Cater Lindberg Early Reform Analysis

Charity and Poverty in Early Reform Efforts The early reformation altered the lexicon of western cultural and called into question fundamental ideas about community, family, education, and public welfare. Within the plurality of the reform movements that Cater Lindberg describes there is an obvious and resounding theme—Belief. The goals of early reformers were often markedly different in regards to the doctrine and ritual of an ideal Christian state. Yet each of their movement highlights the power of individual beliefs to shape social ideas and in turn the power of social ideas to shape human lives. In the first chapter of our text History, Historiography, Interpretations Lindberg describes the way in which Lutheran, Catholic, Reformed …show more content…
(Lindberg, 110) In chapters, two and three of our text Lindberg paints a picture of medieval peasant life that is, by and large, grim. The realities of plague and famine consistently impoverished vast regions. This was coupled with lasting effects a feudal cast system. In which Europe's population was divided into three estates, Men who fought, Men who prayed, and everyone else—who worked. (Barnes, Lecture) Individuals whose cast called them to toil made up the medieval peasantry. These men and woman worked the land by social contract. Providing labor to local lords who were tasked with their governance and protection. Today, the colloquial understanding of peasantry is equated with poverty. Of course, not all peasants were poverty stricken, some were wealthy, but the average laborer was easily exploited in the context of the feudal social contract. Leaving many with little to buffer themselves from …show more content…
It is an embodiment of Caritas the divine spiritual notion of love. (Inside the Medieval Mind) Medieval views on poverty go hand-in-hand with a conception of charity. Almsgiving and Charity were far more complex than the simple act of benevolent giving. According to Catholic theology, giving is necessary for salvation. In the documentary Reformation: The Individual before God Diarmaid MacCulloch describes a world in which, “You could give a coin to a beggar and he would pray for your soul.” There was an expectation that the poor could intercede on the behalf of the charitable. This system allowed for what Lindberg calls a vicarious participation” in the inherent closeness to god that poverty supposedly created. (Lindberg,