The Gregorian reform was an important movement of renewal between the mid-eleventh and mid-twelfth centuries and took its name from Pope Gregory VII (1073–1085). The core of the reform was the purification of the Church from secular and political domination. However, Gregory’s programme was fundamentally structural-institutional – particularly in a growing separation of the clergy from the laity expressed by universal celibacy, and in securing the unity of the Church through a centralized papacy. One effect of the reforms was to focus supernatural power increasingly in a clerically controlled sacramental system.
While the reform had a spiritual and moral content, especially a concern for the quality of clerical life and pastoral care, it unlocked a radical evangelical fervor which the hierarchy of the Church found difficult to contain. In the end, it could be argued that the Gregorian reform failed to satisfy lay people and the outstanding religious spirits of the age. Two things resulted from this. First, a new spiritual climate developed which favored evangelical simplicity and piety. Second, there was a movement outwards from the world of the cloister and a growing resistance to forcing the spiritual life into organized systems. At its most extreme, this dissatisfaction contributed to the birth of dissident movements such as the Waldensians (who re-emerged as a reformed church in Italy during the Reformation), the Humiliati, and various apocalyptic groups even within established religious orders who predicted the imminent second coming of Christ.
The so-called vita evangelica was not an organized movement but a way of describing a widespread spiritual fervor. It centered on a return to gospel values expressed in simplicity, the literal imitation of the poor and homeless Jesus (mendicancy and wandering), and in preaching. It is noticeable that women played an active role at the start although eventually this was curtailed in significant ways. This can be seen with the eventual enclosure of some women’s groups (for example the Poor Clares) and a general suspicion of others (for example, the Beguines).
In the case of the various elements that went to make up the vita evangelica, some were absorbed into the spiritual mainstream. Thus, the mendicant groups found an accepted place through formal recognition of new religious orders such as the Franciscans in the thirteenth century. Some people who began as radical wandering preachers, such as Norbert of Xanten, eventually settled down to a fairly orthodox monastic life (Norbert founded the Canons Regular of Premontre´). Even the mendicants, while retaining their relative simplicity, mobility, and emphasis on popular preaching, took on a structured lifestyle as religious orders. However, they continued close connections with lay Christians by founding associated groups, known as Tertiaries (or ‘‘Third Orders’’), for men and women who were unable to take on the full lifestyle of the parent order. Some Tertiaries lived in community but the majority continued to live at home in normal married and working environments while undertaking a life of prayer and charitable work compatible with everyday commitments.
One category that bridged the gap between the Gregorian Reforms and the vita evangelica was the so-called ‘‘canonical life.’’ The defining style was one of clergy or groups of women who lived in community as Canons (or Canonesses) Regular yet exercised a pastoral ministry. The most notable expression was a revival of the fifth-century Rule of St Augustine. This canonical revival also integrated clerical reform with elements of the new evangelical fervor – not least its encouragement of a more active spirituality of service. Many of the new communities of men and women ministered to the poor, nursed the sick, or cared for pilgrims. Some male communities took on the pastoral care of geographical areas. Some communities of Canons Regular or of Canonesses integrated pastoral care with contemplative-monastic observance.
The Canons Regular of Premontre´ (Premonstratensians) in particular were influenced by elements of Cistercian austerity and the Canons of St Victor in Paris (or Victorines) became notable for the foundation of a contemplative-mystical tradition that combined the Augustinian theological tradition with the mystical theology of Pseudo-Dionysius and with the new ‘‘scientific’’ theology of the schools. The two most notable exponents were Hugh of St Victor (d. 1141) and Richard of St Victor (d. 1173) who exercised a major influence on the development of a distinct spiritual theology. Richard’s doctrine was condensed into two important works, Benjamin minor and Benjamin major, which describe the contemplative journey. Richard and his disciples increasingly made a certain reading of the teachings of pseudoDionysius the yardstick to judge a mystical way of life. Richard had considerable influence, for example on St Bonaventure’s Journey of the Mind into God and on The Cloud of Unknowing, the fourteenth-century English mystical text.
The Catholic Reformation
