The Cantebury Tales was Geoffrey Chaucers Satire Towards the Catholic

Geoffrey Chaucer expresses his disillusionment with the Catholic Church, during the Medieval Era, through satire when he wrote, The Canterbury Tales. The Medieval Era was a time when the Catholic Church governed England and was extremely wealthy. Expensive Cathedrals and shrines to saints' relics were built at a time when the country was suffering from famine, scarce labor, disease and the Bubonic Plague, which was the cause of death to a third of Europe's population and contributed to the rise of the middle class. It seemed hypocritical to the people when the church preached against the sin of greed when the church was built and dressed so lavishly. There were rumors of corrupt Popes, church clerical and priest ignoring their vows of poverty and celibacy. They ignored the Canon law, which is an ecclesiastical law that governs the Roman Catholic Church. This triggered Chaucer to satirize the corruption through his use of comedic, pleasant ridicule of human vices with his characters, the Pardoner, the Monk, the Prioress, the Summoner and the Friar. He incorporates the seven deadly sins in his stories, which are pride, envy, sloth, gluttony, avarice, lechery and wrath to explain the fall of man with his religion. The Canterbury Tales is recognized as the first book written in English and this paved the way for other writers such as Shakespeare. With his collection of stories written in English it gave the non wealthy an opportunity to enjoy his literature, because before Chaucer only the wealthy had the education to read stories that were written in other languages, such as French. The Canterbury Tales is written about a group of pilgrims wh... ... preached what God would desire of man and that there are many ways to heaven as part of his tale to the other pilgrims. The second part of the tale is about asking for forgiveness for one?s sins. He went on explaining the seven deadly sins to the other pilgrims. Chaucer sent an intelligent, virtuous churchman on the journey to Canterbury as an example to the other pilgrims and an opportunity for them to seek redemption. Geoffrey Chaucer created ironies between the church clergy's characterizations and their duties to express the corruption and the decline of the Catholic Church in England. Most of the English clergy did not live up to the expectations of the congregation. The Church was so full of hypocrisy that this left the congregation feeling disillusioned with their church leaders and paved the rise of Protestantism.