Resurrection andRenewal 339
With their higher literacy rate and more formed religious society, the moth-
ers of communal Italy would have scored higher, had Jacques queried them.
Saint Galgano’s mother suffered greatly from her perceived failure to form
her son in religion and curb his wilder instincts.^197 That Saint Michael the
Archangel supplied some help was unusual, but her conscientiousness was
more universal. Saint Raimondo of Piacenza’s mother, who apprenticed him
out to a trade rather than have him taught to read, did teach him the three
essential prayers.^198 Imparting this minimum was certainly not an insurmount-
able task. Italian was close enough to Latin so that regular repetition of the
essential prayers within the child’s hearing, in church and at home, could
imprint them on the memory.^199 After the Lateran Council of 1215 ,allChris-
tians approaching confession for a general Communion had to recite the
Pater, the Ave, and the Credo, at least in the vernacular.^200 But learning by
osmosis favored learning the prayers in the normative language, Latin. All
three prayers were liturgical. The priest sang the Pater Noster at every Mass.
The Ave and the Credo had their place at the beginning of every hour of the
Office. When the average Italian recited the Credo, he, like Saint Giovanni
Buono, knew the ‘‘Faith of the Roman Church,’’ not as the catechetical Apos-
tles’ Creed, but as the liturgical Nicene Creed.^201 That was the creed people
heard sung (to a simple and memorable tune) every Sunday.
Letters in thirteenth-century Italy were no monopoly of the clergy; lay
theologians like Albertano of Brescia wrote sermons and discussed theology
in a nonclerical environment. Thirteenth-century Italian Bibles occasionally
included catechetical appendixes adapted to lay needs, such as expositions
of the Creed.^202 These expositions focused on the topics attacked by heretics,
such as the authority of the Church and the real presence in the Mass.
Theology, like prayers, could also be learned by osmosis. Saint Raimondo of
Piacenza, while a young shoemaker and still illiterate, sought out other spiri-
tually minded laborers for theological conversation on feast days. When
word of this got around, other laypeople gathered in his shop for pious con-
versation during free time. The discussions became so popular, and Raimon-
do’s spiritual understanding so well known, that people asked him to give
little spiritual talks (conciones) in his shop. Raimondo humbly refused, saying
that this was the office of priests and doctors of theology. But the lay study
group continued to meet. It was certainly not the only one in communal
Italy.^203 I belabor this point since too sharp a distinction is often made be-
tween a ‘‘literate’’ piety of the clergy and the ‘‘popular’’ piety of the laity.^204
197 .Vita Sancti Galgani, 1 ,p. 188.
198. Rufino of Piacenza,Vita et Miracula B. Raymundi, 1. 6 ,p. 646.
199. On such learning of prayers by osmosis, see Zafarana, ‘‘Cura pastorale,’’ 511 – 12.
200. Lett,Enfant, 110.
201 .Processus... B. Joannis Boni, 4. 6. 307 ,p. 849.
202. E.g., Pisa, Biblioteca Cateriniana del Seminario Arcivescovile,ms 177(xivcent.), fols. 3 r– 6 r.
203. Rufino of Piacenza,Vita et Miracula B. Raymundi, 5. 19 – 20 [i.e., 2. 19 – 20 ], pp. 648 – 49.
204 .PaceCinzio Violante, ‘‘Sistemi organizzativi della cura d’anime in Italia tra Medioevo e Rinasci-
mento: Discorso introduttivo,’’Pievi e parrocchie,ed. Erba et al., 1 : 29 , who thinks the piety of the urban
faithful was ‘‘parecchio diversa da quella ufficiale,’’ meaning that represented by synodal legislation.