Pastoralia (genre)

Pastoralia is a genre of written practical and theoretical aids aimed at pastors, parish priests and curates that proliferated in Western Europe in the later Middle Ages.^[1] It was the product of renewed interest in pastoral care after about 1200, especially after the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215.^[1][2]

Pastoralia as a collective term for this new species of literature was coined by Leonard Boyle.^[3] The word may also refer to the theology underlying this literature^[4] or even to the techniques and capabilities it was meant to inculcate.^[5] In these senses, it is closely connected in meaning with the terms pastoral theology and practical theology.^[6]

The main areas of concern in the pastoralia are the sacraments, preaching, anointing of the sick and moral theology.^[7] There are many subgenres, such as "guides to hearing confession, catechisms, compendia to canon law, and manuals for parish priests".^[8] Boyle provides a diagram of subgenres.^[9] Among the named genres he identifies are:

• episcopal constitutions
• distinctiones
• artes praedicandi
• artes moriendi
• summae poenitentiae
  • summae confessorum
  • summae de casibus
  • summae confessionis
    • summae confitendi
    • confessionalia
      • canones poenitentiales

Pastoralia were written in Latin for the clergy, but for the interested laity there were vernacular works, sometimes in verse. Those works destined for a lay audience included explanations of the sacraments and of penance.^[10]