The Basilica of St Bernardino all'Osservanza

The Fratres Divoti o de Observantia

The Fratres Divoti or de Observantia were one of the many reformed congregations of the Franciscan Order from which stemmed, from the fourteenth century, several branches of the Franciscan family which all converged in the Franciscan Order of the Friars Minor with the last reform in 1897 by Leo XIII..
Even while Saint Francis was alive there were a number of different stances regarding life as the saint saw it, especially as far as poverty was concerned. These differences gave immediate rise to the creation of the “Conventuals”, keepers of Franciscan memories in friaries and large basilicas, and a so-called “spiritual” branch, who gave a more radical interpretation of the principle of poverty.
The Observant movement recorded a significant growth during the fifteenth century, in response to the decadence that the Franciscan Order was experiencing at that time. It was a movement of restoration and reform which did not want to break away from the Order, but bring all friars to the primitive and most rigorous observance of the Rule. It was a return to the original ideas of Saint Francis, in perfect obedience to the lawful superiors: “Regulam simpliciter in primaeva puritate observare”.
The founder of the Observance in Italy was the lay friar Paoluccio Trinci, an aristocrat from Foligno. In 1368, with the permission of their superior, he retired with some other friars in the hermitage in Brogliano, between Foligno and Camerino, desiring to observe the Rule rigorously. But the name of the Blessed Paoluccio was soon overshadowed by that of Saint Bernardino of Siena who, together with his disciples Saint John of Capistrano, Saint James of la Marca and Blessed Albert of Sarteano, was the true propagator of the Observant reform movement which, as a result of their effort, spread throughout Europe and flourished in Italy.
Saint Bernardino clearly expressed his interpretation of the Franciscan Rule through the letters he sent to all the Franciscan cenobia in Italy, so as to overcome any doubt concerning the implementation of the principle of Poverty. These letters reveal a notion of religion that is extremely conciliatory and respectful of human needs: he advocated the principle of an usus moderatus of things so as not to demean the dignity required by the pastoral purpose of the Order. Unlike the Conventuals, the Observants confirmed their complete renunciation of property. Through their spirit of moderation and reasonableness they acquired a broad consensus, and they were sought for as mediators of peace between rival Princes and cities. Following the Ite vos bull of 1517, Pope Leo X split the Conventual and Observant Franciscans into two independent families.