View source for Mendicant orders

{{Short description|Type of religious lifestyle}}
{{Use Oxford spelling|date=August 2016}}
[[File:Legend of St. Francis by Giotto.jpg|thumb|[[Pope Innocent III]] approving the statutes of the Order of the [[Franciscans]], by [[Giotto]]]]
{{canon law}}

'''Mendicant orders''' are primarily certain [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] [[religious order]]s that have vowed for their male members a lifestyle of [[vow of poverty|poverty]], traveling, and living in urban areas for purposes of [[preacher|preaching]], [[Evangelism|evangelization]], and [[Christian ministry|ministry]], especially to less wealthy individuals. At their foundation these orders rejected the previously established [[monasticism|monastic]] model, which prescribed living in one stable, isolated community where members worked at a trade and [[common ownership|owned property in common]], including land, buildings and other wealth. By contrast, the [[mendicant]]s avoided owning property, did not work at a trade, and embraced a poor, often [[wiktionary:itinerant|itinerant]] lifestyle. They depended for their survival on the goodwill of the people to whom they preached. The members of these orders are not called [[monk]]s but [[friar]]s. 

The term "[[wikt:mendicant#Adjective|mendicant]]" is also used with reference to some non-Christian religions to denote holy persons committed to an [[asceticism|ascetic]] lifestyle, which may include members of religious orders and individual holy persons.

== Active orders ==
The [[Second Council of Lyon]] (1274) recognised four main mendicant orders, created in the first half of the 13th century:
* Order of the Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel ([[Carmelites]]) first historical recorded in 1155<ref name="Carmelites Cath Encyc">{{cite web |title=The Carmelite Order |url=https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03354a.htm |website=www.newadvent.org |publisher=Catholic Encyclopedia |access-date=21 April 2024}}</ref> and their reform branch, the [[Discalced Carmelites]] (established in the 16th century)
* [[Order of Friars Minor]] ([[Franciscans]]) founded 1209<ref name="RSF Cath Encyc">{{cite web |title=Rule of Saint Francis |url=https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06208a.htm |website=www.newadvent.org |publisher=Catholic Encyclopedia |access-date=21 April 2024}}</ref>
* [[Order of Preachers]] (Dominicans) founded 1216<ref name="OP History">{{cite web |title=History Of The Order |url=https://www.english.op.org/about-us/the-dominican-order/history-of-the-order/#:~:text=Official%20Foundation,the%20confirmation%20of%20the%20Order. |website=The Dominican Friars in Britain |publisher=English Province of the order |access-date=21 April 2024}}</ref>
* [[Order of Saint Augustine]] (Augustinians) founded in 1244<ref name="Foundation APTV">{{cite web |title=The Augustinian Order |url=https://augustinian.org/about/order/#:~:text=Augustine%20was%20founded%20in%201244,that%20had%20recently%20been%20founded. |website=The Augustinians |publisher=Augustinian Province of St. Thomas of Villanova |access-date=21 April 2024}}</ref>
Other mendicant orders recognized by the [[Holy See]] today are the

* Order of the Most Blessed Trinity ([[Trinitarians]]) sometimes called the Red Friars, founded 1193
* [[Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy]] (Mercedarians) founded 1218 and after a reform [[Discalced Mercedarians]].
* Order of Servants of Mary ([[Servite Order|Servite]]s) founded 1233 by the Seven Holy Men of Florence, Italy. The order was suppressed by the Second Council of Lyon on the basis of the restrictions in the decree ''Ne nimium'' of 1215; the suppression was not fully enforced and was subsequently overturned by [[Pope Benedict XI]] in his [[Papal bull|Bull]], ''Dum levamus'', of 11 February 1304.<ref>[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13736a.htm Griffin, Patrick. ''Order of Servites''. The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 13. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. 19 Aug. 2013]</ref>
* [[Order of Minims]] ([[Hermit|hermits]] of St. Francis of Paola) founded 1436.
* Other [[Franciscan]] orders:
** [[Order of Friars Minor Conventual]]
** [[Order of Friars Minor Capuchin]]
* [[Brothers Hospitallers of Saint John of God|Hospitaller Order of the Brothers of Saint John of God]] founded in 1572 by [[John of God]].
* Order of the Poor Clerics Secular of the Mother of God of the Pious Schools ([[Piarists]]) founded in 1617 by [[Joseph Calasanz]].
* [[Bethlehemite Brothers|Order of Bethlehemite Brothers]], founded in Guatemala in 1653 and suppressed in 1820. They were refounded in 1984.<ref name="Giancarlo Rocca 1978">Giancarlo Rocca (dir.), ''Dizionario degli Istituti di Perfezione'', Edizioni Paoline, Roma, vol. V, 1978, col. 1185.</ref>

Like the monastic orders, many of the mendicant orders (especially the larger ones) underwent splits and reform efforts, forming offshoots (permanent or otherwise) some of which are mentioned in the lists given above.

==Former orders==
Former mendicant orders that are now extinct:
* [[Ambrosians]] or ''Fratres sancti Ambrosii ad Nemus'', existed before 1378, suppressed by [[Pope Innocent X]] in 1650.
* [[Fraticelli of Monte Malbe]], founded at Monte Malbe near [[Perugia]], Italy, in the 14th century; by the end of the century they had dispersed.
* Hospitallers of San Hipólito (Saint Hippolytus) or Brothers of Charity of de San Hipólito were founded in Mexico and approved by Rome as a mendicant order in 1700. In the 18th century they were absorbed by the Brothers Hospitaller of Saint John of God.
* [[Jesuati]], or ''Clerici apostolici Sancti Hieronymim,'' Apostolic clerics of [[Jerome]], founded in 1360, suppressed by [[Pope Clement IX]] in 1668.
* [[Brothers of Penitence|Saccati]] or "Friars of the Sack" ''(Fratres Saccati)'', known also variously as [[Brothers of Penitence]] and perhaps identical with the ''Boni homines'', ''Bonshommes'' or ''Bones-homes'', whose history is obscure.<ref name="Giancarlo Rocca 1978"/>
* [[Crutched Friars]] or ''Fratres Cruciferi'' (cross-bearing friars) or Crossed Friars, Crouched Friars or Croziers, named after the staff they carried which was surmounted by a [[crucifix]], existed by 1100, suppressed by [[Pope Alexander VII]] in 1656.
* Scalzetti, founded in the 18th century, suppressed by [[Pope Pius XI]] in 1935.<ref name="Giancarlo Rocca 1978"/>
Orders no longer mendicant:
* Jesuits or [[Society of Jesus]], founded in 1540, and for a time considered a mendicant order, before being classed instead as an Order of [[Clerics Regular]].
Orders considered heretical by the Catholic Church:
* [[Dulcinians]]

==See also==
*[[Apostolic poverty]]
*[[Medieval Restorationism]]
*[[Mendicant monasteries in Mexico]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
*[https://www.metmuseum.org/essays/mendicant-orders-in-the-medieval-world Art of Medieval Mendicant Orders]
*[https://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2010/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20100113_en.html Audience of Benedict XVI, 13 January, 2010]
*[https://www.op.org/ Order of Preachers – Dominicans]
*{{CathEncy|wstitle=Mendicant Friars}}
*{{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Mendicant Movement and Orders|short=x}}

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{{RC consecrated life}}
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[[Category:Mendicant orders| ]]
[[Category:Christian asceticism]]