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DESCRIPTION
The focus of this talk would be the liturgical year. The northern Italian bishops of the late fourth and early fifth century are pivotal in establishing the Christian liturgical year. The act of shaping a liturgical cycle is a traditional aristocratic act; Cicero can be used to illustrate the classical precursors. The bishops are clearly and consciously the heirs of the Roman landed aristocracy. Ambrose de officiis outlines a program of adapting pagan elite virtue and habits to the newly emerging Christian world. The liturgical year is shaped by pivotal Christological and Eschatalogical moments, but is equally focused on subsuming the traditional agrarian calendar. Thus, liturgical life is, in the early Church, also about ecological life. Finally, it is the liturgical year which allows the average Christians to be trained for true leisure.
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