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This article offers a pedagogical approach to introducing undergraduate students to hagiology by comparing medieval sanctity to modern celebrity. The bodies of saints and celebrities are important loci for the transmission of sanctity or celebrity from a person to the public and for the continuity of identity. Examples include St. Faith, St. Cuthbert, Kim Kardashian, and Marilyn Monroe. Using a comparative method allows students who are non-religious to better apprehend the unfamiliar practices and beliefs around the cult of saints and relics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the 11th–12th centuries, extreme ascetic practices reappeared in Western Europe, in particular, the wearing of hauberks and heavy iron chains, associated with penitence and eremitism. This article discusses the charisma of three ascetic saints of the 12th century: Bernard the Penitent (d. 1182), Wulfric of Haselbury (d. 1154/55), and Godric of Finchale (d. 1170). Their hagiographies were written shortly after their death. The authors emphasize that they were revered as holy men already in their lifetime. Their charismatic power was revealed by miracles of healing and prophecy, sometimes in visions. The manifestations of their charisma continued and even increased after their death and were transmitted and spread through their relics. Their mortifications and the signs of their holiness are comparable to those of the stylites and other hermits of Syria of late Antiquity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]