Poor Brothers of St. Francis

The Poor Brothers of St. Francis Seraphicus are a [ congregation of lay brothers of the Third Order of St. Francis, instituted for charitable work among orphan boys and for youth education.

Foundation

The founder was Philip Hoever, born at Obersthöhe, near Cologne, Germany, 1816, who was a schoolmaster at Breidt and Aachen. Through the influence of Mother Frances Schervier, foundress of the Little Sisters of the Poor of St Francis, Hoever, at Christmas, 1857, dedicated himself with four others to the service of God and of abandoned men.

In 1860 the Brothers obtained a home at Aachen. In the following year (5 January) Cardinal Geissel, Archbishop of Cologne, approved the new congregation. When Hoever died in 1864, it had twenty-six members and some postulants.

Later history

In 1869 the institution received a Catholic orphanage at Moabit, Berlin, and from 1866 it spread in the United States (Teutopolis, Illinois; Detroit, Michigan; Thenville, Kentucky; and Cincinnati, Ohio). The "Kulturkampf meant that in 1876-77 they had to give up all their houses in Prussia. They retired to Blyerheide on the Dutch frontier, where the new mother-house was erected.

After 1888 the Brothers were allowed to return to Prussia, and different houses were founded; Hohenhof in Upper Silesia, 1891; Dormagen on the Rhine, 1902, etc.; in Belgium at Voelkerich, 1900; in the Netherlands at Roermond, 1903. The constitutions of the Poor Brothers were approved by Pope Pius X in 1910.

References

*"Der selige P. Johannes Hoever und seine Stiftung" (Aachen, 1896);
*Heimbucher, "Die Orden und Kongregationen", II (Paderborn, 1907), s. v. Arme Brüder vom hl. Franziscus.

External links

* [http://www.franciscan-brothers.net/ Home Page]
* [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12248b.htm "Catholic Encyclopedia" article]