Franciscan Friars of the Renewal

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When we do God’s will, vocations come. It’s that simple. My first cousin is a Dominican nun in Nashville. There’s a waiting list of young girls to get in. A few years ago, they had so many they decided they had to expand their facilities, which were a beautiful pre-Civil War hospital with 18’ ceilings, etc.! All they did was leak the word out that they needed to expand, then prayed. This was around August of that year, I think. By December, they had a couple of million donated, if I recall correctly. Also, those dioceses that are faithful and do what is right have sufficien vocations. Those who are liberal and want to do things their way rather than the Church’s way, are very wanting for vocations.
 
The desertnuns.com are growing too, they are trying to build a monastary to hold more vocations…if you go on their web site, you can see how it’s coming.
If anyone wants to support their “nun run” coming up, you can still contribute as a 'shadow runner".
 
It is more accurate to measure the rate of the Final Professions than the number of postulants or new novices. The Friars do seem to be growing rapidly; as JREducation has pointed out, men appear to be drawn to the Franciscans and radical poverty, but the rapid growth among women’s orders appears confined to only a few–the two Dominican teaching orders in Nashville and Ann Arbor; the Sisters Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara, though their website does not list final professions, their novitiate is large, and possibly the Salesian Sisters. Other orders with large novitiates, the Sisters of Life and the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal, appear to produce few Final Professions, two Sisters of Life and one Franciscan last year. Young women have always been drawn to teaching. The teaching orders were always the largest; this may explain the grown of the two Dominican teaching orders.
 
I believe this phenomenon may be a cultural one. I believe that American women are very different, in this respect, from African, South American, European and Asian women. In these other Churches, the number of women religious in mendicant communities is overwhelming. That is not the case in the USA. In the USA the growth seems to be among the teaching Dominicans and the enclosed Franciscans, Poor Clares. I’m not sure I understand the reason for this difference.

On the other hand, in the USA we’re seeing an explosion among Franciscan men. The Franciscan orders of men are continuously sub-dividing to accommodate the large number of men who are all attracted to the discipline, asceticism and poverty of the Franciscan charism, while at the same time, we (me included) are attracted to specific Franciscan ministries.

My community (Franciscan Brothers of Penance) is an off-shoot of the Capuchins and the Secular Franciscans. We were founded by two Caps and three SFOs. We have grown from five to 96 in 15 years. Now we’re giving birth to a new foundation, the Franciscan Brothers of Life. Even though it’s still in the discernment stage, in less than one year we have had over 100 inquiries from men and we have six aspirants. This community has yet to go through all the steps to canonical erection. But there is a desire on the part of men to live the mendicant life that is not as common among women in the USA. What is most interesting is that these men come from very different backgrounds.

I have a theory that what is helping the Franciscans, the Friars of the Renewal and others, is the withdrawal from parish life and the shift in focus from priesthood back to consecrated life. We still ordain some friars, but it’s no longer a given. There is that return to the original intention of St. Francis, the erection of a brotherhood of men who have many gifts and diverse ministries. And like the original intention of St. Francis, there is a preference for ministry on the street, with the most vulnerable, preaching, hermitages and most of all the conversion of Catholics. St. Francis deliberately told his first brothers not to ask for parishes and to avoid them. He did not want his brothers to be tied down to priestly work. They would lose their identity as brothers and their identity as minors, because parish work places you in a position of authority. This was to be avoided at all costs. Today, the renewal within the male branch of the Franciscan family focuses on brotherhood and minority. Men find this attractive. I should say that they find it attractive because Christ gives them this grace or this awareness of the need for this kind of life.

We live in such a confused world, that it makes sense that Christ would once again use the spirit of St. Francis to restore some sense of order to the Church. He did it once and it worked. I guess that God figures that if it worked once, it will work again. What is most interesting is that many of these friars have been very instrumental in educating and promoting vocations to the secular priesthood. Like the original friars, the friars today are staying away from parish work, but are promoting vocations in that direction. I think this attracts men, the ability to live a consecrated life that supports the important ministry of the parish, without being directly involved in it.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF 🙂
 
I don’t know exact numbers, but the Franciscans of the Renewal do have a large number of brothers and priests. It takes a long time to get from the beginning to the end. Losing postulants is normal, their life is very hard and it is a discernment, but overall they have grown more rapidly than most.
I thought they had more sisters last year than one? Maybe I’m confusing the photos with an earlier level entrance.
This link has photos from the past few years. It’s a hard life in their order, the Sisters for Life seem a little less austere, but a wonderful one also.

franciscanfriars.com/vocations/index2.htm
 
debraran said:
I don’t know exact numbers, but the Franciscans of the Renewal do have a large number of brothers and priests. It takes a long time to get from the beginning to the end. Losing postulants is normal, their life is very hard and it is a discernment, but overall they have grown more rapidly than most.
I thought they had more sisters last year than one? Maybe I’m confusing the photos with an earlier level entrance.
This link has photos from the past few years. It’s a hard life in their order, the Sisters for Life seem a little less austere, but a wonderful one also.

franciscanfriars.com/vocations/index2.htm
Click to expand...
I feel like I spend my life on CAF explaining this point, but here I go again. All Franciscans, of any branch of the order, are brothers. Some brothers are ALSO priests. But they never cease to be brothers. That’s what the word friar means. It’s bad Latin for Frater (brother). A friars’ formation is complete when he makes solemn vows, which is about six years after he enters. It can be extended up to 10. Whether a friar is ordained or not depends on his brothers. The way it works among Franciscans is that you ask for permission to be ordained. The brothers vote. If they vote against it, then you do not have a vocation to be a priest. But you do have a vocation to be a friar.

If the friars vote in favor of ordination, then it goes to the Minister. He is the final word of Christ on the matter. If he approves, then he presents you to a bishop for ordination. If the Minister vetoes the vote of the community, you may not be ordained, but you are still a friar for life. Once you have made solemn vows, no one can take that away from you. To leave or be dismissed is a very complicated process and can only happen for very serious reasons.

The Franciscans of the Renewal (CFR) have many ordained brothers. But the Franciscan custom is to keep the number in check to avoid becoming an order of priests. You never want an order of Franciscans where every brother is ordained. Then it would no longer be Franciscan. It would be something else.

The Friars of the Renewal are well known because they have a lot of TV exposure, thanks to Fr. Benedict’s presence on EWTN. This has been a blessing to them. Many men don’t know the other branches of the Order as well. We don’t have that much exposure. They are certainly an admirable group of friars, very much loved and appreciated by the entire Franciscan family. I think that what we Franciscans most love about them is that they have set the tone for renewal and they have called the laity’s attention back to Franciscan life and spirituality through their exposure. The Church of today, especially in the USA and Europe, needs another booster shot of Franciscan spirituality. It reformed the Church of the Middle Ages. The Friars of the Renewal are certainly a booster shot where ever they are, because they are very present in the streets. We need that today.

I believe that there are two major areas where we need an injection of Franciscan spirituality: street ministry, which the Friars of the Renewal do very well and the other is the Gospel of Life, which is why we’re now promoting the Franciscans of Life.

I have always hoped that our presence on CAF would trigger some vocations. So far my community has picked up two from CAF. But I hope that the presence of religious men on CAF will spark some curiosity in more men.

Sometimes it’s a little disappointing, because most of the men who come to the vocation forum want to be secular priests. As much as we need secular priests for our parishes, we also need male religious for the street, Gospel of Life, the missions, soup kitchen, hospital, schools, hospice, homeless shelter, immigrants, AIDS victims, elderly poor, youth, children, and spiritual direction, and enclosure. These are ministries that the typical diocesan priest does not do. Not because he’s mean or indifferent, but it’s not his role. That is the proper role of male religious and women religious.

Just this Monday I was speaking to my spiritual director, who happens to be a secular priest. He was lamenting the fact that we have a shortage of monks. It was very interesting to listen to this very busy pastor, who can use another priest in his rather large parish, praying for more monks instead of more priests. He said something that I found impressive. “As much as I could use another associate, I need monks to pray for my parish more than I need priests. Without monks, the Church has no spine. They are the backbone of the Church.”

We continued to talk about the soul and the journey into God and he said, “I try to encourage the laity in my parish to think about the religious lfie. I find that they all support the religious life with their prayers and donations. But they don’t move in that direction and I don’t know what to do about it.” I could tell that he was truly frustrated. For a diocesan or secular priest, whatever you want to call them, to be so distressed because the laity is not moving toward religious life was very refreshing. Most diocesan priests don’t understand religious life. We religious spend a lot of time educating them.

So wake up folks. We need more male religious and more secular priests. If you want to keep your parishes open, you need to supply secular vocations. If you want to keep the consecrated life present in the Church, you need to supply more religious. Let’s not just pray, let’s start doing some heavy campaigning, beginning in our families. Your admiration is appreciated, your recruiting for us would be a bonus. 😃

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF 🙂
 
debraran said:
I don’t know exact numbers, but the Franciscans of the Renewal do have a large number of brothers and priests. It takes a long time to get from the beginning to the end. Losing postulants is normal, their life is very hard and it is a discernment, but overall they have grown more rapidly than most.
I thought they had more sisters last year than one? Maybe I’m confusing the photos with an earlier level entrance.
This link has photos from the past few years. It’s a hard life in their order, the Sisters for Life seem a little less austere, but a wonderful one also.

franciscanfriars.com/vocations/index2.htm
Click to expand...
The toughest time for an order/community is after the death of their founder. Then it shows how true it is or was it just his personality holding it together.

IMHO, the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal are more than just Fr. Benedict’s personality.
 
Also the friars and sisters were around long before EWTN asked him to do the Sunday night show. They have a wonderful book A Drama of Reform" which talks about it. They started in 1987 on their own. They had a lot of men and women that wanted to join but had to wait for canonical approval. They had “quasi” canditdates to start.
They nuns and brothers aren’t on TV and live a life most couldn’t tolerate for long, I dont think notoraity keeps people, but it might right now initially attract some being on the television. Living the life is totally different though. It also might help with donations, but since they are always trying to build new shelters, etc. it probably is never really enough.
 
ByzCath said:
The toughest time for an order/community is after the death of their founder. Then it shows how true it is or was it just his personality holding it together.

IMHO, the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal are more than just Fr. Benedict’s personality.
Click to expand...
Actually, Benedict is not the founder. They were a group of friars. Benedict was their first Minister, but he is no longer a Minister.

I believe that one of the gifts, for lack of a better word, that keeps the different Franciscan obediences going is not the founder of each obedience. If you look at the Franciscan family, we have three Orders. Each order breaks down into obediences or branches with its own ministry and government. But each obedience is bound to follow the rule of their order: Friars Minor, Poor Sisters or Brothers of Penance. What some people simply call first, second and third.

What is most intereresting among Franciscan men is that the “founders” of each obedience have all disappeared into history. No one ever refers to them as founders. We all refer to our Holy Father Francis as the founder, because regardless of which group you belong to, you follow one of his three rules. And in all three rules Francis commands absolutee obedience to him evern after his death. And all elected superiors after him are his vicars. So the man with the charism is Francis. Every novitiate across the orders focus on teaching the novices to live the Gospel as Francis lived it, not as the founder of their branch lived. What we get from the founder or founders of each branch is our ministry, asceticism and our government. But our way of life we get from Francis and we see him as the founder. The others are reformers.

The hiearchy in the Francisan tradition, from top to bottom is:

Christ
Pope
Francis
Chapter
Minister
Guardian
Local Fraternity in a vote
Individual friar

If you look at that tree, when Fr. Benedict and the founding friars are gone, it really makes no difference, because the fidelity is to Christ, the Church and Francis. The man with the charism is Francis. Fr. Benedict and the other friars will go down in history as the reformers, much like Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross in the Carmelite tradition. They are loved and respected not only by the Friars of the Renewal, but by all Franciscan Friars, because they were the first Franciscans to take Vatican II and apply it. Their courage triggered an erruption of reform movements in the Franciscan family, not only in the USA, but also in other jurisdictions. The reforms keep coming.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF 🙂
 
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