page_title: John Mirk
section_title: Festial
hierarchical_section_title: John Mirk / Works / Festial
caption_attribution_description: English: Depiction of a carved stone, considered by the authors to have come from Shrewsbury Abbey and to depict St Winifred, flanked by John the Baptist and St Beuno.
context_page_description: John Mirk was an Augustinian Canon Regular, active in the late 14th and early 15th centuries in Shropshire. He is noted as the author of widely copied, and later printed, books intended to aid parish priests and other clergy in their work. The most famous of these, his Book of Festivals or Festial was probably the most frequently printed English book before the Reformation.
context_section_description: The Liber Festivalis (Book of Festivals) or Festial is a collection of homilies for the festivals of the liturgical year as it was celebrated in Mirk's time in Shropshire. He began with Advent Sunday and worked his way through to All Saints' Day, with a final sermon for the consecration of a church, although the order is disturbed to some extent in some manuscripts. Each sermon features one or more narrations, intended to illustrate the theme. His most important source was the Golden Legend, an immensely popular collection of hagiographies compiled by Jacobus de Voragine in the mid-13th century. However, Mirk chose to write in the vernacular, Middle English, a decision of ambiguous significance. It distinguished him from most other apologists for orthodoxy, as use of the vernacular was a key demand of the Lollards, although it was still not considered heretical in itself. Mirk was faced by the rise of a new class of literate laypeople, as well as by the sometimes unlettered parish clergy whom he acknowledges as his audience. His response was to present a compressed but comprehensive view of Christian teaching that privileges oral tradition above Biblical texts.
  Mirk's narrations have often seemed simplistic or "materialist" to later ages. Ford comments that "English sermon collections composed with a popular audience in mind almost invariably favor a story-telling style and have been almost invariably criticized by scholars." The homily for Corpus Christi defends the doctrine of Transubstantiation, which the festival celebrates and the Lollards rejected, with just such a story, concerning Oda of Canterbury.
  This byschop had wyth hym of his clerkys þat beleuet not perfitly in þe sacrament of þe auter, and sayde þat þai myʒt not beleue þat Crist schedd his blod in þe masse. Then was þis bischop sory for her mysbeleue and prayed to God ʒorne for her amendement. And so, on a day, as he was at his masse, when he had made þe fraction as þe maner is, he saʒe þe blod drop doun from þe ost fast into þe chalice. Þen he made syne to hem þat mysbeleuet, to come and se. And whew þei saue his fyngurys blody and blod rane of Cristis body into þe chalis, þai weron agryset þat for veray fer þai cryet and sayd : Be þow blesset, man, þat has þis grace þus to handul Cristis body! We beleue now fully þat þis is verray Godis body, and his blod þat dropet þer into þe chalis. But now pray to hym þat þou hast þer in þi hondys, þat he sende no vengauwce vpon vs for oure mysbeleue! and so þe sacrament turnet into his forme of bred as hit was beforn; and þai weren good men and perfyte alway aftyr in þe beleue.
  This bishop had with him several of his clergy who did not have a perfect belief in the sacrament of the altar and said that they might not believe that Christ shed his blood in the Mass. So this bishop was sorry for their disbelief and prayed to God for their amendment. And so, one day, he was at his Mass, and when he had made the fraction in the prescribed manner, he saw blood drop down from the Host into the chalice. Then he signalled those who disbelieved to come and see. And when they saw that his fingers were bloody and that blood ran from Christ's body into the chalice, they were terrified to the extent that they cried out in real fear: “Blessed be you that have this grace so to handle Christ's body. We believe now that this is truly God's body and his blood that dropped there into the chalice. But now pray to him, whom you have there in your hands, that he send no vengeance upon us for our disbelief.” And so the sacrament turned into the form of bread as before; and they were good men and always after perfect in their faith.
  Mirk goes on explicitly to reject Lollard teaching on images.
  For as Saynt Austyn sayde : Þe mynde of Cristis passion is þe best defence aʒens temptacions of þe fende. Herefor ben roodes sett on hey in holy chirch, and so by syʒt þerof haue mynd of Cristis passion. And þerfor roodes and oþyr ymages ben necessary in holy chirch, whateuer, þes Lollardes sayn.For as St Augustine said: the memory of Christ's passion i
caption: Depiction of a carved stone, considered by Owen and Blakeway to have come from Shrewsbury Abbey and to depict St Winifred, flanked by John the Baptist and St Beuno.[22]
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