By highlighting the intersection of clergy, elites, and outcast groups, Working in the Vineyard of the Lord illuminates the understanding of religious reform, popular devotion, and changing attitudes toward charity in sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Italy. Lance Lazar's work represents a new look at popular devotion throughout Early Modern Italy and its distillation in confraternal piety.

Lazar's research sheds new light on the sixteenth-century revolution in charity and poor relief, particularly the aggressive new charity focusing on marginalized groups such as...