Summary: This book presents a new and exciting approach to the medieval church that examines literary texts, visual decorations, ritual performance and lived experience in the production of sanctity. The meaning of the church - as building, idea and community - was intensely debated in the fourteenth- and fifteenth-centuries and the book explores what was at stake not only for the church's sanctity but for the identity of the parish community as a result. Focusing on pastoral material used to teach the laity, this study shows how the church's status as a sacred space at the heart of the congregation was dangerously, but profitably, dependent upon lay practice. The sacred and profane were inextricably linked and, paradoxically, the church is shown to thrive on the sacrilegious challenge of lay misbehavior and sin.

Contents: The church consecration ceremony and the construction of sacred space ; The Book of the Foundation of St Bartholomew's Church: consecration, restoration, and translation ; Sacred and profane: pastoral care in the parish church ; What the church betokeneth: placing the people at the heart of sacred space. (Manchester Medieval Literature and Culture)

We regret to inform you that this title is no longer available.
Please contact us if you need additional assistance.