Examines how thirteenth-century clergymen used pastoral care - preaching, sacraments and confession - to increase their parishioners' religious knowledge, devotion and expectations.

Pastoral Care, the religious mission of the Church to minister to the laity and care for their spiritual welfare, has been a subject of growing interest in medieval studies. This volume breaks new ground with its broad chronological scope (from the early eleventh to the late fifteenth centuries), and its interdisciplinary breadth. New and established scholars from a range of disciplines, including history, literary studies, art history and musicology, bring their specialist perspectives to bear on textual and visual source materials. The varied contributions include discussions of politics, ecclesiology, book history, theology and patronage, forming a series of conversations that reveal both continuities and divergences across time and media, and exemplify the enriching effects of interdisciplinary work upon our understanding of this important topic.

A close examination of religious texts illuminates the way in which parish priests dealt with their female parishioners in the middle ages.

Using a variety of sources and disciplinary angles, this book shows the many and varied ways in which pastoral care came to play such an important role in the day to day lives of medieval people. 1 volume, 335-page, 17-chapter, English-language survey of study of medieval pastors (priests, bishops, abbots, abbesses, popes, etc.) and their relationship to their respective congregations (1215-1536).

The role of pastoral care reconsidered in the context of major changes within the Anglo-Saxon church. The tenth and eleventh centuries saw a number of very significant developments in the history of the English Church, perhaps the most important being the proliferation of local churches, which were to be the basis of the modern parochial system. Using evidence from homilies, canon law, saints' lives, and liturgical and penitential sources, the articles collected in this volume focus on the ways in which such developments were reflected in pastoral care, considering what it consisted of at this time, how it was provided and by whom. Starting with an investigation of the secular clergy, their recruitment and patronage, the papers move on to examine a variety of aspects of late Anglo-Saxon pastoral care, including church due payments, preaching, baptism, penance, confession, visitation of the sick and archaeological evidence of burial practice. Special attention is paid to the few surviving manuscripts which are likely to have been used in the field and the evidence they provide for the context, the actions and the verbal exchanges which characterised pastoral provisions.

"This book examines the pastoral and sacramental work of the early medieval church in the British Isles. It provides a synthesis of recent scholarship which has uncovered new evidence about the organisation and structure of the early church and the close relations between monks and clergy and between the 'Roman' and 'Celtic' churches." "It shows how theological ideals were translated into pastoral work and demonstrates the short comings of the 'national church' approach to the history of early British and Irish Christianity. It will become the foundation for most future work on this central field of early medieval history."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

An account of Dominican activities in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales from their arrival in 1221 until their dissolution at the Reformation