put away."]

Grant of a Plenary Indulgence to All the Faithful Who Visit Churches
of the Friars Minors

To all the faithful of Christ who view these present letters, health
and apostolic blessing:

With solicitude, as is the duty of our pastoral office, for the
health of the Lord's flock entrusted by divine arrangement to our
unworthy care, we willingly invite the faithful of that flock, all
and singular, to visit churches and perform pious and meritorious
works, in order that with the aid of divine grace, through spiritual
largesses, indulgences (namely), and the pardoning of sins, they may
the more easily reach the joys of everlasting happiness. For in the
Indias, China, and the Philippine Islands, we desire that the churches
already founded, or to be founded within the next ten years, and each
one thereof belonging to the monasteries or houses of the discalced
brethren known as the Order of Minors of St. Francis [18] of Observance
be held in due veneration by the faithful of Christ themselves--that,
frequenting them with befitting reverence, and flocking thither
to those churches with greater readiness for the sake of devotion,
they thereby may find themselves more fruitfully refreshed through
the bestowal of heavenly grace. Therefore, relying on the mercy of
Almighty God and the authority of his blessed apostles Peter and Paul,
we mercifully in the Lord grant and bestow a plenary indulgence and
remission of all their sins, on all the faithful of Christ of either
sex, who, truly penitent and confessed each year, visit devoutly the
aforesaid churches, or any of them, on the first and second day of
the month of August, as well as the feasts of St. Francis, St. Anthony
of Padua, St. Clare, St. Louis, and St. Bernardine; and these during
their visit shall, from the first vespers to sunset of those days and
feasts, pour forth pious prayers to God for the exaltation of Holy
Mother Church, the uprooting of heresies, and the conversion of the
peoples of those regions to the Catholic faith. These presents are
to hold for all times. But, as it would be difficult to have these
present letters carried to all and singular the places where needed,
we desire, and by our apostolic authority decree, that to copies of
them bearing the seal of any person in ecclesiastical rank, the same
respect shall be paid as would be given to the originals themselves,
were they shown. Given at Rome, at St. Peter's, under the seal of
the Fi