The Society of Saint Francis (SSF) is an international Franciscan religious order within the Anglican Communion. It is the main recognised Anglican Franciscan order, but there are also other Franciscan orders in the Anglican Communion. Background Francis of Assisi and Clare of Assisi, the founders of the Franciscan movement, produced separate rules for three parallel orders, which still co-exist as parts of the Franciscan family today: The First Order were to be mendicant friars, embracing poverty as a gift from God and living the community life in the world and serving the poor. The Second Order were to be a parallel community of sisters living a more enclosed life of prayer and contemplation. The Third Order was to consist of brothers and sisters not living in community, nor under full monastic vows, but nevertheless taking simple promises and following a rule of life in the world. Within Anglicanism, the Brothers of the First Order are called the Society of Saint Francis (SSF); the Sisters of the First Order are called the Community of Saint Francis (CSF); the Sisters of the Second Order are called the Community of Saint Clare (OSC); and the Brothers and Sisters of the Third Order are called the Third Order of the Society of Saint Francis (TSSF). Men and women who wish to associate themselves with the Society of Saint Francis without taking formal vows may become Companions (CompSSF). History During the English Reformation all religious orders, including Franciscans, were banished from Britain. Not until the mid-nineteenth century were the first sisterhoods refounded in the Church of England, in response to the social needs of the time. Then came a revival of interest in Francis. The Community of St Francis (CSF) was founded in 1905 with sisters living in poverty and working in the East End of London. Shortly after World War I, the Revd Douglas Downes, an economics don at Oxford University, and a few friends gave practical expression to their sympathy with and concern for victims of the depression by going out onto the roads and sharing the life of the homeless men and boys, looking for work from town to town. In 1921, a Dorset landowner, Lord Sandwich, offered a small farm property (now Hilfield Friary), and here the group of friends was able to offer shelter to the exhausted wayfarers and others in temporary need of help. Towards the end of the