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Effect Of Religion In The Society
Effect Of Religion In The Society
Effect Of Religion In The Society
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Chaucer and the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, which governed England, Ireland, and the entire Continent of Europe, had become extremely wealthy by the late fourteenth century. The cathedrals that grew up around shrines to saint’s relics were incredibly expensive to build. The amount of gold that went into decorating them surpassed the riches in the noble’s chest.
Moreover the boxes used to hold the relics were more jewel-encrusted than the kings crown.
In a Century of disease, plague, and scarce labor, the sight of a Church ornamented with unused gold seemed unfair to the people. Considering the Churches great display of material wealth, it suddenly seemed hypocritical for them to preach against greed. There is a two way process where the Church has an influence on the society and the society influences the Church. This is because it is the people from the society who make up the Church. Those same people became the characters the Geoffrey Chaucer used in The Canterbury Tales.
In the general prologue, various pilgrims are introduced, a Nun, a Munk, and a Friar, all remarkable figures of the Church. They represent distinct areas of Christianity, with some holding to strict worship of Christ and others clearly disobeying the laws. As the prologue continues, more characters are introduced, a Summoner and a Pardoner who represent the corruption of the Church.
The Summoner is unlawful, unfaithful to the Church and engages in un-christian like behaviors, such as having sexual relations with prostitutes. While the Pardoner is a dishonest person who shows no doubts about passing off false items as the relics of saints. Basically conning people of their money by making them believe that they have sinned and need to buy pardons.
Lynch, Joseph H. The Medieval church: A Brief History. New York: Longman Group UK Limited, 1992.
The pardoner was a proud man. While others were not as educated as he was, the pardoner spoke in Latin to show off his linguistic ability. His failure to practice what he preached made him a model of hypocrisy and deceit. The pardoner was such a bragger that he boasted of the sins that he had done. "I spit out my venom under the color of holiness, to seem holy and true"(page 343). The pardoner admitted to his astonishing behavior and confessed to his immorality. His shameless confession indicated that he was guilty of foolishness: I preach, as you have just heard, and tell a hundred other falsehoods...my intention is to win money, not at all to cast out sins (page 343).
A 16th-century movement in Western Europe that aimed at reforming some doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church and resulted in the establishment of the Protestant churches. The world of the late medieval Roman Catholic Church from which the 16th-century reformers emerged was a complex one. Over the centuries, the church, particularly in the office of the papacy, had become deeply involved in the political life of Western Europe. The resulting intrigues and political manipulations, combined with the church’s increasing power and wealth, contributed to the bankrupting of the church as a spiritual force.
The Basilica of St. Denis contributed to the rise of the Catholic Church, for it provided a physical representation of the “Holy Jerusalem”, for many people to see. By viewing this representation of heaven, many people reestablished their faith into the church and longed for salvation, so that they can be accepted into the “spiritual heaven” after their death. This desperate attempt to gain salvation caused individuals to devote themselves to the church, which brought the Catholic Church leverage, power, and wealth.
Chaucer first begins his sly jab at the Church’s motives through the description of the Pardoner’s physical appearance and attitude in his “Canterbury Tales.” Chaucer uses the Pardoner as a representation of the Church as a whole, and by describing the Pardoner and his defects, is able to show what he thinks of the Roman Catholic Church. All people present in the “Canterbury Tales” must tell a tale as a part of story-telling contest, and the pilgrim Chaucer, the character in the story Chaucer uses to portray himself, writes down the tales as they are told, as well as the story teller. The description of the Pardoner hints at the relationship and similarity between the Pardoner and the Church as a whole, as well as marks the beginning of the irony to be observed throughout the “Pardoner’s Prologue and Tale.” The narrator describes the Pardoner as an extremely over confident, arrogant, and unattractive man, noting that his hair is “as yellow as wex,” lying thin and fl...
The job of the summoner was to find those who were not living a “holy” life and bring them to the court. This “unholy” life that they would get people for were for things like adultery. The narrator tells the reader of one of the acts of this summoner,” A good felawe to have his concubyn/A twelf-month and excuse him ate fulle;/Ful prively a finch eek could he pulle,” these lines tell the reader that the summoner would sleep around with girls which was one thing he would arrest people for. Chaucer use the ugliness of the summoner to show the hypocrisy of the church. Things the members would condemn would be things they would be
It is very rare that a book is written without the opinions of the author being clearly expressed somewhere within that book. Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales is one such book. In the General Prologue alone, by viewing Chaucer’s description of the Knight, the Prioress, and the Friar, the reader is able to pick up on Chaucer’s satirical humor toward the church of the 14th century.
The tithes from the people were what made the Church so wealthy (“The Medieval Church”). With wealth and power, and the fear of damnation, the Church was able to be as corrupt as it wanted because there was no one to stop them. Because of this corruption in the Church, a man by the name of Geoffrey Chaucer bec...
Chaucer lived in a time of great flux. His world was not only different from the world of his parents and grandparents; it was different from the one that he grew up in himself. The Black Plague had decimated the population and created voids in the labor force. The 100 Year’s War was ongoing and required countless men and resources to continue. Traditions, customs and rituals were questioned as society changed. The divisions within social strata were blurring and the organization of Europe was changing. Because of this enormous change on all fronts, no one had the ability to predict what would come in the future. It was this context in which Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales, so it’s no wonder why he wrote his poem about a group of people who are in a transitory phase, a pilgrimage, which is completely different from their day to day existences. The three pillars or estates of society, the nobility, the Catholic Church and the peasants were changing and competing for a stronger foundation within society. Chaucer took the opportunity to comment on all of the estates in his poem, especially the Church. His keen insight allowed him to differentiate between the rules and the actors within Catholicism, and it appears that he was able to see the virtue of religion as well as the corruption within it.
In the Medieval times, the Roman Catholic Church played a great role in the development of England and had much more power than the Church of today does. In Medieval England, the Roman Catholic Church dominated everyday life and controlled everyone whether it is knights, peasants or kings. The Church was one of the most influential institutions in all of Medieval England and played a large role in education and religion. The Church's power was so great that they could order and control knights and sends them to battle whenever they wished to. The Church also had the power to influence the decision of Kings and could stop or pass laws which benefited them in the long run, adding to this, the Church had most of the wealth in Europe as the Church demanded a Tithe from all the common life which meant that they had to pay 10 percent of their income to the Church. The Church controlled all the of the beliefs and religion of the Church as they were the only ones who could read or write Latin and as such could decipher the Bible and scriptures which gave them all the power to be the mouth of God. The Legacy of the power and the influence of the Church can still be found, even today in modern times.
The Catholic Church has long been a fixture in society. Throughout the ages, it has withstood wars and gone through many changes. It moved through a period of extreme popularity to a time when people regarded the Church with distrust and suspicion. The corrupt people within the church ruined the ideals Catholicism once stood for and the church lost much of its power. In the Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer primarily satirizes the corruptness of the clergy members to show how the Catholic Church was beginning its decline during the Middle Ages.
The Reformation was a decisive period in the history not only for the Catholic Church, but also for the entire world. The causes of this tumultuous point in history did not burst on the scene all at once, but slowly gained momentum like a boil that slowly festers through time before it finally bursts open. The Reformation of the Church was inevitable because of the abuses which the Church was suffering during this period. At the time of the Reformation, a segment of the Church had drifted away from its mission to bring Christ and salvation to the world. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Church had gradually become weaker because of abusive leadership, philosophical heresy, and a renewal of a form of the Pelagian heresy.
Chaucer uses the Prioress, the Monk and the Friar to represent his views on the Church. He makes the three model members of the Church appear to have no problems with self-indulgence, greed, and being unfaithful to their vows. He displays his anti skeptical thoughts of the faults of the medieval church by making fun of its teachings and the people of the church, who use it for personal gain. Chaucer see’s the church as corrupt, hypocritical and greedy.
The characters are on a pilgrimage which is a clear indicator that the text is of religious genre. The Catholic Church, at the time, was losing many followers due to the Black Death and their lack of faith in the importance of the church. The Summoner and the Pardoner, who both represent the Catholic Church, are both described as greedy, corrupt, and abusive. This is a direct correlation to how Chaucer and many others felt about the Catholic Church during this period. The Monk and the Prioress are not described as being corrupt like the Summoner and the Pardoner; however they are described as falling short of what is considered ideal for people of their position. They both are described as being in a depressed state. Also bot...
Geoffrey Chaucer was a on a mission when he wrote The Canterbury Tales. That mission was to create a satire that attacked three major institutions. Raphel displays, “Medieval society was divided into three estates: the Church (those who prayed), the Nobility (those who fought), and the Patriarchy. The General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales is an estates satire.” Chaucer wanted to shed light on the institutions that were taking advantage of the everyday man. Chaucer does this by making up tales about certain people that she light to the undercover world of the institutions. In The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer uses satire to attack the Church, the Patriarchy, and the Nobility.