True Followers of Justice: Identity, Insertion and Itinerancy among the Early Franciscans

As thirteenth-century urban populations increased, the friars, entrusted by the Church with the ministry of preaching, naturally needed to go where the people were. At the same time they needed to honor their way of life, which required them to live prayerfully in fraternities, yet not settle down permanently in stable religious houses after the monastic model.