The Religion of the Poor: Rural Missions in Europe and the Formation of Modern Catholicism, c.1500-c.1800

The Religion of the Poor is a major work of early modern history, an ambitious survey of Catholic missions into the European countryside from 1500-1800. Louis Chatellier analyzes the impulses to missionary activity at the end of the Middle Ages, and outlines in detail the development of missionary activity after the Council of Trent. He discusses the type of religion proffered by the missionaries, and documents the way in which mission activities changed in reaction to external social and political circumstance.