'The Right Ordering of Souls': The Parish of All Saints' Bristol on the Eve of the Reformation: 47 (Studies in the History of Medieval Religion)

The relationship between people and parish in the late medieval ages illuminated by this study of a remarkable survival from the period. In the two centuries preceding the Reformation in England, economic, political and spiritual conditions combined with constructive effect.Endemic plague prompted a demonstrative piety and, in a world enjoying rising disposable incomes, this linked with current teachings - especially the doctrine of Purgatory - to sustain a remarkable devotional generosity.Moreover, political conditions, and particularly war with France, persuaded the government to summonits subjects' assistance, including responses encouraged in England's many parishes.As a result, the wealthier classes invested in and worked for their neighbourhood churches with a degree of largesse - witnessed in parish buildings in many localities - hardly equalled since. Buildings apart, the scarcity of pre-Reformation parish records means, however, that the resonances of this response, and the ma