So that you might exercise this ministry with greater confidence, we concede to you all that we can, so that in the aforementioned region you will have our authority to preach, to baptize the Saracens who have just come over to the faith, to reconcile apostates, to impose penances, and to absolve those who are excommunicated and who cannot travel easily to the Apostolic See. You are also permitted to pronounce a sentence of excommunication in that land on all those who pass over into heresy

Furthermore, we prohibit any Christian from expelling you from that land by force. We also command you, under virtue of obedience, to in no way presume to abuse these faculties, but as indefatigable laborers for Jesus Christ, to conduct yourselves there in a manner beyond reproach, so that you might merit a just wage from the divine Father of the household and so that we ourselves might be able to assign you to even more important tasks.^a

Given at Rieti, on the seventh of October, in the tenth year of our pontificate (1225).

G) Recolentes qualiter of Gregory IX (1228)

Even before the process of Francis’s canonization had been completed, his friend and protector Hugolino, now Pope Gregory IX, made plans to construct a basilica in his honor. The commune of Assisi had already donated a hill outside the walls as a site for the church. In this bull he requested donations from the faithful of the Catholic world to assist in this project.^b The following year he sent another bull under the same title to the Minister General, John Parenti, taking the basilica under his protection as the property of the Apostolic See.^c

Gregory, Bishop and Servant of the servants of God, to all the faithful who may read these letters: greetings and apostolic benediction.

We recall how the sacred plantation of the Order of Lesser Brothers began and grew marvelously under blessed Francis of holy memory, through the favor of Christ spreading far and wide the flowers and perfumes of a holy way of life, so that in the desert of this world the beauty

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Ut autem Ministerium vestrum confidentiùs exequamini, concedimus, ut in praedicta dumtaxat regione vobis liceat praedicare; baptizare Saracenos ad fidem noviter venientes; & reconciliare apostatas; injungere poenitentias; & excommunicatos illos absolvere, qui ad Sedem Apostolicam commodè non possunt accedere; liceatque vobis in terra illa in eos, quos haereticos esse constiterit; excommunicationis sententiam promulgare.

Inhibemus quoquoe, ne cui Christiano liceat vos de terra illa ejicere violenter. Praecipimus autem vobis in virtute sanctae obedientiae, ut his nullatenus praesumatis abuti; sed tamquam inconsusibiles Operarii JESU CHRISTI ita irreprehensibiliter vos geratis, quod a Summo Patrefamilias retributionis denarium mereamini; & nos majora vobis possimus committere confidenter.

Datum Reate nonis Octobris, Pontificatus Nostri Anno Decimo.

Recolentes qualiter of Gregory IX (1228)⁶

Gregorius &c. Universis Christifidelibus praesentes Literas inspecturis Saltuem, & Apostolicam Benedictionem.

Recolentes, qualiter Sancta plantatio Fratrum Minorum Ordinis sub Beato Francisco bonae memoriae incoepit, & mirabiliter profecit; per gratiam Jesu Christi flores sanctae conversationis longè, latèque proferens, & odores; ita quod in Deserto hujus Mundi Sacrae Religionis honestas videatur procedere ab Ordine supradicto;