Order of Poor Ladies

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The Order of Poor Ladies, also known as the Order of St Clare, the Poor Clares, the Poor Clare Sisters, the Clarisse, the Minoresses, or the Second Order of St. Francis, is an order of nuns in the Roman Catholic Church. It was the second Franciscan order to be established, founded by Saints Clare of Assisi and Francis of Assisi in 1212. The Poor Ladies, founded Palm Sunday in the year 1212, were organized after the Order of Friars Minor (the first order), and before the Third Order of penitents or tertiaries, of which the secular part was later called the Secular Franciscan Order. As of 2004 there are over 20,000 Poor Clare nuns in over 20 observances and federations living in over 76 countries throughout the world. ^[1]

In Medieval England their convent was located near Aldgate. The order gave its name to the still-extant street known as Minories in the City of London. The Poor Clares were brought to the United States in 1875 when Mother Maddalena Bentivoglio and her sister Constanza were sent by Pope Pius IX to establish a monastery of Poor Clares of the Primitive Observance. The Proto-monastery was established in Omaha, Nebraksa, in 1878.

One branch of the Poor Clares (OSC) follows the "Rule of St. Clare," which was approved by Pope Innocent IV the day before St. Clare died in 1253. Other branches are the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration (PCPA) (originally known as the Franciscan Nuns of the Blessed Sacrament, founded in 1854, counting Mother Angelica among its members), the Capuchin Poor Clares, and the Colettine Poor Clares (PCC).

1 The Convent
2 External links
3 References
4 See also

[edit] The Convent

In June and July 2006 BBC Two broadcast a television series called The Convent ^[2], in which four women were admitted to the monastery for a period of six weeks.