Social Discipline And Its Enforcement
Through the Consistory During the Reformation attempts to enforce confessional conformity against external groups and control the moral conduct of the common people escalated. Social disciplining is the name given to these attempts by the authorities during the Reformation. To understand social disciplining one must first understand that at this time all Christians believed in maintaining a certain amount of church discipline. Also, as mentioned in Po-Chia Hsia’s text Social Discipline in the Reformation at this time there was a, “double contract, between God and the Chosen People, and between the Ruler and the People. ” Thus, the ruler is both a servant of God and a sort of God to the people. This system benefited both state and religious authorities because these magistrates issued many statutes and mandates regulating the household. These consisted of sexual deviancies and their punishments, encouraged the family to uphold a patriarchal household, condemned luxury at weddings, baptisms, and burials, and some denounced magical healings, blasphemies, and swearing.
In full effect, each territory had their own setup of social disciplining. For example, Lutheran territories had consistory courts, marriage courts, and regular parish visitations. In addition, Catholic states had clerical councils and instituted visitations. Also, Calvinist states used moral supervision by the elders and preachers in synodal, provincial, and class meetings. For state authorities, this helped because they kept control over people and the rules kept people in order. These systems had people believing their ruler is very powerful and should be listened to. This benefited state authorities because their word would be listened to and people would stay in check. Also, it was a basic control over civil disobedience because the mandates kept people living a certain way and peoples trust in their ruler kept them following the mandates.
Social disciplining also benefited religious authority because people would attend church because it was mandated. In addition, it gave a lot of power to the church in many cases because if someone got in trouble and was put on trial the church held the trial and could prosecute the individual. The way for the common people to contest social discipling was to not obey the mandates put in place by the authorities. The common people could not go to church or break a lot of the moral codes set in place to contest social discipling. The reasons these people may contest these systems are that they are not the religion that is being enforced, don’t believe in God, or just want to do things that the church sees as wrong. Overall, social disciplining is beneficial to the authorities because it helps to keep order in the community, but it can easily be contested because the moral codes were very strict and easy to break, they could not control people’s thoughts or actions, and the people could lie to the enforcers of social discipline.
A system of social disciplining was in place in Geneva. In Geneva there was a system of government with many councils and within the small council there was a group of subcommunities of which one was known as the consistory. The consistory dealt with moral offenses and religious cases. The consistory policed behavior by putting people on trial and then giving them a verdict based on their trial. In most cases, the verdict was that the person on trial had to attend more sermons and know prayers. In other cases, involving things other than not frequenting sermons the results vary but most commonly the person had to stop doing whatever they were doing wrong and attend more sermons. Basically, to be the ideal Genevan citizen one must attend all sermons, know all the prayers and songs, and not do anything morally wrong in the community or be accused of doing anything wrong.
One case that exemplifies the average case in the consistory and how the consistory could be contested is the case of Guilliermon Moyne. This case from Registers of the Consistory of Geneva in the Time of Calvin by Robert M. Kingdon is about a woman who is summoned to the consistory, “On the Word of God, because of the sermons. ” Basically, these charges are about her not attending the sermons, whether or not she knows prayers, and if she learns by going to sermons. Her response is that she attends sermons on Sundays, attends all the feasts, and attends sermons other days when she can. Also, she adds where she attends sermons and that she struggles to retain what preachers say. Then, she says the prayer and messes it up and then in confession begs for Gods’ mercy. The consistory then said, “she was admonished to frequent the sermons and strive to learn to pray to God and go to the house of Monsieur Henri, minister. ” After this women butchered the prayer and did not attend sermons frequently her punishment was to just go more often and try to learn how to pray. This is an example of how the consistory dealt with most cases, by ordering people to attend sermons more. This could very easily be contested by this woman just lying to the consistory about how often she frequents sermons, or by her just leaving and not doing anything they asked of her. The inability of the consistory to truly implement their requests allows a lot of people the ability to disobey what they are asked to do.
A different case that shows the power the consistory possessed is the case of Pierre Durand. Pierre is summoned to the consistory because of his repentance for having fornicated. Pierre answers, “that he begs mercy of God and of justice and that he was not married when he fornicated. ” Then, Pierre says he has received Communion last in the fall. Since this case was held on September 21 that means Pierre last received Communion almost a year ago. One would imagine that not receiving Communion for such a long time and for fornicating while not in marriage would result in some bad punishment. The consistory advised, “that he be admonished at the sermons and on the day of prayer and that he not receive the next Holy Communion, and go to the catechism. ” In this case that is a pretty harsh punishment because of the social implications that are involved. That is because many members of the community attend the sermons and the day of prayer, so he will be embarrassed in front of all his fellow citizens. This is one example of the consistory really coming down on an individual and enforcing more than just attending more sermons. This shows the benefit of social disciplining in for the authorities because of the embarrassment this man is going to face he will most likely not do anything wrong again and he will begin to be much more religious.
Finally, a case that shows the lack of power the consistory has over people’s minds but shows the power it has over people’s lives is the case of Pierre Falcat and Nycod Moury. Pierre and Nycod were priests before the Reformation. This is a case of two men who openly renounce the Reformation to the consistory. Pierre starts and says that he has doubts about the Reformation and that he wants to live according the way his predecessors did. Then, he goes on to profess his love for his faith and God. In sum, Pierre was taught and grew up a Roman Catholic and he does not want to convert to or practice another faith. Then he is followed up by Nycod who also professes his love for the Lord. Both priests seem to be not fully committed to the Reformation and they had previously left Geneva once the reform happened. The consistory then advised them to, “be given proper admonitions to frequent the sermons and the Word of God. ” Basically, the two men were not really punished that much. Due to the lack of punishment these two men contested the social disciplining and they did not change their ways. Then, a year later in 1543, the men were banished from Geneva and their possessions were taken from them. This is a prime example of the power the consistory had to mess up one’s life. But, no matter how much they tried the consistory could not forcibly convert one’s mind to another faith.
The consistory was a working example of social discipling during the Reformation. Though the social discipling was effective in many cases there were problems with it as well. As seen in the Pierre Falcat and Nycod Moury case and the Pierre Durand case social disciplining gave the authorities a lot of power to impact people’s lives. But, as seen in the Guilliermon Moyne case the consistory can give a verdict but who is to say that people will follow said verdict, or who is to say that people don’t just memorize prayer to lie to the consistory about their involvement in the church. Therefore, social discipling was relatively effective in controlling the community and keeping people on the right moral track, but social disciplining’s effectiveness also depended heavily on whether the individual was a person of faith and if they actually followed what they were asked to do.
