The order adheres to the teachings and spiritual disciplines of the founder and of his main associates and followers, such as Clare of Assisi, Anthony of Padua, and Elizabeth of Hungary, among many others.

The original Rule of Saint Francis approved by the pope disallowed ownership of property, requiring members of the order to beg for food while preaching.

[8] The modern organization of the Friars Minor comprises several separate families or groups, each considered a religious order in its own right under its own Minister General and particular type of governance.

[9] It has 667 communities; 4,289 members; 2,921 priests[10] A sermon on Mt 10:9 which Francis heard in 1209 made such an impression on him that he decided to fully devote himself to a life of apostolic poverty.

[11] The mendicant orders had long been exempt from the jurisdiction of the bishop, and enjoyed (as distinguished from the secular clergy) unrestricted freedom to preach and hear confessions in the churches connected with their monasteries.

[5] Amid numerous dissensions in the 14th century, a number of separate observances sprang up, almost like sects (to say nothing of the heretical parties of the Beghards and Fraticelli), some of which developed within the order on both hermit and cenobitic principles.

The literal and unconditional observance of this was rendered impracticable by the great expansion of the order, its pursuit of learning, and the accumulated property of the large cloisters in the towns.

It was John XXII who had introduced Conventualism in the sense of community of goods, income, and property as in other religious orders, in contradiction to Observantism or the strict observance of the rule.

By direction of Pope Martin V, John of Capistrano drew up statutes which were to serve as a basis for reunion, and they were actually accepted by a general chapter at Assisi in 1430; but the majority of the Conventual houses refused to agree to them, and they remained without effect.

Equally unsuccessful were the attempts of the Franciscan Pope Sixtus IV, who bestowed a vast number of privileges on both original mendicant orders, but by this very fact lost the favor of the Observants and failed in his plans for reunion.

This division was finally legalized by Leo X, after a general chapter held in Rome in 1517, in connection with the reform movement of the Fifth Lateran Council, had once more declared the impossibility of reunion.

[5] The habit of referring to the Francisans as Cordeliers in France is said to date back to the Seventh Crusade, when Louis IX asked who the particularly zealous monks pursuing Saracens were, and was told they were "de cordes liés".