The concept of heresy—and the threat posed by anything deemed heretical—is a major concern for the monks in The Name of the Rose. Abo, Ubertino, Jorge, Bernard Gui, and William all speak at length on the subject, and the Pope’s readiness to condemn certain Franciscan sects as heretical forms an underlying conflict that builds tension throughout the story. William’s reason for coming to the abbey in the first place is to mediate talks between representatives of the papal court and representatives of the Minorites, an order of Franciscan monks endorsed by the Emperor and led by Michael of Cesena, who has been summoned to Avignon to answer for the Franciscans’ support of ecclesiastical poverty. The Pope sees the Franciscans’ ideas as having given rise to heretical sects like the Dolcinians, who enforce their views by violently targeting the rich and powerful, including church officials. Jorge’s conviction that laughter is heretical motivates him to make sure any monk who reads Aristotle’s lost volume on the subject will meet his doom, and Bernard Gui’s eagerness to discover and punish heresy leads him to try to convict Remigio, Salvatore, and the young woman from the village. The fuzzy boundaries between what is and is not considered heretical are a continual source of consternation to Adso, particularly when he listens to William’s conversations with the mystical Ubertino and the more pragmatic Abo. William attempts to explain the phenomenon of heresy to his young scribe by comparing it to a great river, pointing out that it is society’s most disenfranchised members—those who have not been given a place among the body of the “people of God”—who are swayed by the message of hope they find in the teachings of heretical preachers.