The Monk: The Catholic Church

A reoccurring theme throughout The Monk is in reality, bashing the Catholic Church. I think this is a pretty obvious thing that Matthew Lewis does in the book. The title itself already has you thinking about the Catholic Church. Most of the really “bad” behaving characters in the novel are from the church. We have Ambrosio, obviously, who is a very sexual being when it comes down to it. We have Agnes who is the nun who is pregnant. I even found that a very small and seemingly insignificant character went against the church. When Don Raymond was telling his story to Lorenzo, we hear of Marguirite’s past. She was telling of how her love had died and she had been given to another member of the banditti. She says, “They cast lots to deicide to whose possession I should fall. I became the property of the infamous Baptiste. A robber, who had once been a monk…” (pg.108) I find this interesting that Lewis would deicide to make even a small character who we hear little about, a monk. This man was now a member of the feared banditti. He killed many innocent people. This man was at one point a monk. There are many other characters that do not perform the way “holy” people ought to throughout the book, these are just a few. It just goes to show how little stock Lewis put into the Catholic Church. It is like he pokes fun at it. I can see why many parents would not like their children reading this novel. It makes them really question their faith. I mean there are other reasons why parents wouldn’t want their children to read The Monk too, but I do think Lewis’ outright distaste for the Catholic Church could be one of them.
Lewis pokes fun of the church in another way. Near the end of the book when the crowd is burning the convent, some of the nuns go down into the tomb’s the take refuge. Here they are all very afraid. I think this a reasonable enough response. I mean people are trying to kill them. It is down here thought that, to me, it seems like Lewis is making fun of their intelligence. “Alone therefore, and in darkness, he prepared to pursue his design, while the nuns were contented to offer up prayers for his success and safety.” (pg. 315) Here Lorenzo is being very courageous and about to go into the dark abyss and he has to go alone. The nuns were described before as being “timid”, but they cannot even go without a light so Lorenzo can see. They then are “contented” to pray for safety. I found this funny. I get this picture of the Lorenzo going down the stairs into complete darkness and above him there is a circle of nuns on their knees praying. They forget the danger and pray. I am not trying to say that praying is bad, but it can only get you so far. Praying was not going to go down those steps and rescue the moaning person. I just think this makes the nuns seem unintelligent. They were afraid of the statue and then once it presented no danger they forgot all about it and moved on to the next thing to be afraid of. It makes the nuns look dumb and it makes you wonder if all nuns are that way. Are these the people you want to be behind your church?