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The Gilbertine Order was founded around 1130 by St. Gilbert in Sempringham, Lincolnshire, where he was a parish priest. Saint Gilbert of Sempringham (about 1083&mdash February 4 1190) became the only Englishman to found a Convent, mainly because the Cistercian Located north of Bourne, on the Lincolnshire fen edge, Sempringham is now a very small hamlet consisting of a church a house and a well giving little Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs) is a county in the east of England. It was the only completely English religious order, and died out with the Dissolution of the Monasteries. England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland A religious order is a lineage of communities and organizations of people who live in some way set apart from society in accordance with their specific religious devotion usually The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the formal process between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded Brian Golding has written a useful early history of the Gilbertines, cited below.

Contents

Founding

St. Gilbert originally wanted to found a men's order, but found that to be impossible. Instead, he accepted seven women, whom he had taught in the village school and founded a women's order based on the Cistercian Rule in 1131.

Eventually he added lay sisters to do daily chores, so that the nuns could attend to their duties, and lay brothers to do the hardest work in the fields. In the most common usage lay brothers are those members of Catholic Religious orders particularly of monastic orders occupied primarily with manual labor and with A Nun is a Woman who has taken special vows committing her to a religious life In the most common usage lay brothers are those members of Catholic Religious orders particularly of monastic orders occupied primarily with manual labor and with In 1139 the small order opened its first new foundation on the island of Haverholm, a gift from Alexander, Bishop of Lincoln. Haverholme Priory was a Monastery situated 4 miles north east of Sleaford, Lincolnshire, near Anwick. Alexander of Lincoln (Latin Alexander Lincolniensis) (died in early 1148 Bishop of Lincoln, was born in Blois, France. Over the years more and more foundations were established, and Gilbert soon became overwhelmed. In 1147 he left England for the Continent to seek assistance, and the Cistercian Order was approached by Gilbert at its major house in Citeaux to take on the running of Gilbert's foundations. England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland Continental Europe, also referred to as mainland Europe or simply the Continent, is the Continent of Europe, explicitly excluding European Cîteaux Abbey (French Abbaye de Cîteaux) is a Roman Catholic Abbey located in Saint-Nicolas-lès-Cîteaux, south of Dijon, The Cistercians refused, apparently because they were unable to cope with the double houses of men and women, but Pope Eugenius III, himself a Cistercian, intervened to ask the abbot Saint Bernard of Clairvaux to assist Gilbert in drawing up Institutes for a new Order. Pope Bernard of Clairvaux, OCist ( 1090 - August 20, 1153) was a French abbot and the primary builder of the reforming Cistercian monastic order Pope Eugenius then appointed Gilbert as the first Master of the Order of Sempringham or Gilbertines.

Habit

The Gilbertines wore a habit with a black Soutane, and with white Cowl and Scapular, so that when viewed from God's perspective, they would appear as a white cross on a black background. The cassock, an item of Clerical clothing, is a long close-fitting ankle-length Robe worn by clerics of the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox This article is about the garment used by monks For other uses see Cowl (disambiguation or Cowling (disambiguation. For the shoulder bone see the article Scapula. A scapular (from Latin scapula, shoulder is a length of

The Crosier Canons, who are still extant, wear the opposite : white over black. The Canons Regular of the Order of the Holy Cross, commonly called Crosiers are a Roman Catholic religious order.

Layout

Each Gilbertine priory had one church, divided unevenly by a wall. The nuns had the larger part, and the canons the smaller. The latter would join the nuns only to give mass. Mass is a fundamental concept in Physics, roughly corresponding to the Intuitive idea of how much Matter there is in an object From the church, the nunnery was normally to the north, and the canons' dwellings to the south.

Lay Brothers

One source of perpetual pain for Gilbert were the lay brothers. These came purposely from low peasant families, because they spent their days working hard on the farms and in the fields. A peasant is an agricultural worker who subsists by working a small plot of ground The problem was that they did not take well to discipline and needed a firm hand to guide them. There seem to have been many instances of insubordination and scandal from them, and of these two stand out:

The Nun of Watton

In the mid-twelfth century, a girl was brought to the Priory of Watton as a child, but had no real religious vocation. This Nun of Watton became pregnant by a lay brother, who fled, but was brought back for punishment. The Nun of Watton (born 1140s was the alleged central protagonist of a drama at a Gilbertine convent in Yorkshire where the nun in question was admitted to the holy life as The other nuns then made the girl castrate him, and then stuck the removed parts down her throat. They then chained her up, where she mysteriously lost the baby. It is said that Henry Murdac, the Archbishop of York and the man who had brought her to the priory, appeared with two heavenly women who cleansed the girl's body of her sin and her pregnancy. Henry Murdac was Abbot of Fountains Abbey (1144&ndash1147 and Archbishop of York (1147&ndash1153 Early life He was a native The Archbishop of York is a high-ranking cleric in the Church of England, second only to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Her chains then fell off. St Aelred of Rievaulx was called in to investigate and declared it to be a miracle. Ailred (or Aelred) Abbot of Rievaulx ( 1110 - 12 January 1167) was an English Christian Saint However, he was also intensely critical of the Nun's fellow sisters and Gilbert of Sempringham himself for their lack of pastoral care.

The Sempringham Revolt

Towards the end of Gilbert's life, when he was around 90 years old, some of the lay brothers in Sempringham rose up against him, complaining of too much work and too little food. The rebels, led by two skilled craftsmen, received money from both religious and secular backers and took the case to Rome. Pope Alexander III ruled in Gilbert's favour, but the living conditions of the lay brothers were improved thereafter. Pope Alexander III (c 1100/1105 &ndash August 30, 1181) born Rolando (or Orlando) Bandinelli, was Pope from 1159

The Middle Ages

The Gilbertine order was always popular. They were the final homes of the last members of the Welsh royal family, young daughters, after the rest had been defeated and killed in the 1280s. King after king gave the order liberal charters, yet it always had financial problems. By the end of the 15th century the order was greatly impoverished, and Henry VI exempted all of its houses from paying taxes or any other sort of payment. Henry VI (6 December 1421 &ndash 21 May 1471 was King of England 1422–1461 (though with a Regent until 1437 and then 1470–1471 and a claimant to the kingdom He could not and did not force his successors to do the same.

Dissolution

By the time of the Dissolution, there were 26 houses of Gilbertines, but only four were ranked as "greater houses" with annual incomes of over £200. These gave in without a fight and surrendered "of their own free will" in 1538. Each nun and canon then received a pension for the rest of their days. The last prior of all, Robert Holgate, Bishop of Llandaff, was promoted to Archbishop of York in 1545. Robert Holgate (1481/1482 &ndash 1555 was Bishop of Llandaff and then Archbishop of York (from 1545 to 1554 The Bishop of Llandaff is the Ordinary of the Church in Wales Diocese of Llandaff. The Gilbertines were the one truly English order, so the Dissolution marked its permanent end.

Legacy

The Gilbertine legacy remains quite small; only 15 extant manuscripts are associated with the order, attached to five of the Gilbertine houses. Four additional works ascribed to Gilbertine members, but not surviving in Gilbertine copies, include the Vita of Gilbert of Sempringham, the Gilbertine Rule, the so-called 'Sempringham Continuation' to Le Livere de Reis Engleterre, and the works of Robert Mannyng. Robert Mannyng or Robert de Brunne (c1275 - c1338 a Gilbertine monk provides a surprising amount of information about himself in his two known works Handlyng

Oblates of St. Gilbert

In 1983, following celebrations of the nine hundredth anniversary of Gilbert's birth, a number of laypeople in the East Midlands undertook to sustain the memory and work of Gilbert and the Gilbertine Order by establishing a secular Order. Year 1983 ( MCMLXXXIII) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1983 Gregorian calendar) The Oblates of St. Gilbert exist to promote the Gilbertine contemplative spirit and to foster interest in the study of Gilbert and his Order. They are supported by the Cistercian monastery of Mount St. Bernard Abbey in Leicestershire, England. Mount St Bernard's Abbey is a Cistercian monastery of the Strict Observance ( Trappists) near Whitwick in Leicestershire, England,

Bibliography

External links

This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913. The public domain is a range of abstract materials &ndash commonly referred to as Intellectual property &ndash which are not owned or controlled by anyone The Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to today as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language Encyclopedia published by The Encyclopedia

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