Church-sect dynamics and the Feast of Corpus Christi

Sociology of Religion, Fall, 2004 by Barbara R. Walters

INTRODUCTION

The Roman Catholic ecclesia reached an apogee in the thirteenth century, a historical period referred to by Le Goff as one of the essouflement and excess of the grand expansion of Christianity from the eleventh and twelfth centuries (Le Goff 1999: 11). This apogee took form through a consolidation of resources and power manifest in its encyclopedic systematic theology, a highly developed apparatus of canon law, and the ascendancy of papal over monarchical authority, which together embodied a profound conjoining of the keys of Saint Peter with temporal sources of power (Schluchter 1998). The seeds of destruction were nonetheless incubating from within this vast socio-religious-political monolithic network referred to by Troeltsch (1931) as the ecclesia. These were kindling in the nascent but aggressive persecution of heretics, Jews, and homosexuals: an internal war openly declared at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 alongside church mandates for annual confession by the laity, annual participation in communion, and acceptance of the then ill-defined doctrine of transubstantiation (cf. Macy 1999; Leff 1967). In 1227 Pope Gregory IX began to delegate the work of the Inquisition, which became an unfettered inquiry and examination of potential internal enemies, to the Dominicans and Franciscans who as professional theologians were thought uniquely qualified to identify heresies (Hamilton 1999:164-181).

The Feast of Corpus Christi emerged in this context, premiering at Saint Martin's basilica in Liege in 1246 and added to the calendar of the universal church in 1264, a few months after an initial celebration for Pope Urban IV at the Papal Chapel (Lambot 1942). Interest in the new feast was reinvigorated at the Council of Vienne in 1311, several years before Pope John XXII instituted the exhibition of the Host in monstrance, giving way to the carnival-like processions for which the feast is famous. The Feast of Corpus Christi was the only addition to the Temporale in the thirteenth century and is best understood as the central unifying symbol of a religious movement, which was initiated by women and led by a charismatic prophetess, Juliana, a nun at Mont-Cornillon (cf. Walters 2002:84). Mont-Cornillon was the site of a leprosarium and monastery under the Rule of Saint Augustine, just outside the city walls of Liege.

The empirical pattern of the acceptance and diffusion of the new feast fits neatly with sociological concepts and models derived from classic and contemporary research on religious movements (e.g. Weber 1978; Durkheim 1965; Stark and Bainbridge 1980). An initial expressive phase from 1209 to 1246 developed around Juliana under the conditions of strife and fragmentation (Walters 2003) that characterized the diocese of Liege. The thirteenth-century diocese covered most of modern Belgium and thus was situated on the border between France and Germany. Its territorial location placed it at the vortex of a struggle for temporal power between the papacy and Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II: a conflict amplified by internecine struggles and dynastic rivalry in neighboring Flanders between the two heirs from two lineages. The rivalry resulted from the two marriages of Countess Margaret as well as struggles in the ville between an established patrician stratum, noble prince bishops, and newer rising urban groups (Pirenne 1929; 1963; Vercauten 1946). The context of Liege created religious "seekers."

As with other religious movements, Juliana's initial audience emerged from pre-existing networks; and, similar to the successful religious movements reported by Stark and Bainbridge (1980), it was propelled in an initial "expressive" or "contingency" phase by affective ties. The first recruits were drawn and mobilized through Juliana's face-to-face friends and acquaintances among the abundant population of religious women, but also monks and friars from the new order of the Dominicans. Roles in the initial phase largely conformed to the pattern of inclusion for women described in Weber's theory, that is, pneumatic manifestations were central (1978: 489). Women worked alongside men, even led them, in the movement to establish the new feast in the early phase. In contrast to another of Weber's theoretical observations, these were mostly high-born women that rallied around Juliana, affluent women with influential connections among the nobility and within the ecclesiastic hierarchy (cf. Walters 2002; Bynum 1991), although Juliana also drew in the poor beguines.

As the movement's central figure, Juliana was hallowed by manifestations of the Holy Spirit, which were interwoven into the social tapestry of the charismaaudience relationship. Walters (2002), employing a case pattern and analytic model and a number of dimensions, has interpolated the classic Weberian catergories to identify Juliana as a "prophetess" (cf. Bynum 1991). Juliana was an Augustinian nun and as such held an office; like a priest she laid "claim to authority by virtue of service in a sacred tradition" (Weber 1978:440). However, women were excluded from the order of the priests. Juliana, through pneumatic manifestations, personal characteristics, intense devotion, and other special gifts expanded her influence well beyond the scope of her official authority, even to include charismatic influence over women outside religious orders, such as the beguines. And, like the mystics, Juliana was perceived to have received confirmation of this expanded religious authority directly from God. This female charismatic type and her mystical relationship to God were literally condemned with the last breath of the institutionalization phase of the Feast of Corpus Christi after Juliana's death, at the Council of Vienne in 1311, as were the beguines (cf. Weber 1978:489).