Dr. Bartol; but she never joined any church."

Since she did not practice the ritual aspect of religion--not joining any church--Alcott unfortunately did not understand Catholic devotion. She depicts a rather romanticized and aesthetic view of Catholicism, at least when reflecting on prayers and devotions. Nevertheless, I enjoyed her books very much when I read and re-read them so many years ago.

Blessed John Henry Newman on Preaching and Words

I am sure you have heard the statement often attributed to St. Francis of Assisi: "Preach the Gospel at all times. Use words if necessary." As this blog notes, it can be cited with a certain edge and even a semi-political tone:

It is always attributed to St. Francis of Assisi---founder of the Franciscan Order---and is intended to say that proclaiming the Gospel by example is more virtuous than actually proclaiming with voice. It is a quote that has often rankled me because it seems to create a useless dichotomy between speech and action. Besides, the spirit behind it can be a little arrogant, intimating that those who "practice the Gospel" are more faithful to the faith than those who preach it.

And, of course, St. Francis never said it. But in using the book compiled by Father Benedict Groeschel, Praying to Our Lord Jesus Christ, particularly during my weekly hour of adoration of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, I re-read (re-prayed?) this prayer by Blessed John Henry Newman, in which the English saint goes even further in contrasting actions and words in preaching, in the circumstances of everyday life:

"Make me preach you without preaching-not by words, but by my example and by the catching force, the sympathetic influence, of what I do - by my visible resemblance to your saints, and the evident fullness of the love which my heart bears to you."

Without over-analyzing the prayer, I would comment that this is an emblem of Newman's motto as Cardinal, "Cor ad cor loquitor"--"Heart Speaks to Heart", a motto he borrowed from St. Francis de Sales. Recalling that Blessed John Henry Newman, particularly because of the Parochial and Plain Sermons collected from his years as an Anglican, is known as a great preacher, means that Newman meant that this is true: he should preach without preaching at all. Knowing that he also did preach by preaching means that formal preaching and teaching is required, but this personal, heart-to-heart example and influence is essential.

The entire prayer, "Jesus the Light of the Soul" from Meditations and Devotions:

Stay with me, and then I shall begin to shine as you shine: so to shine as to be a light to others. The light, O Jesus, will be all from you. None of it will be mine. No merit to me. It will be you who shines through me upon others. O let me thus praise you, in the way which you do love best, by shining on all those around me. Give light to them as well as to me; light them with me, through me. Teach me to show forth your praise, your truth, your will. Make me preach you without preaching-not by words, but by my example and by the catching force, the sympathetic influence, of what I do - by my visible resemblance to your saints, and the evident fullness of the love which my heart bears to you.

Father Groeschel's collection of prayers from the early Church to the twentieth century, from the martyrs to Blessed John Paul II, from the Fathers of the Church through the saints of the Middle Ages and each age of Church, is not really a book to be read through, since it's a book of prayers to inspire prayer and meditation. I am, however, reading the introductions to the sections as an excellent survey of the history of spirituality.

Rereading MR. BLUE

Mr. Blue is a novella by Myles Connolly, screenwriter and editor of The Knights of Columbus Columbia magazine (in fact, during the Cristiada era in Mexico). I first read Mr. Blue while attending Kapaun-Mt. Carmel High School; Sister Eustacia had a list of extra reading, which included some Catholic classics -- she also had Sheila Kaye-Smith's Superstition Corner on that list (but that's another post!)

Loyola Classics brought out a new paperback edition a few years ago with an introduction by John Breslin, SJ. Father Breslin points out two disparate models for the character J. Blue--G.K. Chesterton's St. Francis of Assisi and F. Scott Fitzgerald's Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby. Father Breslin offers more thoughts on J. Blue and the novel here:

Recently, I read Mr. Blue again, and I have come to realize that the character of Blue must also have appealed to us all, and to countless other readers, because he was a uniquely American personality. As Myles Connolly wrote him, J. Blue was the man that the ambitious Jay Gatsby might have become had he steered by a higher truth than the sound of money in Daisy Buchanan's voice.


It is hard to overestimate G. K. Chesterton's effect on several generations of young Catholic intellectuals-in-the-making. He took on the modern world with all its scientific works and philosophical pomps in the name of a reimagined Christendom, alive with story and redolent of paradox. "To have fallen into any of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian Science would indeed have been obvious and tame," he wrote in Orthodoxy. "But to have avoided them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect. . . . There are an infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands."


Chesterton's method was simple but brilliantly realized: One by one he raised and demolished, often through ridicule or humor, the suppositions of pseudoscience and the secular nostrums of the educated classes. In response to the Freudian notion that Gothic spires were phallic symbols, Chesterton sagely agreed; otherwise, he deadpanned, they would surely have been built upside down.


Chesterton saw himself as an apostle of affirmation in a world gone gray. At the same time, he threw open doors and windows in a Church that seemed cautious to a fault and not very interested in new ideas. The Council of Trent had settled all the important questions four centuries before, but G. K. made orthodoxy exciting, even dangerous. Rather than viewing it as a straitjacket that stifled Christian theology, he preferred to see orthodoxy as a glorious balancing act and spoke of its "romance." Myles Connolly made young Mr. Blue its ardent embodiment.

I re-read it last week myself, and found Breslin's frame of reference very helpful. The part of the novella I remember having a great impact when I first read it was J. Blue's idea for a movie about a dystopian future where Christianity and free will have been obliterated--one man, a mere number in his cell, turns out to be a Catholic priest celebrating the Last Mass on Earth even as the world comes to an end and Jesus returns.

(BTW: I am not very happy with the new blogger interface as it adds spaces between paragraphs; after awhile, I give up the struggle to take them away! I apologize for the odd spacing.)

The Franciscans in England: Intellectuals and Martyrs

An image of Bl. Agnellus of Pisa (1195 - 1236), appointed by St Francis to be the first Minister Provincial of England (from the Franciscan Province of Great Britain website)

On this feast of St. Francis of Assisi, who is probably one of the most popular saints inside and outside of the Catholic Church, some background on the Franciscans in England. According to this site:

In 1224 Francis decided to send some friars to England and appointed Agnellus of Pisa to lead a small expedition. On Tuesday, 10 September of the same year, a small boat landed near Dover and nine roughly-dressed figures disembarked, and so the Franciscan Order was implanted in England. The nine friars were led by an Italian, Agnellus of Pisa, who had previously been Custos in Paris. It included three Englishmen who had joined the Order, probably in Paris where many Englishmen of the time went to study, five Italians and one Frenchman. Within seven weeks of arrival they had established friaries in Canterbury, London and Oxford, the ecclesiastical, political and intellectual capitals of England.

Dom David Knowles described the early life of the Franciscans in his book Saints and Scholars when describing the life of Thomas of Eccleston. Those first groups demonstrated St. Francis's radical poverty and became very popular because of it, after the initial misunderstanding.

The order grew and grew in England, Wales and Scotland, and its members contributed greatly to intellectual developments:

Of all the activities of the Friars in England perhaps it is the Intellectual Tradition which most stands out in the Order. One German historian, Hilarin Felder, said that, apart from St. Bonaventure, all the major contributors to the Franciscan Intellectual Tradition were from the Province of England. The friary at Oxford was founded in 1224 and the friary at Cambridge in 1226. Agnellus of Pisa arranged for Robert Grosseteste (1168-1253), Bishop of Lincoln, to be the first teacher of theology to the Friars. Grosseteste was one of the leading thinkers of his day. The Franciscan involvement at Oxford would change the intellectual face of Europe. The Franciscan Oxford tradition is a veritable Who’s Who of intellectual giants, not just in the Order, but in the history of Western Thought: Adam Marsh (d. 1259), Thomas of York (d. 1260), first Franciscan lecturer at Cambridge, Richard Rufus of Cornwall, (d. c.1260-61), Roger Marston (1235-1303), William of Ware (who may have taught Duns Scotus) (f. 1270-1300), Roger Bacon (1214-1294), John Duns Scotus (1266-1308), William of Ockham (1285-1349), John of Peckham (1240-1292), who would later become Archbishop of Canterbury and is entombed within the magnificent splendour of Canterbury Cathedral.

Then, of course, came the English Reformation:

The Observants were staunch defenders of Henry's marriage to Catherine and of the Supremacy of the Pope over the entire Church. One of the friars, Elstow, even preached against Henry's divorce in the presence of the King, showing great courage and gaining a spell in prison for his pains. Consequently the Observants were the first religious to be attacked by Henry and, when they refused to be cowed, the first to be suppressed in 1534. Some were imprisoned, Bl. John Forest was martyred and many Observants went into exile to Pontoise, Paris. In 1555-1559, the friary at Greenwich was restored under Queen Mary, who remembered the friars' loyalty to her mother, but this friary was suppressed again only four years later in 1559 by Elizabeth I. In 1559 the Observants scattered to Scotland, Pontoise and the Low Countries, although there were always those who remained in hiding in England to minister to the Catholic faithful in the years of persecution.

And the other Franciscan martyrs:

This missionary spirit was watered by the blood of the Province's martyrs. There has never been any period since 1224 when there have not been Franciscans in Britain, even throughout the times of persecution. The Province has given martyrs to the Church and many confessors who were imprisoned and persecuted for their faith. Bl. John Forest was martyred under Henry VIII, St. John Jones (1559-1598) died at St. Thomas’ Waterings, South London, on July 12th 1598 during the reign of Elizabeth I. In the time of the Commonwealth between 1642 and 1646 Bl. Thomas Bullaker, Henry Heath, Francis Bell and John Woodcock were hanged, drawn and quartered. St. John Wall was martyred in 1679 during the hysteria occasioned by the perjuries of Titus Oates. Several other friars died in prison and many more suffered periods of imprisonment in serving the Catholic population of England during the penal years.

The order expanded in the nineteenth century after 1850, and

At present there are friaries in: Canterbury, Clevedon, Cold Ash, Edinburgh (Craigmillar), Glasgow, Nottingham, Stratford and Woodford. Most of these friaries minister to parish communities and reach out from there to the wider Church in collaboration with the lay people of the parishes as well as the members of the wider Franciscan family. At Canterbury the friars run a Study Centre with an international reputation that continues the intellectual tradition of the Province.

St. Clare and the Poor Clares in England

Today is the feast of St. Clare, who followed St. Francis's devotion to poverty more closely than any of his other disciples.

The Poor Clares were in England before the Reformation, of course. The Abbey of the Order of St Clare, for example, was located in Aldgate on the eastern edge of London. The Abbey was surrendered in 1539. Venerable Mary Ward established an English convent of Poor Clares in Gravelines, Spanish Netherlands in 1607. During the French Revolution, the nuns of that house had to leave France. They came to England in 1795.

Here is a sad story from earlier this year in The Catholic Herald about the closing of a Poor Clare convent after 160 years:

The Poor Clares were founded by St Clare of Assisi and St Francis of Assisi on Palm Sunday in the year 1212 and spread throughout Europe. Their primary vocation was a contemplative life to pray in seclusion for the needs of the world. At Baddesley Clinton the Poor Clares were also involved in running a local school.

In 1850 a group of six Sisters arrived in Warwickshire from Bruges and the Poor Clare community of Baddesley Clinton was the first community of Poor Clares of the Colettine Reform to be re-established in England after the Reformation.

The community had close links with Blessed John Henry Newman, who lived in the Oratory House in Edgbaston, Birmingham. This holy parish priest used to visit the Sisters and bring provisions given by his parishioners – they used to leave these in a box at the back of the church situated next to the Oratory House.

The Sisters were poor and Cardinal Newman brought other gifts, including Christmas and Easter hampers at his own expense.

Sister Felicity, Reverend Mother Abbess, and two members of the Poor Clare Community at Baddesley Clinton, attended the beatification of Blessed John Henry Newman by Pope Benedict XVI during Mass at Cofton Park, Birmingham, on September 19 2010.