Title: Unnatural Frenchmen : the politics of priestly celibacy and marriage, 1720-1815 /
Authors: Cage, E. Claire, 1982-
Year: 2015
Subjects: Catholic Church Clergy History; Catholic Church Clergy History; Catholic Church France Influence.; Catholic Church; Celibacy Catholic Church History; Celibacy Catholic Church History; Celibacy Catholic Church; Clergy; Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.); France
Abstract: This book examines the divisive issue of clerical celibacy in Enlightenment and revolutionary France, looking at how it shaped religious politics, the lived experience of French clerics, and gendered citizenship. Drawing on a wide base of printed and archival material, including thousands of letters that married priests wrote to the Pope, historian Claire Cage highlights individual as well as ideological struggles.
Contents: Clerical celibacy from early Christianity to the Ancien regime -- An unnatural state: the clerical celibacy controversy in Enlightenment France -- Priests into citizens: clerical marriage during the early Revolution, 1789-1793 -- A social crime: clerical celibacy from the Terror to Napoleon -- Married priests in the Napoleonic era.