Christian Tradition Notes Feb 16, 2016

Christian Tradition Notes February 16, 2016

Friday’s Test

Know terms on list and general locations on map for the terms, places, dates test

-About 30 questions

-1 hour to complete

-No notes or friends

-Don’t need to know everything about locations on map, just the one’s that we talked about in class

Last week's class

Two types of clergy: Secular vs regular

  -Secular: The lay people are primary audience/going out into the world                                         
  -Regular: Monastics (they follow a monastic rule) the rule is a guide for living, and theyare working and praying.

Within Mendicants there are Franciscans and Dominicans

 -Franciscans and Dominicans are monastic reformers, but they have two distinct ways of living. Dominicans preach in public. Tau: represents a cross. Franciscans wear the cross of Christ (Tau) on their bodies.

Ermetic: Hermits, living on your own in the desert

Monastic movements: In Europe, in the later middle ages, there were ~45,000 people a part of the monastic movement. In 11th-14th Century, rise in women going into monastic movement/lay monastic movements (not officially recognized). Why might women do this? It's a way to become educated and it provides opportunities…(not going into monastic movements solely for religious reasons)

Effect of Monastic Movement:

-Women entering movement

-Spread of culture

-Reform Movement

Class 2/16

Investiture Controversy:

●      Controversy in the 11th-12th centuries. Who has the authority to appoint bishops, the emperor or the pope?

●      Gregorian Reform: Reforms under Pope Gregory VII

            -1050-80

            --Aims to get a lot of power for the church

            -Discatus Papae: Pope may depose emperors and Roman church has never erred, nor will it...his reforms become ideas that become the doctrine of papal infallibility. 

            -Compulsory celibacy of the clergy (can’t become married)
Why would he do this? So that priests can focus, and priests are seen as being married to the church. Mostly because clergy members would give property to their children as inheritance and this is an issue because the property should goto the church.

            -Against simony (i.e. selling of church offices)

           

●      Concordant of Worms (Worms is a place)

            -1122

            -Investiture Controversy comes to an agreement:

                        -Bishops and abbots chosen by clergy

                        -Separation between church and state

                        -Invested with secular power and then spiritual

Medieval Critiques of the Papacy

●      Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179)

○      Benedictine abbess (in charge of monastery of nuns)

○      Visionary, scientist, author, composer, liturgist, artist, preaches

○      She’s brave...moves her nuns from the monastery at Disibodenberg to Rupertsberg, in order that they could live a life of poverty

●      She did this without permission, but she got her way

                        Scivias (Book)- Hildegard of Bingen has visions while she’s awake. One of our readings explains her visions. The visions are very strange. In one vision, she is a womb, and there are people running in and out of the womb (related to the book of revelations). This is a symbol of the church (church is the bride of christ).

-Church should be virtuous

-She is the perfecter of people, so she should be perfect

-Church’s greatness comes from works of priests.
Hildegard of Bingen is calling people to reform, because she has these visions from God, and work from priests should be done for God

Protestant Reformation

●      Martin Luther (1483-1546)

●      Augustine monk and doctor of Theology at Wittenberg

●      Prolific author and theologian

○      Sola scriptura

○      Justification by faith alone-it is a work of God

○      Priesthood of believers

●      Excommunicated in 1520 (Luther burns the papal bull with the order)

●      Translates the New Testament into German (importance of the vernacular), although he would leave some books out, such as Revelation, if given the chance.

●      Not someone you want to invite to a dinner party

●      95 Theses (1517)- Big reason why he was excommunicated

○      Written in Latin

○      Nailed on a door in Wittenburg on Halloween

○      “The pope cannot remit any guilt, except by declaring that it has been remitted by God and by assenting to God’s remission…”

○      “Rare as is the man that is truly penitent, so rare is also the man who truly buys indulgences..” --says this because people are buying indulgences without penances (confessing sins)

○      “Christians are to be taught that he who gives to the poor or lends to the need does a better work than buying pardons..”

○      “To think the papal pardons so great that they could absolve a man even if he had committed an impossible sin and violated the Mother of God-- this is madness.”

○      He is critiquing the church and the practice of indulgences while still being a catholic in the church. He is not the only one critiquing the church, but he does it abrasively.

○      His letter that he writes makes him sound like a jerk, but he is a jerk with a point. He’s calling for a reform because the church is corrupt. People should not be able to buy their way to salvation. He was a big jerk because he wanted to get attention so that change would occur.

○      Church should be teaching love and the gospel, not indulgences. Hildegard of Bingen  believes this too, but she didn't get much attention.

Spread of the Reformation

●      German Peasants’ War (1524-25)

-Fomented, in part, by reformers, including Thomas Muntzer

-Reformation ideas → peasant unrest

What are the multiple factors involved in the German Peasants’ War according to Scribner? A weave of social and political factors.

-According to him…

            *Class: The middle class is very split.

*Ideas: There are different levels of reformation of ideas. Urban Elite, Artisans (large-sized group), and Peasant all have different perspectives on reformation.

            *Culture: During medieval period, the use of magic (witchcraft) to control/combat evil forces, etc.

*Stress: Relieved existential anxiety

The Counter Reformation or Catholic Reformation

●      Council of Trent

-Called by pope Paul III

-Reaffirms the structure of the church, including sacraments, orders, practices

-Emphasis on the importance of faith and works in contrast to Luther

-Reform the church administration and an attempt to cut down on excess

●      Other responses

-Mysticism and spirituality, such as the practiced by St. teresa of Avila, Ignatius of Loyola, St. John of the cross

-Baroque art- Bernini. Church likes this type of art because of dramatic style and use of emotion

For Next Class:

Read:

September 25th, October 11th, and 14th