A Woman of the Reformation
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College of Saint Benedict and Saint John's University DigitalCommons@CSB/SJU School of Theology and Seminary Graduate Papers/Theses School of Theology and Seminary 8-2006 A Woman of the Reformation Megan S. Enninga College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.csbsju.edu/sot_papers Part of the History of Religions of Western Origin Commons Recommended Citation Enninga, Megan S., "A Woman of the Reformation" (2006). School of Theology and Seminary Graduate Papers/Theses. 16. https://digitalcommons.csbsju.edu/sot_papers/16 This Graduate Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Theology and Seminary at DigitalCommons@CSB/SJU. It has been accepted for inclusion in School of Theology and Seminary Graduate Papers/Theses by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@CSB/SJU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Enninga 1 A Woman of the Reformation By Megan S. Enninga 1209 SW 15th St. Willmar, MN 56201 A paper submitted to the Faculty of the School of Theology of Saint John’s University, Collegeville, Minnesota, in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in Liturgical Studies. SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY Saint John’s University Collegeville, Minnesota August 2006 Enninga 2 This Paper was written under the direction of ___________________________________ Signature of Director _________Martin J. Connell__________ Name of Director Enninga 3 Megan S. Enninga has successfully demonstrated the use of German and Spanish in this paper. _________________________________________ Signature of Director ____________Martin J. Connell______________ August 2006 Enninga 4 A Woman of the Reformation Description of the Project: Katharina Schütz Zell (1497 or 8-1562) influenced Strasbourg, Germany and the surrounding area by her marriage to a clergyman, publishing a hymnal and other writings, and by serving as a strong advocate for those less fortunate than herself. By looking at some of her writings, the climate of the society in this period in regards to clerical marriage, and some of her acts of social activism, Katharina Schütz Zell will be proven to be a remarkable woman and most likely the only woman of this period in Strasbourg who had such a wide variety of contributions during this period of the Reformation. This paper may not be duplicated. ___________________________________ Signature of Student Writer ____________________________________ Date Enninga 5 The history of women in the liturgy is a rare topic in traditional church history books such as systematic theological treatises, official rites and texts, and learned commentaries. Evidence of feminine influence is more often found in the margins of such books. More often than not the presence of women is noted in Christian worship through letters, diaries, and autobiographies written by the women themselves. One of the earliest women whose writings have actually survived is Egeria, who wrote in her travel diaries about the liturgical life of the church in the Holy Land in the 4th century. Some of the letters that were written by powerful clerics to women have been saved. Letters written by St. Benedict, the founder of the Order of St. Benedict and writer of the Benedictine Rule to his sister St. Scholastica still influence Benedictine communities today. Most modern day theologians would find it difficult to name even ten women in the early Church and lay people most likely know even fewer. These few examples show just some of what women have faced to get their story heard throughout history. Although overlooked and often ignored, women have played a large part in the writing of the hymns and prayers of the Church. Furthermore, the activism and strong character of women was poignant during the years of the reformation as they upset the societal balance by marrying clergymen and supporting the reformers in their work. There is also the material evidence of women at work in the Church present in such things as the shrines that they built, the pictures that they painted, and the numerous prayer cards and Sunday hats they purchased. A Woman of the Reformation Katharina Schütz Zell (1497 or 8-1562) by her marriage to a clergyman, publishing a hymnal and other of her own writings, and by her strong advocacy for those less fortunate than herself helped to transform the role of women in Strasbourg, Germany. Katharina, who happened to be born into a turbulent time in the history of Christian worship, chose to speak out Enninga 6 amidst the many voices vying to be heard during the age of religious reform. Katharina virtually was the only woman in this period to do all of these things thus creating a huge impact. Katharina was born in 1498 and although known for her strong religious background was never a nun, a member of any established religious community or the child of a well to do family. The daughter of Elisabeth Gerster and Jacob Schütz, Katharina had nine brothers and sisters who survived infancy.1 Her father was an artisan (woodworker) and Katharina was given a good education although she never learned the Latin which would have helped her in learning what the Roman Catholic Church was trying to say during the liturgies. Katharina grew up in a Church where she had to memorize prayers to feel that she was a part of what was happening and experienced much frustration about the state of the Church. By memorizing the prayers, Katharina had her only connection with what was happening during the liturgies and she knew in her heart that there could be more to the liturgy than just memorization. At the age of ten, she dedicated herself to God and in her teens lived a life of celibacy, participated in the sacraments and did good works, and lived in her own home. Katharina went to confession, did charitable acts, and went to Mass. Though she lived out all of the things that the Church taught would bring her to salvation, she yearned for more. Even with all of her studies, Katharina felt like the woman in the Gospels who had an incurable flow of blood which no doctors could help; hers was a kind of sickness until death.2 Katharina chose to fill her need by reading the Bible although clergy at the time did not encourage this. Before Katharina had reached the age of twenty, women sought her out to teach them about the pursuit of salvation. By the time Katharina reached adulthood and women were beginning to search for their own position in their 1 It is unclear on the exact number of siblings that Katharina had due to the high rate of infant mortality and lack of records. 2 Elsie Anne McKee, Katharina Schütz Zell: The Life and Thought of a Sixteenth-Century Reformer, vol. 1 (Boston, MD: Brill, 1999), 28 (footnote 57). Enninga 7 church, her own spiritual struggles enabled her to fully understand their desire to learn more about Jesus. Clerical Marriage Katharina’s first large act of rebellion against traditional society was to be one of the first women to marry a clergy person in Strasbourg. She married Matthew Zell on December 3 or 4, 1523 at 6AM. 3 Matthew, one of the newest clergymen in the community to research the “Lutheran” ideas that Martin Luther was speaking about in March of 1521 began preaching his conclusions. Katharina found solace in the joyous liberating message that God’s salvation is purely a gift through the grace of Christ. 4 Reformers supported marriage of clergy as a way of ending the separation of clergy from the rest of the society. Because marriage involved a reciprocal, responsible relationship, women who married clergy were given a new status.5 The marriage of the clergy in the community caused a huge uproar due to the position that women held in society and the clerical structure. Women in Germany in the late Middle Ages had a completely different status from women in France or Italy.6 They were left to the task of caring for their husband and the home and were kept out of anything in the public life. With this uproar about the marriage of clergy, family members felt that their daughters and sisters were being scandalized by the clerics and thus canons were beaten up. Some women claimed that they had 3 Miriam Usher Chrisman, Strasbourg and the Reform: A Study in the Process of Change, (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1967), 133. McKee lists the date of the Zell marriage as the 4th of December while Chrisman uses the 3rd as the date of the marriage taking place. 4Elsie Anne McKee, Katharina Schütz Zell: The Life and Thought of a Sixteenth-Century Reformer, vol. 1 (Boston, MD: Brill, 1999), 40. 5Chrisman, Miriam Usher. "Women and the Reformation in Strasbourg, 1490-1530" Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 62 (1972): 148. Chrisman chooses to use Katherine in referring to Katharina Schütz Zell and Matthias in referring to Matthew Zell. Matthaus is another name given for Matthew. For this paper I have chosen to use the names Katharina and Matthew. In a footnote in one of Chrisman’s books, Strasbourg and the Reform: A Study in the Process of Change, she writes that French historians use French forms and German historians name people in German, thus giving people two names and thus suggesting one of the reasons for the variance in the names between authors in writing about Katharina. For this paper I have chosen to use the names Katharina and Matthew. 6 Ibid., 143. Enninga 8 been beaten when they did not submit to the wishes of the clerics. This hostility that had been sizzling for over thirty years was finally brought to a head with the first marriages of clergy in the community.