Sex, Gender, and Episcopal Authority in an Age of Reform, 1000}}}1122 [Paperback]

Examines the debates over ecclesiastical reform in western Europe during the high Middle Ages from a new perspective.Examining the debates over ecclesiastical reform in western Europe from a new perspective, this book explores the ways in which contemporary political writers conveyed messages about 'public' life through images of the 'private' life of the Church, arguing that the images were shaped by contemporary ideas about sexuality and gender.Examining the debates over ecclesiastical reform in western Europe from a new perspective, this book explores the ways in which contemporary political writers conveyed messages about 'public' life through images of the 'private' life of the Church, arguing that the images were shaped by contemporary ideas about sexuality and gender.The eleventh and early twelfth centuries were a period of intense debate over ecclesiastical reform in western Europe. This book examines the debates from a new perspective, exploring the ways in which contemporary political writers conveyed messages about public life through textual and sometimes visual images of the private life of the Church. It argues that the images they used - of bishops as husbands of their sees, of the laity as the sons of Mother Church, and of the pope as father of bishops - were shaped not only by intellectual and ritual traditions, but also by contemporary ideas about sexuality and gender. Megan McLaughlin reveals that the boundaries between the public and the private were extremely fluid in the central middle ages  both because of both the realities of political life in that period and the changing nature of life within European households.Introduction; 1. The reform of marriage; 2. The Bride of Christ; 3. The ambiguities of motherhood; 4. The Mother of the Faithful; 5. Fathers and sons; 6. Fathers in the spirit; Conclusion: the stumbling block. &superb&McLaughlin argues her point in lively and subtly amusing prose, sparked with effective quotations of medievlÃ.