ABSTRACT

In studying ecclesiastical history, it is dangerous to concentrate exclusively on the clergy and forget that the Church, as the congregatio fidelium, includes lay as well as clerical members. In judging relations between the clergy and the laity, one must strike a fair balance between favourable and hostile elements. The laity's principal obligations to the Church were in the parish. The best measure of popular religious sentiment is the existence of activities which went beyond the requirements of canon law, of which the most marked are the activities of the various religious guilds. Some guilds were primarily concerned with economic matters, but even they took part in various spiritual observances, which show how the influence of the Church permeated all aspects of social life. Far more important were the guilds which existed in many parish churches.