We can only blame ourselves for the Reformation?

[PiousTemplar]

I’m not good at making long questions, so I’ll keep it brief.

At the time of the reformation, the Church was in crisis. Full of corruption, and the Pope’s at the time were hardly the best role models. There were 3 social classes of the time (in France anyway): Nobles, Clergy, and the Commoners. The Nobles and high-ranking Clergy (Bishops, Cardinals, Abbots) were immensely rich, and paid no taxes, while the commoners (which included parish priests, religious brothers and sisters) were poor and had to pay the full weight of government taxation. With society and the Church like this, was it not obvious there would soon be a revolt in the Church? This was probably a catalyst for the unjust and evil anti-clerical executions in France, I think.

Think about it, it took the protestant revolt to convince the Church that it was in need of reform, and can we be certain that if the reformation had not of happened, would the Council of Trent have been started anyway? Or would some suggest that the reformation helped the Church notice it’s dire need of reform?

Was it our fault?

 

[Bob_Crowley]

I’m not good at making long questions, so I’ll keep it brief.

At the time of the reformation, the Church was in crisis. Full of corruption, and the Pope’s at the time were hardly the best role models. There were 3 social classes of the time (in France anyway): Nobles, Clergy, and the Commoners. The Nobles and high-ranking Clergy (Bishops, Cardinals, Abbots) were immensely rich, and paid no taxes, while the commoners (which included parish priests, religious brothers and sisters) were poor and had to pay the full weight of government taxation. With society and the Church like this, was it not obvious there would soon be a revolt in the Church? This was probably a catalyst for the unjust and evil anti-clerical executions in France, I think.

Think about it, it took the protestant revolt to convince the Church that it was in need of reform, and can we be certain that if the reformation had not of happened, would the Council of Trent have been started anyway? Or would some suggest that the reformation helped the Church notice it’s dire need of reform?

Was it our fault?

To some extent it was the Church’s fault. There had been calls for reform long before Luther.

However there were other factors. A lot of the nobility were not rich and were losing ground to the rising mercantile class. Thus they had selfish reasons to want to grab church wealth and lands for themselves. The Reformation gave them the excuse they needed. Never underestimate mere human culpability and it’s bedfellow, politics.

The printing press had recently been invented. This meant that ideas, revolutionary and otherwise, could now be circulated more widely. If you want a comparison today, look no further than the internet. Only 20 years ago, debating topics with other people on the other side of the world was reserved for very few.

The Renaissance had led to both a new spirit of enquiry and artistic licence, particularly in Italy, but also in other parts of Europe. And a lot of it was politically motivated.

But … the Church could have reformed itself from within, but did not.

There were two positive developments which came from the Reformation. The first was that it hastened the development of democracy. The US for example, in its Constitution, was mindful of the violence which had torn Europe apart for a century not so long before. And the founding fathers did what they could to ensure that the key ingredient would be human freedom.

Secondly it allowed, in due course, critical analysis of the Bible, which the Church continued to resist long after Protestants had begun to do so. Nowadays of course, the Church is as active in this as any other outfit.

Unfortunately humans don’t seem to be able to make profound changes to their own thinking without immense violence - Revolutions and Reformations are noted for their cruelty and division. But they don’t happen in a vacuum. There’s always a reason.

 

[PiousTemplar]

Thanks for the answer.

I am still confused on why the higher clergy was very rich back then. It seems like many of them acted like it was a money making career. Aren’t Catholics supposed to preach against materialism?

 

[puzzleannie]

who is “we”? I was not alive in the 16th century

The reform in the Catholic Church was already well underway when Calvin and Luther left, so by itself the presence of abuse is not the reason for the Protestant break-away events of the Reformation.

 

[PiousTemplar]

who is “we”? I was not alive in the 16th century

The reform in the Catholic Church was already well underway when Calvin and Luther left, so by itself the presence of abuse is not the reason for the Protestant break-away events of the Reformation.

‘We’ as in ‘Us’ Catholics. We are the same faith today as we were back then.

How do you know that there was reform happening in the Church before Luther and Calvin? Do you have a source to substantiate this claim?

I’m getting there, but I still have concerning doubts every now and then.

 

[TimothyH]

There was also the little issue of Islamic armies from the Ottomon Empire and the imminent fall of Europe to Islam.

The Kingdom of Bosnia fell if 1463. Hungary was about to be taken over. Islamic armies advanced far enough into Europe that they had actually laid siege to the city of Vienna in Austria. It wasn’t unitl the Battle of Malta in 1565, where 500 Knights of Malta of the Catholic Church and a handful of Malteese were able to stop the Ottomon Empires advance. All this was taking place just as Luther was starting to cause trouble; he was excommunicated in 1522.

Now if you are the Pope, are you going to focus on the imminent fall of Europe to Islam or are you going to focus on some renegade heretic monk in Germany. It’s easy for us to criticize the Popes, social structure, etc but hindsight is 20/20 and there were bigger fish to fry in terms of wold geo-politics and the salvation of an entire continent.

And untold billions of people worldwide being led away from the fullness of truth, away from the sacraments, away from God’s mercy in the sacrament of Pennance and away from the Eucharist cannot cannot be called reform. The fruit of the reformation is unbridled sexual passion and it’s result, millions of butchered infants due directly to Protestantism’s embrace of contraception.

Reform my foot.

-Tim-

 

[PiousTemplar]

There was also the little issue of Islamic armies from the Ottomon Empire and the imminent fall of Europe to Islam.

The Kingdom of Bosnia fell if 1463. Hungary was about to be taken over. Islamic armies advanced far enough into Europe that they had actually laid siege to the city of Vienna in Austria. It wasn’t unitl the Battle of Malta in 1565, where 500 Knights of Malta of the Catholic Church and a handful of Malteese were able to stop the Ottomon Empires advance. All this was taking place just as Luther was starting to cause trouble; he was excommunicated in 1522.

Now if you are the Pope, are you going to focus on the imminent fall of Europe to Islam or are you going to focus on some renegade heretic monk in Germany. It’s easy for us to criticize the Popes, social structure, etc but hindsight is 20/20 and there were bigger fish to fry in terms of wold geo-politics and the salvation of an entire continent.

-Tim-

Oh, very informative thank you.
I accept the fact that the Church was more focused on Eastern Europe, but the social structure of Clergy having enormous benefits and riches was not a ‘new’ ideal. The social structure had been like this for many centuries. I’m simply concerned as to why they took so long to review and change it…

 

[Bob_Crowley]

Thanks for the answer.

I am still confused on why the higher clergy was very rich back then. It seems like many of them acted like it was a money making career. Aren’t Catholics supposed to preach against materialism?

The Church has always been pragmatic. One of the reasons that the higher clergy were rich was simply that they were drawn from the nobility in the first place. A bishop in those days had to be able to ensure his diocese was financially independent, and the only people who had that sort of wealth in medieval times were those of noble birth.

Hence most bishops were drawn from the nobility. They had wealth to start with, and with the revenues from church lands, sometimes became even richer.

I once heard a sermon by my old Protestant pastor on Thomas a Becket. With his usual humour, the old pastor quoted that he and Henry (the future king) “both lived in the fast lane. If Henry and Thomas came to visit, you locked your wine in the cellar, and hid the key. So when Henry later needed a bishop, then who better than his friend Thomas? But Thomas read the Bible - I mean that’s always a good thing to do if you’re going to be a bishop… etc.”

Anyway he stated that it was the tradition in those days for a new bishop to give away some of their wealth to the poor. Some didn’t have much wealth to give, but Thomas had a lot to give. He quoted Thomas standing on the steps of the Cathedral and handing out money to the poor, looking up to heaven, and saying “Lord, only You know how ***easy ***this is…”

The point is that Thomas was drawn from nobility. Most of the bishops were, because they had the money in the first place, to support the cathedral, the religious orders, the hospices, and the demands of Rome.

 

[puzzleannie]

‘We’ as in ‘Us’ Catholics. We are the same faith today as we were back then.

How do you know that there was reform happening in the Church before Luther and Calvin? Do you have a source to substantiate this claim?

I’m getting there, but I still have concerning doubts every now and then.

uh yeah I was a historian before this current retirement job. I have also studied church history as an essential part of world and European history

the question as you pose it makes no sense and is anachronistic.

If you mean to ask, “Where the abuses within the Catholic Church in the 16th century to blame for the Protestant Reformation?” then say so.