Het liturgisch leven in de laatmiddeleeuwse Nederlanden

Abstract

In this article I persue two questions about liturgical life in the Low Countries of the late Middle Ages: 1. What is there to be known about the participation of the ordinary faithful in the liturgy? 2. What meaning did the liturgy have for the structuring of the life of the faithful? I have tried to find an answer to these questions with the aid of the synodal statutes of the dioceses of Cambrai, Liege and Utrecht and with the help of the richest Middle Dutch source for religious practice, viz. the Tafel van den Kersten Ghelove, written c. 1400 AD by the Dutch Dominican Dirc van Delft. These sources make clear that the sacraments were seen as an organizing system within the life cycle of each believer as well as within the social group. With the assistance of 'the seven' the Church as an institution wanted to create a society which was primarily orientated upon the hereafter. The role alloted to the institution of marriage in this is surprising.