ПРОПОВЕДНИЧЕСКАТА ДЕЙНОСТ НА ФРАНЦИСКАНЦИТЕ И ПАПСТВОТО ПРЕЗ 20-ТЕ И 30-ТЕ ГОДИНИ НА XIII ВЕК.

This article traces the transformation of the Franciscan Order from a community consisting predominately of laymen into an order of educated priests and a major instrument in the Church’s battle against heretics, schismatics, and infidels. Within the process of clericalization, the development of the preaching activity of the minors is examined in particular, since it is this activity of the friars that formed the basis of their successful actions in the service of the Apostolic See. As a result of the increasingly close ties with the papacy, in addition to improving the pastoral care for the faithful, the preaching activities of the friars were also directed against the political opponents of the Pope, condemned as heretics and schismatics. As a consequence of the return to Orthodoxy and the hostile policy towards the Latin Empire, the Bulgarian Tsar Ivan Asen II (1218–1241) also became one of those schismatics. An attempt is made to trace the role of the Franciscans in preaching the crusade against Bulgaria propagated by pope Gregory IX in 1238. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]