ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes that a historically situated system of thought and practice can provide insight into similar spiritual encounters medieval entrants might have had inside the varying spatial church arrangements which constituted Franciscan architecture across Europe. Bonaventure’s concept of the perscrutator or searcher into the affective depths of theology is a useful metonym for the following case study into one such set of mental habits, one disseminated to friars and laity alike by the Franciscan textual community. Using Bonaventure’s dimensional theology as the intellectual lens which might have guided a medieval devotee’s search for God inside Franciscan architectural space provides a compelling spatial framework to engage the depths of Franciscan architecture in the spiritual journey to God. The perscrutator plumbs the depths to discover the hidden spiritual things through the charity of the Holy Spirit, grace, and the searcher’s own efforts, thus attaining salvation and ultimately spiritual perfection.
