The Order of Minims is a Catholic mendicant order of friars whose charism is rooted in humility, penance, simplicity, and service, inspired by Saint Francis of Paola. Members strive to consider themselves the least (minimi) of all religious, living a life of poverty, chastity, obedience, and an added vow of perpetual abstinence from meat, eggs, and dairy products as a sign of austere devotion and self‑denial. Their spirituality emphasizes prayer, evangelical penance, communal life, and apostolic outreach, seeking to follow Christ in deep humility and merciful service to others.

The Order of Minims, formally called Ordo Minimorum, was founded in 1435 in Calabria, Italy, by Saint Francis of Paola, a hermit drawn to solitude and rigorous asceticism, who gathered followers committed to a deeper life of penance and humility. The order received papal approval in 1474 and later consolidated its rule under Pope Julius II in 1506. At its height in the 16th–17th centuries it included hundreds of friaries across Europe, but numbers declined following political upheavals such as the French Revolution. Today the Minims remain a mendicant order of pontifical right, present principally in Italy, Spain, Brazil, Cameroon, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, India, Mexico, the United States, and other countries, living a life of contemplation, prayer, and humble service.

Email: curiageneraleminimi@gmail.com (General Curia, ask to be connected with the vocation/formation contact) Minim Fathers – Novitiate – Bogotá, Colombia Email: noviciadovirgendelmilagro@gmail.com (vocation/formation contact)