Many folks do big, special things in observance of the Christmas season, but not the Little Brothers of St. Francis. The aim of their tiny, one-of-a-kind fraternity is to bring friendship and humanity to Boston's lonely, shunned street people year-round.
They have never sought publicity and today, 36 years after the founding of their order, few people would know the Little Brothers exist but for the theft of the concrete statue of Jesus from in front of their Mission Hill friary a couple of weeks ago. The theft and subsequent return of the statue brought sudden attention to the six brothers and one candidate who currently belong to the order.
But among the homeless and elderly of Boston's streets and poor neighborhoods, the Little Brothers are well-known and much loved.
"Yo! Brothers!" shouted one group of street people that two of the friars greeted on the fringes of Chinatown one frosty morning last week. "The brothers are all right!"
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That was the beginning of the Little Brothers of St. Francis. In addition to street ministry, the brothers regularly visit the sick in hospitals and bring the needy into the friary for food, warmth, and conversation.
Over the years, the Little Brothers developed a reputation for the depth and sincerity of their effort to follow St. Francis, and built relationships with Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
Mother Teresa found the brothers' lifestyle and values much like her own. She housed a group of nuns at the friary in the 1980s, and stayed there once herself, leaving behind a lock of her hair and a piece of cloth cut from her habit, prized items in the brothers' collection of more than 50 sacred relics.
Members of the order met seven times with John Paul. A rosary the pontiff blessed and presented to them, in a leather box embossed with the papal seal, also was a treasure of the friary until this month, when they gave it to 11-year-old Earl Smith of Brighton, who had donated his life savings of $107 to the brothers in reaction to the theft of their statue.
With six full brothers, and one in training, the order has more members than ever and is beginning to think about sending missions to other places, in the tradition of St. Francis. Curran says requests have been received from Honduras, Colombia, Kazakhstan -- and even Assisi, though the home of St. Francis is awash in Franciscans.
"The bishop [of Assisi] said the Franciscans there are all involved in the churches and pensions and tourist shops," Curran said. "They are not out on the streets with the poor and homeless."
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