11 - The friars’ schools of theology

Summary

The Fourth Lateran Council in November 1215 promulgated a full pastoral programme for the rejuvenation of the Catholic Church. Innocent III had already imparted his blessing upon the nascent mendicant orders, the Dominicans and the Franciscans, before the ecumenical council. Although both orders were then hatchlings and friars were relatively few, both prospered in the wake of the ecumenical council and began to attract a large number of recruits, who propagated papal teaching throughout the western Church; Dominicans and Franciscans were enthusiastic champions of the papal reform and they assisted prelates in a variety of ways through teaching, preaching and hearing confessions. The canons of this council created a template for ecclesiastical reform, which can be detected in the pastoral dedication of friars such as Haymo of Faversham, who embodied the spirit of the Council. Franciscan literature provides innumerable examples of the friars responding to these canons and fervently promoting its teaching in the subsequent diocesan synods. The Revd Dr Maurice W. Sheehan, OFM, Cap, regarded the friars as a providential response to the problems besetting the Church, especially in the urban centres. He added:

The Fourth Lateran Council coincided with the rise of the universities and the new orders of friars (…) and marked the beginning of a new era in the pastoral life of the Church (…). The clergy, who had to be disciplined, edu-cated, orthodox and fitted by character and training for the direction of souls, were the key to its success. They had, in effect, to live good lives and to study theology. The friars grasped the full implication of the conciliar decrees and made a determined effort to put them into practice (…). The studies of the friars were aimed at their apostolate of preaching in the pulpit and instruction in the confessional. This combination of learning and its practical application to Christian life made them indispensable to those committed to making a reality of the conciliar decrees. Popes and bishops seized upon the friars as agents of reform because of the moral force of their lives and their dedication to the cure of souls.

The canons of this council framed the pastoral outlook of St Francis, as his writings show. His emphasis on eucharistic piety was communicated to the friars and it became the cornerstone of their teaching and preaching.