The cathedral of Notre-Dame, Reims, France.Paul Almasy
Religious orders: canons and monks
Interest in the humanity of Christ and the desire to live the apostolic life in imitation of him influenced religious orders in the 12th century. The reformed orders of canons represent one aspect of this trend. The founder of the Premonstratensian order, Norbert of Xanten, was recognized for inspiring many to imitate the life of Christ. The order spread throughout Europe after its founding in 1120 and cultivated both the active and the contemplative religious life. Norbert’s order was part of a broader movement to regularize the life of all canons by enforcing monastic rules.
Traditional monastic life also underwent an apostolic-inspired reform in the late 11th and 12th centuries. Beginning with a few relatively small quasi-eremitic orders in Italy, such as the Camaldolese and the Vallombrosans, the movement spread to France with the founding of the extreme eremitic Grandmontines in 1077 and the eremitic Carthusians in 1084; it became as wide as Christendom with the multiplication of the daughter monasteries of Cîteaux (founded in 1098). The guiding principle of the Cistercians (based at Cîteaux) was exact observance of the Rule of St. Benedict, with emphasis on simplicity, poverty, and manual work. The addition of lay brothers tapped a large reservoir in an age of increased religious devotion and economic and population growth, and the organization of the order—which featured annual visitations and a general chapter—ensured good discipline and enabled the Cistercians to accommodate a vast family of houses scattered throughout the Latin church.
The success of Cîteaux owed much to the genius of St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux from 1115 to 1153, who was for 30 years the untitled religious leader of Europe. Owing to his influence, other new orders—such as the Premonstratensians, the English Gilbertines, and the military Knights Templars—accepted or imitated Cistercian practices. By the end of the 12th century, however, changing social conditions and growing urbanization necessitated a new kind of religious order that would assume the prominence in society once held by the monks. The mendicant orders
In the early 13th century a new manifestation of the apostolic life appeared in the form of orders of mendicant preachers. The rise of the mendicants was in part a response to the revival of urban centres and the expansion of trade. The Waldenses, one of the first groups to adopt a life of evangelical poverty, were declared heretical for refusing to submit to ecclesiastical authority and for criticizing the church and its wealth. But the idea of adopting the apostolic life, prefigured by Robert d’Abrissel in the 12th century, was a powerful one that recalled the original purity and simplicity of the church at a time when both church and society were becoming increasingly wealthy and complex. Showing considerable foresight and discernment, Innocent III embraced the movement and made it part of the church when he approved the Franciscan and Dominican orders.
Francis of Assisi, a man of magnetic personality who believed that he was called by Christ to preach poverty, had no thought of founding an order, but his message and his genius exactly suited the age, and the vast concourse of his followers gradually transformed itself from a homeless, penniless band of preachers and missionaries in Italy into an international body governed by a single general and devoted to the service of the papacy. In contrast, Dominic de Guzmán (c. 1170–1221), whose vocation was preaching against heretics and whose followers kept a canonical rule, changed his existing institute into one of friars. Gradually the two groups became similar: international, articulated groups of men bound to an order but not to a community. They took the customary monastic vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience but dropped the vow of stabilitas (“stability”) in favour of mobility, and they were governed by elected superiors under a supreme chapter and a general. Remarkably, first the Dominicans and then the Franciscans entered and soon dominated the theological schools of Paris and Oxford. Two similar bodies joined them, the Carmelites and the Austin Friars, and for almost a century the members of the various mendicant orders were the theologians, the preachers, and the confessors of the Christian people. The rise of heresy
The same religious enthusiasm that contributed to the rise of Gregorian Reform and the orthodox movements of the late 11th and 12th centuries also inspired movements of religious dissent or heresy. The earliest episodes of heresy in the West predate the Gregorian Reform, and their ideals may have been absorbed by the Gregorians. In the early 12th century Gregorian Reform movement may have given rise to a wave of radical reformers whose religious zeal led them to excessive criticism of the church. The early dissenters, such as Tanchelm and Peter of Bruys, attracted large but ephemeral followings of clergy and laity. In the 1150s the Italian canon Arnold of Brescia (died 1155), an outspoken critic of clerical wealth and corruption, assumed the leadership of a revolt against the pope in Rome. Despite their popular appeal, these dissident leaders failed to inspire the kind of broad movement that would emerge later in the century.
By the 1140s and possibly earlier, Bogomil missionaries from the eastern Mediterranean or the Balkans appeared in parts of western Europe. Their preaching and ascetic lifestyle gave rise to the Cathari (from Greek katharos, meaning “pure,” from the ascetic lives of their leaders), a sect that became prominent in northern Italy and southern France. Although the Cathari maintained that they alone were true Christians, their leaders, the “perfects,” overtly denied many traditional Christian doctrines, such as the Incarnation of Christ (they taught a Docetist Christology, which maintained that Christ only appeared to assume the flesh). Cathari teachings were dualistic, regarding matter and the human body as evil and spirit as good. Consequently, the perfects ate no meat and practiced celibacy. The sect’s emphasis on poverty and its practice of mutual assistance appealed to many who were repelled by the luxury and wealth in which the Catholic hierarchy then lived. In the 1170s the Waldenses (named after their founder, the French merchant Valdes [often incorrectly known as Peter Waldo]) initiated another type of dissent in the Rhône valley and Piedmont. Anticipating St. Francis of Assisi, Valdes adopted a life of poverty and evangelism, and the movement grew in the newly emerging towns of Europe.