Past Belief

2019 ◽  
pp. 13-40
Author(s):  
Anthony Grafton
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Saint Augustine ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Early History ◽  
Ecclesiastical History ◽  
Royal Road ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Church

This chapter examines the centrality of early modern ecclesiastical history, written by Catholics as well as Protestants, in the refinement of research techniques and practices anticipatory of modern scholarship. To Christians of all varieties, getting the Church's early history right mattered. Eusebius's fourth-century history of the Church opened a royal road into the subject, but he made mistakes, and it was important to be able to ferret them out. Saint Augustine was recognized as a sure-footed guide to the truth about the Church's original and bedrock beliefs, but some of the Saint's writings were spurious, and it was important to be able to separate the wheat from the chaff. To distinguish true belief from false, teams of religious scholars gathered documents; the documents in turn were subjected to skeptical scrutiny and philological critique; and sources were compared and cited. The practices of humanistic scholarship, it turns out, came from within the Catholic Church itself as it examined its own past.

ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE ‘ARIAN CONTROVERSY’ IN THE FOURTH CENTURY

2010 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 229-263
Author(s):  
David M. Gwynn
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
Literary Sources ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Material Evidence ◽  
The Church ◽  
Archaeological Approach ◽  
Arian Controversy

The so-called ‘Arian Controversy’ that divided the Christian Church in the 4th c. has been the subject of considerable scholarly debate in recent decades. The literary sources from which the majority of our knowledge of the controversy derives are highly polemical and distorted, written almost exclusively from the perspective of those whose positions would come to be accepted as ‘orthodox’, and this in turn has directly influenced scholarly interpretations of the material evidence from this crucial period in the history of the Church. In this paper I wish to reconsider that material evidence and ask how an archaeological approach independent of the biases of our literary sources might broaden our understanding of the controversy and its impact upon the 4th c. Roman empire.

The Role of the Archdeacon Today

1995 ◽  
Vol 3 (17) ◽  
pp. 379-392
Author(s):  
R. L. Ravenscroft
Keyword(s):  
Local Church ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Early History ◽  
Under Five ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church

The office of archdeacon has its origins in the early history of the Church. The archdeacon is referred to by St. Jerome and other writers of the fourth century. He was the principal deacon of a local church. The eminent Victorian ecclesiastical lawyer, Sir Robert Phillimore wrote: ‘The primitive offices of the archdeacon may be enumerated under five heads. First, to attend the bishop to the altar and to order all things relating to the inferior clergy and ministrations in the church. Secondly, to assist the diocesan in the distribution and management of the ecclesiastical revenues.’

scholarly journals Korespondencja ks. dr. Jana Kwolka z ks. prof. Janem Fijałkiem za lata 1919–1936

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (26) ◽  
pp. 289-420
Author(s):  
Józef Wołczański
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Relevant Literature ◽  
Social Boundaries ◽  
Reference Library ◽  
Scientific Authority ◽  
Medieval Church ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The University ◽  
The Church

[The correspondence between Rev. Prof. Jan Fijałek and Rev. Dr Jan Kwolek in the years 1919–1936] This paper presents a collection of a few dozen letters written between 1919 and 1938. Their authors were two eminent representatives of the humanities and of the Polish Catholic Church at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. One of them, Reverend Professor Jan Nepomucen Fijałek, represented the Kraków Archdiocese, though professionally he was associated with the University of Lviv and the Jagiellonian University. As an outstanding scholar and expert on sources to the history of medieval Church and spiritual culture of Poland, as well as a distinguished pedagogue, he enjoyed great renown in the world of science. The other correspondent, Reverend Doctor Jan Kwolek, a lawyer, lecturer at the Theological Institute of the Latin rite in Przemyśl, chancellor of the Episcopal Curia, organizer and director of a Diocesan Archive, a model for the whole country, unceasingly developed his interests in canon studies, history of the Church, and showed great concern for preserving the archive heritage of the Przemyśl Diocese. The majority of the letters were written by Rev. Kwolek, though they are not complete; the addressee had collected them meticulously, sometimes adding brief commentaries. The Przemyśl priest must not have attached a lot of weight to collecting the letters of the Kraków mentor, as only over a dozen of them have been preserved. The sources present very interesting material. The “supplicant” here is definitely Rev. Kwolek, seeking in the unquestionable scientific authority of Rev. Fijałek advice on organizing the Przemyśl archive but also methodological and factual guidelines for archive research and publications. In the course of time the distance between the two scholars was gradually decreasing, though it never crossed accepted social boundaries. What confirms that is the elaborate titles both correspondents addressed each other with. The subject matter of the letters is rather diverse and includes several themes. The dominant one is Rev. Kwolek’s requests to be recommended relevant literature necessary to complete a reference library needed in research and scholarly work. Quite a lot of space is also devoted to the Przemyśl priest’s reports on the progressing work on completing and organizing the archive of the Episcopal Curia in Przemyśl. Rev. Prof. Fijałek, apparently did not hide his sincere appreciation of the activity of the junior priest, indefatigable archive fanatic, encouraging him, providing him with expert instruction and warning him against naïve faith in the patronage of successive bishops. Another extensive motif is common and readily produced by church circles gossip on different Church dignitaries in Kraków and Przemyśl, as well as expectations of personal reshuffles and new careers with the start of every new pontificate. Without a doubt, the presented material deserves publication, as it shows the effort of creating and then preserving pioneer initiatives on scholarly and religious ground, particularly in Przemyśl in the first half of the 20th century.

Ecclesiology/Church–State Relationship in Early Modern Catholicism

2014 ◽  
pp. 149-164
Author(s):  
Stefania Tutino
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Political History ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Aspect ◽  
Early Modern Catholicism ◽  
Spiritual Community ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
The Church

This essay provides a broad overview of the main ecclesiological controversies within the Catholic Church between the sixteenth and the eighteenth centuries, and it shows how the Reformation affected the ways in which Catholic theologians understood the Church as both a spiritual community and a political government. This essay also explores some of the most relevant repercussions of the Catholic ecclesiological debates in the political history of post-Reformation Europe. By discussing issues such as the nature and scope of the supreme authority over the Church, the political aspect of the Church, and the complex relationship between political and spiritual authorities, early modern Catholic theologians contributed significantly to the broader history of Western thought. Moreover, following the developments of the Catholic ecclesiological debates can help us to put the political history of Europe in a wider theoretical and transnational perspective.

scholarly journals VII.—The Church of St. Augustine, Hedon, Yorkshire

Archaeologia ◽  
1884 ◽  
Vol 48 (01) ◽  
pp. 185-200
Author(s):  
George Edmund Street
Keyword(s):  
Saint Augustine ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Architectural Features ◽  
Architectural Description ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Town ◽  
The Church

In venturing to lay before the Society of Antiquaries some notes on the architectural features of the church of Saint Augustine, at Hedon, near Hull, I have taken it for granted that I should be excused if I did not try at the same time to go into the archæological history of the town or churches; what is here expected from an architect being, I presume, that he should prepare a simple architectural description of the various parts of the building, such as might be given without any knowledge at all of the men who built it, or of any documentary evidence as to the dates at which they built. The truth is that we architects have not often the leisure necessary for the investigation of this part of the subject, and in this case I doubt whether if I had leisure I could have learnt much beyond what is told by Mr. Poulson in his carefulHistory of Holdernesse.

A History of Development of Medical Missions and Catholic Evangelization in Sub-Saharan Africa From the Early Twentieth Century to the Present: Tracing Some Representative Founders and Orders in the Context of the Twentieth Century Church

2021 ◽  
pp. 002436392110245
Author(s):  
Ellen M. Dailor
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Medical Missions ◽  
Religious Orders ◽  
Catholic Health Care ◽  
History Of ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Church

Although the care of the sick has been a charism of Catholic community since the beginning, and hospitals as we know them have developed since the fourth century, religious orders began to develop hospitals as part of their mission work during the colonial expansion of the seventeenth century. These early efforts, however, were primarily a response to the needs of the colonists as well as recognition that the poor who were sick required care in these regions. It can be argued that medical missions developed during the twentieth century as a response to the outreach of Protestants as well as the exposure of physicians to the needs in mission territories, and that their advancement and success impacted the attitudes of the popes and bishops of the twentieth century. This article examines several individuals and organizations who have contributed to the development of medical missions in Africa in modern times and trace the approach of the Church toward medical missions by exploring missionary religious orders, especially women’s religious orders, and papal and council documents. It primarily considers the role of medical missions in areas that had only a limited Catholic presence prior to nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and where Catholic health care and the local Catholic Church essentially developed together, and considers ways in which the growth of medical missions and the thinking of the Church developed together.

Naughty Printed Books

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Scott Kastan
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
Printed Books ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Fact ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Scholarly Discussion ◽  
The Church

TheIndex librorum prohibitorum, first issued in 1559, the Roman Catholic Church’s official effort to ban certain books, is often contrasted with John Milton’sAreopagitica, so often claimed the foundational text of a modern notion of freedom of expression. But the opposition is more a function of a modern desire than of historical fact. The two texts do not so much display this reassuring opposition as their unnerving similarity. This article examines and attempts to undo some of the oppositions that have structured most of the scholarly discussion on the subject of censorship: Catholic versus Protestant, state versus individual, repression versus freedom. All of these play their role in an undeniably appealing history of liberty and toleration, but it is not a history that has much purchase in early modern England, as may be shown by a consideration of the efforts of the Church and authorities in England to prevent the circulation of what they called “naughty printed books.”

‘Truth Never Needed the Protection of Forgery’: Sainthood and Miracles in Robert Hegge’s ‘History of St. Cuthbert’s Churches at Lindisfarne, Cuncacestre, and Dunholme’ (1625)

2011 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 270-283
Author(s):  
Sarah Scutts
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Religious Polemic ◽  
The Moment ◽  
The Church

Robert Hegge’s ‘History of St. Cuthbert’s Churches at Lindisfarne, Cuncacestre, and Dunholme’ was one of many texts produced in the early modern period which portrayed and assessed the Anglo-Saxon Church and its saints. This Protestant antiquarian work fits into a wider tradition in which the medieval past was studied, evaluated and employed in religious polemic. The pre-Reformation Church often played a dual role; as Helen Parish has shown, the institution simultaneously provided Protestant writers with historical proof of Catholicism’s league with the Antichrist, while also offering an outlet through which to trace proto-Protestant resistance, and thereby provide the reformed faith with a past. The Anglo-Saxon era was especially significant in religious polemic; during this time scholars could find documented evidence of England’s successful conversion to Christianity when Pope Gregory the Great sent his missionary, Augustine, to Canterbury. The See of Rome’s irrefutable involvement in the propagation of the faith provided Catholic scholars with compelling evidence which not only proved their Church’s prolonged existence in the land, but also offered historic precedent for England’s subordination to Rome. In contrast, reformed writers engaged in an uneasy relationship with the period. Preferring to locate the nation’s Christian origins in apostolic times, they typically interpreted Gregory’s conversion mission as marking the moment at which Catholic vice began to creep into the land and lay waste to a pure primitive proto-Protestant faith. In order to legitimize the establishment of the Church of England, Catholicism’s English foundations needed to be challenged. Reformers increasingly placed emphasis upon the existence of a proto-Protestant ‘strand’ that predated, but continued to exist within, the Anglo-Saxon Church. Until the Norman Conquest, this Church gradually fell prey to Rome’s encroaching corruption, and enjoyed only a marginal existence prior to the Henrician Reformation in the 1530s. Thus Protestants had a fraught and often ambiguous relationship with the Anglo-Saxon past; they simultaneously sought to trace their own ancestry within it while exposing its many vices. This paper seeks to address one such vice, which was the subject of a principal criticism levied by reformers against their Catholic adversaries: the unfounded creation and veneration of saints. Protestants considered the degree of significance the medieval cult of saints had attached to venerating such individuals as a form of idolatry, and, consequently, the topic found its way into countless Reformation works. However, as this essay argues, reformed attitudes towards sainthood could often be ambivalent. Texts such as Hegge’s prove to be extremely revealing of such ambiguous attitudes: his own relationship with the saints Cuthbert, Oswald and Bede appears indistinct and, in numerous instances, his understanding of sanctity was somewhat contradictory.

The Ecclesiastical Historian in the Service of Clio

1969 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 106-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Tracy Ellis
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Special Interest ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
Ecclesiastical History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Materials Used ◽  
The Church

Even the most ardent devotee of ecclesiastical history cannot realistically claim for his special interest a major role in Clio's fraternity in this age of high secularization. Yet it may be said, I believe, that the role is growing rather than diminishing for historians generally as they assess the value of scientific and professional works such as those of the Fliche and Martin series, The Christian Centuries edited by Louis J. Rogier, Roger Aubert, and David Knowles, the successive volumes ofConcilium.Theology in The Age of Renewaldevoted to ecclesiastical history, and the projected Oxford History of the Christian Church under the guiding hand of Owen Chadwick. And parenthetically at the outset I should like to make it clear that while most of the materials used in this paper are related to the Roman Catholic Church simply because of my greater familiarity with her story, I use the term ‘Christian Church’ in the broadest possible sense to embrace the Protestant, Anglican, and Orthodox communions, as well as that of the Church to which I owe my personal faith and allegiance.

The Ascetic Tradition and the English College at Valladolid

1985 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 275-283
Author(s):  
Michael E. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Early History ◽  
Roman Catholicism ◽  
Speaking Up ◽  
Ecclesiastical History ◽  
Practical Usefulness ◽  
Modern Mind ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church

The history of English Roman Catholicism from the end of the sixteenth century right through to the nineteenth has as one of its main features the rivalries between seculars and regulars, especially between the seculars and the Jesuits. As this dispute primarily, but not exclusively, concerns the clergy it is most clearly seen in the history of those colleges which provided clergy for the English mission. The early history of the English College in Rome is not only the story of English and Welsh rivalry, but of frequent objections to the Jesuit administration and accusations by the seculars of the enticement of students to join the Society. Similar cases are to be found in the history of Saint Alban’s College Valladolid, but in this college there is an added dimension. Not only did the seculars complain about the Jesuits but the Jesuits complained of students being enticed away to the Benedictines. Later, a certain amount of bitterness arose out of the establishment of a college directed by the seculars in Lisbon. The Jesuits considered that they should have been placed in charge. What is more, there were even quarrels among the catholics detained in Wisbech castle. The ‘stirs’ there bore a remarkable resemblance to those at the college in Rome. As Aveling remarks about English Roman Catholicism ‘Historians have been defeated by its immense complexities of ecclesiastical intrigue and embarrassed by its sheer ferocity’. The quarrels not only provoke a feeling of distaste in the modern mind — why couldn’t these people resolve their differences and get on with their spiritual mission? They also instil puzzlement – are these disputes to be explained solely as political intrigue and in-fighting within the Catholic party? If so, how could such a cause appear attractive or plausible? How could such a house divided against itself, stand? I want to suggest that there is an element often overlooked which, although not explaining fully these intrigues and dissensions, nevertheless might help us to understand better what was going on. This can be called the positive attraction of the ascetic ideal. Bossy has stated in reference to the history of the English Catholic community ‘martyrology pointed this subject historiographically speaking up a cul-de-sac’. I want to suggest that cul-de-sac or no, the consideration of martyrdom and of life as a preparation for martyrdom is a path that can lead to a vantage point from which one can view this clerical back biting and contentiousness in a clearer light. Evenett in his Birbeck Lectures in 1951 pleaded for a better integration of the history of spirituality into ecclesiastical history and in particular devoted some space to a consideration of the origins of the Catholic revival in Spain. He pointed out the overlap of those who abandoned the world with those who remained in it, reforming its practice. Speaking of the Carthusians of the sixteenth century he said ‘A larger interest and practical usefulness in the external affairs of the Church were manifest by them at this period than we are accustomed to associate with modern Parkminster or Miraflores’. Following these lines let us turn to certain aspects of Spanish spirituality and its relationship to England.

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