Gender, Catholicism and Spirituality

Women and the Roman Catholic Church in Britain and Europe, 1200-1900

Laurence Lux-Sterritt, Carmen Mangion

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN:
  9780230577619
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781137267948
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Social History
• Index: History

This timely collection of essays on British and European Catholic spiritualities explores how ideas of the sacred have influenced female relationships with piety and religious vocations over time. Each of the studies focuses on specific persons or groups within the varied contexts of England, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain, together spanning the medieval period through to the nineteenth century.

Examining the interplay between women's religious roles and patriarchal norms, the volume highlights the relevance of gender and spirituality through a wide geographical and chronological spectrum. It is an essential resource for students of Gender History, Women's Studies and Religious Studies, introducing a wealth of new research and providing an approachable guide to current debates and methodologies.

Contributions by: Nancy Jiwon Cho, Frances E. Dolan, Rina Lahav, Jenna Lay, Laurence Lux-Sterritt, Carmen M. Mangion, Querciolo Mazzonis, Marit Monteiro, Elizabeth Rhodes, Kate Stogdon, Anna Welch

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgements
• List of Contributors
• Preface
• Introduction: Gender, Catholicism and Women’sSpirituality over the Longue Durée
• 1 Presence and Absence: Reading Clare of Assisi in Franciscan Liturgy and Community1
• 2 Marguerite Porete and the Predicament of her Preaching in Fourteenth-Century France
• 3 The Impact of Renaissance Gender-Related Notions on the Female Experience of the Sacred: The Case of Angela Merici’s Ursulines
• 4 Teresa de Jesús’s Book and the Reform of the Religious Man in Sixteenth-Century Spain
• 5 Mary Ward’s English Institute and Prescribed Female Roles in the Early Modern Church1
• 6 An English Nun’s Authority: Early Modern Spiritual Controversy and the Manuscripts of Barbara Constable1
• 7 Power in Piety: Inspiration, Ambitions and Strategies of Spiritual Virgins in the Northern Netherlands during the Seventeenth Century1
• 8 ‘Martyrs of England! Standing on High!’: Roman Catholic Women’s Hymn-writing for the Re- invigoration of the Faith in England, 1850–19031
• 9 Expressions of Self-Surrender in Nineteenth-Century France: The Case of Thérèse Couderc (1805–1885)
• 10 The ‘Mixed Life’: Challenging Understandings of Religious Life in Victorian England1
• Afterword
• Glossary
• Further Reading
• Index