Thirteenth-century Franciscan missionary energy targeted Mongols and China more than Muslims

Evidence

For those who were more interested in preaching the Gospel than in becoming martyrs, the lands east of Islam became attractive. It was primarily Franciscan missionaries that Pope Innocent IV and the French king Louis IX sent to negotiate with and preach to the Mongols in the midthirteenth century: one of them was William of Rubruck, whose relation of his mission Bacon put to good use. In 1289 Nicolas IV sent John of Monte Corvino to China; Franciscans continued to voyage east in the following centuries—and west as well, founding missions on the coast of California in the eighteenth century. But few of their missions were to Muslims. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1168