Nortish religious houses

Nortish religious and secular houses
Camevole Abbey in Bissex is a Royal Cistercian convent.
Part of a series on the Church of Nortend
Liturgy	Nortish Rite
Theology	Akeepian Frympellite
Structure Places Sulthey Cathedral Abbey Lendert Cathedral Priory Chepingstow Cathedral Minster Polton Cathedral Minster Allord Abbey University of Aldesey Nortish religious houses Churchmen Archbishop of Sulthey Archbishop of Limmes Archbishop of Rhise
Art and Music	Church music Illuminated manuscripts Architecture

The religious and secular houses of the Church of Nortend are those ecclesiastical bodies where clerks, being either religious or secular, and either in orders or lay, live or are members in common for the purpose inter alia of divine service. Great Nortend has a long and unbroken history of both religious and secular common life which date back to Sulthey Abbey founded in the 8th century by St. Laurence in 751, two years after the foundation of the Church and See of Sulthey.

The distinction drawn between the two kinds of house is traditionally that a religious convent is „cloistered and contemplative”, whereas a secular college is „open and apostolic”. There are currently as of 2020, 623 houses in Great Nortend under the auspices of the Church of Nortend, with a total of approximately 10,000 clerks living in community, excluding in these numbers the numerous other non-communal.

History

The gatehouse at Rundelset Priory which was a daughter house of Staithway Abbey. It was dissolved in 1668. The house was refounded at the same site in 1822 by Edmund VII, the first new foundation in centuries.

After the promulgation of the Statute of Limmes and Statute of Supremacy which formally severed the Church of Nortend from the papal authority and placed Alexander I as head of the Church, the houses, especially the religious houses, went into a period of decline, although there was no intention of their dissolution at the time.

As with other clerks, members of colleges, priories and abbeys were required to renounce allegiance to the Pope by taking the Oath of Supremacy. Those foundations who refused to take the oath forfeited their lands to the Crown, who appointed a Steward to administer them, although the members were usually allowed to stay. Despite the threat of loss of income, many houses refused to take the oath and recognise Alexander as head of the Church. This led to the confiscation of nearly 100 houses before 1670.

In 1668, the 12th Duke of Cardenbridge, a well-known reformer, was captured and hanged by the abbot and monks of Staithway Abbey on Cardoby. Alexander I had opposed the criminalisation of papal allegiance but upon his death at the end of 1668, William III acceded to the throne with a far stricter policy. Staithway Abbey, as well as its daughter houses at Rundelset and Eyock were dissolved almost immediately. Statutes were quickly passed which resulted in the immediately criminalisation of Roman papal allegiance and thenceforth, the penalty for such recusancy was to be death. In line with the prevailing Lutheran consensus, religious vows were abolished and nullified, replaced by oaths.

Suppression

After the suppression and execution of the Six Heretics in 1670, numerous houses very quickly „voluntarily” chose to recognise William and take the Oath of Supremacy. Even so, the perceived excesses of religious houses continued to cause controversy, especially between peasants and their monastic landlords. For centuries, the strict rules of the orders had been often ignored. The 13th Duke of Cardenbridge, now King’s Clerk, aggresively advocated for the suppression and dissolution of the monasteries as he believed they would always bear allegiance to the Pope, and thus posed a dangerous subversive presence. It is likely that his father's hanging by the monks of Staithway influenced this zeal in this matter, despite his otherwise via media theology. Several smaller and indebted houses were indeed dissolved starting in 1675. The first change came when the Carmelites were entirely dissolved and dispersed in 1676. The houses of canons and canonesses regular were secularised soon after in 1679. Professions declined drastically after the Schism, and the population of religious dwindled in number.

Quia solliciti

Even so, reform was urgently needed, as the structure of religious life faltered and steadily decayed, and began to threaten the stability of the Church. The canon Quia solliciti was enacted by Edmund VI in 1711 which, inter alia, provided for reform of the monastic orders. Cardinal Mier, Archbishop of Sulthey, revised the Rule of Saint Benedict for use by cloistered houses. Notably, rules of cloister, stability and communication were much reformed „for the better service of the publick good”. Another canon requiring that clergymen and religious dress only in black and white led to the modern strictly black and white habits.

Furthermore, all religious houses were required to use a new reformed liturgy for Divine Service, albeit which retained seven hour services—Mattins, Prime, Tierce, Sext, Nones, Vespers and Compline—unlike the secular Book of Hours which cut these down to four—Mattins, Prime, Vespers and Compline. The hour services were to be said at „convenient times according to their nature” and not at „stubborn hours in the night tide”.

De mendicis ordinibus

The maundant orders did not escape reform either. Adherence to their rules of life had become so corrupt that many friars typically lived in their own houses, as secular clerks, only coming to the friary church for Divine Service, with little oversight or control. The more steady houses also did not escape the new zeal for more reformed doctrines. In 1676, the Carmelite convents had been dispersed owing to their deemed inappropriate „mystical” spirituality. In 1678, an order was given to the effect that owing to the ease with which superstitious people were fooled by the preaching of unlearned friars, all friars would be required to gain a degree before they would be permitted to preach. This resulted in the expansion of several halls at the University of Aldesey as well as the founding of New College in 1685.

Nonetheless, reform was slow and adherence to the religious rules of poverty and chastity increasingly difficult to enforce. In 1729, Edmund further promulgated De mendicis ordinibus which radically reformed the maundant houses by secularisation into secular colleges. The new seculars, who were generally termed canons and nuns, were forbidden to wander from town to town or to beg, but rather enjoined to stay and keep residence in their town according to the statutes thereof, and to undertake „profitable business”.

Akeepian Settlement

Since the Schism in the subsequent reformist atmosphere, there had been a marked decline in the number of religious professions, slightly improved by official recognition and reform in the 18th century. Despite the growing influence of the Akeepian faction, Mary's courtiers tended strongly Lutheran. Convinced by the Lord High Treasurer, she issued the canon In reformatione which suspended initiations and professions into religious life. However, after her wedding to the Earl of Scode and the success of the Company of Scodeliers, political life turned sharply in the Akeepians’ favour, termed the Akeepian Settlement. Under the new Lord High Treasurer, the Earl of Lockon, In reformatione was revoked, prompting a flurry of donations and bequests to religious houses, followed by a dramatic increase in numbers.

To-day

The abbey mill at Bassham Abbey.

Since the Akeepian Settlement, when popular mood shifted back in favour of religious houses, houses grew steadily until stabilising in the mid-20th century to about the current level, when the „Steady State Policy” was implemented by the Foide ministry. Under the law of Great Nortend, houses normally have the legal status of corporations aggregate with ecclesiastical almond-shaped common seals. Under canon law, ecclesiastical houses are either religious (or cloistered) or secular.

Houses are free from taxes and tithes. In return, they are required to be self-sufficient and cannot rely on petty alms of cash. Monasteries must be endowed with enough land, called the „stight”, to produce a sufficient income for the sustenance of the abbey or priory through tithes and rents or the sale of produce. An average abbey holds a stight of 15,000 acres of land, roughly equivalent to around 8 to 9 medium-sized manors. Stights usually include mills, cornhouses and tithe barns. The monasteries in total own 3,845 manors which make up roughly 15% of the total land of Great Nortend, although around half are owned by the fifty largest abbeys.

Although maundant houses traditionally relied upon begging, nowadays colleges rely on a stight in addition to alms and government funding for their public services. It also remains common to bequeath money to houses for the endowment of a chauntry or for regular services for a certain number of years, although new perpetual chauntries or endowment with land in frankalmoign is forbidden by law without a licence.

Religious houses

Hedghew Priory is home to a large convent of Black Minchens.

There are 324 religious, or monastic, houses under the Church of Nortend, which follow one of two forms of the Rule of Saint Benedict as reformed by Cardinal Miers. The black monks and black minchens, or Benedictines, wear mostly black habits whilst the white monks and white minchens, or Cistercians, wear mostly white habits. The specific form of the habit varies from monastery to monastery, according to local traditions and statutes.

Houses under both rules have a simple hierarchy of dependent daughter priories under a mother abbey. Priories may be elevated to abbatial status by the Crown and become independent once the canonical requirement of twelve monks or minchens has been met. An abbey which has declined in size may also fall back into a priory. There are four royal Cistercian abbeys, two male and the two female. The Sovereign is the commendatory abbot of these abbeys. Most abbeys which are also the seat of a bishop become cathedral priories (with the notable exception of the Cathedral Abbey of Sulthey), as the bishop becomes the de jure abbot, with the religious community headed by a prior.

Within a monastery, the distinction between the two types of monks or minchen — lay and choir — has been abolished since the 18th century. All monks and minchens are required to spend time in study and crafts, as well as manual labour and chores, according to rank, age, expertise and ability. All installed monks are titled „Dean” while novices are called „Brother”. Minchens are titled „Dame” if installed, and „Sister” if not.

Secular houses

St. Martin's School is run by the Black Canons of Cireford Priory.

The secular houses form the vast majority of the ecclesiastical houses in the Church of Nortend, being an admixture of formerly religious mendicant (maundant) orders with canons regular, canons secular, collegiate churches and various chauntry, hospital colleges. The Dominicans and Augustinians (Austins) are the two remaining notionally maundant (mendicant) orders of the Church of Nortend since 1726, the other orders having been dissolved or absorbed thereinto. There are 111 Dominican houses and 137 Austin houses. The modern maundant orders are a merger of the pre-Reform maundant orders and the orders of canons regular. From the Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustinian and Carmelite maundant orders and the Augustinian and Norbertine canonical orders came the modern Dominican and Augustinian canons.

The Dominicans are dedicated to preaching and education, and are known for their many schools. Dominicans wear a white habit with a black cloak, whence the name of Black Canons. The Augustinians are dedicated to healing and serving the poor, providing healthcare and assistance to the poor. Most of the dispersed Franciscans and Carmelites entered Augustinian houses, which adopted the white cloak formally in 1734. Augustinians thus wear a black habit with a white cloak, and are known as White Canons. The female Augustinians, or White Nuns, also continue to be known as Minoresses, given that the vast majority were originally Franciscan houses of the Poor Clares.

Male members are installed as canons of the priory, if in priests' orders. Otherwise, they are brothers. Women members are either nuns, or lay sisters, depending on if one has been installed or not. After the Reform, the nuns and sisters of both the Dominicans and the Augustinians began to undertake apostolic works in the community like the canons and brothers, the Dominicanesses mainly in the care and education of young children and girls, and the Minoresses in nursing and midwifery. As a rule, all installed brothers are ordained, and called canons, while all installed sisters are called nuns.

Both orders have a national hierarchy, headed by a Prior General respectively. The brothers and sisters often move between individual convents. The Constitutions of the Dominicans and Augustinians were reformed by each order's hierarchies, and approved by the Archbishop of Sulthey in 1730 and 1732 respectively.

See also

• St. Peter's Cathedral Priory, a Benedictine house-cum-cathedral in Lendert-with-Cadell
• Allord College, a Benedictine abbey school