The History of Christianity: From the Disciples to the Dawn of the Reformation

(Rick Simeone) #1

Lecture 30: Cathedrals and Chapters


dialectic: The controversy was a stepping-stone on the way to
medieval Scholasticism.

o More important, the controversy reveals that attention was
given to the Eucharist as an “object” to be worshiped and
adored, rather than as the element of a meal to be eaten.

o The more the Eucharist was understood in this fashion, the
more the distinction between clergy and laity consisted in the
“mysterious/magic” power to effect the “transformation” of
bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. Note that
the Protestant taunt that yielded the phrase “hocus-pocus” for
something magical and phony was based on the solemn words
of consecration in the Catholic Mass in Latin: Hoc est Corpus
Meum, “This is my body.”

Clark, Medieval Cathedrals.
Scott, The Gothic Enterprise.


  1. How can disputes over the Eucharist (transubstantiation) be connected
    to the character of Christian liturgy as performed in the great
    medieval cathedrals?

  2. Discuss the role of cathedral chapters as centers for Christian life in the
    towns and cities of medieval Europe.


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