While the book adopts a broader approach to Catholic pain practices by exploring the writing, remembering, and conserving of pain, this introduction focuses on practices intended to induce or cultivate pain, whether physical or emotional. By examining such practices (e.g. the meditation on the suffering Christ, religious weeping, and martyrdom) in the Middle Ages and the early modern period, the chapter sets the scene for the pain practices of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a period in which dolorist ideals were seemingly challenged by medical advances. Stressing the need to nuance this narrative of opposition, the chapter introduces the book’s praxeological approach and shows how attention to more ‘everyday’ practices allows for a more diverse understanding of the Catholic way of engaging with pain in this period.
University of Antwerp, Belgium - ORCID: 0000-0002-7623-2292
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy - ORCID: 0000-0002-0026-4036
KU Leuven, Belgium - ORCID: 0000-0003-0037-0661
University of Innsbruck, Austria - ORCID: 0000-0001-8671-6349
Chapter Title
Pain fragments: from cultivation to more everyday Catholic pain practices
Authors
Tine Van Osselaer, Leonardo Rossi, Kristof Smeyers, Maria Heidegger
Language
English
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-1072-0.02
Peer Reviewed
Publication Year
2026
Copyright Information
© 2026 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Book Title
Pain fragments
Book Subtitle
Practising Catholicism in the 19th and 20th centuries
Editors
Tine Van Osselaer, Leonardo Rossi, Kristof Smeyers, Maria Heidegger
Peer Reviewed
Number of Pages
184
Publication Year
2026
Copyright Information
© 2026 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Publisher Name
Firenze University Press
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-1072-0
ISBN Print
979-12-215-1071-3
eISBN (pdf)
979-12-215-1072-0
eISBN (epub)
979-12-215-1073-7
Series Title
Fragmentaria. Studi di storia culturale e antropologia religiosa
Series ISSN
2975-1217
Series E-ISSN
2975-1225