The Porziuncola Project
The History of the Poor Clare Nuns
1212 Saint Clare of Assisi Founded the "Poor Ladies of San Damiano" and lived with the Benedictine Nuns at San Paolo Monastery
1213 Clare and her sisters move into San Damiano Monastery
Between 1212 and 1213 Saint Francis wrote a Rule of Life for Saint Clare and the Poor Ladies of San Damiano
1219 Cardinal Ugolino of Ostia, Prefect for the Congregation for Religious and the Cardinal Protector of the Friars Minor, wrote a Rule of Life for the Poor Ladies of San Damiano, but it did not include the privilege of poverty.
In 1228 Pope Gregory IX, formally Cardinal Ugolino, gave Saint Clare the Decree of the Privilege of Poverty.
1233 St. Agnes of Prague founds a Poor Ladies Monastery in Prague
1234 St. Agnes of Prague joins the Poor Ladies in Prague
Between 1234 and 1253 Saint Clare writes four letters to St. Agnes of Prague
1247 Pope Innocent IV wrote yet another Rule of Life for Saint Clare and her sisters.
Between 1247-1253 Saint Clare writes her Testament which expresses her great love of the life and her love of poverty.
1253 Saint Clare Receives Papal Approval for Her Way of Life and dies two days later
(She is the first woman to write a Rule for a Woman's Religious Order)
1254, eleven months after her death, Saint Clare was canonized.
By the time of her death there are fifty sisters living at San Damiano and several monasteries established throughout Christendom.
Over the past 800 years the Poor Clare Order has developed into four major branches;
The Urbantine Poor Clares, The Colettine Por Clares, The Capuchin Poor Clares and the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration.
Urbatine Poor Clares
In the year 1263, ten years after the Rule of Saint Clare was approved by Pope Innocent the IV, Pope Urban IV gave the Poor Clare Nuns yet another Rule.
The purpose of the Rule was to give uniformity to the observance of life. It officially named the Order: "Order of Saint Clare". Although the Rule was to be implemented in every monastery, it had the drastic effect of creating a division between those monasteries that observed Urban's Rule and those who followed the Rule written by St. Clare in 1253.
The primary problem lied with the mitigating poverty. It also created a very rigid form of discipline, foreign to St. Clare's original Rule.
Over the years the need for reform in the Poor Clare life was attributed to the weakness of this Rule. Monasteries are primarily autonomous so, each monastery may discern it's own personal level of observance. Some monasteries remained incredibly faithful to Saint Clare's primitive inspiration and charism, while others opted for mitigations from the Rule.
Like the other Poor Clare Nuns, the Urbanist Poor Clares have produced many saints and blesseds of the Church.
After the Second Vatican Council the Urbanist Poor Clare Nuns and other non-reform monasteries formed a federation and wrote a set of constitutions that reflect the greater openness to mitigations, exemptions and discrepancies with Saint Clare's primitive inspiration.
Colettine Poor Clares
The Fifteenth Century:
St. Colette of Corbie was the child of her parents old age. Dying while she was yet still an adolescent, St. Colette was left to the care of the Abbot of the local monastery. Early on in her life she attempted joining both a Benedictine and a Poor Clare Order. Disenchanted by their lack of observance she left and lived with a group of celibate women. Eventually she became and Anchoress and lived a holy life of prayer, austerity and contemplation.
During this time Saint Francis and Saint Clare appeared to her and taught her the history of the Franciscan and Poor Clare Orders. She was given deep knowledge of their life and their charisms.
Saint Francis revealed to her that she was to bring reform to the entire Franciscan and Poor Clare Orders. Refusing, she was struck blind for three days until she consented.
With the help of a Franciscan Fr. Henri de La Baume, St. Colette received permission to leave her anchor hold. Later she would petition the pope and receive the authority to found reform monasteries of the Poor Clares and bring a renewal of life to the Friars Minor.
St. Colette brought her reform to France, Belgium and Flanders. In later years these Franciscan Friars would be known by the nickname "The Colettines".
St. Colette wrote a commentary on St. Clare's Rule which became the Constitutions of this branch of the Poor Clare Order. Today these same Constitutions serve as the foundation for the present set of Colettine Poor Clare Constitutions.
Throughout the ravages of the post-Second Vatican Council's misinterpretations and destruction of religious life the "Poor Clare Colettines " (P.C.C.) continue to remain as faithful as ever to St. Clare and the reform of St. Colette. The Order has it's own federation continues to receive vocations and open new monasteries.
Capuchin Poor Clares
In the sixteenth Century, Blessed Maria Lorenza Longa came to Naples from Spain with her husband, the Viceroy of Naples. Having been poisoned by one of her servants she remained crippled for years. Having made a pilgrimage to the House of our Lady in Loretto Italy, she was cured of her paralysis.
After her husbands death she assumed his duties as Viceroy of Naples. She was a good woman dedicated to the service of the poor.
During her stay in Naples she entered the Third Order of Saint Francis. She and her follow Third Order member took to serving the poor and the needy.
When her term as Viceroy ended Bl. Maria Lorenza Longa founded a monastery with her other Third Order members. St. Theatine wrote a Rule of life for them. Unhappy with this Rule of life and the spirituality that was so differed from their Franciscan spirituality, they turned to the newly founded Capuchin Reform.
The Capuchin Friars were pleased to use their own Constitutions, along with the Constitutions of Saint Colette in order to provide them with a set of Constitutions.
The reform became known as the Capuchin Poor Clares (C.P.C.). The new reform grew rapidly and enjoyed fervent zeal until the present.
After the Second Vatican Council the Capuchin Poor Clare Order has relaxed its observance of the Cloister and has mitigated the observance of poverty it once so firmly embraced.
The community wears the full habit and maintains a decent observance of the Capuchin Poor Clare life. They continue to receive vocations. The Capuchin Por Clares follow their own set of Constitutions and belong to their own federation under the General of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin.
Perpetual Adoration
In 1854, December 8th, the very same day that Pope Pius IX Proclaimed the Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, Sr. Marie Claire Bouillevaux founded the Poor Clare Nuns of Perpetual Adoration (P.C.P.A.) in France.
Assisted by a Capuchin, Fr. Bonaventure Heurlat, she wanted to found an Order that would make reparation for all the blasphemies committed against Our Lord. Sr. Marie Claire was inspired by the story of the one Leper who returned to thank our Lord for healing him. Together they founded the monastery of perpetual adoration so that the Poor Clare nuns could both give thanks to the Lord and make reparation for sins committed against Our Lord.
Poor Clare Monasteries of Perpetual Adoration began to spring up and soon many were founded.
In 1925 the first was founded in the United States, Cleveland, Ohio.
Although all Poor Clare Monasteries have adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, and some perpetual, The Poor Clare Nuns of Perpetual Adoration have it as part of their founding charism. Each sister is expected to take two holy hours a day in thanksgiving and reparation.
The sisters have a federation of monasteries, but, each monastery is autonomous and self governing. The observance of the Poor Clare Rule will differ from monastery to monastery.
The Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration have received a revival and resurgence through the example and popularity of Mother Angelica in Hanceville, Alabama.
Over these past few decades the sisters have experienced periods of growth and the opening of new monasteries.