Spirituality and Reform

In colorful detail, Calvin Lane explores the dynamic intersection between reform movements and everyday Christian practice from ca. 1000 to ca. 1800. Lowering the artificial boundaries between "the Middle Ages," "the Reformation," and "the Enlightenment," Lane brings to life a series of reform programs each of which developed new sensibilities about what it meant to live the Christian life. Along this tour, Lane discusses music, art, pilgrimage, relics, architecture, heresy, martyrdom, patterns of personal prayer, changes in marriage and family life, connections between church bodies and governing authorities, and certainly worship. The thread that he finds running from the Benedictine revival in the eleventh century to the pietistic movements of the eighteenth is a passionate desire to return to a primitive era of Christianity, a time of imagined apostolic authenticity, even purity. In accessible language, he introduces readers to Cistercians and Calvinists, Franciscans and Jesuits, Lutherans and Jansenists, Moravians and Methodists to name but a few of the many reform movements studied in this book. Although Lane highlights their diversity, he argues that each movement rooted its characteristic practice - their spirituality - in an imaginative recovery of the apostolic life.
Calvin Lane explores the intersection between reform movements and everyday Christian practice from c.1000 to c.1800. Providing colorful details, Lane lowers the artificial boundaries between "the Middle Ages" and "the Reformation" to show a series of reform programs each of ...
In Spirituality and Reform, Calvin Lane has accomplished two goals. Lane has synthesized and explained dozens of theological movements stretching from the Gregorian reforms of the eleventh century to the Moravians and Pietists of the 1700's and he has challenged the artificial boundaries that scholars use to separate historical periods. His book unites the waves of theological reform rocking Latin Christendom. Lane has written a solid book to explain and emphasize the constantly evolving and consistent nature of Christian theology in pre-modern Europe.--Sixteenth Century Journal
A superb study of Christian devotion and spirituality in medieval, Reformation and early modern times. Breaking through the old periodization paradigm, this fresh narrative focuses on how people prayed, believed, worshiped, and practiced the faith in an age of change and reform. Highly recommended!--Timothy George, Beeson Divinity School, Samford University
Calvin Lane's Spirituality and Reform proposes an attractive alternative to traditional narratives and timelines of premodern Western Christian reform. . . . Spirituality and Reform is an appealing interpretation of premodern Western Christianity and a useful survey of recent topical literature. It continues and advances current scholarly trends with accessible and memorable structure and prose. It may not single-handedly bring about the deconstruction of tedious historiographical barriers, but it certainly makes a clear case for why such deconstruction is necessary.--Church History: Studies in Christianity and Culture