Ship of Fools: How corrupt was the Catholic church at the time of the Reformation?

Thread: How corrupt was the Catholic church at the time of the Reformation? Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by chive (# 208) on :

I was brought up uber Protestant (indeed I was more Protestant than Wood ) and I was brought up on outrageous stories of the corruption and general terribleness of the Catholic church and why the Reformation was entirely a Good Thing.

I am now a Catholic and I'd like to think that although the church was probably a bit crap (as it has humans in it, that is entirely normal) but not the most corrupt thing in the entire universe and it sorted itself out somewhat with the Counter Reformation. I have read a fair bit about it over the years but most sources have their agendas are written from one position or the other.

So help me, what is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth if such objectivity is indeed possible?

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

chive:

quote:
So help me, what is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth if such objectivity is indeed possible?

You said something about humans? So probably not.

But I will still enjoy seeing this thread unfold.

[ 22. May 2013, 13:21: Message edited by: Lyda*Rose ]

Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :

I sincerely doubt that an objective view of such an emotionally laden event is possible. But, given that the Church was the object of so many attempts at reform for so many centuries, and given the accounts that virtually everyone accepts of the Renaissance papacy, it is hard to imagine that the Church as center of political power was not also the center of political corruption.

My expectation is that the Reformation did a world of good to Catholicism, as reflected in the counter-reformation. And I can't quite imagine that the Church would have come to those reforms were it faced with anything less than the existential threat of the Reformation. Of course, YMMV.

--Tom Clune

Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :

It depends on the country. The Catholic Church in England was actually quite good at its job, Cardinal Wosley non-withstanding. There were much more brazen offenses in Germany.

[ 22. May 2013, 13:41: Message edited by: Zach82 ]

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

In many ways Chive corruption was not the problem. Where there are humans there will be corruption. The problem was perhaps more to do with the way dissent, difference and dialogue were handled.

Lets see if I can tell a story that is somewhat different to what either tells. The Reformation did not come out of nowhere. The century before there had been big battles between Christianity and Islam in Europe. As often with an outside threat, what had happened was a closing of ranks, opposition voices were silenced, dissendents treated badly and so on.

Now by the Reformation the threat had decreased, what was more there was a rediscovery of ancient European Culture (I think we are due another bout of that soon) which asked questions of the prevailing philosophical consensus.

The Western Churches response was to create the "enemy within" and to batten down the hatches even harder. This is a bad idea, it actually does not destroy the dissidence it suppresses it, rather like putting weights on a steaming pressure cooker. Pour in a heavy dose of developing nation states, and you have a powder keg ready to go off.

Jengie

Posted by Justinian (# 5357) on :

quote:
Originally posted by chive:
I was brought up uber Protestant (indeed I was more Protestant than Wood ) and I was brought up on outrageous stories of the corruption and general terribleness of the Catholic church and why the Reformation was entirely a Good Thing.

I am now a Catholic and I'd like to think that although the church was probably a bit crap (as it has humans in it, that is entirely normal) but not the most corrupt thing in the entire universe and it sorted itself out somewhat with the Counter Reformation. I have read a fair bit about it over the years but most sources have their agendas are written from one position or the other.

So help me, what is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth if such objectivity is indeed possible?

The whole truth is not something anyone will know. But what is undoubtedly true is that the Church was (1) busy selling inulgences and (2) using this to fund the Vatican.

What is also definitely true is that less than 15 years before Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the church door (or at least published them), the Pope had been Alexander VI, otherwise known as Rodrigo Borgia. Now to get into quite how corrupt Alexander VI was takes knowing both about him and his son Cesare Borgia. Alexander VI tried to set up his son with a dynasty - and did so by using the army of the Papal States - you could either surrender to the Papal States or be excommunicated for opposing the pope, have indulgences and blessings given to your enemies, and then overwhelmed by the Papal States lead by Cesare Borgia. (Machiavelli's great political achievement was dancing fast enough to prevent Florence being entirely swallowed up by this juggernaut). Alexander VI therefore turned the Papal States into an aggressive military power, crossing a line I don't believe any other pope in history had.
His successor but one, Julius II (Pius III was pope for less than a month) who appears, so far as I know, to have been a good thing who took over a complete mess and improved it in the ten years he had.

And then we reach Leo X, the pope who actually triggered the Reformation. Alexander VI was probably the worst pope in history (turning the Papal States into a military power does that to your reputation). Leo X also shows up on at least one list of worst ten popes and for very different reasons. Alexander had vision, Leo was merely petty, venial, and corrupt - and his response to successfully bribing his way into the papacy is alleged to be "Since God has given us the papacy, let us enjoy it". He instituted the selling of indulgences (effective Simony on a church-wide scale) to fund St Peters' in Rome, but other than corrupting the sacraments that way (and the allegations about his behaviour in bed) his failings were those of being someone more suited to being a patron of the arts than pope. He spent lavishly (mostly on good causes) and died in massive debt. He didn't keep his word when messing in international politics.

So at the time of the Reformation, the Papacy was still an aggressive militarist state (something that was going to bite them in 1527 when Rome was sacked by soldiers under the control of one of the Cardinals, officially working for the Papal States) and was selling sacraments. Pope itself was a position that had to be bought.

Was it the most corrupt thing in the entire universe? No. Was it even the most corrupt state at the time? Probably not. The courts were generally extremely corrupt. But when your claim to influence rests on moral foundations, going that spectacularly immoral is damning.

And that IMO the worst pope in history (Alexander VI) had been pope less than 20 years before, and another I would put in the bottom five* really didn't help anything.

Hope some of that helps.

* My list includes Leo X for the selling of indulgences, with Urban II for kicking off the crusades, Benedict IX actually selling the Papacy, and Boniface VIII also grabbing secular power round out my list.

Edit: To clarify I'm focussing on the papacy because at a low level any organisation that big varies a lot, but the leadership sets the direction.

[ 22. May 2013, 13:54: Message edited by: Justinian ]

Posted by lilyswinburne (# 12934) on :

What about how corrupt the Catholic Church is NOW?

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :

The corruption existed because the church had so much power, and at that time there was no effective counterweight.

Human nature being what it is, some people will use power entirely for their own self-interest. Many people high in the church exploited their positions for their own interests.

There were many sincere Christians in the church, but not so many in the hierarchy. The people who usually end up with power are the ones who want to use it selfishly.

Moo

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Justinian:
What is also definitely true is that less than 15 years before Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the church door (or at least published them), the Pope had been Alexander VI, otherwise known as Rodrigo Borgia. Now to get into quite how corrupt Alexander VI was takes knowing both about him and his son Cesare Borgia. Alexander VI tried to set up his son with a dynasty - and did so by using the army of the Papal States - you could either surrender to the Papal States or be excommunicated for opposing the pope, have indulgences and blessings given to your enemies, and then overwhelmed by the Papal States lead by Cesare Borgia. (Machiavelli's great political achievement was dancing fast enough to prevent Florence being entirely swallowed up by this juggernaut). Alexander VI therefore turned the Papal States into an aggressive military power, crossing a line I don't believe any other pope in history had.

A good summary (longer than a typical blog post but much shorter than an academic book) on why Alexander VI (a.k.a. Roderigo Borgia) was probably the worst pope ever can be found here. Note that most of what puts him above the usual standard of corruption expected of just-prior-to-the-Reformation pontiffs is political corruption, not doctrinal heresy or sexual immorality. A brief excerpt

quote:
I applauded her concision at the time, but when she had moved on my friends immediately turned on me and (with the full pressure of a common language demanding thoroughness) asked, “Why was he so bad? I mean, this is the high Renaissance right before the Reformation – weren’t all the popes incredibly corrupt and terrible? You’ve been telling us stories about catamites and elephants and brothels all day; what made Alexander VI so exceptional?”

It is a fair question. The papal throne was indeed at its most politicized at this point, a prize tossed back and forth among various powerful Italian families and the odd foreign king, and Italy remains littered with the opulent palaces built with funds embezzled by families who scored themselves a pope. My best short answer is this:

1. They were Spaniards, and the Italians hated that, so all possible tensions were hyper-inflamed.

2. Instead of the usual graft and simony, they tried to permanently carve out a personal Borgia duchy in the middle of Italy, and when that was going well, they tried to turn the papacy into a hereditary monarchy.

3. They very nearly succeeded.

Which is good as far as it goes, but I highly recommend clicking through for the long answer.

quote:
Originally posted by Justinian:
His successor but one, Julius II (Pius III was pope for less than a month) who appears, so far as I know, to have been a good thing who took over a complete mess and improved it in the ten years he had.

The same source also has a write-up of Pope Julius II (a.k.a. Giuliano della Rovere).

Posted by Jon in the Nati (# 15849) on :

quote:
What about how corrupt the Catholic Church is NOW?

What about it? Fire up a new thread (so as not to derail this one) and tell us all about it, if it is so relevant.

Posted by CL (# 16145) on :

I'm always amused at this idea that the nadir of the papacy coincided with the Reformation. It pales in comparison to the 10th century which has variously been titled Saeculum obscurum and Pornokratia.

Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on :

There was also the wealth and corruption of the monasteries and the inability of most parish priests to read or write properly - they probably got their mistresses to help them [Biased]

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

Ooo!Ooo! Share a little, CL! You are right, I missed that bit. And how did they pull from the brink without a mighty Reformation to push them?

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

Just a little note to say the success of the Reformation was in part due to the shifting of corruption. In other words, the Reformation received support by those who saw the opportunity to permanently divert power and funds from Rome to themselves.

This in no way is meant to support or attack any other points on either side. I've no dog in this fight.

Posted by Justinian (# 5357) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
The same source also has a write-up of Pope Julius II (a.k.a. Giuliano della Rovere).

Thanks. Hadn't seen that one.

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Just a little note to say the success of the Reformation was in part due to the shifting of corruption. In other words, the Reformation received support by those who saw the opportunity to permanently divert power and funds from Rome to themselves.

This in no way is meant to support or attack any other points on either side. I've no dog in this fight.

Quite. The country piles of English nobility built on the remains of demolished abbeys, anyone?

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

Ha, chive, you were a Daughter of the Whore to me!

Sigh. I'm sorry. Christianity had sold out to Babylon AFTER conquering it 1200 years before. The Reformation was NOT the return to the faith once delivered.

And I embrace it ALL. I am its son. We all are its children, her children, their children.

I'm a son of a bitch too.

Posted by Fr Weber (# 13472) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
Ooo!Ooo! Share a little, CL! You are right, I missed that bit. And how did they pull from the brink without a mighty Reformation to push them?

The Cluniac reforms were such a mighty reformation, but they happened within rather than outside the Church.

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :

In response to the OP - very? (Like the rest). Moving on .....

Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Just a little note to say the success of the Reformation was in part due to the shifting of corruption. In other words, the Reformation received support by those who saw the opportunity to permanently divert power and funds from Rome to themselves.

This in no way is meant to support or attack any other points on either side. I've no dog in this fight.

Indeed, one political effect of the Reformation was the emergence of the State as the chief legitimate political actor (i.e the rise of the German Princes and Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries and declaration that he, not the Pope was head of the national church of England)

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

quote:
Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
In response to the OP - very? (Like the rest). Moving on .....

Corruption happens wherever people have power - while it may still happen in the Catholic church, it happens in Protestant churches too.

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:
Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
In response to the OP - very? (Like the rest). Moving on .....
Corruption happens wherever people have power - while it may still happen in the Catholic church, it happens in Protestant churches too.

Yes but .... we don't all have a bad contemporary track record on abuse of the vulnerable like the RCC ...

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

quote:
Originally posted by ExclamationMark:

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:
Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
In response to the OP - very? (Like the rest). Moving on .....
Corruption happens wherever people have power - while it may still happen in the Catholic church, it happens in Protestant churches too.
Yes but .... we don't all have a bad contemporary track record on abuse of the vulnerable like the RCC ...

Really? Abuse scandals have been rife in evangelical circles and there have been several high-profile cases in the Anglican church. To label the RCC as being particularly prone to abuse of the vulnerable is lazy and unfair - and ignores the excellent work the RCC does in healthcare and education (which even you could not begrudge them, surely?). Has the RCC dealt with abuse claims badly? Absolutely! But the 'RCC = paedophiles' thing has got to stop, because it's just not true.

Posted by Kaplan Corday (# 16119) on :

It is an interesting historical issue to pursue, with Protestants and secularists interested in maximizing the sixteenth century RCC’s degree of corruption, and revisionists such as Eamon Duffy out to minimize it – a bit like enthusiasts for the eighteenth century revival emphasizing the low state of England before Wesley.

When I looked for Duffy’s book on my bookshelf to make sure I was spelling his name correctly, I discovered it beside an 1884 History of Protestantism with a quote from Carlyle (!) on the title page: “Protestantism, the sacred cause of God’s light and truth against the devil’s falsity and darkness”.

The important point to remember is that all Christian traditions have skeletons in the cupboard when it comes to their actual practice, and that the Reformation cannot be justified or condemned on the basis of whether or not the papacy was in a decadent state in the sixteenth century.

Even if every single bishop of Rome had always been a paragon of personal virtue, the Reformation would still have been necessary because the papacy per se is a thoroughly unscriptural concept.

In the same way today, even if none of the child sex abuse scandals had ever happened, and every priest had always been an exemplar of pastoral integrity, the RC priesthood would still be wrong because of the unbiblical clerical casteism and sacerdotal soteriology which it represents.

[ 23. May 2013, 09:56: Message edited by: Kaplan Corday ]

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

Even if I disagreed with the concept of the RC priesthood (which, no one will be surprised to learn, I don't), isn't 'wrong' a bit of a strong term? 'Different', yes, 'not as Biblically accurate', yes, but wrong? I fail to see how the RC priesthood is so Biblically wrong (and I agree with you regarding the Pope) that it must be labelled as totally wrong. The structure of priests and bishops seems perfectly Biblically sound - but then, I would say that [Biased]

Posted by Kaplan Corday (# 16119) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Even if I disagreed with the concept of the RC priesthood (which, no one will be surprised to learn, I don't), isn't 'wrong' a bit of a strong term? 'Different', yes, 'not as Biblically accurate', yes, but wrong? I fail to see how the RC priesthood is so Biblically wrong (and I agree with you regarding the Pope) that it must be labelled as totally wrong. The structure of priests and bishops seems perfectly Biblically sound - but then, I would say that

I am not interested in kicking off another discussion of the validity of the papacy and RC priesthood, but in making the point that from a Protestant point of view, the Reformation was and is essentially doctrinal, rather than merely a reaction to the real or perceived depravity of the RCC's personnel or institutions.

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
...from a Protestant point of view, the Reformation was and is essentially doctrinal, rather than merely a reaction to the real or perceived depravity of the RCC's personnel or institutions.

Yes but... many of the Protestant churches still have a strongly hierarchical structure with a stark divide between clergy (those who perform the rites, do the teaching, hear from God) and laity (those who receive blessing from the clergy).

IMO the Reformation only did part of the necessary work: it challenged the concept of one worldwide human leader of the body of Christ, but it left intact the clergy / laity concept, sadly.

Posted by Hawk (# 14289) on :

What do we mean by corrupt? And by what standard are we measuring it?

The Catholic Church sold salvation for cash money. The leadership was controlled by wealthy patrician families for their own benefit. Bribery of the Cardinals was rife. Laws were made and overuled for the benefit of the rich and powerful. Many were killed either by instigation, or collusion by the Church, solely to invcrease their power, and wealth.

Is this corruption? The people doing this would have considered it necessary. If God's Church was to be effective, it had to be powerful. Thus playing the game of thrones with the crowned heads of Europe was necessary, in fact could be considered virtuous. And since salvation was only as a result of sincere repentence, how could one measure repentence except by asking for sacrifice. And what is more sacrificial than giving up one's gold? Surely that is a benefit to the church, and assists the faithful to be sincere in their repentance, they might have argued.

I beleive the Catholic Church was absolutely corrupt, according to my measure. But to their meausure at the time, they considered it to be the most virtuous organisation on Earth.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
The leadership was controlled by wealthy patrician families for their own benefit. ... Laws were made and overuled for the benefit of the rich and powerful. ...

You've described the current US Congress and Supreme Court marvelously.

Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :

Thank goodness we got rid of all that elitism and corruption during the Reformation. [Angel]

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
am not interested in kicking off another discussion of the validity of the papacy and RC priesthood, but in making the point that from a Protestant point of view, the Reformation was and is essentially doctrinal, rather than merely a reaction to the real or perceived depravity of the RCC's personnel or institutions.

Alright then, slight tangent. If the Reformation is essentially doctrinal, can the CoE split be considered part of the Reformation?

Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
am not interested in kicking off another discussion of the validity of the papacy and RC priesthood, but in making the point that from a Protestant point of view, the Reformation was and is essentially doctrinal, rather than merely a reaction to the real or perceived depravity of the RCC's personnel or institutions.
Alright then, slight tangent. If the Reformation is essentially doctrinal, can the CoE split be considered part of the Reformation?

Saint Henry's theology was generally what was politically expedient in the moment, but after Eddy Six Anglicans were pretty thoroughgoing Protestants with a few more Catholic accoutrements than others like bishops.

[ 23. May 2013, 16:09: Message edited by: Zach82 ]

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:

quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
Ooo!Ooo! Share a little, CL! You are right, I missed that bit. And how did they pull from the brink without a mighty Reformation to push them?
The Cluniac reforms were such a mighty reformation, but they happened within rather than outside the Church.

CL raised a serious question. Things did get pretty bad at Rome in the ninth century. See here for the "Cadaver Synod" that condemned Pope Formosus after his death. His successor in the papacy had Formosus' rotting corpse exhumed, dressed in papal vestments, and put on trial publicly for various offences.

I'd like to hear more about this period and the Cluniac reforms, because they present one half of a historical problem. How was it that the Church was able to survive this mess, but not the mess of the Renaissance papacy? Was it simply that in ninth century Europe there was plenty of other mess for people to concern themselves with? Or was it that the princes of the day saw no percentage for themselves in sponsoring a breakaway church?

The reforms of the 1215 Lateran Council were very important also; they are enacted against the backdrop of the Crusade against the Albigensians and the great feud between the Colonna and the Orsini in Rome. It is just after the official recognition of the Franciscan Order, just before the founding of the Dominicans. Innocent III has just brought King John to heel and lifted the interdict on England; later that year, the Pope will quash the odd document John's barons have just forced him to sign at Runnymede, ensuring that no one will ever hear of it again.

The question we might ask would be: Why was it that the Church at these earlier periods had been resilient enough to reform itself? And why was the Church of the sixteenth century able to reform itself only after the shock of the Reformation? I like Jengie Jon's answer, but I wonder what other factors might have played a role.

Finally, I wonder just how much effect the antics of the Renaissance popes would have had on the average "person in the pew" at the time. Would it be safe to say that, then as now, there would be no more than a few people who really cared what the Church was getting itself up to on a national or international level, as long as things went as usual in their local parishes?

This is a point of controversy among historians of England at present: Eamon Duffy thinks the Catholic Church still had the hearts and allegiance of the people in 1530, and that the Reformation in England was accomplished by a coup at the highest levels of government, enforced by terror. Diarmaid MacCullough disagrees, and will be writing a new biography of Thomas Cromwell to show that the Reformation did have popular support behind it. No prizes for guessing which of the two is a Roman Catholic and which is a deacon in the Church of England. [Snigger]

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Saint Henry's theology was generally what was politically expedient in the moment, but after Eddy Six Anglicans were pretty thoroughgoing Protestants with a few more Catholic accoutrements than others like bishops.

Those few more Catholic accoutrements were responsible for a lot of controversy. Futhermore, Elizabeth's Anglican church was not just a restoration of Edward VI's. A historian would be able to give details, but I gather that the different editions of the BCP contain a host of small edits that together alter the theological nuances significantly.

Posted by Fr Weber (# 13472) on :

With the 16th-century reformations there was the added element of nationalism. A number of princes used the reformation movements as levers to free themselves from Papal domination; if (e.g.) Martin Luther had been less intransigent and if some of the German princes had been less eager to make use of him as a rallying-point for their independence, the Lutheran reformation might well have been (like the earlier Cluniac and Franciscan ones) taken on board by the Catholic hierarchy.

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
With the 16th-century reformations there was the added element of nationalism.

I'm not sure nationalism was all that new an addition in the sixteenth century. There was a fairly clear nationalist element in the Avignon Papacies of the fourteenth centuries. While the development of what would become known as the Westphalian state was starting to pick up steam in the sixteenth century, generic nationalism is far older.

Posted by CL (# 16145) on :

quote:
And why was the Church of the sixteenth century able to reform itself only after the shock of the Reformation?

That is misstating history. Rumblings towards reform, as opposed to Reform, had already started by the 1510s; basically following previous historical patterns of reform - several decades of decline followed by energetic renewal. To use and athletics metaphor, Luther et al jumped the gun and ran out of the stadium.

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

Well you could always say it was the failure of the centralised authority to move quick enough which is why they jumped the gun. Most of the Reformers after all felt they were pushed rather than they jumped.

Jengie

Posted by CL (# 16145) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
With the 16th-century reformations there was the added element of nationalism. A number of princes used the reformation movements as levers to free themselves from Papal domination; if (e.g.) Martin Luther had been less intransigent and if some of the German princes had been less eager to make use of him as a rallying-point for their independence, the Lutheran reformation might well have been (like the earlier Cluniac and Franciscan ones) taken on board by the Catholic hierarchy.

Imperial politics rather than Papal domination. The German princes were primarily motivated by greed (coveting Church land and tithes) and power (giving two fingers to Charles V).

Posted by CL (# 16145) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Well you could always say it was the failure of the centralised authority to move quick enough which is why they jumped the gun. Most of the Reformers after all felt they were pushed rather than they jumped.

Jengie

You may as well criticise an oil tanker for not being able to turn as fast as a dinghy. As for being pushed, hardly. When you radically redefine the nature of the Church and her sacraments the Church hasn't left you, you've left the Church.

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

Hoping we might be able to discuss this without letting our sectarian biases dictate our conclusions for us. It seems an interesting historical question.

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
With the 16th-century reformations there was the added element of nationalism. A number of princes used the reformation movements as levers to free themselves from Papal domination; if (e.g.) Martin Luther had been less intransigent and if some of the German princes had been less eager to make use of him as a rallying-point for their independence, the Lutheran reformation might well have been (like the earlier Cluniac and Franciscan ones) taken on board by the Catholic hierarchy.

We'd call it "nationalism" but we see it through the rear-view mirror of our own history.

I wonder how much difference a contemporary would have perceived between the territorial and dynastic ambitions of Clovis I (after his conversion, the champion of the Catholic Church against the Arian Visigoths), and those of Albrecht of Brandenburg-Ansbach (last Grand Master of the Teutonic Order and first Duke in Prussia, after his adoption of Lutheranism).

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

quote:
Originally posted by CL:

quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Well you could always say it was the failure of the centralised authority to move quick enough which is why they jumped the gun. Most of the Reformers after all felt they were pushed rather than they jumped.

Jengie
You may as well criticise an oil tanker for not being able to turn as fast as a dinghy. As for being pushed, hardly. When you radically redefine the nature of the Church and her sacraments the Church hasn't left you, you've left the Church.

Ah but that is debatable there is at least as much redefining in response to the Reformation as because of it!

By the way the pushing rather happened before the redefining of theology. It is as if the "new" views came from being pushed.

Jengie

[ 23. May 2013, 18:54: Message edited by: Jengie Jon ]

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
I'm not sure nationalism was all that new an addition in the sixteenth century. There was a fairly clear nationalist element in the Avignon Papacies of the fourteenth centuries.

Really? Could you say what you think that element was? Nationalism I'd suppose to require the identification of a people with a proposed or actual Westphalian state. The middle to high medieval period has the beginnings of the invention of peoples, demarcated by language and religion. But not I think the desire to create integral states as a formal embodiment of them. The ruling classes of Europe simply had too many fingers in too many territories at that point. That the Kings of France had an interest in having the Popes as their clients is a different matter.

Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :

I think the Reformation was probably a lot more complicated than just nationalism or corruption.

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
I'd like to hear more about this period and the Cluniac reforms, because they present one half of a historical problem. How was it that the Church was able to survive this mess, but not the mess of the Renaissance papacy? Was it simply that in ninth century Europe there was plenty of other mess for people to concern themselves with? Or was it that the princes of the day saw no percentage for themselves in sponsoring a breakaway church?

One of the consequences of the Cluniac reforms was the centralisation of power in the church. The Papacy reclaimed power over the local churches from local rulers. So the people who really had an interest in reforming the church were the papacy. The Holy Roman Emperors, or some of them, supported the reforms, partly out of personal piety and partly because they probably thought a strong Papacy was preferable to a strong nobility.

Posted by Russ (# 120) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

The question we might ask would be: Why was it that the Church at these earlier periods had been resilient enough to reform itself? And why was the Church of the sixteenth century able to reform itself only after the shock of the Reformation?

The sixteenth century was a very different set-up. Universities, printing press, growing urbanisation, growing middle class. Perhaps with greater social and geographical mobility, there was less of a sense of the impossibility of change ?

Seems to me that the flashpoint for the reformers was the issue of sale of indulgences. That's not just the Pope and his court in distant Rome misbehaving at a personal level while the whole machinery of the church got on with the job of supplying priests to Christendom to preach and dispense the sacraments. A bad priest would sooner or later be replaced by a good priest, a bad pope by a good pope. Personal depravity the church had always survived.

The sixteenth century corruption combined
- the pope as a player in the games of European politics rather than any sort of neutral arbiter
- the dimension of doctrinal error in the idea of indulgences as a commodity that could be bought and sold
- a corruption of what was seen as the whole purpose of the church - dispensing forgiveness for sin to allow the repentant into heaven - rather than mere corruption at the top.

The specific doctrines of the reformers were ISTM nothing special; had those ideas not been the preferred remedies of those who most effectively pointing out what was wrong with the church, they probably wouldn't have been widely adopted.

But the idea of people reading Scripture for themselves, that the Bible could be a benchmark against which church leaders and their teachings could be held to account - that was the idea whose time had come, the answer to the sickening corruption of all that the church was and is supposed to be.

Best wishes,

Russ

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

Finally, I wonder just how much effect the antics of the Renaissance popes would have had on the average "person in the pew" at the time. Would it be safe to say that, then as now, there would be no more than a few people who really cared what the Church was getting itself up to on a national or international level, as long as things went as usual in their local parishes?

This is a point of controversy among historians of England at present: Eamon Duffy thinks the Catholic Church still had the hearts and allegiance of the people in 1530, and that the Reformation in England was accomplished by a coup at the highest levels of government, enforced by terror. Diarmaid MacCullough disagrees, and will be writing a new biography of Thomas Cromwell to show that the Reformation did have popular support behind it. No prizes for guessing which of the two is a Roman Catholic and which is a deacon in the Church of England.

Perhaps it is my dark, cynical heart, but I'm thinking had Mary lasted a bit longer, England would have remained Catholic a bit longer.

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

I agree and what if a little Tudor/Hapsburg son was born?? The BBC envisioned this scenario a few years. Not a bad alternative to Puritans and Civil War

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :

quote:
Originally posted by SeraphimSarov:
I agree and what if a little Tudor/Hapsburg son was born??

Given the fact that Mary was part Hapsburg and there were some nasty genes in that family, it would not necessarily have turned out well.

Moo

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

Finally, I wonder just how much effect the antics of the Renaissance popes would have had on the average "person in the pew" at the time. Would it be safe to say that, then as now, there would be no more than a few people who really cared what the Church was getting itself up to on a national or international level, as long as things went as usual in their local parishes?

This is a point of controversy among historians of England at present: Eamon Duffy thinks the Catholic Church still had the hearts and allegiance of the people in 1530, and that the Reformation in England was accomplished by a coup at the highest levels of government, enforced by terror. Diarmaid MacCullough disagrees, and will be writing a new biography of Thomas Cromwell to show that the Reformation did have popular support behind it. No prizes for guessing which of the two is a Roman Catholic and which is a deacon in the Church of England.
Perhaps it is my dark, cynical heart, but I'm thinking had Mary lasted a bit longer, England would have remained Catholic a bit longer.

Conrad Russell pointed out that, given time, the Protestant "heresy" was stamped out everywhere else. There were large Protestant communities in France, Bohemia, Hungary, and even Italy.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

Germany? Sweden? The Netherlands? North America?

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Germany? Sweden? The Netherlands? North America?

I do think the success of the Dutch Revolt had quite a bit to do with the success of Dutch Protestantism. The southern provinces, the nucleus of present-day Belgium, remained under Spanish rule and remained Catholic.

North America's an interesting story. French Huguenots attempted to establish a colony at Ft. Caroline in Florida, and were wiped out by Spanish troops under the leadership of Pedro Menendez de Aviles, who founded St. Augustine. The Frenchmen were hanged from trees with placards around their necks: "Not as Frenchmen but as heretics."

Posted by Lynnk (# 16132) on :

It seems to me, that after what I've just been reading about popes and vaticans and religious wars and indulgences and what appears to be the obscene wealth of the catholic church, compared to what I read in the Gospels in my Bible,that the catholic church has little to do with Christianity
And I won't even mention the dealings with children that to many church leaders were prepared to overlook.

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lynnk:
It seems to me, that after what I've just been reading about popes and vaticans and religious wars and indulgences and what appears to be the obscene wealth of the catholic church, compared to what I read in the Gospels in my Bible,that the catholic church has little to do with Christianity
And I won't even mention the dealings with children that to many church leaders were prepared to overlook.

I'd be inclined to agree... if those things were unique to the Catholic Church. Sadly, they seem to be found just as much in Protestantism (both mainline & evangelical), atheism, communism, and pretty much any other group that manages to claw their way into power. Something about the human condition, I guess.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

I'm not sure what you mean about the 'obscene wealth ' of the Catholic church.Certainly the Vatican contains many cultural treasures,but I'm sure that if you put a monetary value on the contents of many museums in the USA or other countries,you might conclude that they also were obscenely wealthy.
It's not possible to sell off a bit of St Peter's,for example and if you tried what could you do with the High altar ? Who would buy it and what would they do with it.These things ,along with the contents of the ?Vatican museums belong to the patrimony of the human race,held in trust for the benefit,not only of Catholics but for all of humanity

Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
I'm not sure what you mean about the 'obscene wealth ' of the Catholic church.

Ask a Mexican. One of the things that was accomplished after the Mexican Revolution was banning the building of new RC churches in Mexico. The reason was that the Church had impoverished the native population for years building massive edifices. Every tiny town in Mexico has a cathedral to the honor and glory of the Church and the agony of the peasants. "Obscene" is way too kind a term for this foul excess.

--Tom Clune

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

Finally, I wonder just how much effect the antics of the Renaissance popes would have had on the average "person in the pew" at the time. Would it be safe to say that, then as now, there would be no more than a few people who really cared what the Church was getting itself up to on a national or international level, as long as things went as usual in their local parishes?

This is a point of controversy among historians of England at present: Eamon Duffy thinks the Catholic Church still had the hearts and allegiance of the people in 1530, and that the Reformation in England was accomplished by a coup at the highest levels of government, enforced by terror. Diarmaid MacCullough disagrees, and will be writing a new biography of Thomas Cromwell to show that the Reformation did have popular support behind it. No prizes for guessing which of the two is a Roman Catholic and which is a deacon in the Church of England.
Perhaps it is my dark, cynical heart, but I'm thinking had Mary lasted a bit longer, England would have remained Catholic a bit longer.
Conrad Russell pointed out that, given time, the Protestant "heresy" was stamped out everywhere else. There were large Protestant communities in France, Bohemia, Hungary, and even Italy.

Not large in Italy, even if you count the Spirituali and the Thirty Years War settled Bohemia for Catholicism

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:

Finally, I wonder just how much effect the antics of the Renaissance popes would have had on the average "person in the pew" at the time. Would it be safe to say that, then as now, there would be no more than a few people who really cared what the Church was getting itself up to on a national or international level, as long as things went as usual in their local parishes?

This is a point of controversy among historians of England at present: Eamon Duffy thinks the Catholic Church still had the hearts and allegiance of the people in 1530, and that the Reformation in England was accomplished by a coup at the highest levels of government, enforced by terror. Diarmaid MacCullough disagrees, and will be writing a new biography of Thomas Cromwell to show that the Reformation did have popular support behind it. No prizes for guessing which of the two is a Roman Catholic and which is a deacon in the Church of England.
Perhaps it is my dark, cynical heart, but I'm thinking had Mary lasted a bit longer, England would have remained Catholic a bit longer.
Conrad Russell pointed out that, given time, the Protestant "heresy" was stamped out everywhere else. There were large Protestant communities in France, Bohemia, Hungary, and even Italy.

Not large in Italy even if you count the Spirituali. The Thirty Years War settled Bohemia for Catholicism

Posted by Cedd007 (# 16180) on :

quote:
Originally posted by chive:

... I have read a fair bit about it over the years but most sources have their agendas are written from one position or the other ...

This is, I think, the key reason why objectivity is so difficult. The fault-lines between Catholic and Protestant are so deep that even atheists can unconsciously display a bias towards the one or the other. In England the Protestant version of events is still probably the main story, except that most people now think that Henry Vlll was in it just for the money.

The question is complicated by the fact that all churches have changed profoundly in 5 centuries, yet we use the terms 'Catholic' and 'Protestant' as though there is unbroken continuity. In which tradition do you place Erasmus, for example? His publication of the Greek text of the New Testament helped fuel rising expectations of what the Church should be like. In my view, both Catholics and Reformers responded with a knee-jerk reaction, and what might have been a fruitful debate was hijacked by the 16th century equivalent of social media: scurrilous and inflammatory pamphlets were the dark side of the printing revolution. It is frightening how quickly theological debate degenerated into each side labelling the other as 'Antichrist' – who required execution rather than dialogue.

As far as England is concerned I believe we have got much closer to an objective account of what was going on in the 16th Century, as historians have begun to dismantle the Protestant account. A good example of this is Scarisbrick's book of Henry Vlll, which shows clearly that the thinking of Henry, the Pope and Cardinal Wolsey, whether 'right' or 'wrong', is totally alien to the way we think in the 21st Century. From this point of view Eamon Duffy's approach – where the fault-lines would appear as deep as ever – can be misleading. But then I suppose he was reacting to the Protestant story that had grown up for centuries without being challenged. By and large I think Protestants and Catholics ought now to be able to look back at this period and laugh at both our follies.

Those follies were so enormous that modern differences between Catholic and Protestant are insignificant. A very good case can be made that Mary l's brief reign was about as successful as the first few years of Elizabeth's, and that had Mary lived longer the Catholic faith (and subsequently the Catholic take on English History!) would have triumphed. However, I still think Cock-up, rather than Providence, was at work, when Mary made the political error of burning the Archbishop of Canterbury outside my Oxford college, whilst allowing him airtime before he died. Poor Public Relations can change the whole course of history.

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

quote:
Grammatica:I do think the success of the Dutch Revolt had quite a bit to do with the success of Dutch Protestantism.

I have looked at this sentence a couple of times, and I'm still not sure if it isn't a tautology.

I mean, the Dutch revolt arose because Protestants wanted to get rid of Spanish Catholic rule. When they managed to do so, would this be the success of the Dutch Revolt (we usually call it the '80 Year War'), or would it be the success of Dutch Protestantism? Isn't that saying the same?

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

Cathedrals and churches are built to the glory of God,not to the glory of the Church.It is a moot question,of course,as to whether churches should be built in prominent places with towers and spires to indicate their relative importance in a 'Christian' country.

Indeed the faithful contribute much to the building of churches,impoverishing themselves sometimes for the greater glory of God,but if one toes too far along that line one could say that churches should not be built,indeed even that the Gospel should not be preached.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

The whole problem with the OP and many of OUR responses is the sense of distance. From THEM.

THEY were, ARE, us. We ARE them. Even though my Roman brothers refuse me, I embrace them.

I embrace US. Yeah with easily slitty eyes, with twitches toward the sword lay down. Which is NOT the case with our Muslim brothers.

The Reformation was, is as corrupted by threatened power as any of us who finds a stone in their hand.

Posted by CL (# 16145) on :

quote:
Originally posted by tclune:

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
I'm not sure what you mean about the 'obscene wealth ' of the Catholic church.
Ask a Mexican. One of the things that was accomplished after the Mexican Revolution was banning the building of new RC churches in Mexico. The reason was that the Church had impoverished the native population for years building massive edifices. Every tiny town in Mexico has a cathedral to the honor and glory of the Church and the agony of the peasants. "Obscene" is way too kind a term for this foul excess.

--Tom Clune

Horseshit.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

What, we weren't imperialists CL ?

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
Indeed the faithful contribute much to the building of churches,impoverishing themselves sometimes for the greater glory of God,but if one toes too far along that line one could say that churches should not be built,indeed even that the Gospel should not be preached.

I there's a false equivalence in there, Forthview... Whether or not to build churches is a totally separate consideration from whether or not to preach the Gospel. You can have church services in existing buildings like community halls / centres, pubs, cafes, offices etc. Or you can meet in people's homes.

I know many people consider none of those locations to be viable options, of course. But the Gospel can be preached without dedicated church buildings, especially (referring to tclune's post) ones that cause significant financial impoverishment of the local community.

Posted by Gildas (# 525) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Just a little note to say the success of the Reformation was in part due to the shifting of corruption. In other words, the Reformation received support by those who saw the opportunity to permanently divert power and funds from Rome to themselves.

This in no way is meant to support or attack any other points on either side. I've no dog in this fight.
Indeed, one political effect of the Reformation was the emergence of the State as the chief legitimate political actor (i.e the rise of the German Princes and Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries and declaration that he, not the Pope was head of the national church of England)

You may be mistaking cause and effect. It was the development of something bearing a marked resemblance to the Machiavellian state in 14th Century France which enabled Philip the Fair to successfully defy the Pope in a way outwith the ability of the Hohenstaufen Emperors. The Pope's divisions, as it were, during the high medieval period were the landed aristocracy who could always use a Papal - monarchical disagreement to leverage further rights or powers for themselves. Once the Monarch had successfully got the drop on the aristocracy he could defy the Papacy without worrying about his vassals announcing "Oh Noes! You defy the Pope! We renounce our allegiance forthwith". Once you have a monarch sufficiently sure of his position to step away from the Papacy, then they could do. (I think a schism of the Lutheran sort was delayed by the Avignon schism which offered dissident monarchs an alternative Pope should the Roman version not be obliging, although the 15th Century saw Lollardy in England and Hussism in Bohemia.) There was never any danger of, say, Barbarossa, adopting, say, Waldensianism as an alternative to Catholicism because the power of the Pope was too established but 16th Century monarchs could and did adopt Protestantism because they were sufficiently powerful to stick two fingers in the general direction of Rome. The exception being Henri IV if France who inherited an extremely weak monarchy with a Catholic army in the field against him. He was obliged to concede that Paris was worth a Mass. But the English monarchy could go from Roman Catholicism to Henrican absolutism to Edwardian Reformed religion to Roman Catholicism to the Elizabethan settlement without the authority of the monarch being seriously threatened.

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:

quote:
Grammatica:I do think the success of the Dutch Revolt had quite a bit to do with the success of Dutch Protestantism.
I have looked at this sentence a couple of times, and I'm still not sure if it isn't a tautology.

I mean, the Dutch revolt arose because Protestants wanted to get rid of Spanish Catholic rule. When they managed to do so, would this be the success of the Dutch Revolt (we usually call it the '80 Year War'), or would it be the success of Dutch Protestantism? Isn't that saying the same?

I'll try to say it differently, then.

Protestantism in the Dutch provinces would have been stamped out if the provinces had continued under Spanish rule. However heartfelt the Dutch Protestants' convictions may have been, death, conversion, or emigration would have been their only choices, if the Dutch Revolt had not succeeded. Dutch Protestants needed the shelter of the Dutch Republic to survive.

The English Lutherans (and surviving Lollards) needed Henrician and Edwardian political shelter to survive. Given time, Mary Tudor would have stamped them out, but she was not given time.

In other words, the survival of a denomination or even an entire religion may depend on whether or not it has political shelter or protection. In the absence of political shelter it will fail and be reduced to a tiny minority; in the presence of active persecution it will eventually be stamped out altogether.

Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :

Trawling through a whole load of counterfactuals is always great fun, but in truth we'll never know whether - if Mary Tudor had lived longer or played her cards right - we might have had a very different outcome. You could say much the same about Edward VI.

Seeing history from the tail-end, as it were, it's easy to overlook the fact that Mary's accession was a genuinely popular event. It didn't finish that way of course. But neither were Edward VI's more extreme reforms popular. People must have been asking themselves "Now what?" when Elizabeth came to power. By any standard she was canny enough to see what a more extreme course would demonstrably lead to, from either direction. Her advisers were also well aware of what might happen along the French lines if pushed - indeed Francis Walsingham was in Paris at the time of the St. Bartholomew's day massacre and very nearly got dragged into it. Is it so unthinkable that most of the population may have thought likewise, whatever their religious sympathies?

It may be a bit of an overstatement to say that reformation histories tend to polarise along confessional lines. I know it looks that way, but I think there are other things going on. Mostly, the traditional way of doing history leads to repeating the victory narratives of the winners, whether catholic or protestant. These were times of great state propaganda, and the winners' narratives will largely reflect that. Both used wild hyperbole.

What I think people like Duffy have done is to follow a general trend of the 20th century and look much more closely at contemporary local records. That needs a lot more legwork as they are dispersed around the country, buried in local archives, unindexed for content. When you do that, the hope is that you can get a better idea of what it all looked like on the ground, and you can then get an idea of how the rhetoric from the top matched up with the reality on the ground.

To be honest, I have also found the most useful way of reconciling the two approaches is looking at other areas of contemporary Tudor history - it's not too difficult to see where the rhetoric comes from and why.

Posted by Grammatica (# 13248) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
But neither were Edward VI's more extreme reforms popular. People must have been asking themselves "Now what?" when Elizabeth came to power. By any standard she was canny enough to see what a more extreme course would demonstrably lead to, from either direction. Her advisers were also well aware of what might happen along the French lines if pushed - indeed Francis Walsingham was in Paris at the time of the St. Bartholomew's day massacre and very nearly got dragged into it. Is it so unthinkable that most of the population may have thought likewise, whatever their religious sympathies?

I go to a lot of meetings involving nonprofits, grantwriters, and public-private partnerships. These days, whatever the topic, or even the field, the one thing everyone at the meeting will say is: "We need a predictable revenue stream and a predictable set of goals/ measures/ outcomes."

They've been bounced around for years now by one new "initiative" after another, one un- or under-funded mandate after another, each one inconsistent with the previous one. Each time there's a new "initiative" announced, they have to change or even reverse their direction and mission. Sometimes (as this year in Florida) funding is awarded with great fanfare for the first year of a start-up project and vetoed for the second.

Organizations are not being given the time they need to build staff, acquire practical expertise, establish a presence. The surest way to make a nonprofit scream at this point is to threaten it with "transformative" leadership.

I think maybe I can understand how people felt at Elizabeth's accession. Whatever it is, don't care, as long as she sticks with it and it isn't too harsh.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

Financial impoverishment because of the building of splendid churches ? Should this actually be the case,one should ask oneself how important are these cultural landmarks which sometimes can be understood as showing the power of the Church.
But the real power of the Church is in its proclamation of the Gospel.

If one thinks that splendid churches simply impoverish the population,making them subjects of the Church,can we not say that the propagation of the Gospel does the same ? There are quite a few people who think that the Christians have too much power in this country anyway (Scotland) and that's not only the Catholics who have power.
Christians are able to influence the school system (say some people),they have an automatic right to places on school boards,about 20% of the schools are directly in Catholic hands.Christians,according to some people, misuse this power to more or less force others to do what they consider to be correct.Some people say that the country would be much better off if the Christians just kept out of sight.

The government of Benito Juarez in Mexico (after whom Benito Mussolini was named) was an extremely anticlerical government which tired to forbid the public acceptance of religion. No religious dress was allowed on the streets.In spite of all this anticlericalism many Mexicans maintained and continue to maintain a genuine attachment to the Catholic Church.

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
If one thinks that splendid churches simply impoverish the population,making them subjects of the Church,can we not say that the propagation of the Gospel does the same ?

Again, I think this is a conflation of two separate issues. The argument goes that building expensive churches and cathedrals consumes money that might have been better spent on addressing poverty. (Mind you, I'm sure plenty of jobs are created by such a major undertaking as building a cathedral.)

How does propagation of the Gospel impoverish people? I'm not sure what you're getting at here...

Posted by MarsmanTJ (# 8689) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
I think maybe I can understand how people felt at Elizabeth's accession. Whatever it is, don't care, as long as she sticks with it and it isn't too harsh.

Well of course. Whether Protestant or Catholic, they were Church of England which means change is a foreign and difficult concept. [Razz]

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by CL:

quote:
Originally posted by tclune:

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
I'm not sure what you mean about the 'obscene wealth ' of the Catholic church.
Ask a Mexican. One of the things that was accomplished after the Mexican Revolution was banning the building of new RC churches in Mexico. The reason was that the Church had impoverished the native population for years building massive edifices. Every tiny town in Mexico has a cathedral to the honor and glory of the Church and the agony of the peasants. "Obscene" is way too kind a term for this foul excess.

--Tom Clune
Horseshit.

Those churches were built for the Glory and worship of God. This argument is just another part of the "Black Legend".

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

'Horseshit' and 'just another part of the "Black Legend" '. Are those are the most convincing rebuttals you have of tclune's argument?

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

Some people - and I am not one of them - would say that preaching the Gospel is just bringing people under the yoke of Church authorities of all types,taking away from people their freedom to do whatever they think best.Evangelists,priests,ministers do this to have power over people.
Some people would say that it is enslavement -impoverishment not merely in a financial way but in a way of making people dependent on the Church and losing the riches of free thought.
This is not my personal way of thinking,however.

Posted by Kaplan Corday (# 16119) on :

At the historical and aesthetic level I have rather a soft spot for cathedrals, but the fact is that there is not one single verse in the NT to justify the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

An other way of looking at this is to say that all places are sacred, for God is present everywhere that a believer calls upon him.
There is an old pre Christian Celtic belief that there are certain 'thin places' where the presence of God is made more manifest than others.

At the time of the Calvinist Reformation here in Scotland when most of the pre Reformation churches were abandoned,not normally destroyed,but just abandoned to the depredations caused by wind,weather and time,it is significant that the population continued to accept that there was something special about those places.If one looks at the heaps of stones which were once the cathedral of St Andrews,the cathedral of Elgin,the Lantern of the North,the great Cistercian Abbey of Melrose,to name but three,you will see there the burial places of the citizens of the post Reformation period.

In the Old Testament we read of the presence of God in the Ark of the Covenant.Most NT Christians see in a special way the presence of God in the Holy Eucharist and in the proclamation of His Living Word.Around these places of the presence of God to his people have grown up church buildings to provide a worthy dwelling place for God amongst men.For the Christian these are the real treasures of churches,rather than their aesthetic appeal,which is certainly not to discount the aesthetic appeal which may either attract some people to the Truth of the Gospel or confirm others in their Faith.That is why I continue to say an attack on churches is an attack on the Proclamation of the Gospel.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

When I remember the small town in which I grew up here in Scotland there were five large churches along the 300 metres length of the main street.
Three separate Church of Scotland charges,stemming from the secessions of the 19th century,plus a very nice and quite large Episcopal church,as well as a Baptist church.
Just off the main street there was a large Catholic church which held six separate services on a Sunday.
I often wonder just how much money was spent in Scotland on the building of separate churches for the Church of Scotland,the Free Church of Scotland,the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland,the United Presbyterian church of Scotland and others which came and went in the wake of disruptions and re-unions.I'm certainly not complaining about it,but it is wrong to castigate only the Catholic church for the building of edifices.If you put all the smaller church buildings whether seen as sacred spaces or not,they still amount to a lot of money spent on church building.

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
I often wonder just how much money was spent in Scotland on the building of separate churches for the Church of Scotland,the Free Church of Scotland,the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland,the United Presbyterian church of Scotland and others which came and went in the wake of disruptions and re-unions.I'm certainly not complaining about it,but it is wrong to castigate only the Catholic church for the building of edifices.If you put all the smaller church buildings whether seen as sacred spaces or not,they still amount to a lot of money spent on church building.

Absolutely, Forthview. I certainly didn't mean to single out the RCC for criticism regarding the money spent on church buildings (construction and maintenance, the latter being an important consideration too), and I'm guessing the same is true for Kaplan Corday.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

SCK we are indeed friends !

Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Forthview:
I often wonder just how much money was spent in Scotland on the building of separate churches for the Church of Scotland,the Free Church of Scotland,the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland,the United Presbyterian church of Scotland and others which came and went in the wake of disruptions and re-unions.

Hehe. A fair amount. Don't envy us ... it's come back to bite us on the bum, as we have been over-supplied with churches ever since. Many of them were never full, even back in the day. Yet every congregation will fight tooth and nail to keep their massive edifice with all of 10 people worshipping in it.

It may interest you to know that the Free Church, when it broke away in the 1843 Disruption, managed to take with it a whole bunch of rather wealthy radicals. Within ten years it had built New College in Edinburgh to train its ministers - a superb facility with cutting-edge scholarship - and this financed purely by subscription.

They were also brilliantly organised and energetic. They developed a kind of 'flatpack' church - a simple design which could be flung up anywhere quickly and cheaply. These are good solid buildings even now, but they really didn't cost that much, especially as the architectural style tended towards the simple and practical, with no stained glass or ornamentation. And they paid for it all themselves, as well as paying for their own ministers and manses, for they had no 'old money' to rely on.

Apart from these wealthy city-dwelling free-thinkers, the Free church congregations also attracted many of the poorer urban workers and rural crofters and farm workers, so for many congregations this was quite a feat. Even now, when the Free and the Established Church have been (mostly) reunited for over eighty years, the former Free Church congregations have a reputation for better giving.

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
'Horseshit' and 'just another part of the "Black Legend" '. Are those are the most convincing rebuttals you have of tclune's argument?

It perhaps is astonishment that in 2013 , people can still argue about the poor , deluded peasant oppressed by the wicked Catholic Church which builds golden churches on their backs
It boggles the mind

Posted by Sober Preacher's Kid (# 12699) on :

You've never been to Quebec, have you?

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
You've never been to Quebec, have you?

A caricature is a caricature

Posted by Sober Preacher's Kid (# 12699) on :

After the Quiet Revolution of the 1960's, Quebecois themselves and a large part of the Quebec media feels that they were oppressed by the Catholic Church and that the Church built magnificent churches while selling out their interests.

As a Protestant, I have no dog in that race.

Posted by Forthview (# 12376) on :

When faith is lost people see things differently.
In the Calvinist Western Isles of Scotland there are a number of people who feel that they are oppressed by the Free Church as places of entertainment and relaxation are generally closed.Golf courses and swimming pools are shut,cinemas are closed,shops are closed.Children's playparks have the swings tied up.

For those who take the Lord's Day seriously this is as it should be,but for those who think otherwise, they describe themselves as being oppressed by the heavy hand of the Church (protestant)It's possibly the same in Quebec,say I who have never been there.

Posted by k-mann (# 8490) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
I'd like to hear more about this period and the Cluniac reforms, because they present one half of a historical problem. How was it that the Church was able to survive this mess, but not the mess of the Renaissance papacy? (…) The question we might ask would be: Why was it that the Church at these earlier periods had been resilient enough to reform itself? And why was the Church of the sixteenth century able to reform itself only after the shock of the Reformation? I like Jengie Jon's answer, but I wonder what other factors might have played a role.

Who says she didn’t? The counter-reformation, and especially the council of Trent, dealt with a bucketload of corruption.

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
At the historical and aesthetic level I have rather a soft spot for cathedrals, but the fact is that there is not one single verse in the NT to justify the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.

Not one? And what, exactly, do you mean by that? Are there any texts in the New Testament that prohibits “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices”? If not, we shouldn’t be too eager to criticise this. It is also important to note that the Church which canonized Scripture happened to hold on to “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.” The earliest Christian synagogues in Jerusalem, for instance, were oriented towards the point where we now find the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, instead of the Temple. These Christians sure held fast to “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.” Scripture didn’t fall down from the sky, and it didn’t pop out of a historical vacuum. It came to be within the Church, and its canonization also happened within the Church. And in both cases we have historical evidence to suggest that the Church held on to “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.”

Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :

quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
...there is not one single verse in the NT to justify the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.
Not one? And what, exactly, do you mean by that? Are there any texts in the New Testament that prohibits “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices”?

I don't know if there's any text that explicitly prohibits the 'holy ground' concept, but ISTM the whole tenor of the New Testament is that we worship God by following his ways in our whole life, rather than by attending certain events / ceremonies at particular places.

There are some specific references, though - what comes to my mind is Jesus talking to the Samaritan woman, effectively saying 'there is no specific 'holy place' to go and praise God, and the fact that a few churches are noted as meeting in people's homes.

And there's the simple fact that the pre-Constantine church is not recorded as having built any dedicated 'places of worship' (and we have no archaeological evidence of such, AFAIK). Yes, the early Christians faced much persecution but it wasn't constant, AIUI, and I'd have thought they had enough time and resources to at least build something if they wanted to.

Posted by Justinian (# 5357) on :

quote:
Originally posted by SeraphimSarov:
Those churches were built for the Glory and worship of God.

Because it was God and not the priest that stood in front of the people collecting their adulation. It was God and not the priests that had their lifestyles funded. And you wonder why people are cynical that things were done for the greater glory of God rather than the greater glory of the Church. (The RCC is, by the way, certainly not the only offender. Golden statues of a holy man who spent time as a beggar and is considered in another religion an avatar of Vishnu dealing with suffering of the poor are just as much of a problem. And don't get me started on Patriarch Kiril.)

Posted by k-mann (# 8490) on :

quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:

quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
...there is not one single verse in the NT to justify the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices.
Not one? And what, exactly, do you mean by that? Are there any texts in the New Testament that prohibits “the concepts of holy ground, sacred sites, consecrated space or edifying edifices”?

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
I don't know if there's any text that explicitly prohibits the 'holy ground' concept, but ISTM the whole tenor of the New Testament is that we worship God by following his ways in our whole life, rather than by attending certain events / ceremonies at particular places.

But unless you want to be a Gnostic, any gathering would have to happen at a particular place. The Eucharist is physical, baptism is physical.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
There are some specific references, though - what comes to my mind is Jesus talking to the Samaritan woman, effectively saying 'there is no specific 'holy place' to go and praise God, and the fact that a few churches are noted as meeting in people's homes.

What Christ said to the Samaritan woman was that there wasn’t to be but one place to worship God – either the Temple in Jerusalem where the Jews praised and sacrificed to God or Mount Gerizim, where the Samaritans praised and sacrificed to God. He didn’t, however, say that there were no such places. As to your point about Church meetings in people’s homes: All the evidence we have, especially archeological, suggests that this was large buildings of rich Christians, converted for formal Christian worship, and not just someone meeting in their loving room. We have no historical or archaeological evidence of that, and it seems anachronistic. These buildings were the forerunners of the Basilica.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
And there's the simple fact that the pre-Constantine church is not recorded as having built any dedicated 'places of worship' (and we have no archaeological evidence of such, AFAIK).

I’m sorry, but that is just wrong. We have many instances of formal Christian buldings before 318.

quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Yes, the early Christians faced much persecution but it wasn't constant, AIUI, and I'd have thought they had enough time and resources to at least build something if they wanted to.

And we have ample evidence that they did – that they converted buildings and set them aside for formal worship. A few articles on this: Rainer Riesner, “What does archaeology teach us about early house churches?” (TTK* 78:3-4, 2007), pp.159-185; Karl Olav Sandnes, “Ekklēsia at Corinth: Between Private and Public” (TTK 78:3-4, 2007), pp.248-265.

My point, however, was a more methodological one: The Church from whom we have received the New Testament did not abolish, but instead held tightly onto the belief that there is a place for holy grounds, sacred sites, consecrated spaces or edifying edifices.

* TTK = Tidsskrift for teologi og kirke, a Norwegian peer reviewde Journal of theology. Translated, the title means something like Journal for Theology and Church.

Posted by Honest Ron Bacardi (# 38) on :

The best preserved early church is usually reckoned to be that at Dura-Europos and dates from 235AD, well before the Battle of Milvian Bridge, let alone the formalising of Christianity as state religion.

Posted by SeraphimSarov (# 4335) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Justinian:

quote:
Originally posted by SeraphimSarov:
Those churches were built for the Glory and worship of God.
Because it was God and not the priest that stood in front of the people collecting their adulation. It was God and not the priests that had their lifestyles funded. And you wonder why people are cynical that things were done for the greater glory of God rather than the greater glory of the Church. (The RCC is, by the way, certainly not the only offender. Golden statues of a holy man who spent time as a beggar and is considered in another religion an avatar of Vishnu dealing with suffering of the poor are just as much of a problem. And don't get me started on Patriarch Kiril.)

No. Because the Sacrifice of the Mass was celebrated in those churches and God was glorified by that
I'll give you , Kyril however

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