Today is the feast of Bl. Agnellus of Pisa, who was sent eight centuries ago to establish the Franciscans in Oxford. This octocentenary of the arrival of the Greyfriars in England is being marked by a series of celebratory events which began at Dover and Canterbury last Sunday. They conclude with a High Mass in the Dominican church in Oxford at 4pm on September 21st.
Bl. Agnellus dies in 1236 and his remains were preserved in the friary church until its destruction in the sixteenth century. It is possible they are still there. One suggestion is that they are in a garden adjacent to the site. Another, made by the late Fr Jerome Bertram, Cong. Orat.,who helped excavate the friary in the 1970s, is that they are under the fish counter in the Sainsbury's which now occupies part of the site…
I have posted about Bl. Agnellus in 2010 at Bl. Agnellus of Pisa, in 2011 at Bl Agnellus of Pisa, and in 2015 at Bl Agnellus of Pisa
I have posted more about the medieval Greyfriars house in Oxford in 2012 in Medieval Franciscans in Oxford and, slightly more generally along with the other friaries of the town and University, in a 2015 post Out and about Oxford with Friars
The Franciscan Capuchins established a new community at the church of St Edmund and St Frideswide together with an academic Hall of the University - now sadly closed - in 1928. The Capuchins are one of the later reformed Franciscan communities established in 1525. The return of the Conventual Franciscans, the successors of the medieval friars, to Oxford occurred in 2014 and that is is covered in Greyfriars return to Oxford
May St Francis, Bl.Agnellus, and all the Franciscan saints and beati pray for the Franciscan community and for us all.
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