Friars are not monks, and the colours of their cloaks became their names
A monk vows to stay in one monastery for life. A friar does the opposite, moving between houses across a whole province and living among ordinary people on donations. Medieval England nicknamed the orders by their clothing: White Friars for Carmelites, Black Friars for Dominicans, Grey Friars for one Franciscan branch.
The word comes through Norman French frere from the Latin frater, brother, the term the Latin New Testament used for members of the Christian community; in the Spanish-speaking world it became the title Fray. Friars belong to the mendicant, or begging, orders, which emerged in the 12th and 13th centuries. They take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience like monks, but aim them outward at service in society rather than at contemplation behind cloister walls. A friar may be an ordained priest or a lay brother.
The Second Council of Lyons in 1274 recognised four great orders. The Carmelites, dating from about 1155, began as purely contemplative hermits and turned mendicant in 1245. St Francis of Assisi founded the Friars Minor in 1209, St Dominic's Order of Preachers won papal approval around 1216, and the Augustinians were gathered from scattered hermit groups by Pope Innocent IV in 1244. Smaller orders followed, and friars also exist today among Anglicans and Lutherans.
Their mobility gave them roles far beyond preaching. From the time of Pope Gregory IX, Dominicans and Franciscans served as chaplains to swelling crusader armies, hearing confessions bishops could no longer manage. Thomas Aquinas, himself a Dominican, urged them to support soldiers spiritually but insisted a priest must never bear arms. Dominicans, trained as learned debaters, also served widely as agents of the Inquisition. Perhaps surprisingly, some friars from merchant families preached in favour of trade at a time when the Church was traditionally suspicious of commerce.
Their visibility made them targets too. Attacks came mostly from urban mobs, especially where friars acted as inquisitors, and public mockery was far more common than serious harm. Reformation polemics sharpened hostility, and trials in Ghent from 1578 led to more than a dozen friars being jailed, exiled or executed. Their legacy survives in odd places: Spanish Franciscans under Junípero Serra founded San Diego in 1769, which is why its baseball team is called the Padres.
Source: Friar
