Opposition To Praying To Saints And Angels Among The Pre-Reformation Waldensians

They weren't consistent in all of their beliefs, and different Waldensians have held different views of prayer, but many of them opposed praying to saints and angels to one degree or another. That includes opposition to those practices during the Waldensian movement's pre-Reformation years. In a book on the Waldensians, the historian Gabriel Audisio writes:

[quoting a medieval Roman Catholic source] 'These heretics refuse to accept the reality of miracles within the Church due to the merits and prayers of the saints who, they maintain, have never intervened in any way. In the same way, they insinuate amongst themselves that the saints in heaven do not listen to prayers and pay no attention to the homages we on earth pay to them; the saints do not pray for us, it is therefore useless to entreat their suffrage. Consequently, the Waldensians hold in contempt the solemnities which we celebrate in honour of the saints, as well as the other signs of veneration and homage; and on saints' days, if they can do so without too great a risk, they work.'

Statements from the community in Piedmont produced before the inquisitorial courts in the middle or at the end of the [fourteenth] century are clear on this point: 'We should not pray to saints asking that they intercede for us with God; our prayers should be addressed to God alone'; 'The apostles and the other saints have no power and should not be applied to.' In Prague, this is cited as a heretical article: 'The saints should be neither invoked nor venerated, nor should the Virgin Mary.'…

The power of saints and the Virgin Mary was thrown into question everywhere. The second error of the 'Waldensian heretics' in Bohemia was maintaining that 'the blessed Virgin and the saints in general should be neither adored or invoked'. When interrogated in 1451, Philip Regis from the San Martino valley in Piedmont declared, 'No saint has the power to realise actions or miracles or bestow grace, which God alone can do.' Pierre Crespin from the diocese of Embrun in the Dauphiné recanted in 1489, believing, among other errors, that 'God alone should be adored and invoked in prayer, not the saints.' Monet Rey, from Saint-Mamans near Valence, confirmed in 1494, 'Prayers should not be addressed to the saints; they cannot help us; God alone can.' Claude Seyssel denounced as the ninth error of the Waldensians the fact that 'they refuse to honour the saints'. This denial of the power of saints could not be clearer or more widespread….

In certain statements during the trials, moreover, a more moderate declaration often followed a categorical denial. Monet Rey, for example, after voicing the intransigent attitude quoted above, then added, 'Sundays must be more solemn than any other feast-days; other feast-days were invented by the Church, they do not have to be celebrated; people can even work on these days other than on those honouring the apostles and other similarly important days.'…Denying the cult of saints therefore did not necessarily mean assuming clear-cut, deliberately provocative attitudes….

Herman Rudeger 'had heard that God alone should be adored and invoked and he believed this; however, when in need, he invoked the blessed Virgin Mary'. Ghertrud, wife of Claus Walther, admitted that she invoked the Virgin Mary but not the saints. There is the case of Katherina, wife of Tyde Sachze, who believed in relics as long as you repented. These confessions enable us to appreciate the gap that could exist between principles and their application in daily life, and also between preachers' words and devotees' understanding.

(The Waldensian Dissent [New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007], approximate Kindle locations 866, 1412, 1424, 1489)

Elsewhere (1565), Audisio discusses some indirect indications of their opposition to praying to beings other than God. When interrogated, the Waldensians could recite the Lord's Prayer from memory over and over again, but were less familiar with the Ave Maria. They seem to have memorized the opening words of the Ave Maria, to be able to cite the words when asked to and thereby avoid persecution, but they often got the words wrong, weren't able to cite the prayer beyond the opening words, and so forth. Their lesser familiarity with prayers to beings other than God adds further weight to the direct, explicit testimony we have elsewhere for the Waldensians' opposition to praying to saints and angels. Audisio cites Claus Walther's testimony in 1393: "'He believes Pater Noster to be the only prayer, but the heresiarchs [Waldensians] told him to learn Ave Maria because of their enemies.' It is thus plain that the Poor of Lyons [Waldensians] recognised one prayer, the Pater Noster, but learnt a few lines from the Ave Maria to conform outwardly." (1578) He goes on to cite another line of evidence, the lesser concern for honoring saints found in the wills of Waldensians when contrasted to what's found in the wills of Roman Catholics. "In this case, it is their silence that is telling." (1584)