Welcome To Our Parish

St. Francis of Assisi welcomes you! To register in the parish, please fill out a registration form found below, in the vestibule of the church, or in the parish office, and then return it to the office. You will receive a follow-up letter and phone call, and there will be a New Parishoner Welcome every three months.

Parish Registration Form

The Vision of St. Francis of Assisi Parish

As parishioners of St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church, our mission is to LIVE the GOSPEL, celebrating our Franciscan Spirituality in the midst of a diverse and ever-changing global culture.

We, led by the Spirit of God and blessed with great diversity, will joyfully welcome all people. As a community of faith, with the Sunday Eucharistic celebration as the source of our strength, and inspired by the vision of Saints Francis and Clare,

• We come together seeking the face of Christ in each individual, respecting the dignity, and affirming the value of each individual.
•We come together as partners in ministry, reaching out in compassion and justice to people of diverse cultures, the poor, the elderly, the shut-ins, the lonely, single parents, children and young adults, those alienated, and those un-welcomed.
•We come together embracing and celebrating the gifts of each parishioner. Through God’s grace, we are empowered to share these gifts with each other, with our community and with our Church, whether we are at St. Francis for a brief period of time or for the rest of our lives.
•We come together as a reconciling community, trusting in God who turns our minds and hearts to thoughts of peace. We stand as a people committed to seek the kingdom of God where enemies begin to speak to one another and those who are estranged join hands in friendship.

In these ways, we strive to build up the Church, fulfill the message and mission of Jesus Christ, and to love God and all of God’s creation.

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Parroquia San Francisco de Asís

Como fieles de la Iglesia Católica en la Parroquia San Francisco de Asís, nuestra misión es vivir el Evangelio, celebrando nuestra espiritualidad franciscana en medio de una diversa y siempre cambiante cultura global.

Guíados por el Espíritu de Dios y bendecidos por esta gran diversidad, nosotros les damos gozosos la bienvenida a todos. Como comunidad de fe, la celebracion eucarística dominical es la fuente de nuestra fuerza y vida de fe. Así mismo, inspirada por la vida evangélica y ejemplar de San Francisco de Asís y Santa Clara,

• Nos reunimos como companeros en el servicio, viviendo y transmitiendo compasión y justicia para todos: gente de toda cultura, pobres, ancianos, abandonados, ninos, jóvenes, inmigrantes y marginados.
• Nos reunimos, abrazando y celebrando los dones y carismas de cada fiel. Por la gracia de Dios somos fortaleciods para compartir estos dones unos con otros, con nuestra comunidad y con nuestra iglesia, ya sea que estemos de paso o vivamos por el resto de nuestras vidas en la parroquia San Francisco de Asís.
• Por último, nos reunimos como comunidad reconciliada confiando en Dios quien cambia y transforma nuestras mentes y pensamientos en pensamientos de paz. Y nos proclamamos como gente comprometida a buscar el Reino de Dios siendo siempre instrumentos de paz, de reconciliación y de amistad fraternal en Cristo Jesus.

A través de estos medios, nosotros nos esforzamos para edificar la Iglesia y cumplir el mensaje y misión de Jesucristo: amar a Dios como Padre y en el a toda su creación.

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History of Saint Francis of Assisi Parish

Welcome To Our Church. Francis of Assisi Parish was established in 1957 to serve the military community at Quantico Marine Base. Bishop Ireton proposed to the Franciscans that the parish be under their care, and the first pastor was appointed early that same year.

Also in 1957, ground was broken for the first parish building-the school/auditorium. In September 1957, Mass was celebrated for the first time in the new parish auditorium and the school was opened for 143 students in grades 1-3. In 1961, the statue of St. Francis (in the middle of the circle between the school and the church) was dedicated as a memorial to Maj. Withold J. Bacauskas, USMC, the first parishioner of St. Francis to be killed in the line of duty.

By 1962, there were 325 students in St. Francis of Assisi School and another 505 children and youth in religious education. In 1968, there were about 90 families registered in the parish. By late 1974, there were 235 families registered. The school was closed (and housed Christendom College for part of the time) for eleven years, from 1969-1980. By 1981, there were 215 students in the school and plans were underway to add a wing to the building. In October of that year, plans to build a church were announced. Parishioners played a significant role in the construction due to the serious illness and subsequent death of the pastor.

The current church building was dedicated in 1984. In 1996, an administrative wing was added to the Church, and in 1999, an additional wing was constructed for use as a pre-school and nursery facility. In the fall of 2000, a new $4.8 million dollar Parish Center was dedicated.

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Who was St. Francis?
by Leonard Foley, O.F.M.

Francis of Assisi was a poor little man who astounded and inspired the Church by taking the gospel literally—not in a narrow fundamentalist sense, but by actually following all that Jesus said and did, joyfully, without limit and without a mite of self-importance.

Serious illness brought the young Francis to see the emptiness of his frolicking life as leader of Assisi's youth. Prayer—lengthy and difficult—led him to a self-emptying like that of Christ, climaxed by embracing a leper he met on the road. It symbolized his complete obedience to what he had heard in prayer: "Francis! Everything you have loved and desired in the flesh it is your duty to despise and hate, if you wish to know my will. And when you have begun this, all that now seems sweet and lovely to you will become intolerable and bitter, but all that you used to avoid will turn itself to great sweetness and exceeding joy."

From the cross in the neglected field-chapel of San Damiano, Christ told him, "Francis, go out and build up my house, for it is nearly falling down." Francis became the totally poor and humble workman.

He must have suspected a deeper meaning to "build up my house." But he would have been content to be for the rest of his life the poor "nothing" man actually putting brick on brick in abandoned chapels. He gave up every material thing he had, piling even his clothes before his earthly father (who was demanding restitution for Francis' "gifts" to the poor) so that he would be totally free to say, "Our Father in heaven." He was, for a time, considered to be a religious "nut," begging from door to door when he could not get money for his work, bringing sadness or disgust to the hearts of his former friends, ridicule from the unthinking.

But genuineness will tell. A few people began to realize that this man was actually trying to be Christian. He really believed what Jesus said: "Announce the kingdom! Possess no gold or silver or copper in your purses, no traveling bag, no sandals, no staff" (see Luke 9:1-3).

Francis' first rule for his followers was a collection of texts from the Gospels. He had no idea of founding an order, but once it began he protected it and accepted all the legal structures needed to support it. His devotion and loyalty to the Church were absolute and highly exemplary at a time when various movements of reform tended to break the Church's unity.

He was torn between a life devoted entirely to prayer and a life of active preaching of the Good News. He decided in favor of the latter, but always returned to solitude when he could. He wanted to be a missionary in Syria or in Africa, but was prevented by shipwreck and illness in both cases. He did try to convert the sultan of Egypt during the Fifth Crusade.

During the last years of his relatively short life (he died at 44) he was half blind and seriously ill. Two years before his death, he received the stigmata, the real and painful wounds of Christ in his hands, feet and side.

On his deathbed, he said over and over again the last addition to his Canticle of the Sun, "Be praised, O Lord, for our Sister Death." He sang Psalm 141, and at the end asked his superior to have his clothes removed when the last hour came and for permission to expire lying naked on the earth, in imitation of his Lord.

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St. Francis Church