ABSTRACT
Priests of the medieval Catholic Church understood something about the relationship between affect and attitude. To instill the proper attitude in parishioners. priests dramatized the power of liturgy to save them from Hell in a service in which the experience of darkness and fear gave way to light and !"ami liar liturgy. These ceremonies "were written and performed so as to first arouse and then allay anxieties and fears" (Scott, 2003, p. 227):
This ceremony was designed to buttress beliefs by experience and to transfigure abstract ions into attitudes. In place of merely hearing about "the chaos and perdition of hell that regular performances of liturgy were designed to hold in check" (Scott, :2003), pari.shioncrs should actually feel reactions of fear and confusion when contemplating Hell, and of hope and relief at the familiar sounds of liturgy.
