Certainly gloves were a mark of religious dignity at an extremely early period, and played a distinctive part in the rites and services of the ancient Church. Officiating priests invariably consecrated the Holy Sacrament with gloves on their hands. This custom still obtains in the Church of England. Moreover, the laity always drew off their gloves within the sacred portals, where it was sacrilege to cover worldly hands even as the Fathers covered theirs.
To teach truth by sight was one of the great endeavors of the mediæval Church. We should not forget that the masses of the people in those days were untaught and childlike in their mental processes. The clergy were profound scholars, but they understood how to appeal to the minds of their communicants; they knew that their imaginations should be impressed, that sacred imagery should be indelibly stamped upon the sensitive-plate of the soul. Not lipparables only, but allegories for the eye—visible symbols—conveyed sacred meanings where words could not. Thus art became the handmaiden of religion, and familiar objects were invested with hidden significance. In this catalogue gloves were by no means forgotten.
Bruno, Bishop of Segni, tells us that the gloves of the clergy were originally made of linen to denote that the hands they covered were chaste, pure, without blame. In 1287, Durandus, Bishop of Mende, went to great pains to prove that the sacred _chirothecae_—for the old Latin name had been kept—were white. He says: “It was specified that by these gloves the hands would be preserved chaste, clean during work, and free from every stain.” The gloves which encased the hands of Pope Boniface VIII., at the time of his burial, were of white silk, beautifully worked with the needle, and ornamented with a rich border, studded with pearls.
Considerably later—exactly when is not known—ecclesiastical gloves ceased to be invariably white, but changed their hue, like the other vestments, according to the current church seasons. Then the gloves of the church became glorious indeed in color, texture and design! St. Charles Borromeo prescribes that “they shall be woven throughout, and adorned with a golden circle on the outside.”