The laity in the Middle Ages: religious beliefs and devotional practices

Abstract

This volume grapples with some of the most important and most difficult issues in medieval history: the nature of popular devotion, the role of religion in civic life, the sociology of religious attitudes and practices, and the relationship between the intersecting spheres of lay and clerical culture.

Contents

Part I. The Emergence of the Laity Within the Church (Eleventh to Thirteenth Centuries). 1. The Idea of God. 2. The Middle Ages of "The People" 3. The Laity in the Feudal Church. 4. The Crusades: The Masses Appear on the Scene. 5. A Twelfth-Century Novelty: The Lay Saints of Urban Italy. 6. Two Laypersons in Search of Perfection: Elzéar of Sabran and Delphine of Puimichel -- Part II. Religion in Precept and in Practice. 7. Lay Belief Around 1200: Religious Mentalities of the Feudal World. 8. The Pastoral Transformation of the Thirteenth Century. 9. "Ordo Fraternitatis": Confraternities and Lay Piety in the Middle Ages. 10. Medieval Penitents. 11. Liturgy and Folk Culture in the Golden Legend. 12. Anti-Semitism and Popular Canonization: The Cult of St. Werner. 13. Patronage of Saints and Civic Religion in the Italy of the Communes -- Part III. Women's Choice: Human Marriage Or Spiritual Nuptials. 14. Female Sanctity in the Franciscan Movement. 15. Conjugal Chastity: A New Ideal in the Thirteenth Century. 16. The Virginal Marriage of Elzéar and Delphine. 17. A Holy Woman During the Hundred Years' War: Jeanne-Marie of Maillé -- Part IV. The Inspired Word. 18. Female Prophets, Visionaries, and Mystics in Medieval Europe. 19. Mystical Sanctity at the Time of the Avignon Papacy and the Great Schism. 20. Eucharistic Devotion and Mystical Union in Late-Medieval Female Saints. 21. The Reaction of the Church to Late-Medieval Mysticism and Prophecy. 22. Joan of Arc and Female Prophecy in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries.