In the Canterbury Tales, Chaucer uses a lot of his written works to show his negative view of the church. These written works include “The Pardoner’s Tale,” “The Nun’s Priest’s Tale,” “The Parson’s Tale,” and finally “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue”. All of these written works by Chaucer were created somewhat out of spite against the church. Chaucer had an extremely negative view on the church. He believed that the church was a corrupt society filled with hypocrisy. Chaucer’s main purpose for writing these tales was to bring the church’s corruptness and hypocrisy to light. In the Pardoner’s Tale, Chaucer shows the corruption in the church by describing the Pardoner. The Pardoner was a priest who gave out pardons for sins. In that time period, …show more content…
This makes sense since Chaucer wrote the tales and he has a negative view on the church though some of his tales have a positive view of the church like The Nun’s Priest. In The Wife of Bath’s Prologue the wife blames the entire religious establishment, claiming that church writings breed hostility toward wives because they were written by men. This resentment is influenced by Chaucer’s negative beliefs on the church. However, in The Wife of Bath’s Tale the wife shows grace to religion by saying Thanks be to God who is forever alive, “Of husbands at church door have I had five( Chaucer 1400).” This quote shows that the wife is gracious to God for allowing her to have so many husbands. The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale shows varied beliefs on religion and the church. The Parson’s Tale tells the story of a parish priest whose wish is to make the final mortal pilgrimage to the Heavenly Jerusalem. The Parson’s Tale and The Wife of Bath’s Prologue/Tale all discuss religious matters whether negative or positive which shows Chaucer’s willingness to discuss religious matters whether good or bad in his