‘Grant me Grace’: Alternative Visions for Vernacular Theology and Lay Devotion in Richard Caister and Nicholas Love

Abstract

Richard Caister is an important but unstudied example of vernacular theology in England in the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. Himself a priest, Caister’s extant work indicates a figure who departed from the conservative instutionalism of Thomas Arundel’s regime on two very important points: the suitability of the vernacular for theological and spiritual discourse and the necessity of auricular confession. The distinctive position Caister takes on these points can be observed best by a comparative analysis to Nicholas Love’s theological work which provided a theological rationale for Arundel’s restrictive legislation, articulating a negative view of the vernacular and of the capacity of the laity which endorsed lay dependence upon their Latinate clergy. This article argues that Caister provides an important alternative vision for vernacular theology and the laity predicated upon a thorough Christocentrism.