Chapter 6 - Religion, humanism, arts and learning Flashcards
what were guilds and confraternities?
voluntary associations of individuals created to promote works of christian charity or devotion.
how many parish churches were there?
over 8000
what was the focus of religious experience?
the parish church
why was the church often the centre of the community?
the church provided the focus of popular entertainment. its festivals, which were closely linked to the agricultural year, provided much needed enjoyment and guilds and confraternities offered charity, good fellowship and the chance for ordinary people to contribute to the good of their local community.
how did the church make it easier for the social and political elites to maintain social control?
through its encouragement of good behaviour, obedience and stress on the values of community. it also provided employment opportunities.
what does erastian mean?
the view that the state should have authority over the church
what is a diocese?
an area under the pastoral care of a bishop in the christian church.
what role did the papacy play within the English Catholic Church?
the pope was the supreme head of the church but they did little else and the king was firmly in control.
how was the Church of England administered?
through two province (Canterbury and york) and through 17 dioceses.
what was common for senior churchmen to do?
to enjoy positions of significant influence and power within the kingdom.
during the medieval period where were most senior figures in the church drawn from?
the ranks of the aristocracy.
who were the two churchmen who exercised the most power under Henry VII?
John Morton and Richard Fox
why did churchmen often have important political roles?
senior churchmen were generally highly competent and conscientious professionals, often with legal training, who performed their duties effectively.
what does grace mean?
the pure state a soul needed to be in to enter heaven.
what is purgatory?
in traditional Catholic thinking, purgatory was the state in which the souls of the dead were purged of their sins before they could enter the kingdom of heaven.
what framework did the church provide?
the church provided a framework for how an individual thought, reasoned and behaved.
how did people try and reach heaven?
by observing as many of the seven sacraments as possible.
what is transubstantiation?
the Christian belief that the substance of bread and wine completely changed into the substance if christ’s body and blood by a validly ordained priest during the consecration at Mass.
what was the centre of the catholic religious experience?
the mass
why was the mass important? (two reasons)
- it was a sacrifice performed by a priest on behalf of the community.
- it was a sacred ritual in which the whole community participated.
what is corpus christi?
literally meaning the ‘body of christ’, Corpus Christi is a feast of the Catholic Church which celebrates the ‘blessed sacrament’ and whose importance developed from the thirteenth century with the increasing emphasis on transubstantiation.
what is a benefactor?
a person who makes a charitable donation
what are chantries?
chapels where masses for the souls of the dead took place
what does intercession mean?
the action of saying a prayer on behalf of another; in traditional catholic thinking it was the role of the priest to intervene with God on behalf of an individual.
why would the dying often leave money to the church?
to enhance the beauty of worship, to ensure the remembrance of the benefactor and to reduce the time the benefactor would spend in purgatory.
what would benefactors often leave money to?
chantries
what was the central role of the chantry priest according to Eamon Duffy?
‘the central function of a chantry priest was intercession for the soul of his patron’.
what is an example of communal religious influences?
confraternity (also known as a religious guild or lay brotherhood)
what did confraternities do?
they gathered together, usually in association with a parish church, to provide collectively for the funeral costs of members, to pay chaplains for masses for their members, to help maintain church fabric, to make charitable donations and to socialise.
how did benefactors see their donations?
as a way of benefiting the religious experience for themselves and for their community.