El título de este episodio es de Papas y Príncipes.En lo que respecta a la Iglesia de Occidente, el siglo XIV se abrió con una nota que aparentaba ser fuerte. A principios del año 1300, el papa Bonifacio VIII proclamó un Año de Jubileo, un nuevo acontecimiento en el calendario de la Iglesia. El decreto del Papa anunciaba el perdón general de todos los pecados para todos los que visitaran las iglesias de San Pedro y San Pablo de Roma durante los 10 siguientes meses. Grandes multitudes acudieron a la ciudad.Bonifacio VIII era interesante. Le gustaba la ceremonia ostentosa y pretenciosa. Aparecía regularmente en público vestido con ropajes reales, o mejor aún, imperiales, anunciando: "Soy el César. Soy emperador". Su corona papal tenía 48 rubíes, 72 zafiros, 45 esmeraldas y 66 grandes perlas. Se permitía el lujo de ser generoso con el perdón. En la iglesia de San Pablo, los peregrinos a Roma mantenían a los sacerdotes ocupados noche y día recogiendo y contando las interminables ofrendas.Para Bonifacio, mirando al futuro los años parecían brillantes.  El Vaticano había mantenido un poder religioso y político sin rivales durante 2 siglos y no había nada en el horizonte que anunciara un cambio. El Papa tenía ante sí el brillante ejemplo de Inocencio III, que cien años antes había dominado a emperadores y reyes. Bonifacio supuso que seguiría en la misma línea.Pero sólo 3 años después, Bonifacio murió a consecuencia del mayor insulto personal jamás infligido a un Papa. Incluso mientras los celebrantes del Jubileo se regocijaban, había fuerzas trabajando para acabar con la supremacía de la soberanía papal medieval.No hace falta estudiar mucho la historia para darse cuenta de que a menudo se están produciendo grandes cambios bajo la superficie, mucho antes de que la gente sea consciente de ellos. El siglo XIV fue una época así. Los papas de Roma continuaron "como si nada" mientras nuevas ideas y fuerzas radicales alteraban la Fe.  La idea de la Cristiandad, un Imperio cristiano que unificó Europa del siglo VI al XIV, se estaba deteriorando rápidamente.La llamada Cristiandad había sido útil para crear la Europa de los siglos VII y VIII. Pero su importancia se desvaneció en los siglos XII y XIII. El Papa Inocencio III había demostrado que la soberanía papal era eficaz para reunir a los príncipes en una cruzada o para defender a la Iglesia contra los herejes. Pero en los siglos XIV y XV se produjo un marcado declive del poder y el prestigio papal.Como estamos acostumbrados a pensar en el mundo político, como un conjunto de naciones-estado, nos cuesta hacernos a la idea de que son un fenómeno bastante reciente. Durante la mayor parte de la historia, la gente vivía regionalmente; sus vidas y pensamientos estaban limitados por las fronteras de su condado o aldea. Durante siglos, Galos y Godos se definieron a sí mismos por su tribu. Nunca se les ocurrió llamarse Franceses o Alemanes. Tales etiquetas nacionales no entran en juego hasta más tarde, cuando Europa salió de la Edad Media hacia lo que llamamos el Mundo Moderno. Un mundo, por cierto, marcado como moderno precisamente por esta nueva forma de identificarnos.En el siglo XIV, la gente empezaba a acostumbrarse a la idea de que eran ingleses o franceses. Esto fue posible porque, por primera vez, empezaron a pensar en el estado político en términos independientes de su afiliación religiosa.Europa se alejaba, muy lentamente, de su pasado feudal. La tierra era menos importante, ya que el dinero en efectivo se convirtió en el nuevo énfasis. Los dirigentes políticos se dieron cuenta de que necesitaban fuentes de ingresos cada vez mayores, lo que significaba impuestos.Eduardo I de Inglaterra y Felipe el Hermoso de Francia estaban en conflicto, como había sido habitual durante siglos. Para financiar sus cada vez más costosas campañas de expansión territorial, decidieron exigir impuestos al clero. Pero los papas habían mantenido durante mucho tiempo que la Iglesia estaba exenta de tales impuestos, sobre todo si el dinero recaudado se iba a utilizar para que la sangre de otro saliera de su cuerpo a gran velocidad.En 1296, el papa Bonifacio VIII promulgó un decreto en el que amenazaba con la excomunión a cualquier gobernante que impusiera impuestos al clero y a cualquier miembro del clero que pagara sin el consentimiento del Papa. Pero Eduardo y Felipe pertenecían al nuevo tipo de monarca que avanzaba hacia los numerosos tronos de Europa. No les impresionaban las amenazas de Roma. Eduardo advirtió que, si la Iglesia no pagaba, se le retiraría la protección de la Corona y se le confiscarían sus propiedades en lugar de los impuestos. La respuesta de Felipe fue bloquear la exportación de oro, plata y joyas procedentes de Francia, privando a Roma de una importante fuente de ingresos procedentes de sus recaudaciones.El Papa Bonifacio dio marcha atrás, protestando por haber sido malinterpretado. Estaba seguro de que no había querido cortar las contribuciones para la defensa del reino en tiempos de necesidad. Fue una clara victoria para ambos reyes.Sin embargo, su victoria sobre el poder papal aún tenía camino por recorrer. Reforzado por el éxito del Jubileo, El Papa Bonifacio asumió que la reverencia que se le profesaba en todos los rincones de Europa se extendía también a la esfera civil. Mandó añadir otro ornamento de oro a su corona, que significaba su poder temporal. Luego, persiguió al rey Felipe de Francia, tratando de debilitar su derecho de gobernar. Felipe respondió desafiando al Papa a que mostrara dónde había dado Jesús a la Iglesia autoridad temporal.En el año 1301, Felipe encarceló a un obispo francés acusado de traición. Bonifacio ordenó su liberación y anuló su anterior concesión sobre los impuestos de las tierras de la Iglesia. Al año siguiente, Felipe convocó a la nobleza, el clero y otros dirigentes de Francia y formó una especie de parlamento de Francia. Obtuvo entonces su apoyo unánime en su disputa con el Papa. Uno de los nuevos ministros civiles expresó así la elección que debían hacer: "La espada de mi señor es de acero; la del Papa, de palabras".Varios meses después, Bonifacio emitió la afirmación más extrema del poder papal en la historia de la Iglesia; la Bula papal conocida como Unam Sanctum = El Único Santo, la más famosa de todas las bulas de la Edad Media, que afirmaba la autoridad del Papa sobre todas las demás autoridades. Su significado era inconfundible. Declaró: "Es del todo necesario que todo ser humano esté sometido al Pontífice Romano".La respuesta de Felipe al Unam Sanctum no fue menos drástica. Solicitó la destitución de Bonifacio alegando que su elección había sido ilegal. Para llevar a cabo este plan, Felipe recurrió a Guillermo de Nogaret, el abogado que le ayudó a establecer las bases políticas de Francia.Nogaret era también un maestro en la presentación de las llamadas "pruebas".  Había conseguido testimonios para apoyar su caso por medios tan dudosos como desnudar a un testigo, untarlo de miel y colgarlo cerca de una colmena. Su caso contra Bonifacio iba mucho más allá de la acusación de que su elección era ilegítima. Nogaret afirmó que el Papa era culpable de herejía, simonía y grave inmoralidad. Autorizado por una asamblea francesa de clérigos y nobles, se apresuró a viajar a Italia para traer al Papa a Francia y juzgarlo ante un concilio eclesiástico.Bonifacio tenía 86 años y había abandonado Roma para pasar el verano. Se alojaba en su ciudad natal cuando Nogaret llegó con tropas. Irrumpieron en la habitación de Bonifacio, maltratándolo violentamente. Esperaron unos días a que se recuperara y se dispusieron a regresar a Francia. Pero los habitantes de la ciudad descubrieron lo que ocurría y rescataron al Papa. Murió unas semanas después, débil y humillado.Este trágico asunto se convierte en una especie de marcador del hecho de que los gobernantes de Europa ya no tolerarían la interferencia papal en lo que consideraban asuntos políticos. El problema era que, después de tantos siglos de Cristiandad, resultaba difícil determinar dónde terminaba la política y dónde empezaban los asuntos de la Iglesia. Lo que estaba claro era que el poder de un rey dentro de su propio país era ahora un hecho.Al mismo tiempo, el abuso de un Papa, aunque fuera impopular, se resentía profundamente. A pesar de su declaración del Jubileo, Bonifacio no era un líder querido. Había sido objetivo de muchas críticas. Para que te hagas una idea de lo bajo que había caído la estima de Bonifacio, Dante, autor de La Divina Comedia, le reservó un lugar en el infierno. Aun así, el Papa era el Vicario de Cristo. Pocas personas de aquella época podían concebir el Cristianismo sin el Papa y la jerarquía eclesiástica que presidía.Incluso cuando no existía un vocabulario político para ello, la gente de principios del siglo XIV empezó a distinguir entre la autoridad secular y la religiosa y a reconocer los derechos de cada una en su propio lugar.Cuando el sucesor de Bonifacio murió tras un breve reinado, el audaz golpe de Felipe pareció dar sus frutos. En el año 1305, el Colegio de Cardenales eligió a un Francés, el Arzobispo de Burdeos, como Papa Clemente V. Clemente nunca puso un pie en Roma, prefiriendo permanecer más cerca de casa, donde siempre estaba accesible para cumplir las órdenes reales.La elección de Clemente marcó el inicio de un periodo de 72 años llamado "La Cautividad Babilónica del Papado", en honor al exilio judío de unos 2000 años antes. Después de Clemente, seis papas, todos franceses, gobernaron desde la ciudad francesa de Aviñón y no en Roma.Este traslado de los Papas a Francia era algo más que una cuestión geográfica. En el pensamiento de los europeos, la Ciudad Eterna de Roma representaba no sólo la idea de la Sucesión Apostólica de la Iglesia fundada por San Pedro, sino también del Imperio Romano. ¿Aviñón estaba rodeada por qué? El Reino de Francia. La Iglesia era un mero instrumento en manos de una nación, la francesa, sedienta de poder.Esto se resintió amargamente en Alemania. En el año 1324, el Emperador Luis el Bávaro actuó contra el Papa Francés Juan XXII apelando a un concilio general. Entre los eruditos que apoyaban tal medida estaba Marsilio de Padua, que había huido de la Universidad de París. En 1326, Marsilio y su colega Juan de Jandún presentaron a Luis una obra titulada Defensor de la paz. En ella se cuestionaba toda la estructura papal de la Iglesia y se abogaba por un gobierno democrático. Defensor de la Paz afirmaba que la Iglesia era la comunidad de todos los creyentes y que el sacerdocio no era superior a los laicos. Ni los papas, ni los obispos, ni los sacerdotes tenían ninguna función especial; sólo servían como agentes de la comunidad de creyentes.En esta visión revolucionaria de la Iglesia, el Papa se convertía en un cargo ejecutivo del consejo eclesiástico, que eran simplemente ancianos espirituales. El Papa estaba subordinado a la autoridad del Consejo. Esta nueva forma de gobierno de la Iglesia se llamó Conciliarismo. Pronto pasaría de la teoría a la práctica.Pero eso -como solemos decir- es tema para otro podcast._________________Deseo dedicar un momento al final de este episodio para dar las gracias una vez más a todos los que se han tomado la molestia de hacernos una reseña en iTunes. Al ser el mayor portal de podcasts, las opiniones allí ayudan mucho a promocionar CS.Y gracias a quienes han hecho donaciones a CS recientemente. Cada donación se utiliza para mantener el podcast en funcionamiento.    

Este episodio de CS se titula: "Aquí No Hay Bobos".Los Franciscanos tenían una respuesta al Escolástico Dominico que vimos en el episodio anterior. De hecho, el equivalente Franciscano de Aquino vivió en la misma época. Se llamaba Juan Buenaventura.Nacido en Toscana en 1221 como Juan Fidanza, pasó a ser conocido como Buenaventura cuando se recuperó milagrosamente de una grave enfermedad siendo un niño de cuatro años. Al recobrar la salud, su madre anunció: "Buenaventura = Buena fortuna" y el nombre se le quedó grabado.Mientras que Aquino era predominantemente un teólogo, Buenaventura era a la vez teólogo y un consumado administrador en los asuntos de los Franciscanos. Donde Tomás era preciso pero seco, Juan era un místico dado a la gran elocuencia. Si Aquino era prosa, Buenaventura era poesía.Buenaventura se unió a los Franciscanos e inmediatamente destacó en sus estudios. Pasó 3 años en París estudiando con el escolástico Alejandro de Hales. Alejandro hizo un gran cumplido a su alumno cuando dijo que en Buenaventura "Adán parece no haber pecado".Terminados sus estudios en París, se quedó a enseñar, ocupando el puesto de Juan de Parma cuando éste asumió la dirección de los Franciscanos. Sólo tenía 26 años. A esa edad, cualquiera se habría visto sobrepasado, pues Buenaventura se convirtió en el líder de los Franciscanos cuando éstos estaban siendo divididos por la fractura de la que hablamos en un episodio anterior. Adoptó una posición intermedia entre las dos partes y fue capaz de negociar una paz incómoda. Fue una tarea brutalmente dura, pero Buenaventura la llevó a cabo con aplomo y se ganó el título de 2º fundador de la orden.Durante su mandato al frente de los Franciscanos, se puso en cuestión toda la idea de la vida mendicante. Escribió un tratado que acalló la oposición y reforzó el apoyo a los Mendicantes.Bajo la dirección del primer Consejo General Franciscano de Narbona en 1260, escribió la Leyenda de Francisco, el relato Franciscano autorizado sobre el fundador de la Orden.En 1273 fue nombrado cardenal de Albano (Italia). Murió en Lyon mientras asistía a un concilio eclesiástico en 1274. El Papa le aplicó la extrema unción y a su funeral asistieron dignatarios de todo el mundo Cristiano. Fue declarado "Doctor de la Iglesia" en 1587, uno de los más altos honores que puede conceder la Iglesia Romana.Dante, feroz crítico de la religión fingida, concedió a Buenaventura un gran honor al situarlo junto a Tomás de Aquino.Ambos serán considerados siempre por los estudiosos de la historia uno al lado del otro. Un historiador de la teología medieval los llama las estrellas iluminadoras en el horizonte del siglo XIII. Aquino tenía la mente más aguda, pero Buenaventura el corazón más cálido. Quizá por eso cada uno se unió a sus respectivas órdenes: Tomás a los Dominicos y Juan a los Franciscanos.Buenaventura gozó de gran popularidad como predicador. Al ser poeta, sus sermones eran mucho más elocuentes que los de sus compañeros.Cuando Buenaventura escribió, al igual que Aquino, se dedicó a la teología y contribuyó en gran medida a la depuración del pensamiento de la época. Para dar una idea del tipo de cosas con las que luchaban los Escolásticos, he aquí algunos de los temas en los que intervino Buenaventura. . . .La Trinidad, la creación, el pecado, la Encarnación, la gracia, el Espíritu Santo, los sacramentos y el Más Allá. Una vez tratados estos temas básicos, se ocupó de toda una serie de otros temas más populares de discutir. Cosas como. . .- ¿Podría Dios haber hecho un mundo mejor?- ¿Podría haberlo hecho antes de lo que lo hizo?- ¿Puede un ángel estar en varios lugares al mismo tiempo?- ¿Pueden varios ángeles estar al mismo tiempo en el mismo lugar?- En el momento de su creación, ¿Lucifer era corrupto?o ¿Pertenecía al orden de los ángeles?- ¿Existe una jerarquía entre los ángeles caídos?- ¿Tienen los demonios conocimiento previo de los acontecimientos contingentes?Buenaventura discutió si hubo o no relaciones sexuales antes de la Caída, si antes de la Caída el hombre y la mujer eran iguales o no, si Adán o Eva pecaron más gravemente al comer el fruto prohibido.Con cosas tan pesadas e importantes, no es de extrañar que estos tipos pasaran buena parte de su tiempo sentados en un escritorio, estudiando.Buenaventura estaba de acuerdo con Aquino en negar que María fuera concebida inmaculadamente y estuviera libre del pecado original. Discrepó con su colega Franciscano, Duns Escoto, en la cuestión de la transubstanciación. Aunque Escoto discrepaba de Aquino sobre en qué se convertían exactamente el pan y el vino, aceptaba la idea de QUE se convertían en algo MÁS que mero pan y vino, mientras que Buenaventura mantenía la naturaleza simbólica de los elementos de la Comunión.Aunque Buenaventura era una mente brillante, no es por su teología por lo que es conocido. Es difícil serlo cuando vives en la misma época que Tomás de Aquino. Es más conocido como místico y autor de la Vida de San Francisco.Mientras que la Summa de Aquino se convirtió en el libro de texto teológico de la Iglesia Romana, fueron los escritos devocionales de Buenaventura los que agitaron los corazones de miles de sacerdotes comunes para que buscaran a Dios por la gracia y a través de Su Palabra.______________________________________________________________________________Esto nos lleva a otro Franciscano y al último de los Escolásticos que consideraremos, Juan Duns [hecho] Escoto.Permíteme comenzar diciendo que los Escotistas, los seguidores de Duns Escoto, y los Tomistas, que seguían a Aquino, forman las 2 grandes escuelas teológicas de la Edad Media. La batalla entre ellas fue feroz; a veces violenta.Debo decir que, al repasar la obra de Escoto, me resulta difícil comprender su pensamiento. Como sólo tengo una inteligencia media, la mayor parte de su obra me sobrepasa. Escoto era un verdadero cerebrito y cuando le leo, me pierdo. Intentaré resumir su obra más adelante, pero antes echemos un vistazo a su vida. Podemos abarcarla rápidamente, porque, bueno, no sabemos casi nada de él.Nació como "John Duns [hecho]"; en Escocia; de ahí el apodo latino de "Escoto" por el que es más conocido. Escoto se hizo sacerdote y se unió a los Franciscanos. La mayor parte de su carrera la pasó dando clases en Oxford. Finalmente enseñó en París y Colonia, donde murió en 1308. Un monumento a Escoto en la iglesia de los Franciscanos de Colonia lleva esta inscripción:-Escocia me dio a luz, Inglaterra me amamantó, Galia me educó, Colonia guarda mis cenizas.Entre las historias que se cuentan de Duns Escoto hay una que da más luz sobre sus pensamientos que capítulos enteros de sus complejos discursos escritos.Escoto conversó con un granjero inglés sobre el tema de la religión. La conversación giró en torno a la predestinación.  El granjero, que estaba sembrando su campo, dijo a Escoto: "¿Por qué me hablas? Si Dios sabe de antemano que me salvaré, me salvaré tanto si hago el bien como si hago el mal".Escoto replicó "Pues bien, si Dios ha sabido de antemano que el grano de tu bolsa crecerá en esta tierra, crecerá tanto si siembras como si retienes tu mano. Más vale que te ahorres el trabajo que te cuesta".La mente de Escoto era más crítica que constructiva. Tendía a desmenuzar los pensamientos y conclusiones de los demás más que a desarrollar o declarar sus propias posiciones. Su obra parece reaccionaria, aunque sólo utilizaba el método dialéctico de moda entre los escolásticos.Recordarás que el gran empeño de los escolásticos era vincular la fe y la razón; demostrar que la fe no era irracional, sino super-racional. Pretendían demostrar que el intelecto era una herramienta para informar y fortalecer la fe, no para debilitarla.A Escoto se le considera el último de los Escolásticos porque su obra debilitó su empeño. Utilizando la metodología cuestionadora de la dialéctica, atacó, no la suficiencia de la fe como algunos escolásticos, sino la suficiencia de la razón como medio para llegar al conocimiento. Sometió las proposiciones escolásticas a un intenso escrutinio. Mostró cómo varias de las proposiciones teológicas de la Iglesia eran difíciles de sostener por la razón, y sin embargo la Iglesia decía que eran verdaderas. Así pues, el problema debía estar en la razón, no en el dogma de la Iglesia. Algunas cosas debían aceptarse, decía, por la fe.La habilidad de Escoto para plantear preguntas que acorralaban a la gente en rincones lógicos le acumulo partidarios y enemigos. A veces, sus pensamientos eran tan elaborados; sus escritos, tan confusos, que hoy nos referimos en ingles a una persona mentalmente desorganizada u confundida como un “dunce” o "bobo" en español, palabra derivada del nombre de Duns Escoto en ingles.Escoto dedicó gran parte de su tiempo al tema de la voluntad. Es su trabajo sobre ella, el que enmarcó la base filosófica de los Reformadores y sus puntos de vista sobre la Soberanía y la Elección de Dios.Escoto fue el primer teólogo Católico importante que apoyó la doctrina de la Inmaculada Concepción de la Virgen María. Según ésta, la madre de Jesús, aunque nacida de padres humanos, fue concebida en santidad, sin la mancha del pecado original. Esta idea había sido expuesta un siglo antes en Francia, donde inmediatamente suscitó controversia. Escoto defendió este punto de vista en un debate público en París, empleando doscientas líneas de argumentación en su apoyo y ganándose a la universidad para su bando. Aunque Aquino la rechazó, la opinión de Escoto se impuso. En diciembre de 1854, el Papa Pío IX, Franciscano, declaró que la doctrina de la Inmaculada Concepción era un hecho divinamente revelado y un dogma Católico oficial.La reputación de Aquino en filosofía y teología ha eclipsado la de Escoto, aunque éste influyó en un amplio abanico de pensadores posteriores, como el filósofo protestante alemán del siglo XVIII Leibniz y el teólogo Católico francés del siglo XX Teilhard de Chardin. El existencialismo del siglo XX resucitó el énfasis de Escoto en la voluntad por encima de la razón.Si asistes a una clase de filosofía en la universidad hoy en día, lo más probable es que te digan que la fe y la razón son cosas totalmente separadas. La razón, se postula, se basa en la evidencia y en la facultad de la mente. La fe está divorciada tanto de la razón como de la evidencia, y la razón siempre triunfa sobre la fe. Se trata de un giro completo con respecto a los Escolásticos, a quienes pueden atribuirse algunos de los momentos más elevados de la larga historia del análisis filosófico. Para ellos, la fe era lo primero, y la razón una herramienta que ayudaba a completar y reforzar la fe.Duns Escoto comenzó a alejarse de eso mostrando lo poco fiable que podía ser la razón. Su objetivo era recordar a los Escolásticos que, al hacer hincapié en la razón, habían descuidado la primacía de la Fe. Pero en el divorcio que postuló entre fe y razón, lo que ocurrió fue que pensadores posteriores corrieron con la razón como separada y superior a la fe. Si Duns Escoto apareciera hoy en una conferencia de filosofía universitaria, lloraría porque sus ideas han sido tan poco desarrolladas. Y aniquilaría el pensamiento deficiente del profesor laico.

Este Episodio #58 de CS se titula - Negocios de Monjes Parte 1 y es el primero de varios episodios en los que echaremos un vistazo a los movimientos monásticos en la Historia de la Iglesia.Me doy cuenta de que esto puede no sonar muy emocionante para algunos. La perspectiva de profundizar en esta parte de la historia tampoco me interesaba mucho, hasta que me di cuenta de lo rica que es. Verás, al ser un poco fan de la obra de J. Edwin Orr, me encanta la historia del avivamiento. Pues bien, resulta que cada nuevo movimiento monástico era a menudo un nuevo movimiento del Espíritu de Dios en la renovación. Varios fueron un nuevo odre para la obra de Dios.Merece la pena dedicar algún tiempo a desentrañar las raíces del monacato. Empecemos...El tiempo de ocio para conversar sobre filosofía con los amigos era muy apreciado en el mundo antiguo. Incluso si alguien no tenía la capacidad intelectual necesaria para ser elocuente sobre la filosofía, estaba de moda expresar su deseo de disponer de ese ocio intelectual, o "otium", como se le llamaba; pero, por supuesto, estaban demasiado ocupados sirviendo al prójimo. Era la versión antigua de "no tengo "tiempo para mí"".A veces, como el famoso orador romano Cicerón, los antiguos sí disponían de tiempo para esa reflexión y debate ilustrado y se retiraban a escribir sobre temas como el deber, la amistad y la vejez. Aquel altísimo intelecto y teólogo, Agustín de Hipona, tuvo el mismo deseo de joven y, cuando se hizo cristiano en el año 386, dejó su cátedra de oratoria para dedicar su vida a la contemplación y la escritura. Se retiró con un grupo de amigos, su hijo y su madre, a una casa en el lago de Como, para discutir y luego escribir sobre La vida feliz, el orden y otros temas similares, en los que compartían interés tanto la filosofía clásica como el cristianismo. Cuando regresó a su ciudad natal en el norte de África, creó una comunidad en la que él y sus amigos podían llevar una vida monástica, apartados del mundo, estudiando las escrituras y orando. El contemporáneo de Agustín, Jerónimo, traductor de la Biblia latina conocida como la Vulgata, sintió el mismo tirón, y también él hizo una serie de intentos de vivir apartado del mundo para poder entregarse a la reflexión filosófica.¡Ah, la Buena Vida!Esta sensación de "llamada" divina a una versión cristiana de esta vida de "retiro filosófico" tenía una importante diferencia con la versión antigua y pagana. Aunque la lectura y la meditación seguían siendo centrales, se añadió a la mezcla la llamada a hacerlo en concierto con otras personas que también se apartaran del mundo tanto espiritual como físicamente.Para los monjes y monjas que buscaban esa vida comunitaria, lo crucial era la llamada a un modo de vida que permitiera "apartarse" y pasar tiempo con Dios en la oración y la adoración. La oración era el opus dei, la "obra de Dios".Tal y como se concibió originalmente, hacerse monje o monja era intentar obedecer plenamente el mandamiento de amar a Dios con todo lo que uno es y tiene. En la Edad Media, también se entendía como un cumplimiento del mandamiento de amar al prójimo, pues los monjes y monjas oraban por el mundo. Realmente creían que la oración era una tarea importante en nombre de un mundo moral y espiritualmente necesitado de almas perdidas. Así pues, entre los miembros de un monasterio, estaban los que oraban, los que gobernaban y los que trabajaban. Los más importantes para la sociedad eran los que oraban.Se desarrolló una diferencia entre los movimientos monásticos de Oriente y Occidente. En Oriente, los Padres del Desierto marcaron la pauta. Eran ermitaños que adoptaron formas extremas de piedad y ascetismo. Se les consideraba centros de influencia espiritual; autoridades que podían ayudar a la gente corriente con sus problemas. Los estilitas, por ejemplo, vivían en plataformas elevadas, sentados en postes, y eran objeto de reverencia para quienes acudían a pedir consejo. Otros, aislados del mundo en cuevas o chozas, procuraban negarse todo contacto con las tentaciones del "mundo", especialmente con las mujeres. Había en ello una evidente preocupación por los peligros de la carne, que era en parte una herencia de la convicción de los dualistas griegos de que la materia y el mundo físico eran irremediablemente malos.Me detengo para hacer una observación personal y pastoral. Así que ¡advertencia! - Sigue una opinión descarada.No puedes leer el NT sin ver la llamada a la santidad en la vida cristiana. Pero esa santidad es una obra de la gracia de Dios, ya que el Espíritu Santo capacita al creyente para vivir una vida agradable a Dios. La santidad del NT es un privilegio gozoso, no una pesada carga ni un deber. La santidad del NT mejora la vida, nunca la disminuye.Esto es lo que Jesús modeló tan bien; y es por lo que los auténticos buscadores de Dios se sentían atraídos por él. Era atractivo. No se limitaba a hacer santidad, sino que ERA Santo. Sin embargo, nadie tenía más vida. Y dondequiera que iba, ¡las cosas muertas cobraban vida!Como seguidores de Jesús, se supone que debemos ser santos de la misma manera. Pero si somos sinceros, tendríamos que admitir que, para la gran mayoría, la santidad se concibe como una carga de perfección moral seca, aburrida y que absorbe la vida.La verdadera santidad no es el cumplimiento de reglas religiosas. No es una lista de proscripciones morales, un conjunto de "¡No lo hagas! O te castigaré con la Ira Divina y arrojaré tu miserable alma a las llamas eternas".La santidad del NT es una marca de la Vida Real, la que Jesús resucitó para darnos. Es Jesús viviendo en y a través de nosotros.Los Padres del Desierto y los ermitaños que siguieron su ejemplo estaban muy influenciados por la visión dualista del mundo griego, según la cual toda la materia era mala y sólo el espíritu era bueno. La santidad significaba un intento de evitar cualquier atisbo de placer físico y retirarse a la vida de la mente. Este pensamiento fue la principal fuerza que influyó en el movimiento monástico a medida que avanzaba tanto en Oriente como en Occidente. Pero en Oriente, los monjes eran ermitaños que perseguían su estilo de vida en aislamiento, mientras que en Occidente tendían a perseguirlo en concierto y en vida comunitaria.A medida que avancemos, veremos que algunos líderes monásticos se dieron cuenta de que considerar la santidad como una negación negativa de la carne, en lugar de un abrazo positivo del amor y la verdad de Cristo, era un error que intentaban reformar.En Oriente, aunque los monjes podían vivir en grupo, no buscaban la comunidad. No conversaban ni trabajaban juntos en una causa común. Se limitaban a compartir celdas una al lado de la otra. Y cada uno seguía su propio horario. Su único contacto real era que comían juntos y podían orar juntos. Esta tradición continúa hasta hoy en el monte Athos, en el norte de Grecia, donde los monjes viven en soledad y oración en celdas en lo alto de los acantilados, con la comida bajada en cestas.Un acontecimiento crucial en el monacato occidental tuvo lugar en el siglo VI, cuando Benito de Nursia se retiró con un grupo de amigos para llevar una vida ascética. Esto le llevó a reflexionar seriamente sobre la forma en que debía organizarse la "vida religiosa". Benito dispuso que grupos de 12 monjes vivieran juntos en pequeñas comunidades. Luego se trasladó a Montecassino, donde, en el año 529, fundó el monasterio que se convertiría en la casa madre de la Orden Benedictina. La regla de vida que elaboró allí era una síntesis de los elementos de las reglas existentes para la vida monástica. A partir de ese momento, la Regla de San Benito marcó la pauta de la vida religiosa hasta el siglo XII.La Regla lograba un buen equilibrio de trabajo entre el cuerpo y el alma. Pretendía la moderación y el orden. Decía que los que se apartaban del mundo para vivir una vida dedicada a Dios no debían someterse a un ascetismo extremo. Debían vivir en pobreza y castidad, y en obediencia a su abad, pero no debían sentir la necesidad de embrutecer su carne con cosas como azotes y cilicios. Deben comer con moderación, pero sin pasar hambre. Debían equilibrar su tiempo de forma regular y ordenada entre el trabajo manual, la lectura y la oración, su verdadero trabajo para Dios. Debían tener siete actos de culto regulares en el día, conocidos como "horas", a los que asistiera toda la comunidad. En la visión de Benito, el yugo monástico debía ser dulce; la carga, ligera. El monasterio era una "escuela" del servicio del Señor, en la que el alma bautizada progresaba en la vida cristiana.En el periodo Anglosajón de la historia de Inglaterra, las monjas formaban una parte importante de la población. Había varios "monasterios dobles", en los que convivían comunidades de monjes y monjas. Varias abadesas, llamadas "abadesas", demostraron ser líderes destacadas. Hilda, la abadesa del monasterio doble de Whitby, desempeñó un papel importante en el Sínodo de Whitby del año 664.Una característica común de la vida monástica en Occidente era que estaba reservada en gran medida a las clases altas. Los siervos, por lo general, no tenían la libertad de convertirse en monjes. Las casas de monjes y monjas eran destinatarias del patrocinio de la nobleza y de la realeza, normalmente porque los nobles pensaban que apoyando un empeño tan santo, promovían su caso espiritual con Dios.  Recuerda también que, aunque el primogénito lo heredaba todo, los hijos posteriores eran una causa potencial de malestar si decidían competir con su hermano mayor para obtener la primogenitura. Por ello, estos hijos "sobrantes" de buena cuna solían ser entregados por sus familias a las comunas monásticas. Entonces se les encargaba el deber religioso de toda la familia. Eran una especie de "sustitutos espirituales" cuya tarea consistía en producir un excedente de piedad que el resto de la familia pudiera aprovechar. Las familias ricas y poderosas donaban monasterios, tierras y haciendas, por el bien de las almas de sus miembros. Los gobernantes y los soldados estaban demasiado ocupados para ocuparse de su vida espiritual, por lo que los "profesionales" procedentes de sus propias familias podían ayudarles haciéndolo en su nombre.Una consecuencia de esto fue que, a finales de la Edad Media, el abad o la abadesa solía ser un noble o una mujer. A menudo se la elegía por ser la más alta de nacimiento en el monasterio o convento, y no por sus poderes naturales de liderazgo o por su destacada espiritualidad. La cruel caricatura de Chaucer de una priora del siglo XIV muestra a una mujer que habría estado mucho más a gusto en una casa de campo jugando con sus perros.En estos rasgos del mecenazgo noble de la vida religiosa se encontraba no sólo el sello de la aprobación de la sociedad, sino también el potencial de decadencia. Las casas monásticas que se enriquecían y se llenaban de quienes no habían elegido entrar en la vida religiosa, sino que habían sido puestos allí en la infancia, a menudo se volvían decadentes. Las reformas cluniacenses del siglo X fueron una consecuencia del reconocimiento de que era necesario apretar la nave si no se quería perder la orden benedictina por completo. En la comuna de Cluny y en las casas que la imitaron, el nivel de exigencia era alto, aunque también en este caso existía el peligro de distorsión de la visión benedictina original. Las casas cluniacenses tenían reglas adicionales y un grado de rigidez que comprometía la simplicidad original de la vida benedictina.A finales del siglo XI, varios acontecimientos alteraron radicalmente el abanico de opciones para los occidentales que querían entrar en un monasterio. El primero fue un cambio de moda, que animó a los matrimonios de edad madura a decidir terminar sus días como monje o monja. Un caballero que había luchado en sus guerras podía llegar a un acuerdo con su esposa para que entraran en casas religiosas separadas. El ingreso de adultos de este tipo lo hacían quienes realmente querían estar allí, y tenía el potencial de alterar la balanza a favor del compromiso serio.Pero estos adultos maduros no eran los únicos que entraban en los monasterios. Se puso de moda que los más jóvenes se dirigieran a un monasterio en el que la educación se había convertido en algo de primer orden. Entonces los monasterios empezaron a especializarse en diversas actividades. Fue una época de experimentación.De este periodo de experimentación surgió una nueva orden inmensamente importante, los cistercienses. Utilizaban la regla benedictina, pero tenían una serie de prioridades diferentes. La primera era la determinación de protegerse de los peligros que podía acarrear el hacerse demasiado ricos."¿Demasiado ricos?", te preguntarás. "¿Cómo es eso posible si habían hecho voto de pobreza?".Ah, ahí está el problema.Sí; los monjes y las monjas hacían voto de pobreza, pero su estilo de vida incluía la diligencia en el trabajo. Y algunas mentes brillantes se habían unido a los monasterios, por lo que habían ideado métodos ingeniosos para realizar su trabajo de forma más productiva, aumentando el rendimiento de las cosechas y los productos. Al ser hábiles hombres de negocios, hacían buenos tratos y maximizaban los beneficios, que ingresaban en la cuenta del monasterio. Pero los monjes individuales, por supuesto, no se beneficiaron de ello. Los fondos se utilizaban para ampliar los recursos e instalaciones del monasterio. De este modo se obtenían beneficios aún mayores. Que luego se utilizaron para mejorar el propio monasterio. Las celdas de los monjes se hicieron más bonitas, la comida mejor, los terrenos más suntuosos, la biblioteca más amplia.  Los monjes recibieron nuevos trajes. En apariencia, las cosas eran técnicamente iguales, no poseían nada personalmente, pero de hecho, su mundo monástico se mejoró significativamente.Los cistercienses respondieron a esto construyendo casas en lugares remotos y manteniéndolas como alojamientos sencillos y desnudos. También crearon un lugar para las personas de las clases sociales más bajas que tenían vocación, pero que querían entregarse más completamente a Dios durante un periodo de tiempo. A éstos se les llamó "hermanos laicos".El sorprendente éxito inicial de los cistercienses se debió a Bernardo de Claraval. Cuando decidió entrar en un monasterio cisterciense recién fundado, llevó consigo a un grupo de amigos y parientes. Debido a su habilidad oratoria y a su elogio del modelo cisterciense, el reclutamiento procedió tan rápidamente que hubo que fundar muchas más casas en rápida sucesión. Fue nombrado abad de una de ellas en Claraval, de la que toma su nombre. Llegó a ser una figura destacada en el mundo monástico y en la política. Hablaba tan bien y de forma tan conmovedora que era útil como emisario diplomático, además de como predicador. Quizá recuerdes que fue una de las principales razones por las que las Cruzadas fueron capaces de reunir a tantas personas para su campaña.Otros experimentos monásticos no tuvieron tanto éxito. La voluntad de probar nuevas formas de vida monástica dio pie a algunos esfuerzos efímeros de los excéntricos. Siempre hay quienes piensan que su idea es LA forma en que debe hacerse. Ya sea porque carecen de sentido común o no tienen habilidad para reclutar, se desmoronan. Fueron tantos los que se dedicaron a ampliar los límites de la vida monástica que un escritor pensó que sería útil revisar los modos disponibles en el siglo XII. Su obra abarcaba todas las posibilidades, desde los benedictinos y los benedictinos reformados, hasta los sacerdotes que no llevaban una vida de clausura, sino que se les permitía trabajar en el mundo, y las diversas clases de ermitaños.El único rival real de la Regla de San Benito fue la "Regla" de Agustín, que fue adoptada por los dirigentes de la Iglesia. Estos se diferenciaban de los monjes en que eran sacerdotes que podían participar activamente en la comunidad social más amplia, por ejemplo, sirviendo en una iglesia parroquial. No vivían bajo una regla monástica que confinaba a un monje de por vida a la casa en la que había sido consagrado. A los sacerdotes que servían en una catedral, por ejemplo, se les animaba a vivir en una ciudad, pero bajo un código como el de la regla agustiniana, que se adaptaba bien a sus necesidades.El siglo XII vio la creación de nuevas órdenes monásticas. En París, los Victorinos produjeron destacadas figuras académicas y profesores. Los Premostratenses eran un grupo de monjes latinos que se encargaron de la ingente tarea de sanar la ruptura entre las iglesias de Oriente y Occidente. El problema era que no había un grupo monástico correspondiente en Oriente.Lo retomaremos en este punto la próxima vez.El monacato es una parte importante de la Historia de la Iglesia por el enorme impacto que tuvo en la formación de la fe de los cristianos comunes a lo largo de la Edad Media y hasta el Renacimiento. Algunos de los líderes monásticos son los grandes pilares de la fe. No podemos entenderlos realmente sin conocer un poco el mundo en el que vivían.Al terminar este episodio, quiero volver a dar las gracias a todos los oyentes y suscriptores que han dado "me gusta" y han dejado comentarios en la página de FB de CS.También me gustaría decir lo agradecido que estoy a los que han ido a la página de suscripción de CS en iTunes y han dejado una reseña positiva. Hemos desarrollado una gran base de oyentes.Cualquier donación a CS se agradece.Por último, para los suscriptores interesados, quiero invitarte a escuchar el podcast del sermón de la iglesia a la que sirvo; Calvary Chapel Oxnard. Enseño de forma expositiva a través de la Biblia. Puedes suscribirte a través de iTunes, sólo tienes que hacer una búsqueda del podcast de la Capilla del Calvario de Oxnard, o enlazar con la página web calvaryoxnard.org.

This episode is a bit different from our usual fare in that it’s devoted to the subject of art in Church History. It’s in no way intended to be a comprehensive review of religious art. We’ll take just a cursory look at the development of art in the early centuries.Much has been written about the philosophy of art. And as anyone who’s taken an art history course in college knows, much debate has ensued over what defines art. It’s not our aim here to enter that fray, but instead of step back and simply chart the development of artistic expression in the First Centuries.It’s to be expected the followers of Jesus would get around to using art as an expression of their faith quickly in Church History. Man is, after all, an emotional being and art is often the product of that emotion. People who would convert from headlong hedonism to an austere asceticism didn’t usually do so simply based on cold intellectualism. Strong emotions were involved. Those emotions often found their output in artistic expression.Thus, we have Christian art. Emotions & the imagination are as much in need of redemption and capable of sanctification, as the reason and will. We’d better hope so, at least, or we’re all doomed to a grotesquely lopsided spiritual life. How sad it would be if the call to love God with all our heart, soul & mind didn’t extend to our creative faculty and art.Indeed, the Christian believes the work of the Holy Spirit after her/his conversion, is to conform the believer into the very image of Christ. And since God is The Creator, it’s reasonable to assume the Spirit would bend humanity’s penchant for artifice to serve the glory of God and the enjoyment of man.Scripture even says we are to worship God “in the beauty of holiness.” A review of the instructions for the making of the tabernacle make it clear God’s intention was that it be a thing of astounding beauty. And looked at from what we’d call a classical perspective, nearly all art aims to simply duplicate the beauty God as First Artist made when He spoke and the universe leapt into existence.Historians tend to divide Early Church History into two large blocks using The First Council of Nicaea in 325 as the dividing line. The Ante-Nicaean Era runs from the time of the Apostles, the Apostolic Age, to Nicaea. Then the Post-Nicaean Era runs from the Council to The Medieval Era. This was the time of the first what are called 7 Ecumenical Councils; the last of which, is conveniently called the 2nd Nicaean Council, held in 787. So the Ante-Nicaean Era lasted only a couple hundred yrs while the Post-Nicaean Age was 500.It would be nice if Art Historians would sync up their timelines to this plan, but they divide the history of Church Art differently. They refer to Pre-Constantinian Art, while From the 4th thru 7th Cs is called Early Christian Art.The beginnings of identifiable Christian art are located in the last decades of the 2nd C. Now, it’s not difficult to imagine there’d been some artistic expression connected to believers before this; it’s just that we have no enduring record of it. Why is easy to surmise. Christians were a persecuted group and apart from some notable exceptions, were for the most part comprised of the lower classes. Christians simply didn’t want to draw attention to themselves on one hand, and on the other, there wasn’t a source of patronage base for art in service of the Gospel.Another reason there wasn’t much art imagery generated before the 2nd C is because early generations of believers were mostly Jewish with a long-standing prohibition of making graven images, lest they violate the Commandments against idolatry. By the mid 2nd C, the Church had shifted to a primarily Gentile body. Gentiles had little cultural opposition to the use of images. Indeed, their prior paganism encouraged it. They quickly learned they were not to make idols, but had no reluctance to use images a symbols and representations to communicate the Gospel and express their faith.The style of this early art is drawn from Roman motifs of the Late Classical style and is found in association with the burial of believers. While pagans generally practiced cremation, the followers of Jesus shifted to burial as an expression of their hope in the Resurrection. So outside Rome’s walls near major roadways, numerous catacombs were excavated where Christians both met when the heat of persecution was up, and where their dead were interred. Some of the oldest of Christian imagery is a simple outline of a ship or an anchor scratched into the wall of a crypt. Both were symbols of the Church. The anchor is drawn from the NT Book of Hebrews which refers to the hope of the believer as an anchor or the soul. The ship was an apt picture for the Church. A vessel which is IN the Sea, but mustn’t have the sea in it, just as the Church is to be in the World, but the World is not to be in the Church. Another symbol used to make the resting place of Christians was the ubiquitous fish. As burial in the catacombs became de rigeur , families carved out entire rooms for the burial of their members. Bodies were placed in marble sarcophagi which over time were decorated with religious imagery; symbols and scenes drawn from Scripture.Missing from the art crafted by Christians at this time are the scenes that will later become common. There’re few Nativity motifs, fewer crosses, and nothing depicting the resurrection. That’s not to say Christians in this early era didn’t regard the cross & resurrection as central to their faith. The writings of Ante-Nicene Fathers make it clear they did. It’s just that they hadn’t made their way into artistic expression yet. Rather than pointing DIRECTLY at Christ’s crucifixion & resurrection, artists instead used OT stories that foreshadowed the Gospel. Images of Abraham sacrificing Isaac, Jonah & the fish, Daniel in the lion’s den, Shadrach, Meshach, & Abed-Nego in the fiery furnace, as well as Moses striking the rock are all depicted in frescoes and tomb paintings.The few images of Jesus from the Pre-Constantinian art we see him presented as The Good Shepherd, surrounded either by figures who likely represent the apostles, and symbols from nature, like peacocks, vines, doves and so on.Nothing happened in the way of distinctly Christian architecture until Constantine for obvious reasons. Christians simply could not build their own places. When you’re trying to avoid attention due to persecution, engaging a construction project’s just not wise. But once The Faith was removed from the banned list, and the Rulers of Rome showed the emergent Faith favor, Christians began to shape their meeting places in a manner that maximized their utility, while also adorning them with imagery identifying them as dedicated to The Gospel. The discreet and out of the way places they’d met in before no longer served as suitable meeting places for the rapidly growing movement.After Christianity was allowed to own property, it raised local churches across the Roman empire. There may have been more of this kind of building in the 4th C than there has been since, excepting during the 19th C in the United States. Constantine and his mother Helena led the way. The Emperor adorned not only his new city of Constantinople, but also embarked on a campaign to secure the assumed holy Places in the Middle East. Basilicas Churches were erected using funds from his personal account, as well as State funds. His successors, with the exception of Julian, called The Apostate, as well as bishops and wealthy laymen, vied with each other in building, beautifying, and enriching churches. The Faith that had not long before been a cause of great persecution, became a game to compete in; as the wealthy hoped to earn a higher place in heaven by the churches they raised. Churches became a venue for bragging rights. The Church Father Chrysostom lamented that the poor were being forgotten in favor of buildings, and recommended it wasn’t altars, but souls, God wanted. Jerome rebuked those who trampled over the needy to build a house of stone.It might be assumed Christians would adopt the form for their buildings they were used to as pagans – a temple. Interestingly, they didn’t! Most pagan temples were relatively small affairs intended to hold little more than the idol of the god or goddess they were dedicated to. When pagans worshipped, they did so outdoors, often in a courtyard next to the temple. It wasn’t until the 7th C that believers began to re-purpose some of the larger now abandoned pagan temples for their own use. Even during Constantine’s time, Christians began to use layout of the secular basilica, the formal hall where a king or ruler would hold court.The floor plan of one of these basilicas had a central rectangular hall, called a nave, with two side aisles. The main door was on one of the short sides of the nave, and on the opposite wall was the apse where a raised platform was built for the altar where the minister led the service.During the 4th C saw Rome saw over 40 lrg churches built. In the New Rome of Constantinople, the Church of the Apostles and the Church of St. Sophia, originally built by Constantine, towered in majestic beauty. In the 5th C both were dramatically enlarged by Justinian.As I said earlier, in the 7th C, the now abandoned pagan temples were turned over to Christians. Emperor Phocas gave the famous Pantheon to Roman’s bishop Boniface IV.Anyone who’s been on a tour of Israel ought to be familiar with the term “Byzantine.” Because a good many of the ruins Christian tourists visit are labeled as Byzantine in architecture and era. The Byzantine style originated in the 6th C. and in the East continues to this day. It’s akin to the influence the French Classicism of Louis XIV had on Western architecture.The main feature of the Byzantine style is a dome spanning the center of a floorplan that is cruciform. Let me see if I can help you picture this. Imagine a classic cross laid on the earth. The long bean is the central nave with the cross piece are the transverse sides used as side chapels. Suspended over the intersection of main & cross beams is a dome, decorated with frescoes of Biblically rich imagery.Previous basilicas tended to be flat, blocky affairs; earthbound in their ponderance. The Byzantine basilica lifted the roof and drew the eye to that dome which seemed to pierce heaven itself. The eye was drawn upward. That idea will be perfected centuries later in the soaring ceilings and arches of Europe’s Gothic cathedrals.The most perfect execution of the Byzantine style is found in the Hagia Sophia, the Church of Holy Wisdom in Istanbul. It was built by the Emperor Justinian in the 6th C on the plans of Anthemius & Isidore. It’s 220’ wide, 252’ long; with a 180’ diameter dome supported by four gigantic columns, rising 169’ over the central altar. The dome is so constructed that the court biographer Procopius describes it as being suspended form heaven by golden chains.The cross, which today stands as the universal symbol for Christianity, wasn’t used in artifice until at least the late 4th C. The historical record suggest Christians made the sign of the cross on their foreheads, over their eyes, mouths, & hearts as early as the 2nd C. But they didn’t make permanent images of it till later. And then we find some church father urging Christians not to make magical talisman of them.Julian accused Christians of worshipping the cross. Chrysostom wrote, “The sign of universal detestation, the sign of extreme penalty, has become an object of desire and love. We see it everywhere; on houses, roofs, walls, in cities and villages, in markets, along roads, in deserts, on mountains & in valleys, on the sea, ships, books, weapons, garments, in honeymoon chambers, at banquets, on gold & silver vessels, engraved on pearls, in paintings, on beds, the bodies of sick animals, & the possessed, at dances of the merry, and in the brotherhoods of monks.”It isn’t till the 5th C that we find the use of the crucifix; that is a cross that isn’t bare. It now holds the figure of the impaled Christ.

As I record  & post this episode, a new movie’s out called Logan. It’s appears to be the last installment for the venerable X-Men character Wolverine, played by Hugh Jackman. Logan was an immortal who became the subject of a secret military experiment gone wrong. His skeleton was infused with a fictional metal called adamantium that bears the hardness of a diamond. (more…)

This is part 6 of our series titled The First Centuries, in Season 2 of CS. In the last episode we took a look at the Church Father Irenaeus. This episode we’ll consider Tertullian.That may prompt some to wonder if we’re going to work our way through ALL the church fathers of the Early Church. Uh, no – we won’t. Just a few.While he’s known to history as Tertullian, his full name was Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus. (more…)

The First Centuries – Part 5 // Irenæus The historical record is pretty clear that the Apostle John spent his last years in Western Asia Minor, with the City of Ephesus acting as his headquarters. It seems that during his time there, he poured himself into a cadre of capable men who went on to provide outstanding leadership for the church in the midst of difficult trials. Men like Polycarp of Smyrna, Papias & Apolinarius of Hierapolis, & Melito of Sardis. These and others were mentioned by Polycrates, the bishop of Ephesus in a letter to Victor, a bishop at Rome in about AD 190.These students of John are considered to be the last of what’s called The Apostolic Age. The greatest of them was Irenæus. Though he wasn’t a direct student of the Apostle, he was influenced by Polycarp, & is considered by many as one of the premier and first Church Fathers.Not much is known of Irenæus’ origins. From what we can piece together from his writings, he was most likely born and raised in Smyrna around AD 120. He was instructed by Smyrna’s lead pastor, Polycarp, a student of John. He says he was also directly influenced by other pupils of the Apostles, though he doesn’t name them. Polycarp had the biggest impact on him, as evidenced by his comment, “What I heard from him, I didn’t write on parchment, but on my heart. By God’s grace, I bring it constantly to mind.” It’s possible Irenæus accompanied Polycarp when he traveled to Rome and engaged Bishop Anicetus in the Easter controversy we talked about last episode.At some point while still a young man, Irenæus went to Southern Gaul as a missionary. He settled at Lugdunum where he became an elder in the church there. Lugdunum eventually became the town of Lyon, France. In 177, during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, the church in Lugdunum was hammered by fierce persecution. But Irenæus had been sent on a mission to Rome to deal with the Montanist controversy. While away, the church’s elderly pastor Pothinus, was martyred. By the time he returned in 178 the persecution had spent itself and he was appointed as the new pastor.Irenæus worked tirelessly to mend the holes persecution had punched in the church in Southern Gaul. In both teaching and writing, he provided resources other church leaders could use in faithfully discharging their pastoral duties, as well as refuting the various and sundry errors challenging the new Faith. During his term as the pastor of the church at Lyon, he was able to see a majority of the population of the City converted to Christ. Dozens of missionaries were sent out to plant churches across Gaul.Then, about 190, Irenæus simply disappears with no clear account of his death. A 5th C tradition says he died a martyr in 202 in the persecution under Septimus Severus. The problem with that is that several church fathers like Eusebius, Hippolytus, & Tertullian uncharacteristically fail to mention Irenæus’ martyrdom. Because martyrs achieved hero status, if Irenæus had been martyred, the Church would have marked it. SO most likely, he died of natural causes. However he died, he was buried under the altar St. John’s in Lyons.Irenæus’ influence far surpassed the importance of his location. The bishopric of Lyon was not considered an important seat. But Irenæus’ impact on the Faith was outsized to his position. His keen intellect united a Greek education with astute philosophical analysis, and a sharp understanding of the Scriptures to produce a remarkable defense of The Gospel. That was badly needed at the time due to the inroads being forged by a new threat – Gnosticism, which we spent time describing in Season 1.Irenæus’ articulation of the Faith brought about a unanimity that united the East & Western branches of the Church that had been diverging. They’d end up reverting to that divergence later, but Irenæus managed to bring about a temporary peace through his clear defense of the faith against the Gnostics.Irenæus admits he had a difficult time mastering the Celtic dialect spoken by the people where he served but his capacity in Greek, in which he composed his writings, was both elegant & eloquent without running to the merely flowery. His content shows he was familiar with the classics by authors like Homer, Hesiod, & Sophocles as well as philosophers like Pythagoras & Plato.He shows a like familiarity with earlier Christian writers such as Clement, Justin Martyr, & Tatian. But Irenæus is really only 1 generation away from Jesus and the original Apostles due to a couple long life-times; that of John, and then his pupil, Polycarp. We find their influence in Irenæus’ remark impugning the appeal of Gnosticism, “The true way to God, is through love. Better to know nothing but the crucified Christ, than fall into the impiety of overly curious inquires & silly nuances.” Reading Irenæus’ work on the core doctrines of the Faith reveal his wholehearted embrace of Pauline theology of the NT. Where Irenæus goes beyond John & Paul was in his handling of ecclesiology; that is, matters of the Church. Irenæus wrote on things like the proper handling of the sacraments, and how authority in the church ought to be passed on. A close reading of the 2nd C church fathers reveals that this issue was of major concern to them. It makes sense it would. Jesus had commissioned the Apostles to carry on His mission and to lay the foundation of the Faith & Church. The Apostles had done that, but in the 2nd C, the men the Apostles had raised up were themselves aging out. Church leaders were burdened with the question of how to properly pass on the Faith once for all delivered to the saints, to those who came next. What was the plan?We’ll come back to that later . . .Irenæus was a staunch advocate of what we’ll call Biblical theology, as opposed to a theology derived from philosophical musing, propped up by random Bible verses. He’s the first of the church fathers to make liberal use of BOTH the Old & New Testaments in his writings. He uses all four Gospels and nearly all the letters of the NT in the development of his theology.His goal in it all was to establish unity among believers. He was so zealous for it because of the rising popularity of Gnosticism, a new religious fascination attractive an increasing number of Christians.Historians have come to understand that like many emergent faiths, Gnosticism was itself fractured into different flavors. The brand Irenæus dealt with was the one most popular in his region; Valentinian Gnosticism, or, Valentinianism.While several writings are attributed to Irenæus, by far his most important and famous was Against Heresies, his refutation of Gnosticism. Written sometime btwn 177 & 190, it’s 5 volumes is considered by most to be the premier theological work of the ante-Nicene era. It’s also the main source of knowledge for historians on Gnosticism and Christian doctrine in the Apostolic Age. It was composed in response to a request by a friend wanting a brief on how to deal with the errors of both Valentinus & Marcion. Both had taught in Rome 30 yrs earlier.  Their ideas then spread to France.The 1st of the 5 volumes is a dissection of what Valentinianism taught, and more generally how it differed from other sects of Gnosticism. It shows that Irenæus had a remarkable grasp of a belief system he utterly & categorically rejected.The 2nd book reviewed the internal inconsistencies and contradictions of Gnosticism.The last 3 volumes give a systematic refutation of Gnosticism from Scripture & tradition which Irenæus makes clear at that time were one and the same. He shows that the Gospel which was at first only oral, was subsequently committed to writing, then was faithfully taught in churches through a succession of pastors & elders. So, Irenæus says, The Apostolic Faith & tradition is embodied in Scripture, and in the right interpretation of those scriptures by pastors (AKA as bishops). And the Church ought to have confidence in those pastors’ interpretations of God’s Word because they’ve attained their office through a demonstrated succession. Of course, the succession Irenæus referred to was manifestly evident by virtue of the fact he wrote in the last quarter of the 2nd C & was himself, as we’ve seen, just a generation removed from the Apostle John.Irenæus set all this over against the contradictory opinions of heretics who fundamentally deviated from this well-established Faith & simply could not be included in the catholic, that is universally agreed on, faith carved out by Scripture and its orthodox interpretation by a properly sanctioned teaching office.The 5th and final volume of Against Heresies includes Irenæus’ exposition of pre-millennial eschatology; that is, the study of Last things, or in modern parlance – the End Times. No doubt he does so because it stood in stark contrast with the muddled teaching of the Gnostics on this subject. It might be noted that Irenæus’ pre-millennialism wasn’t unique. He stood squarely with the other writers of the Apostolic & post-apostolic age.Irenæus’ view of the inspiration of Scripture is early anticipation of what came to be called Verbal plenary inspiration. That is, both the writings and authors of Scripture were inspired, so that what God wanted expressed was, without turning the writers into automatons. God expressed His will through the varying personalities of the original authors. He even accounts for the variations in Paul’s style across his epistles to his, at times, rapid-fire dictation & the agency of the Holy Spirit’s urging at different times and in different situations.Irenæus’ emphasis on both Scripture and the apostolic tradition of its interpretation has been seen as a boon to the idea of establishing an official teaching magisterium in the Church. Added to that is his remarks that the church at Rome held a special place in providing leadership for the Church as a whole. He based this on Rome being the location of the martyrdom of both Peter & Paul. While Irenæus acknowledges they did not START the church there, he reasoned they most certainly were regarded as its leaders when they were there. And there was a tradition that Peter appointed the next bishop, one Linus, to lead the Church when he was executed. While it’s true Irenæus did indeed suggest Rome ought to take the lead, he said it was the CHURCH there that ought to do so; not its bishop. The point may seem minor, but it’s important to note that Irenaeus himself resisted positions taken by the Bishop at Rome. In our last episode, we noted his chronicle of Polycarp’s & Anicetus’ disagreement over when to celebrated Easter. Anicetus’ successor was Bishop Victor, who took a hardline approach with the Quartodecamins and wanted to forcefully punish them. While as the bishop of the church in Lyon, Irenaeus was ready to follow the policy of the Church at Rome, he objected to Victor’s heavy-handedness and reminded him of his predecessor’s more fair-minded policy.So while Irenaeus does indeed urge a role of first-place for the Church at Rome, we can’t go so far as to say he establishes the principle of the primacy of the bishop of Rome. He’s not an apologist for papal primacy.Nor does he advocate apostolic succession as it’s come to be defined today. What Irenaeus does say is that the Scriptures have to be interpreted rightly; meaning, they have to align with that which the Apostles consistently taught, and that the people who were to be trusted to that end were those linked back to the Apostles because they’d HEARD them explain themselves.He argued this because the Gnostics claimed a secret oral tradition given them from Jesus himself. Irenaeus maintained that the pastors & elders of the Church were well-known and linked to the Apostles and had always maintained the same message that wasn’t secret at all. Therefore, it was those pastors who provided the only safe interpretation of Scripture.For Irenaeus, apostolic authority was only valid so long as it actually squared with apostolic teaching, which itself was codified in the Gospels and epistles of the NT – along with what the direct students of the Apostles said they’d taught. Irenæus didn’t concoct a formula for the passing of apostolic authority from one generation to the next in perpetuity.Irenaeus became a treasured authority for men like Hippolytus and Tertullian who drew freely from him. He also became a major source for establishing the canon of the NT. He regarded the entire OT as God’s Word as well as most of the books our NT while excluding a large number of Gnostic pretenders. There’s some evidence that before Irenaeus, believers lined up under different Gospels as their preferred accounts of the Life of Jesus. The Churches of Asia Minor preferred the Gospel of John while Matthew was the most popular overall. Irenaeus made a convincing case that all 4 Gospels were God’s Word. That made him the earliest witness to the canonicity of M,M,L & J. This stood over against the accepted writings of a heretic named Marcion who only accepted portions of Luke’s Gospel.Irenaeus cited passages of the NT about a thousand times, from 21 of the 27 books, including Revelation. Inferences to the other books can be found as well.Irenaeus provides a perfect bridge from the Apostles to the next phase of Church History presided over by the Fathers, of which he’s considered among the first.

Have you noticed that, generally-speaking, Christians like to argue?Maybe we get it from our spiritual ancestors, the Jews. Once while on a tour of Jerusalem at what are called the Southern Steps of the Temple Mount, our Jewish guide told us that a frequent joke among his people was that where there are 2 Jews, there’s 3 opinions.Yeah; it seems controversy has been a part of the history of The Church since its inception. And maybe that’s really more a “human” tendency than something unique to, or the sole prerogative of the followers of Jesus. (more…)

In part 1 we took a look at some of the sociological reason for persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. Then last time we began a narrative-chronology of the waves of persecution and ended with Antonius Pious.A new approach in dealing with Christians was adopted by Marcus Aurelius who reigned form 161–180. Aurelius is known as a philosopher emperor. He authored a volume on Stoic philosophy titled Meditations. It was really more a series of notes to himself, but it became something of a classic of ancient literature. Aurelius bore not a shred of sympathy for the idea of life after death & detested as intellectually inferior anyone who carried a hope in immortality. (more…)

This is part 2 in our follow-up series on the first centuries in Church History. We’re concentrating on the persecution Jesus’ followers endured. In part 1, we examined the social & civic reasons for persecution in the Roman Empire.The suspicion of nefarious intent by Christians, fueled by their withdrawal from society due to its tacit connection to paganism, morphed into a suspicion of covert actions Jesus’ followers were taking to subvert society. Why were Christians so secretive if they weren’t in fact doing something wrong? And if the rumors were true, Christians WERE doing odd things; like pretending slaves had the same dignity as freemen; that women and children were to be honored as equal to men; and they rescued exposed infants. Why, if they kept all that up, and more joined their cause, what was to become of the world? It would look very different from the one that had been. (more…)

Welcome BACK to Communion Sanctorum: History of the Christian Church.We ended our summary & overview narrative of Church History after 150 episodes; took a few months break, and are back to it again with more episodes which aim to fill in the massive gaps we left before.This time, we’ll do series that go into detail on specific moments, movements, people, places, and other topics. (more…)

The final episode of Communio Sanctorum. We look briefly at the reaction of some Protestants  to Manifest Destiny. DL Moody, The Holiness Movement, Phoebe Palmer, The Azusa Street Revival.This 150th episode of CS is titled The End.150 episodes! And this is the rebooted v2. We had a hundred episodes in v1 before I started over again in an attempt to clean up the timeline and fill in some gaps. (more…)

This 139th episode is titled Evangementalism,We’ve spent a couple of episodes laying out the genesis of Theological Liberalism, and concluded the last episode with a brief look at the conservative reaction to it in what’s been called Evangelicalism. Evangelicalism was one of the most important movements of the 20th C. The label comes from that which lies at the center of the movement, devotion to an orthodox and traditional understanding of the Evangel, that is, the Christian Gospel - the Good News of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.While Evangelicalism is used today mainly to describe the theological movement that came about as a reaction to Protestant theological liberalism, the term can be applied all the way back to the 1st C believers who referred to themselves as “People of the Gospel,” the Evangel. The term was resurrected by Reformers to call themselves “evangelicals” before identifying as Protestants or any of the other labels used for protestant denominations today.The modern flavor of Evangelicalism came about as a merging of European Pietism and revivals among Methodists in England. We might even locate the origin of modern Evangelicalism in the First Great Awakening of the mid-18th C. Its midwives were people like Whitefield, Tennent, Freylinghuysen, and of course Jonathan Edwards.Since major stress of all these was the need for a conversion experience and spiritual new birth, revivalism and an emphasis on the task of evangelism have been front and center in Evangelicalism.As we’ve seen in a past episode, the First Great Awakening was followed a century later by the Second which began in the United States and spread to Europe, then the rest of the world and had a huge impact on how Christians viewed their Faith. What’s remarkable about the Second Great Awakening, is that it came at a time when many church leaders lamented the low state of the Church in Western Civilization. Christianity’s enemies gleefully wrote its obituary. Theological Liberalism helped to push the Faith toward an early grave. But the Second Great Awakening literally shook North American and Europe to their core. A wave of missionaries went out across the globe as a result, spreading the Faith to places no church had existed for hundreds of years, and in some cases, ever before.In newly settled regions on the American frontier, Evangelicalism was carried out in week-long “camp meetings.” Think of a modern concert with multiple bands. Camp meetings were like that, except in place of bands playing music were preachers passionately preaching the Gospel. Might not sound too appealing to our modern sensibilities, but the lonely pioneers of the frontier turned out in large crowds. They’d been too busy building homesteads to consider constructing frontier churches. But now they returned home to do that very thing.One of the largest of these camp meetings took place at Cane Ridge in Kentucky in August 1801. Upwards of 20,000 gathered to listen to Protestant preachers of all stripes.Methodist minister Francis Asbury was just one of several circuit-riders who carried the Gospel all over the frontier. Both Baptists and Methodists worked tirelessly to bring the Gospel to blacks. But the fierce racism of the time refused to integrate congregations. Separate churches were plated for black congregations, of which there were many. In the early 19th C, Richard Allen left the Methodist Church to found the African Methodist Episcopal Church. In the US, it wasn’t long before Evangelical Baptists and Methodists outnumbered older denominations of Episcopalians and Presbyterians, groups where theological liberalism had infiltrated.Charles Finney was an attorney-turned-revivalist who transferred the excitement and energy of the rural camp-meetings to the urban centers of the American Northeast. An innovator, Finney encouraged the newly converted to share the story of how they came to the Faith – called ‘giving your testimony.’ He set what he called an “anxious bench” near the front of rooms where he spoke as a place where those who wanted prayer or to make a profession of faith in Christ could sit. That eventually turned into the modern ‘altar call’ that’s a standard fixture of many Evangelical churches today.By the start of the American Civil War in the mid-19th C, Evangelicalism was the predominant religious position of the American people. In an address delivered 1873, Rev. Theodore Woolsey, one-time president of Yale could say, without the least bit of controversy; “The vast majority of people believe in Christ and the Gospel. Christian influences are universal. Our civilization and intellectual culture are built on that foundation.”While there are many brands, flavors, and emphases inside modern Evangelicalism, it’s safe to characterize an Evangelical as someone who holds to several core beliefs: those being à1)  The authority and sufficiency of Scripture2)  The uniqueness of salvation through the cross of Jesus Christ,3)  The need for personal conversion4)  And the urgency of evangelismFurther refining of Evangelicalism took place when there was a debate over the first of its core doctrines – the authority and sufficiency of Scripture. This is where Fundamentalism diverged from Evangelicalism. The other three core distinctives of Evangelicalism all rest on the authority and sufficiently of the Bible. And while Evangelicalism began as a reaction to theological liberalism, some of the ideas of that liberalism crept into some Evangelical’s view of Scripture.You see, it’s one thing to say Scripture is authoritative and sufficient and another to then say the entire Bible is Scripture.  Is the Bible God’s Word, or does it just contain God’s Word? Do we need scholars and those properly educated to tell us what is in fact Scripture and what’s filler? Are the actual WORDS God’s Words, or do the words need to be taken together collectively so that it’s not the words but the meaning they convey that makes for God’s authoritative message?Some Evangelical leaders noticed their peers were moving to a position that said the Bible wasn’t so much God’s Word as it contained God’s Message. While they weren’t as extreme as the Liberal Theologians, they effectively ended up in the same place. This debate goes on in the Evangelical church today and continues to be the source of much unrest.Conservative Evangelicals started linking the authority of Scripture to the doctrine of inerrancy; that is, belief the Bible’s original writings contained no errors, and that because of the laborious process of transmission of the texts over time, while we can’t say our modern translations are perfect or without any error, they are virtually inerrant; they are trustworthy versions of the originals.At the dawn of the 20th C, Princeton Theological Seminary became the epicenter of this debate as a leading defender of the authority of the Bible. It had long been an advocate for the infallibility of Scripture under such luminaries as Archibald Alexander, Charles Hodge, his son, AA Hodge, and BB Warfield. In a seminal essay on the doctrine of Inspiration in the Princeton Review, AA Hodge and BB Warfield defined inspiration as producing the “absolute infallibility” of Scripture. They said the autographs, the original writings of the Bible were free from error, not just in regard to theological matters, but in contradiction to what theological liberalism claimed, they were without error in regard to ALL their assertions, including those touching science and history.The theological liberalism coming from Europe had a mixed reception in the US at the outset of the 20th C. At first, most churches remained conservative and blissfully unaware of the slow sea-change taking place in the intellectual centers of American universities and seminaries. Battle lines were drawn between liberals and conservatives who were branded with a new label = Fundamentalists. The battle they carried out in the hallowed halls of academia soon spilled over into the pews. It was referred to as the contest between modernists and fundamentalists.While modernists embraced a host of varying ideologies, they shared two presuppositions.First, they urged, Christianity must be reframed in light of new insights; meaning the tenants of Protestant Liberalism.Second, the Faith had to be liberated from the cultural encrustations of traditionalism that had obscured the REAL MEANING of the Bible. What that effectively meant was that ALL and ANY traditional beliefs about what the Bible said was no longer valid. It was a knee-jerk rejection of conservatism.Though the term Fundamentalism wasn’t coined until 1920, it flowed from the 1910 publication The Fundamentals. It was a synthesis of different conservative Protestants who united to battle the Modernists who seemed to be taking over Evangelicalism. Fundamentalists banded together to launch a counteroffensive.There were 2 streams of the early Fundamentalist movement.One was intellectual fundamentalism led by J. Gresham Machen [Gres’am May-chen] and his Calvinist peers at Princeton. [the ‘h’ in Gresham is silent!]The other was populist fundamentalism led by CI Schofield who produced the best-selling Scofield Reference Bible which contained his expansive notes and laid out a dispensationalism many found appealing.Other notable fundamentalist leaders were RA Torrey, DL Moody, Billy Sunday, and the Holiness Movement that moved in several denominations, most notably the Nazarenes.While the intellectual and populist streams of fundamentalism attempted to unite in their opposition to modernism, there were simply too many doctrinal differences between all the various groups inside the movement to allow for a concerted strategy in dealing with Liberalism. As a result, Modernists were able to continue their infiltration and take-over of the intellectual centers of the Faith.In reaction to modernists, in 1910, a group of conservative Presbyterians responded with five convictions that came to be considered the core Fundamentals from which the movement derived its name. Those five convictions flowed from their certainty in the inerrancy and infallibility of Scripture. They were . . .1)  The inerrancy of the original writings.2)  The virgin birth of Jesus.3)  The substitutionary atonement of Jesus on the cross.4)  His literal, bodily resurrection.5)  A belief that Jesus’ miracles were to be understood as real events and not merely literary mythology meant to teach some ethical imperative. Jesus really fed thousands with a few fish and loaves, really raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead, and really walked on water.These fundamentals were elaborated and released between 1910 and 15 in a set of booklets called The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth. The Stewart brothers funded their publication and ensured they were distributed to every Christian leader across the US. Some three million copies were circulated before WWI to combat the threat of Modernism.

CS- 57 Esta es la cuarta parte de nuestra serie sobre las Cruzadas.El plan para este episodio, el último de nuestra mirada a las Cruzadas, es dar un breve repaso a las Cruzadas de la 5ª a la 7ª, y luego un poco de análisis de las Cruzadas en su conjunto.La fecha fijada para el inicio de la 5ª Cruzada fue el 1 de junio de 1217. Era el largo sueño del Papa Inocencio III de reconquistar Jerusalén. Murió antes de que la Cruzada se pusiera en marcha, pero su sucesor Honorio III fue un partidario tan ardiente como él. Continuó la labor iniciada por Inocencio.Los ejércitos enviados no lograron casi nada, salvo desperdiciar vidas. A alguien se le ocurrió la brillante idea de que la clave para conquistar Palestina era asegurar primero una base en Egipto. Ese había sido el plan de la 4ª Cruzada. Ahora los cruzados hicieron del importante puerto de Damietta su objetivo. Tras una larga batalla, los cruzados tomaron la ciudad, por la que el líder musulmán Malik al Kameel ofreció intercambiar Jerusalén y todos los prisioneros cristianos que tenía. Los cruzados pensaron que el emperador del Sacro Imperio Romano Germánico, Federico II, estaba de camino para reforzar sus números, así que rechazaron la oferta. El problema es que Federico no estaba de camino. Así que, en 1221, Damietta volvió al control musulmán.A Federico II le importaba poco la Cruzada. Tras varias salidas en falso que revelaron su verdadera actitud hacia todo el asunto, el emperador decidió que era mejor cumplir sus numerosas promesas y partió con 40 galeras y sólo 600 caballeros. Llegaron a Acre a principios de septiembre del año 1228. Como los líderes musulmanes de Oriente Medio estaban de nuevo enfrentados, Federico convenció al mencionado al-Kameel para que hiciera un tratado de una década que entregaba Jerusalén a los cruzados, junto con Belén, Nazaret y la ruta de peregrinos de Acre a Jerusalén. El 19 de marzo de 1229, Federico se coronó por su propia mano en la Iglesia del Santo Sepulcro.Esta transferencia pacifica de Jerusalén enfureció al Papa Gregorio IX, que consideraba el control de Tierra Santa y la destrucción de los musulmanes como una misma cosa. Así que la Iglesia nunca reconoció oficialmente los logros de Federico.Regresó a su país para hacer frente a los desafíos internos a su gobierno y, durante la siguiente década y media, la condición de los cristianos de Palestina se deterioró. Todo lo ganado por el tratado fue devuelto a la hegemonía musulmana en el otoño de 1244.Las dos últimas Cruzadas, la 6ª y la 7ª, se centran en la carrera del último gran Cruzado; el Rey de Francia, Luis IX.Conocido como SAN LUIS, combinó la piedad de un monje con la caballerosidad de un caballero, y se sitúa en la primera fila de los gobernantes cristianos de todos los tiempos.  Su celo se reveló no sólo en su devoción al ritual religioso, sino en su negativa a desviarse de su fe incluso bajo la amenaza de la tortura. Su piedad era auténtica, como lo demuestra su preocupación por los pobres y el trato justo a sus súbditos. Lavaba los pies a los mendigos y, cuando un monje le advirtió que no llevara su humildad demasiado lejos, le contestó: "Si dedicara el doble de tiempo al juego y a la caza que, a esos servicios, nadie me reprocharía nada".Al saqueo de Jerusalén por los musulmanes en 1244, siguieron con la caída de las bases cruzadas en Gaza y Askelon. En el año 1245, en el Concilio de Lyon, el Papa convocó una nueva expedición para liberar de nuevo a la Tierra Santa. Aunque el Rey Luis yacía en un lecho de enfermo con una enfermedad tan grave que sus asistentes le pusieron un paño en la cara, pensando que estaba muerto, se recuperó y tomó la cruz de los cruzados.Tres años después, él y sus hermanos príncipes franceses partieron con 32.000 soldados. Una flota veneciana y genovesa los llevó a Chipre, donde se habían hecho preparativos a gran escala para su abastecimiento. Luego navegaron hacia Egipto. Damieta volvió a caer, pero tras este prometedor comienzo, la campaña se convirtió en un desastre.La piedad y la benevolencia de Luis no estaban respaldadas por lo que podríamos llamar sólidas habilidades como líder. Estaba dispuesto a compartir el sufrimiento con sus tropas, pero no tenía la capacidad de organizarlas.  Haciendo caso al consejo de varios de sus comandantes, decidió atacar Cairo en lugar de Alejandría, el objetivo mucho más estratégico. La campaña fue un desastre y el Nilo se llenó de cadáveres de cruzados muertos. En su retirada, el Rey y el Conde de Poitiers fueron hechos prisioneros. El Conde de Artois fue asesinado. La humillación de los cruzados nunca había sido tan profunda.La fortaleza de Luis brilló mientras sufría la desgracia de estar cautivo. Amenazado con la tortura y la muerte, se negó a renunciar a Cristo o a ceder alguno de los puestos de avanzada de los cruzados que quedaban en Palestina. Por el rescate de sus tropas, aceptó pagar 500.000 libras, y por su propia libertad renunciar a Damietta y abandonar la campaña en Egipto.Ataviado con ropas regaladas por el sultán, en un barco apenas amueblado, el rey zarpó hacia Acre, donde permaneció 3 años, gastando grandes sumas en fortificaciones en Jafa y Sidón. Cuando su madre, que actuaba como reina regente en su ausencia, murió, Luis se vio obligado a regresar a Francia. Zarpó de Acre en la primavera de 1254. Su reina, Margarita, y los 3 hijos que les nacieron en Oriente, regresaron con él.Se podría haber esperado que un fracaso tan completo destruyera toda esperanza de recuperar alguna vez Palestina. Pero la idea de las cruzadas seguía siendo fuerte en la mente de Europa. Los papas Urbano IV y Clemente III hicieron nuevos llamamientos, y Luis volvió a ponerse en marcha. En 1267, con la mano en una corona de espinas, anunció a sus nobles reunidos su propósito de ir por segunda vez a una santa cruzada.Mientras tanto, llegaban noticias del Oriente de continuos desastres a manos del enemigo "Mahometano" (como llamaban a los musulmanes) y de discordia entre los cristianos. En el año 1258, 40 naves Venecianas entraron en combate con una flota Genovesa de 50 barcos frente a Acre, con una pérdida de 1.700 almas. Un año después, los templarios y los hospitalarios libraron una batalla campal, no contra los musulmanes, sino entre ellos. Luego, en el año1268, Acre, el mayor de los puertos de los cruzados, cayó en manos de los Mamelucos Musulmanes.Luis zarpó en el año 1270 con 60.000 personas hacia el desastre. Apenas había levantado su campamento en el lugar de la antiguo Cartago cuando estalló la peste. Entre las víctimas estaba el hijo del rey, Juan Tristán, nacido en Damieta, y el propio rey Luis.  Su cuerpo fue devuelto a Francia y el ejército francés se disolvió.En el año 1291, lo que quedaba de la presencia de los cruzados en Tierra Santa fue finalmente desarraigado por el control musulmán.Los más familiarizados con la historia de las Cruzadas pueden preguntarse por qué he omitido mencionar la desastrosa Cruzada de los Niños de 1212, intercalada entre la 4ª y la 5ª Cruzada. La razón por la que he decidido omitirla en su mayor parte es porque los historiadores han llegado a dudar de la veracidad de los informes sobre ella. Ahora parece más apócrifa que real, confeccionada a partir de varios informes dispares de grupos que vagaban por el sur de Europa en busca de otra campaña para capturar Jerusalén. Se cuenta que un niño francés o alemán de 10 años tuvo una visión en la que se le decía que debía ir a Oriente Medio y convertir a los musulmanes por medios pacíficos. Cuando compartió esta visión e inició su viaje a Marsella, otros niños se unieron a su causa, junto con algunos adultos de dudosa reputación. A medida que sus filas aumentaban, llegaron a la costa francesa, esperando que los mares se separaran y les abrieran un camino para cruzar a Oriente Medio por tierra firme. No importaba que fuera un viaje de cientos de kilómetros. En cualquier caso, las aguas no se separaron y los niños, la mayoría, acabaron dispersándose. Los que no lo hicieron fueron acorralados por esclavistas que prometieron transportarlos a Tierra Santa, de forma gratuita. Sin embargo, una vez que estaban a bordo de un barco, eran cautivos y eran arrastrados a puertos extranjeros de todo el Mediterráneo, donde eran vendidos.Como he dicho, aunque la Cruzada de los Niños se ha considerado un acontecimiento real durante muchos años, recientemente se ha sometido a escrutinio y duda al examinar detenidamente los registros antiguos. Parece que es más bien un producto de cortar y pegar varias historias que tuvieron lugar durante esta época. De hecho, los niños eran bandas de pobres sin tierra de Europa que no tenían nada mejor que hacer que vagar por el sur de Francia y Alemania, esperando que se convocara la próxima Cruzada para poder ir y, con suerte, participar en el saqueo de las ricas tierras orientales.Quiero ofrecer ahora algunos comentarios sobre las Cruzadas. Así que, aviso, lo que sigue es pura opinión.Durante 7 siglos los cristianos han intentado olvidar las Cruzadas, pero los críticos y escépticos se empeñan en mantenerlas como un tema candente. Mientras que los judíos y los musulmanes han utilizado (en su mayoría con razón, creo) las Cruzadas durante generaciones como punto de queja. En tiempos más recientes, los Nuevos Ateos como Richard Dawkins y Sam Harris las han levantado como una palanca y han golpeado a los cristianos en la cabeza con ellas. ¿No es interesante que estos negadores de Dios tengan que asumir primero la moral bíblica para luego negarla? Si fueran coherentes con sus propias creencias ateas, tendrían que encontrar alguna otra razón para declamar las Cruzadas que no sea que está mal matar indiscriminadamente a la gente. ¿Por qué, según su motivo evolutivo darwinista, de supervivencia del más fuerte, no deberían aplaudir de hecho las Cruzadas? Al fin y al cabo, hacían avanzar la causa de la evolución al deshacerse de los elementos más débiles de la raza.Pero ¡no! Los Nuevos Ateos no utilizan esta línea de razonamiento porque es aborrecible. En lugar de ello, primero tienen que donar una creencia en la moral cristiana para atacar al cristianismo. Eso sí que es ser hipócrita.Y aclaremos los hechos. En el siglo XX se asesinó a más personas por motivos políticos e ideológicos que en todos los siglos anteriores juntos. Entre los comunistas, los nazis y los fascistas, se mataron más de 100 millones. Stalin, Hitler y Mao Zedong estaban motivados por una agenda atea, enraizada en una aplicación social del darwinismo.Karl Marx, el padre ideológico del socialismo comunista, aplicó las ideas evolucionistas de Darwin a la sociedad y convirtió a los seres humanos en meras piezas de una gran máquina llamada Estado. Cualquiera que se considerara un engranaje en lugar de una rueda dentada debía ser eliminado para que la máquina pudiera funcionar como querían los dirigentes. En nombre del comunismo, Stalin mató al menos a 20 millones; Mao, a unos 70 millones.Adolf Hitler se inspiró en el concepto darwiniano del ateo Fredrick Neizsche sobre el ubermensche = el superhombre; el siguiente paso evolutivo de la humanidad. Justificó la matanza de 10 millones diciendo que la Solución Final consistía simplemente en eliminar a quienes obstaculizaban la evolución de la humanidad. Empleó a todo un ejército de asesinos con mentalidad científica que creían que era correcto y bueno librar al mundo de la "maleza humana", como llamaban a los judíos, los eslavos, los homosexuales y los enfermos.Hace falta una ignorancia colosal de la historia para ignorar esto. Sin embargo, los Nuevos Ateos ignoran los hechos porque destruyen su premisa de que el ateísmo tiene la moral alta.Según las pruebas históricas, las Cruzadas, la Inquisición y los juicios por brujería mataron a unos 200.000 en total durante un periodo de 500 años. Ajustando el crecimiento de la población, eso sería alrededor de un millón en términos actuales. Eso es sólo el 1% del total asesinado por Stalin, Mao y Hitler; ¡y lo hicieron en unas pocas décadas!Así que mantengamos las Cruzadas, por muy brutales que fueran, y por muy contrarias a la naturaleza y las enseñanzas de Cristo que fueran, en la perspectiva histórica adecuada. ¡No! No las estoy justificando. ¡Fueron totalmente erróneas! Convertir la cruz en una espada y matar a la gente con ella es una blasfemia y merece la fuerte declamación de la Iglesia.Pero no olvidemos que los cruzados eran seres humanos con motivos no muy diferentes a los nuestros. Esos motivos estaban mezclados y a menudo en conflicto. La palabra cruzada viene de "tomar la cruz", según el ejemplo de Cristo. Por eso, de camino a Tierra Santa, el cruzado llevaba la cruz en el pecho. En su viaje de vuelta, la llevaba en la espalda.Pero la inmensa mayoría de los que iban a las cruzadas eran analfabetos, incluso la mayoría de los nobles. No se les enseñaba la Biblia como a los evangélicos de hoy. La gente de toda Europa pensaba que la salvación residía en la Iglesia y que era repartida por los sacerdotes bajo la dirección y discreción del Papa. Así que, si el Papa decía que los cruzados estaban haciendo la obra de Dios, se les creía. Cuando los sacerdotes difundían que morir por la santa causa de una Cruzada significaba eludir el purgatorio y acceder inmediatamente al cielo, miles de personas cogían el arma más cercana y se ponían en marcha.Para Urbano y los papas que le siguieron, las Cruzadas eran un nuevo tipo de guerra, una Guerra Santa. Agustín había establecido los principios de una "guerra justa" siglos antes. Esos principios eran . . .- Una Guerra Santa era dirigida por el Estado;- Su objetivo era la reivindicación de la justicia, es decir, la defensa de la vida y la propiedad;- Y su código exigía el respeto a los no combatientes; civiles y prisioneros.Aunque estos principios fueron adoptados originalmente por los cruzados cuando emprendieron la 1ª Campaña, se evaporaron en el calor del viaje y la realidad de la batalla.Las Cruzadas desencadenaron horribles ataques contra los judíos. Incluso los compañeros cristianos no estaban exentos de violaciones y saqueos. Increíbles atrocidades cayeron sobre el enemigo musulmán. Los cruzados serraban los cadáveres en busca de oro.A medida que avanzaban las Cruzadas, se alzaba alguna que otra voz que cuestionaba la conveniencia de tales movimientos y su valor final. A finales del siglo XII, el Abad Joaquín se quejó de que los Papas hacían de las Cruzadas un pretexto para su propio avance.Humberto de Romanis, general de los Dominicos, al confeccionar una lista de asuntos que debían tratarse en el Concilio de Lyon del año 1274, se vio obligado a refutar nada menos que 7 conocidas objeciones a las Cruzadas. Entre ellas se encontraban estas 4.- Era contrario a los preceptos del NT hacer progresar la religión mediante la espada;- Los cristianos pueden defenderse, pero no tienen derecho a invadir las tierras de otros;- Está mal derramar la sangre de los no creyentes;- Y los desastres de las Cruzadas demostraron que eran contrarias a la voluntad de Dios.Los cristianos de Europa durante los siglos XIV y XV iban a enfrentarse a problemas mucho más grandes que la conquista de Tierra Santa. Así que, aunque de vez en cuando se pedía una, ésta caía en saco roto.Erasmo, escribiendo al final de la Edad Media, hizo un llamamiento a la predicación del Evangelio como forma de enfrentarse a los musulmanes.  Dijo que la forma adecuada de derrotar a los turcos era la conversión, no la aniquilación. Dijo: "En verdad, no conviene declararnos hombres cristianos matando a muchos, sino salvando a muchos, no si enviamos a miles de paganos al infierno, sino si hacemos cristianos a muchos infieles; no si maldecimos y excomulgamos cruelmente, sino si con oraciones devotas y con el corazón deseamos su salud, y oramos a Dios para que les envíe mejores mentes."Los resultados a largo plazo de 2 siglos de cruzadas no fueron impresionantes. Si el objetivo principal de las Cruzadas era ganar Tierra Santa, frenar el avance del Islam y curar el cisma entre las Iglesias de Oriente y Occidente, fracasaron terriblemente.Durante un tiempo, los 4 reinos de los cruzados mantuvieron un territorio en la costa mediterránea de Tierra Santa. En ellos se formaron tres órdenes militares semi-monásticas: los Templarios, cuya primera sede estuvo en el emplazamiento del antiguo Templo de Jerusalén; los Hospitalarios, también conocidos como los Caballeros de San Juan de Jerusalén, fundados originalmente para cuidar a los enfermos y heridos; y los Caballeros Teutónicos germánicos. Estas órdenes combinaban el monaquismo y el militarismo y tenían como objetivos la protección de los peregrinos y la guerra perpetua contra los musulmanes. Contaban con 500 caballeros armados. Sus grandes castillos protegían los caminos y los pasos contra los ataques. Durante dos siglos, los Templarios, con sus túnicas blancas decoradas con una cruz roja, los Hospitalarios, con sus túnicas negras adornadas con la cruz de Malta blanca, y los Caballeros Teutónicos, con sus túnicas blancas con una cruz negra, fueron vistas habitualmente en los Estados de las Cruzadas y en toda Europa.Aunque las Cruzadas nos parecen hoy una terrible traición al cristianismo bíblico, debemos aportar la mentalidad del historiador y considerarlas en relación con la época en que ocurrieron. Esto no las excusa, pero las hace un poco más comprensibles.La sociedad europea de la Edad Media era irremediablemente belicosa. En la Europa feudal, todo el sistema económico y social dependía del mantenimiento de un ejército; los caballeros, soldados profesionales permanentes; por necesidad, debido al coste que suponía, nobles cuya única profesión era luchar. Las ciudades-estado de Italia estaban frecuentemente en guerra. En España, la presencia de los moros musulmanes trazó durante siglos una línea en el mapa. Así que, aunque los cristianos hubieran querido crear una sociedad pacífica, habría sido social y prácticamente difícil hacerlo.Una forma de afrontarlo fue idealizar la guerra. Es decir, presentar la guerra como una contienda entre el bien y el mal. En el desarrollo de la idea del caballero cristiano, hubo un intento de dar a la batalla espiritual una aplicación literal correspondiente. El caballero era un "soldado de Cristo", un guerrero del bien.  En una época en la que se consideraba que los sacerdotes y los monjes eran los únicos capaces de entrar en contacto con Dios, las Cruzadas eran una forma de que los laicos entraran en el reino espiritual y acumularan algunos puntos importantes con Dios. Los sacerdotes libraban la buena batalla mediante la oración; ahora los laicos podían luchar también, con una espada, una maza o, si era lo único que podían permitirse, una horquilla, hasta que llegaran al campo de batalla donde, con suerte, encontrarían un arma más adecuada.Por eso, para los cristianos medievales era importante convencerse de que la guerra que libraban estaba justificada. Se desarrolló un sofisticado sistema para identificar una guerra "justa". Agustín había hablado mucho de esto, explicando que alguien a quien le han robado su propiedad o su tierra tiene derecho a recuperarla, pero que esto era diferente de la guerra destinada a ampliar el propio territorio. El principio subyacente era que se podía utilizar una fuerza razonable para mantener el orden.A finales del siglo XI llegó un nuevo pensamiento; no la "Guerra Justa" de Agustín, sino el concepto de "Guerra Santa", una que Dios llamó a su pueblo a luchar para restaurar el control cristiano en Tierra Santa. Se trataba de una guerra que no sólo podía considerarse "justificada", y los pecados cometidos en su transcurso perdonados, sino meritoria. Dios recompensaría a los que la libraran. Guibert de Nogent, en su libro Los actos de Dios a través de los Francos, explicó cómo identificar una Guerra Santa. No estaba motivada por el deseo de fama, dinero o conquista. Su motivo era la salvaguarda de la libertad, la defensa del Estado y la protección de la Iglesia. Consideraba que este tipo de guerra era una alternativa válida a ser monje.Esta idea era tan atractiva para la mente medieval que, a medida que avanzaba el siglo XII, hubo que desalentarla, pues parecía que todo el mundo empezaba a ver la caballería y el combate como una guerra espiritual. Los bravucones siempre han sido capaces de convertir en villanos a los que quieren victimizar. Justificaban su brutalidad calificándola de misión divina. Así que los sacerdotes y los teólogos hicieron hincapié en que no todos los combates estaban bajo el mismo paraguas. Las cruzadas eran especiales.Por supuesto, uno de los principales principios de la teología musulmana es la yihad, la guerra santa para difundir la fe. A pesar de las ruidosas protestas de algunos hoy en día, el hecho es que el Islam que Mahoma enseñó, que por supuesto es el verdadero Islam, aprueba el yihad. ¿De qué otra forma se extendió desde su base en el desierto de Arabia a través de Oriente Medio, el norte de África y hasta Europa en tan poco tiempo si no es mediante el poder de la cimitarra?Me parece interesante que los musulmanes modernos censuren las Cruzadas cuando fueron sus propias campañas sangrientas las que tomaron las tierras que los cruzados pretendían ¿qué? ¡RECLAMAR! ¿Cómo podían RECLAMAR algo que no había sido RECLAMADO y conquistado por los musulmanes previamente? Lo repito: Esto no justifica en absoluto las Cruzadas. Son un periodo indefendible de la historia de la Iglesia que queda como una mancha oscura. Pero seamos claros: si son una mancha en la historia de la Iglesia, las conquistas de los musulmanes anteriores a las Cruzadas son igual de oscuras.

The title of this 138th episode is Liberal v EvangelicalIn our last episode, we considered the philosophical roots of Theological Liberalism. In this, we name names as we look at its early leaders and innovators.When I took a philosophy course in college, the professor dispensed on us sorry, unwashed noobs his understanding of faith and reason. After a lengthy description of both, he concluded by saying that faith and reason had absolutely nothing to do with each other. Reason dealt with the evidential, that which was perceived by the senses, and what logic concluded were rationally consistent conclusions drawn from that evidence. Faith, he declaimed, was a belief in spite of the evidence. When I asked if he was thus saying faith was irrational, he just smiled.That professor was an adherent of Immanuel Kant’s philosophy. In Kant’s work Critique of Pure Reason, published in 1781, Kant argued reason is able to comprehend anything in the realm of space and time; what he called the phenomenal realm. But reason is useless in accessing the noumenal, or spiritual realm transcending time and space.Kant didn’t argue against the existence of the spiritual realm. He simply said it’s only something we can experience by feelings. We can’t really THINK about it in the sense that it touches the rational mind.Traditional, orthodox Christians pushed back against the Kantian view of faith as feeling by reminding themselves Jesus said the greatest command was to love God with all they had, including their minds. But liberals found in Kant’s philosophy a justification for unhitching reason from faith and for allowing modern people to live in a secular world while still enjoying the benefits of religious sentiments about ultimate meaning. In other words, it allowed them to get along content with the WHAT of life in the world, without having to bother much with the HOW, or concern themselves at all with WHY.A few years after the publication of Kant’s Critique, the German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher, going against the heart and soul of Christian apologetics dating back hundreds of years, said the heart of Christian Faith isn’t a historical event, like the Resurrection. It was, he argued, a feeling of one’s absolute dependence on a reality beyond one’s self. That awareness, he claimed, could be developed to the point where a person would be able to imitate Jesus’ own good deeds.He wrote, “The true nature of religion is immediate consciousness of Deity as found in ourselves and the world.” This earned Schleiermacher the title, Father of Theological Liberalism. Schleiermacher was born in a pious Moravian home, but as a young man, he imbibed the rationalism of the Enlightenment and became an ardent apologist for accommodating Christianity to popular society. As a professor of the newly founded University of Berlin, he insisted debates over proofs of God’s existence, the authority of Scripture, and the possibility of miracles weren’t the issues they ought to focus on. He said that the heart of religion had always been feeling, rather than rational proofs. God is not a theory used to explain the universe. Rather, God is to be experienced as a living reality. For Schleiermacher, religion isn’t a creed to be pondered by the rational mind. It’s based on intuition and a feeling of dependence.Orthodox Christians who identified religion with creedal doctrines, Schleiermacher maintained, would lose the battle for the Faith in the Modern world because those creeds were no longer rationally acceptable. Religion needed to find a new base. He located it in feelings.Sin, Schleiermacher said, was the result of people living by themselves, isolated from others. To overcome the sin that makes man independent from God and others, God sent a mediator in Jesus Christ. Christ’s uniqueness wasn’t in doctrines about his virgin birth or deity. No à What made Jesus a Mediator who can help us is the perfect example he was of one utterly dependent on God. By meditating on Christ’s example, and feeling our own inner sense of dependence on the universe around us, we too can experience God as Jesus did.In Schleiermacher’s theology, the center of religion shifts from Scripture to experience. So, the Biblical criticism we looked at in the last episode can’t harm Christianity, since the real message of the Bible speaks to an individual’s own subjective pursuit of the divine. The Bible doesn’t need to be factual or true, as long as it affects the feeling of dependence that is the spark that leads to spiritual illumination.Albrecht Ritschl enlarged on Schleiermacher’s ideas, taking them mainstream.For Ritschl, religion had to be practical. It began with the question, “What must I do to be saved?” But he eschewed the merely theoretical. So the question “What must I do to be saved?” can’t just mean, “How do I get to heaven after I die?” Ritschl said salvation meant living a new life, free from sin, selfishness, fear, and guilt.Ritschl’s practical Christianity had to be built on fact, so he welcomed the search for the historical Jesus we talked about in the last episode. The great fact of the Christian Faith is the impact Jesus made on history. Nature, he maintained, gives an ambiguous understanding of God while History presents us with moments and movements that convey meaning.History conveys meaning alright – but I’m not sure all that history’s given us a less ambiguous understanding of God than Nature.Ritschl asserted religion rests on human values, not science. Science conveys facts, things as they are. Religion weighs those facts and attributes more or less value to them.Many Christians of the late 19th C considered Ritschl’s work helpful. It freed them from the destructive impact of the increasingly secular pursuits of history and science. It allowed biblical criticism to use scientific methodology in determining things like authorship, date, and the meaning of Scripture. But it recognized religion is more than facts. Values aren’t under the purview of science; that’s religion’s turf.Protestant Theological Liberalism accepted higher criticism’s denial of Jesus’ miracles, His Virgin Birth, and His preexistence. But that did not in any way diminish Jesus’ importance. For Liberals, His deity didn’t need to arise from His essence. It resides in what Jesus MEANS. He’s the consummate human being who shows us the path to enlightenment and nobility. He’s the embodiment of supremely high ethical ideals whose example inspires us to emulate His example. For Liberal Christians, The Church didn’t come out of some actual, factual events around Jerusalem 2000 years ago, it arose from Jesus’ awe-inspiring example. The Church isn’t a community of people who believe in a literally resurrected Savior so much as a value-creating community that gives meaning and mission to life. That mission is to create a society inspired by love, the Kingdom of God on earth.The impact of this Theological Liberalism wasn’t felt in just one denomination or region. It challenged traditional groups all over Europe and North America.  It appeared in the churches of New England with the moniker: New Theology. Its leading advocates came out of traditional Calvinism. Its greatest early popularizer was Lyman Abbott. Then came Henry Ward Beecher, William Tucker, and Lewis Stearns.Prior to 1880, most New England ministers and churches held to basic orthodox doctrines . . . The sovereignty of God; the depravity of humanity in original sin; the atonement of Christ; the necessity of the Holy Spirit in conversion; and the eternal separation of the saved and lost in heaven and hell.But after 1880, each of those beliefs came under withering fire from Liberals. The most publicized controversy took place at Andover Seminary. The seminary was established by Congregationalists 80 years before to counter Unitarian tendencies at Harvard. Attempting to preserve Andover’s orthodoxy, the founders required the faculty to subscribe to a creed summarizing their adherence to classic Calvinism. But by 1880, under the influence of liberalism, several of the faculty could no longer make the pledge. The spark that lit the flames of controversy was a series of articles in the Andover Review by liberal professors who argued the unsaved who die without any knowledge of the Gospel will have an opportunity at some future point to either accept or to reject the Gospel before facing judgment.Andover’s board filed an action against one of the authors of the articles as a test case. After years of moves and counter-moves, in 1892 the Supreme Court of Massachusetts voided the action of the Board. By then, most denominations had their own tussles with liberalism seeking to infiltrate their colleges and schools.The response to Protestant theological liberalism was a movement which many of our listeners have heard of – Evangelicalism.Evangelicalism began in England in the 19th C, an epoch that in some ways singularly belonged to Great Britain. It was the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution. London became the largest city and financial center of the World. British trade circled the globe; her navy ruled the seas. By 1914, Britannia ruled the most expansive empire in history.But the rapid commercial and industrial growth wasn’t equally distributed across England’s population. The pace of change left many stunned. Every traditionally sacred institution cracked at its foundation. Some feared the horrors of the French Revolution were about to be repeated on England’s hallowed shores while others sang the praises of Lady Progress and dreamed of even greater advances. They regarded England as the vanguard of a new day of prosperity and liberty for all. Fear and hope mingled.As the Age of Progress dawned in England, Protestants attended either the Anglican Church or one of the Nonconforming denominations of Methodist, Baptists, Congregationalist, and a handful of smaller groups. But now, for maybe the first time, Christians from different denominations also formed specialized groups with a specific aim; like distributing Bibles, redressing poverty in urban slums, teaching literacy, and supporting missionaries in the far-flung reaches of the Empire.While liberalism grew in seminaries and colleges among professors and theologians, many ministers working in churches as local pastors and the people in the pews grew increasingly uncomfortable with the emerging doubt in the intellectual centers of their denominations. They may not be as sophisticated or learned in the academic pursuits of the experts, but by golly, they didn’t think a PhD was necessary to believe in or follow God. And if holding a Ph.D. meant having to deny cardinal doctrines of the Faith, then no thank YOU, very much.Evangelicals pushed back on Liberals, saying Christians ought not just to accept what Science says, just because it says it. History proves today’s so-called “science” is tomorrow’s mockery. The Christian faith isn’t just about how it makes you feel and the meaning it brings you. It’s a Faith that rests on the actual, literal events of history. To deny those facts and events is to depart from traditional, orthodox Christianity.The Evangelical Movement began with the work of John Wesley and George Whitefield. Its main characteristics were its emphasis on personal holiness, arising from a conversion experience. It was also devoted to a practical concern for serving a needy world. That holiness and service were nourished by devotion to the Bible which was regarded as inspired and inerrant. The Evangelical message went forth from a large minority of Anglican pulpits and a majority in other denominations.The headquarters of Evangelicalism was a small village three miles from London called Clapham. It was the residence of a group of wealthy Evangelicals who practiced remarkable personal piety. The group’s spiritual leader was John Venn, a man of culture and sanctified common sense. They met for Bible study, conversation, and prayer in the library of the well-to-do banker, Henry Thornton.But the most famous member of the Clapham Groups was William Wilberforce, the parliamentary statesman. Wilberforce found a universe of talented help for Evangelical causes among his Clapham friends. These included John Shore, Governor-General of India; Charles Grant, Chairman of the East India Company; James Stephens, Under-Secretary for the Colonies; and Zachary Macauley, editor of the Christian Observer.At the age of just 25, Wilberforce was dramatically converted to Christ after reading Doddridge’s Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul.  He possessed all the qualities for outstanding leadership: ample wealth, a liberal education, and outstanding talent. Prime Minister William Pitt said Wilberforce had the greatest natural eloquence he’d ever known. Several testified of his amazing capacity for close friendship and his superior moral principles. For many reasons, Wilberforce seemed providentially prepared for the task and the time.He once said, “My walk is a public one: my business is in the world, and I must mix in the assemblies of men or quit the part which Providence has assigned me.”Under Wilberforce’s leadership, the Clapham friends were knit solidly together. At the Clapham mansion, they held what they called “Cabinet Councils.” They discussed the wrongs and injustices of their country, and the battles they’d have to fight. Inside and outside Parliament, they moved as one, delegating to each member the work he could do best to accomplish their common purpose.They founded . . .

• The Church Missionary Society
• The British and Foreign Bible Society
• The Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor
• The Society for the Reformation of Prison Discipline
• and many more.

Their greatest effort though was the campaign to end slavery. Which is a tale I’ll leave for others to follow up.While the Clapham group accomplished much, it was their role in abolishing slavery that provides a sterling example of how an entire society can be influenced by just a few.

The episode is titled Why So Critical?Two episodes back we introduced the themes that would lead eventually to Theological Liberalism. The last episode we talked a bit about how the church, mostly the Roman Catholic church, pushed back against those themes. In this episode, we’ll go further into the birth of liberalism.The 20th century was unkind to Theological Liberalism, with its shining vision of the Universal Brotherhood of Man under the Universal Fatherhood of God. Yet, many mainline Protestant denominations still hold solidarity with Liberalism. It was Professor Sydney Ahlstrom’s view that liberals had provoked as much controversy in the 19th century as the Reformers did in the 16th. The reason for that controversy lay in their objective, stated by one of its premier advocates and popularizers - Harry Emerson Fosdick. In his autobiography, The Living of These Days, the influential pastor of the famous Riverside Church in New York City, said the aim of liberal theology was to make it possible “to be both an intelligent modern and a serious Christian.”Liberals hoped to address a problem may be as old as The Faith itself: That is, how can Christians reconcile their faith to the intellectual climate of their time without compromising the Essentials of The Gospel? By the evaluation of modern Evangelicals, Liberalism failed in that quest precisely because they DID compromise those essentials in their desire to be relevant among their unbelieving peers. Richard Niebuhr expressed the irony of theological liberalism when he said in liberalism “a God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a Cross.”Personally, I’ve been reluctant to produce this episode because the more I’ve studied Theological liberalism, the less certain of being able to handle it competently I’ve grown. Definitions for it are no easier than for political liberalism. In fact, many deny that Protestant liberalism is a theology at all. They refer to it as an “outlook,” or “approach.” Henry Coffin of Union Seminary described liberalism as a “spirit” that honors truth so supremely and it craves the freedom to discuss, publish, and pursue what it believes to be true.But then, if THAT is true, it must certainly lead to certain convictions that derive values and produce judgments. And THAT is precisely what we see the history of Protestant liberalism producing.In the words of Bruce Shelley, “Liberals believed Christian theology had to come to terms with modern science if it ever hoped to claim and hold the allegiance of intelligent men.” So liberals refused to accept religious beliefs on authority alone. They insisted faith must submit to reason and experience. Following the thinking of the Enlightenment, of which they were the spiritual children, they claimed the human mind was capable of thinking God’s thoughts after Him. So, the best insight into the nature and character of God wasn’t His self-revelation in Scripture, which smacked of the old authoritarianism they eschewed; it was human intuition and reason.By surrendering to what we’ll call “the modern mind” liberals accepted the assumption of their time that the universe was a massive but synchronized machine, like a well-made watch. The key to this machine was Unity.I’ll come back to that in a moment, but a little editorializing seems in order. And while some may be rolling their eyes, I think this is germane to what this podcast is – a review of History – specifically Church History. I just made reference to “the modern mind.”Modern is another term that has multiple meanings. Historians use it to refer to the Modern Era, which they debate over the time span of, but let’s go with the common view that it runs from about 1500 to 1900-ish. So wait! IF the Modern Era ended at the beginning of the 20th century, what Era are we in now? The Atomic or Nuclear Era, the Post-Modern Era, the Information Age? Different labels get assigned to the current historical epoch. But don’t we still refer to current trends and fashions as being “modern”? Aren’t we “moderns” in the sense that we’re living NOW? Not many people would want to be considered not modern.It gets confusing because the word modern is plastic with a lot of different meanings and connotations. But here’s where it adds to the confusion as it relates to our discussion on theological liberalism, and some of this spills over into political liberalism. There was a desire to accommodate Christian theology to the modern mind. By which emerging liberals meant accepting the findings of “modern science” as (air-quote) fact and making theology fit into those supposed facts. But there’s a difference, a vast difference between facts and interpretations of facts. A few years after a so-called “Fact” was established by science, others came along to say, “Yeah, uh, we weren’t quite right about that. It’s actually this.” And, it wasn’t uncommon for even that revised new paradigm to be revised yet again.Is coffee good or bad for you? Right now, it’s good. But wait a month and it’ll be bad again, But not to worry, a year out, coffee will be the key to long life and amazing prosperity. Okay. I exaggerate, but not by much.My point is this, the current moment, what we mean by at least ONE of those definitions of “modern” – has a nasty habit of thinking that just by virtue of the fact that we’ve progressed to this point, we’re now smarter, more enlightened and so better than all the moments before this. There’s a kind of arrogance that seems endemic to the fact that we’re here now – the most evolved and educated class of human beings history has known.But a few moments from now, the people living then will think the same thing about themselves and see us as unenlightened bores. And the modern mind will have moved on to the new so-called facts of what turns out to not be science but is in truth scientism.When theology is hitched to “the modern mind” as liberals aimed to do, its eternal verities are traded in for the changing whims of what that is now, and now, then now. And we have to unhitch the adjective ‘eternal’ from those verities – because they simply aren’t true any longer.Okay, end of the editorializing. Adopting the modern view that the universe was a vast harmonious machine, liberals aimed for Unity. They tried merging revelation with natural religion and Christianity with other religions by looking for common themes. Thus, the study of comparative religions was born as an academic pursuit. They aimed to lower the wall between those who were saved and the lost, between God and man.Liberals regarded the traditional and orthodox belief in a transcendent God who exists in a realm above and beyond the natural as stalling their agenda to unify and harmonize. They blurred the lines between the natural and supernatural and equated the spiritual realm with human consciousness. The spiritual realm became little more than the intellectual and emotional activity of human beings. And God was defined as the universal life force that even now is creating the Universe. One liberal said it this way, “Some call it evolution; others call it God.”Remember, theological liberals, aimed to harmonize science with faith. The newest darling on the scientific scene was Darwin and his emerging theory of everything – Evolution by Mutation and Natural Selection. Theological Liberalism had no problem accepting Darwin’s theory.While the challenge of some of the assertions of science to orthodox Christianity was serious, they were secondary to the new views of history. Those views were adopted from the scientific method, which began a rigorous review of the assumptions that had framed classical or traditional history. If facts are based on evidence and repeatable observations, what were we to do with history, which by its very nature refers to the past? Historical criticism became the framework for a new generation of historians and academics. If a defendant is considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, events regarded by traditional history as certain were now suspect until proven true. Modern sensibilities were read back into and layered over persons and events of the past.The application of these liberal principles of historical inquiry to the Bible was called “biblical criticism.” But don’t understand the term criticism here to be pejorative. Biblical criticism simply meant a study of Scripture in order to discover its real meaning. But Biblical criticism discarded the dogmatics of traditional inquiry in favor of a more rationalistic approach.Biblical criticism flowed into two streams, lower and higher criticism. The low-critic dealt with the problem of the physical manuscripts and codices. Their goal was to find the earliest and most reliable texts of Scripture, as close as possible to the originals. The work of lower criticism helped produce the large number of New Testament manuscripts we have today and assisted translators in the work of producing modern Bible versions.Higher criticism proved to be a very different matter. The high-critic wasn’t so much interested in the accuracy of the text. He was more concerned with the meaning of the text. To get at that meaning, he often read between the lines or went behind the text to the events assumed to have produced it. This meant discovering who wrote it, when, and why. Higher criticism held that we can only get at the meaning of a passage when we see it against its background. Higher critics then went to work, systematically dismantling traditional views regarding hundreds of passages. A beloved Psalm, attributed in the text itself to David, higher critics tell us wasn’t written by King D. All because it has a word scholars say wasn’t used for forty-two years after David. So, it must have been written by the Jews in exile.The methods of Biblical higher criticism weren’t new. They’d been in use for a while on other ancient texts. But during the 19th century, they were applied to the Bible. And for many liberals, all it took was some scholar with a Ph.D. to say a traditional view of a passage was wrong, it was this other thing, for them to categorically throw over tradition in favor of the new view.Higher criticism agreed generally that Moses didn’t write the Pentateuch as both Jews and Christians had universally agreed till then. Instead, they’d been penned by at least four authors. And passages that seemed to be prophetic of future events must have been written after the events they supposedly foretold because modern scientific sensibilities don’t allow for the supernatural. High-critics said the Gospel of John, wasn’t = John’s Gospel, that is.Diverging from the discipline of Biblical Criticism was what’s known as the search for the “historical Jesus.” Liberals like the idea of Jesus, if not the actual Jesus presented in the Gospels. You know, the One Who made a whip and cleared the temple and called people white-washed tombs. A liberal reforming Jesus was someone they could get behind, but not the substitutionary-atoning Jesus of the Epistles because THAT Jesus meant a Holy God whose justice demands a sacrifice to discharge sins. And that was an archaic idea no longer acceptable to modern sensibilities. So, liberal critics assigned themselves the mission of saving Jesus from such barbaric and outdated modes of thinking. They assumed the early church and writers of the Gospels embellished Scripture to that end. It was their task to sift through the text and pull out what was legitimate and what was bogus.Literally dozens of so-called “lives of Jesus” were written during the 19th century, each claiming it revealed the true, historical Jesus. While most contradicted each other, they nearly all agreed to disavow the miraculous was central to the genuine Jesus story. They were bound to this since “science” proved the impossibility of miracles.Quick editorial comment – Let’s be clear, the scientific method can’t prove miracles are impossible. Miracles are by their very definition outside the realm of scientific investigation because repeatability is one of the required elements of the scientific method. Miracles, by the very definition, are a contravention of the laws that govern the material realm, and AREN’T typically repeatable. Miracles are unexpected!In their quest to merge science and faith, liberal theologians allowed the so-called facts of their time to be the filter through which they re-worked the content of the Christian Faith. They said Jesus not only didn’t work miracles, He never claimed to be the Messiah, or that history would climax in His visible return to establish the kingdom of God.The cumulative effect of all this was the doubt cast on the Bible as the inspired and infallible Word of God as the authority for faith and practice.When higher critics were done, Liberals were free to sort through Scripture to pick and choose what they wished. They read the Bible through the filter of evolution and saw a progression from blood-thirsty deities requiring sacrifices, to the Jews who embraced the idea of a righteous God served by those who pursue justice, love mercy, and walk humbly. This progressive revelation of God reached its climax in Jesus, where God is portrayed as the loving Father of all Humanity.So far, our review of Theological Liberalism has seemed bent toward a tearing down of traditionalism. That looks at just one side of the liberal coin. The other side was the concurrent movement known as Romanticism.During the early 19th century, Romanticism was a movement that flowed mainly in the artistic and intellectual communities. It looked at life through feelings. The Industrial Age seemed to many to reduce man to a cog in a vast societal machine. Romanticism was an attempt to lift man out of the gears and set him down as a glorious creator and engineer. Man was evolution’s apex achievement and had every right, duty even, to exalt in his lofty place, as well as to aspire to even greater heights. Romanticism focused on the individual and his/her ambitions to attain their ultimate potential. This was the genesis of the Human Potential Movement.So on one hand, liberals aimed for unity, but Romanticism exalted the individual. Liberalism broadened its agenda to unify the two by harmonizing them.Theological liberalism saw itself as the force to do it. Biblical Criticism had rescued the historical Jesus from the muck and mire of traditional orthodoxy. Romanticism then wanted to plant the idea of Jesus in the hearts of all people so they could become all their potential made possible.

The title of this episode is Push-BackAs we move to wind up this season of CS, we’ve entered into the modern era in our review of Church history and the emergence of Theological Liberalism. Some historians regard the French Revolution as a turning point in the social development of Europe and Western Civilization. The Revolution was in many ways, a result of the Enlightenment, and a harbinger of things to come in the Modern and Post-Modern Eras.At the risk of being simplistic, for convenience sake, let’s set the history of Western Civilization into these eras of Church History.First is the Roman Era, when Christianity was officially opposed and persecuted. That was followed by the Constantinian Era, when the Faith was at first tolerated, then institutionalized. With the Fall of the Roman Empire in the West, Europe entered the Middle Ages and the Church was led by Rome in the West, Constantinople in the East.The Middle Ages ended with the Renaissance which swiftly split into two streams, the Reformation and the Enlightenment. While many Europeans broke from the hegemony of the Roman Church to launch Protestant movements, others went further and broke from religious faith altogether in an exaltation of reason. They purposefully stepped away from spirituality toward hard-boiled materialism.This gave birth to the Modern Era, marked by an ongoing tension between Materialistic Rationalism and Philosophical Theism that birthed an entire rainbow of intellectual and faith options.Carrying on this over-simplified review from where our CS episodes have been, the Modern Era then turned into the Post-Modern Era with a full-flowering and widespread academic acceptance of the radical skepticism birthed during the Enlightenment. The promises of the perfection of the human race through technology promised in the Modern Era were shattered by two World Wars and repeated cases of genocide in the 20th and 21st Cs. Post-Moderns traded in the bright Modernist expectation of an emerging Golden Age for a dystopian vision of technology-run-amuck, controlled by madmen and tyrants. In a classic post-modern proverb, the author George Orwell said, “If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.”In our last episode, we embarked on a foray into the roots of Theological Liberalism. The themes of the new era were found in the motto of the French Revolution: “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.”Liberty was conceived as individual freedom in both the political and economic realms. Liberalism originally referred to this idea of personal liberty in regard to economics and politics. It’s come to mean something very different. Libertarian connects better with the original idea of liberalism than the modern term “liberalism.”In the early 19th C, liberals promoted the political rights of the middle class. They advocated suffrage and middle-class influence through representative government. In economics, liberals agitated for a laissez faire marketplace where individual enterprise rather than class determined one’s wealth.Equality, second term in the French Revolution’s trio, stood for individual rights regardless of legacy. If liberty was a predominantly middle-class virtue, equality appealed to rural peasants, the urban working class, and the universally disenfranchised. While the middle class and hold-over nobility advocated a laissez-faire economy, the working class began to agitate for equality through a rival philosophy called socialism. Workers inveighed for equality either through the long route of evolution within a democratic system or the shorter path of revolution via Marxism.Fraternity, the third idea in the trinity, was the Enlightenment reaction against all the war and turmoil that marked European history till then; especially the trauma that had rocked the continent through endless political, economic, and religious struggle. Fraternity represented a sense of brotherhood that rolled across Europe in the 19th C. And while it held the promise of uniting people in the concept of the universal brotherhood of man under the universal Fatherhood of God, it quickly devolved into Nationalism that would only lead to even bloodier conflicts since they were now accompanied by modern weapons.These social currents swirled around the Christian Faith during the first decades of the Age of Progress, but no one predicted the ruination they’d bring the Church of Rome, steeped as it was in an inviolable tradition. For over a thousand years she’d presided over feudal Europe. She enthroned dozens of monarchs and ensconced countless nobles. And like them, the Church gave little thought to the power of peasants and the growing middle class. In regards to social standing, in 18th C European society, noble birth and holy calling were everything. Intelligence or achievement meant little.Things began to heat up in Europe when Enlightenment thinkers began to question the old order. In the 1760s, several places around the world began to feel the heat of political unrest. There’d always been Radicals who challenged the status quo. It usually ended badly for them; forced to drink hemlock or such. But in the mid and late 18th C, they became popular advocates for the middle-class and poor. Their demands were similar: The right to participate in politics, the right to vote, the right to greater freedom of expression.The success of the American Revolution inspired European radicals. They regarded Americans as true heirs of Enlightenment ideals. They were passionate about equality; and desired peace, yet ready to fight for freedom. In gaining independence from the world’s most formidable power, Americans proved Enlightenment ideals worked.Then, in the last decade of the 18th C, France executed its king, became a republic, formed a revolutionary regime, and crawled through a period of brutality into the Imperialism of Napoleon Bonaparte.As we saw in an earlier episode, the Roman Catholic church was so much a part of the old order that revolutionaries often made it an object of their wrath. In the early 1790s, the French National Assembly sought to reform the Church along rationalist lines. But when it eliminated the Pope’s control and required an oath of loyalty on the clergy, it split the Church. The two camps faced off against each other in every village. Between thirty and 40,000 priests were forced into hiding or exile. Atheists recognized the cultural wind was now at their back and pressed for more. Why stop at reforming the Church when you could pry its grip from all society? Radicals moved to remove all traces of Christianity’s influence. They adopted a new calendar and elevated the cult of “Reason.” Some churches were converted to “Temples of Reason.”But by 1794 this farce had spent itself. The following year a statute was passed affirming the free exercise of religion, and loyal Catholics who’d kept a low profile during the Revolution returned. But Rome never forgot. For now, Liberty meant the worship of the goddess of Reason.When Napoleon took control, he struck an agreement with the pope; the Concordat of 1801. It restored Roman Catholicism as the quasi-official religion of France. But the Church had lost much of its prestige and power. Europe would never again be a society held together by an alliance of altar and throne. On the other side of things, Rome never welcomed the liberalism reshaping much of Europe’s courts.As Bruce Shelley aptly remarks, Jesus and the apostles spent little time talking about political freedom, personal liberty, or a person’s right to their opinions. Valuable and important as those things are, they simply do not come into view as values in the appeal of the Gospel. The freedom Christ offers comes through salvation, which places a necessary safeguard on liberty to keep it from becoming a dangerous license.But during the 19th C, it became popular to think of liberty ITSELF as being free! Free of any and all restraint. Any restriction on freedom was met with a knee-jerk opposition. Everyone ought to be as free as possible. The question then became; just what does that mean. How far does “possible” go?John Stuart Mill suggested this guideline, “The liberty of each, limited by the like liberty of all.” Liberty meant the right to your opinions, the freedom to express and act upon them, but not to the degree that in doing so, you impinge others’ ability to do so with theirs. Politically and civilly, this was best made possible by a constitutional government that guaranteed universal civil liberty, including the freedom to worship according to one’s choice.Popes didn’t like that.In the political and economic vacuum that followed Napoleon, several monarchs tried to re-establish the old systems of Europe. They were resisted by a new and empowered wave of liberals. The first of these liberal uprisings were quickly suppressed in Spain and Italy. But the liberals kept at it and in 1848, revolution temporarily triumphed in most European capitals.Popes Leo XII, Pius VIII, and Gregory XVI by all accounts were good men. But they ignored the emerging modernity of 19th century Europe by clinging to a moribund past.There are those who would say it’s not the duty of the Church to keep pace with changing times. The truths of God don’t change. So on the contrary, the Church is to remain resolute in holding to The Faith once and for all delivered to the saints. Faithfulness to the essentials of the Christian Faith is not what we’re referring to here. You can change the flooring in your house without agreeing with the world. Some Popes of the late 18th to mid 19th century seemed to kind of pull the blinds of Vatican windows, trying to keep out the philosophical ideas then sweeping the Continent. That posture toward the wider culture tended to only further alienate the intellectual community.This early form of Liberalism wanted to address historic evils that have plagued humanity. But it refused to allow the Catholic Church a role in that work as it related to morality and public life. Liberals said politics ought to be independent of Christian ethics. Catholics had rights as private citizens, but their Faith wasn’t welcome in the public arena. This is part of the creeping secularism we talked about in the last episode.One of the lingering symbols of papal ties to the Medieval world was the Papal States where the Pope was both spiritual leader and civil ruler. In the mid-19th C, a movement for Italian unity began that aimed to turn the entire peninsula into a single nation. Such a revolution wouldn’t tolerate the Papal States. Liberals welcomed Pope Pius IX, who seemed a reforming Pope who’d listen to their counsel. In 1848, he installed a new constitution for the Papal States granting moderate participation in government. This movement toward liberal ideals moved some to suggest the Pope as leader over a unified Italy. But when Pius’ appointed Prime Minister of the Papal States was assassinated by revolutionaries, Pius rescinded the new constitution. Instead of putting the revolution down, it broke out in Rome itself and Pius had to flee. With French assistance, he returned and returned the Papal states to an absolutist regime. Opposition grew under the leadership of King Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia. In 1859 and 60 large sections of the Papal States were carved away by nationalists. Then in March of 1861, Victor Emmanuel was proclaimed King of Italy in Florence.But the City of Rome was protected by a French garrison. When the Franco-Prussian War forced the withdrawal of French troops, Italian nationalists invaded. After a short engagement in September of 1870, Rome surrendered. After lasting for a millennium, the Papal States were no more.Pius IX holed up in the Vatican. Then in June 1871, King Victor Emmanuel transferred his residence to Rome, ignoring the protests and threatened ex-communication by the pope. The new government offered Pius an annual salary together with the free and unhindered exercise of his religious roles. But the Pope rejected the offer and continued his protests. He forbade Italy’s Catholics to participate in political affairs. That just left the field open to more radicals. The result was a growing anticlerical course in Italian civil affairs. This condition became known as the “Roman Question.” It had no resolution until Benito Mussolini concluded the Lateran Treaty in February 1929. The treaty stipulated that the pope must renounce all claims to the Papal States, but received full sovereignty in the tiny Vatican State. This condition exists to this day.1870 not only marks the end of the rule of the pope of civil affairs in Italy, it also saw the declaration of his supreme authority as the Bishop of Rome in a doctrine called “Papal Infallibility.” The First Vatican Council, which hammered out the doctrine, represented the culmination of a movement called “ultramontanism” meaning “across the mountains.” Originally referring to the Pope’s hegemony beyond the Alps into the rest of Europe, the term eventually came to mean over and beyond any mountain. Ultramontanism formalized the Pope’s right to lead the Church.It came about thus . . .Following the French Revolution (and here we are yet again, recognizing the importance of that revolution in European and world affairs) an especially strong sense of loyalty to the Pope developed there. After the nightmare of the guillotine and the cultural trauma of Napoleon’s reign, many Catholics came to regard the papacy as the only source of civil order and public morality. They believed only popes were capable of restoring sanity to society. Only the papacy had the power to guide the clergy to protect religion from political coercion.Infallibility was suggested as a necessary prerequisite for an effective papacy. The Church had to become a monarchy adjudicating God’s will. Shelley says as sovereignty was to secular kings, infallibility would be to popes.By the mid-19th C, this thinking attracted many Catholics. Popes encouraged it in every possible way. One publication said when the pope meditated, God was thinking in him. Hymns appeared that were addressed, not to God, but to Pius IX.  Some even spoke of the Pope as the vice-God of humanity.In December 1854, Pius IX declared as dogma The Immaculate Conception; a belief that had been traditional but not official; that Mary was conceived without original sin. The subject of the decision was nothing new. What was, however, was the way it was announced. This wasn’t dogma defined by a creed produced by a council.  It was an ex-cathedra proclamation by the Pope. Ex Cathedra means “from the chair,” and defines an official doctrine issued by the teaching magisterium of the Holy Church.Ten years after unilaterally announcing the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, Pius sent out an encyclical to all bishops of the Church. He attached a Syllabus of Errors, a compilation of eighty evils then in place in society. He declared war on socialism, rationalism, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, public schools, Bible societies, separation of church and state, and a host of other so-called errors of the Modern Era. He ended by denying that “the Roman pontiff ought to reach an agreement with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization.”It was a hunker down and rally round an infallible pope mentality that aimed to enter a kind of spiritual hibernation, only emerging when Modernity had impaled itself on its own deadly horns and bled to death.Pius saw the need for a new universal council to address the Church’s posture toward Modernity and its philosophical partner, Liberalism. He began planning for it in 1865 and called the First Vatican Council to convene at the end of 1869.The question of the definition of papal infallibility was all the buzz. Catholics had little doubt that as the successor of Peter the Pope possessed special authority. The only question was how far that authority went. Could it be exercised independently from councils or the college of bishops?After some discussion and politicking, 55 bishops who couldn’t agree to the doctrine as stated were given permission by the Pope to leave Rome, so as not to create dissension. The final vote was 533 for the doctrine of infallibility. Only 2 voted against it. The Council asserted 2 fundamentals: 1) The primacy of the pope and 2) His infallibility.First, as the successor of Peter, vicar of Christ, and supreme head of the Church, the pope exercises full authority over the whole Church and over individual bishops. That authority extends to all matters of faith and morals as well as to discipline and church administration. Consequently, bishops owe the pope obedience.Second, when the pope in his official capacity, that is ex cathedra, makes a final decision concerning the entire Church in a matter of faith and morals, that decision is infallible and immutable and does not require the consent of a Council.The strategy of the ultramontanists, led by Pius IX, shaped the lives of Roman Catholics for generations. Surrounded by the hostile forces of modernity; liberalism and socialism, Rome withdrew behind the walls of an infallible papacy.

The title of this episode of CS is Liberal.The term “modern” as it relates to the story of history, has been treated differently by dozens of authors, historians, and sociologists. Generally speaking, Modernization is the process by which agricultural and rural traditions morph into an industrial, technological, and urban milieu that tends to be democratic, pluralistic, socialist, and/or individualistic.In the minds of many, the process of modernization is evidence of the validity of evolution. The idea is that evolution not only applies to the increasing complexity and adaptation of biological life, it also applies sociologically to civilization and human systems. They too are evolving. So, progress is good; a sign of societal evolution.But critics of modernization decry the abuses it often creates. Not all modern innovations are beneficial. The increased emphasis on individual rights can weaken a person’s sense of belonging to and identity in a family and community. It weakens loyalty to valuable traditions and customs. Modernization builds new weapons that may encourage their inventors to assume they’re superior, then use them to subjugate and dominate those they deem inferior, appropriating their land and resources.Modernization is often linked to a creeping secularization, a turning away from theistic religion. Periodic revivals are viewed as just momentary blips in societal evolution; temporary distractions in progress toward the realization of the Enlightenment dream of a totally secular society.It was during the 19th C that the rationalist ideas of the Enlightenment finally moved out of the halls of academia to settle in as the status quo for European society. Christians found themselves caught up in a world of mind-numbing change. Their cherished beliefs were assailed by hostile critics. Authors like Marx and Nietzsche attacked the Christian Faith from a base in Darwin’s popular new theory.In an attempt to accommodate Faith and Reason, Ludwig Feuerbach, author of The Essence of Christianity, published in 1841, reduced the idea of God to that of a man. He said God is really just the projection of specific human qualities raised to the level of perfection.In 1855, Ludwig Büchner suggested that science dispensed with the need for supernaturalism. A materialist, he was one of the first to say that the advent of modern science meant there was no longer a need to explain phenomena by appealing to the miraculous or some ethereal spiritual realm. No such realm existed, except in the minds of those who refused to accept what science proved. He said, “The power of spirits and gods dissolve in the hands of science.”During the last half of the 19th C, Frederic Nietzsche made the case for atheism. Son of a Lutheran pastor, Nietzsche received an education in theology and philology at the Universities of Bonn and Leipzig.An amateur musician, Nietzsche became friends with composer Richard Wagner, who like Nietzsche, admired the atheist Schopenhauer.In Nietzsche’s philosophy, we see the fruit of something we looked at in an earlier episode. The rationalist emphasis on reason divorced from faith leads ultimately to irrationality because it claims omniscience. By saying there IS no realm but the material realm, it closes itself off to even the possibility of a non-material realm. Yet the process of reason leads inevitably and inexorably to the conclusion there MUST be a realm of being, a category of existence beyond, apart from the material realm of nature.So Nietzsche embraced what has to be called non-rational ideas as the source for creativity, what he called “true living,” and art. An early indication his mind was fracturing, he identified as a follower of Dionysus, god of sexual debauchery and drunkenness. It’s no surprise he indicted Christianity as promoting all that which was weak. He hated its emphasis on humility and its acceptance of the role of guilt in aiming to better people by moving them to repentance and renouncing self. For Nietzsche, the self was the savior. He advocated for people to exalt themselves and unapologetically assert their quest for power. He coined the term Übermensch, the superman whose been utterly liberated from the outdated mores of Biblical Christianity and governed by nothing but truth and reason. This superman decides for himself what’s right or wrong.Nietzsche claimed “God is dead,” so no absolutes exist. There were no facts, only interpretations. Many creatives; authors, painters, and researchers were inspired by Nietzsche and used his writings as inspiration.It was at this time that advocates for what was called comparative religions argued Christianity ought to be studied as just one of several religions rather than from a confessional perspective that views it as TRUE. The assumption was that religion, just like everything else, had evolved from a primitive to a more complex state. A comparative study might find the core idea that united all religions, just as paleontologists looked for the common ancestor to man and apes.By the second half of the 19th C, derivations of the word “secular,” along with new words like agnostic, and eugenics, were part of European vocabularies. Secularization was identified with an emerging modernist separation of morality from traditional religion.Thomas Huxley minted the word agnostic to distinguish mere skeptics from hard-boiled atheists. It seems his development of the term may have actually helped many students, academics, and members of the upper classes in Victorian England shed traditional religious faith and embrace Rationalist-styled unbelief. They did so because they could now express their growing discomfort with supernaturalism without having to go all the way and declaim any belief in a Supreme being. It provided some philosophical wiggle room.Francis Galton introduced the word eugenics in 1883 to designate efforts to make the human race better by “improved” breeding. Galton, an evolutionary scientist, believed eugenics would favor the fittest human beings and suppress the birth of the unfit.In light of all this, it’s not hard to understand why Christian leaders were suspicious that “modernity” and “secularization” seemed to go hand in hand. Many materialists came right out and said they were the same; to be modern meant to be secular and hostile to religious faith.In 1874 John Draper published the hugely influential History of the Conflict between Science and Religion, in which he said religion is the inveterate enemy of reason and science. European society in particular saw a collapse of the political, religious, and social masters that had steered it for centuries. In their place intellectuals emerged who sought a secular substitute to traditional religion.What made this process seemingly unstoppable was the results of modernization and the fruit of technology rapidly enhancing the quality of life across the continent. Many Christians felt they faced a losing battle defending the faith, “once for all delivered to the saints” against the onslaught of a science delivering such wonderful tools every other week.They began to wonder if they could remain “orthodox” while becoming “modern” Christians.That challenge was complicated by the work of Charles Darwin. What made it an even greater challenge was when believers heard from scientists who said they were Christians, who told them Darwin was right. Humans were descended from the apes, not Adam and Eve.Others, like Bishop Samuel Wilberforce, boldly declared Darwin’s ideas incompatible with Scripture. In 1860, Wilberforce published a well-crafted and lengthy response to the Origin of Species. He praised Darwin’s research and engaging style and even gave a nod to  Darwin’s admission to being a Christian. But Wilberforce was careful to mark out many of Darwin’s claims as erroneously conceived.Wilberforce said God is the Author of both the Books of Nature and Scripture. So it’s not possible for the two to contradict each other. It’s been the object of one branch of Apologetics to justify that ever since.In October 1860, Bishop Wilberforce and Huxley engaged in a famous debate at the British Association in Oxford over Darwin’s theories. Huxley shrewdly portrayed the cleric as meddling in scientific matters beyond his competency. Wilberforce used a classic debate rhetorical device that had little to do with the substance of the debate but would prejudice the audience against his opponent. Huxley took the barb, then turned it around and used it to paint Wilberforce as HAVING to use such tactics because of the supposed weakness of his argument. If the Bishop had stuck to the content of his original article in the British Digest, he’d have fared much better.The debate over Darwin’s theory took many turns. Some wondered if he was right that evolutionary processes were progressive in the sense that they moved toward a species perfection. Darwin had said, “As natural selection works solely by and for the good of each being, all corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress towards perfection.” Supporters of Darwinism had a rationale for what came to be known as Social Darwinism with its advocacy for racism and eugenics.Ernst Haeckel introduced Darwinism to Germany. A brilliant zoologist, in 1899, Haeckel published The Riddle of the Universe, in which he argued for a basic unity between organic and inorganic matter. He denied the immortality of the soul, the existence of a personal God, promoted infanticide, suicide, and the elimination of the unfit. Using a hundred lithographs drawn from nature (1904), Haeckel campaigned for the teaching of evolutionary biology in Germany as fact. This was in contrast with the many scientists who viewed Darwinism as an evolving theory.At the dawn of the 20th C, the debate over Darwinism continued. As early as 1910, some claimed the theory of evolution was already dead. As subsequent history has shown, yeah –uh, not quite.Under mounting pressure, Europeans who wanted to be considered “modern, scholarly” yet remain “Christian” often made accommodations in the way they expressed their faith. Early in the century, liberal theologians found new ways to describe and explain the Christian faith. Friedrich Schleiermacher proposed that Truth in Christianity was located in a personal religious experience, not in its historical events or correspondence to reality. He criticized Scholastic Protestant orthodoxy emphasizing assent to propositions about God. He said what was far more important was one’s subjective experience of the divine.Later in the century, Catholic modernists said the Roman Catholic Church must accommodate the advances in knowledge made by higher criticism and Darwinism. They also declaimed the lack of democracy in the running of the Church. Pushing back against all this in 1910 Pope Pius X condemned modernism as the “synthesis of all heresies.”Faced with such dramatic changes and challenges, many 19th C Christians felt the need to define and defend their faith in new ways. That wasn’t an easy task in light of some of the charges being made against it. Those who wanted to align the Faith with the modern scholarship discovered its rules tended to ensconce naturalist presuppositions that allowed no room for the supernaturalism required in theism.Anglicans and those in the Oxford Movement saw no such need to adjust their beliefs. They simply reaffirmed the authority of their faith communities and emphasized the importance of confessions, creeds, and Scripture. In mid-July, 1833, the Anglican theologian John Keble preached a famous sermon titled, “National Apostasy,” which triggered the beginning of the Oxford Movement. Keble warned about the repercussions of forsaking the Anglican Church.We’ll take a closer look at the emergence of Theological Liberalism in our next episode.

The title of this episode is Coping.It’s time once again to lay down our focus on the Western Church to see what’s happening in the East.With the arrival of Modernity, the Church in Europe and the New World was faced with the challenge of coping in what we’ll call the post-Constantine era. The social environment was no longer favorable toward Christianity. The institutional Church could no longer count on the political support it enjoyed since the 4th C. The 18th C saw Western Christianity faced with the challenge of secular states that may not be outright hostile but tended to ignore it.In the East, Christianity faced far more than benign neglect for a long time. When Constantinople fell in 1453 to the Turks, The Faith came under a repressive regime that alternately neglected and persecuted it.While during the Middle Ages in Europe, Popes were often more powerful than Kings, the Byzantine Emperor ruled the Church. Greek patriarchs were functionaries under his lead. If they failed to comply with his dictates, they were deposed and replaced by those who would. When the Emperor decided reuniting with Rome was required to save the empire, the reunion was accomplished against the counsel of Church leaders. Then, just a  year later, Constantinople fell to the Ottomans. Many Eastern Christians regarded this calamity as a blessing. They viewed it as liberation from a tyrannical emperor who’d forced them into a union with a heretical church in Rome.The new Ottoman regime initially granted the Church limited freedom. Since the patriarch fled to Rome, the conqueror of Constantinople, Mohammed II, allowed the bishops to elect a new patriarch.  He was given both civil and ecclesiastical authority over Christians in the East. In the capital, half the churches were converted to mosques. The other half were allowed to continue worship without much change.In 1516, the Ottomans conquered the ancient seat of Middle Eastern Christianity in Syria and Palestine. The church there was put under the oversight of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Then, when Egypt fell a year later, the Patriarch of Alexandria was given authority over all Christians in Egypt. Under the Ottomans, Eastern Church Patriarchs had vast power over Christians in their realm, but they only served at the Sultan’s pleasure and were often deposed for resisting his policies.In 1629, the Patriarch of Constantinople, Cyril Lucaris, wrote what was considered by many, a Protestant treatise titled Confession of Faith. He was then deposed and executed. Fifty years later, a synod condemned him as a “Calvinist heretic.” But by the 18th C, the Reformation wasn’t a concern of the Eastern Church. What was, was the arrival of Western philosophy and science. In the 19th C, when Greece gained independence from Turkey, the debate became political. Greek nationalism advocated Western methods of academics and scholarship. The Greeks also demanded that the Greek Church ought to be independent of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Conservatives wanted to subsume scholarship under tradition and retain allegiance to Constantinople.During the 19th and early 20th Cs, the Ottoman Empire broke up, allowing national Orthodox churches to form in Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania. The tension between nationalist and conservative Orthodoxy dominated the scene. In the period between the two world wars, the Patriarch of Constantinople acknowledged the autonomy of Orthodox churches in the Balkans, Estonia, Latvia, and Czechoslovakia.Early in the 20th C, the ancient patriarchates of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch were ruled by Arabs. But the newly formed states existed under the shadow of Western powers. This was a time when out of a desire to identify with larger groups who could back them up politically and militarily, a large number of Middle Eastern Christians became either Catholic or Protestant. But an emergent Arab nationalism reacted against Western influence. The growth of both Protestantism and Catholicism was curbed. By the second half of the 20th C, the only nations where Eastern Orthodox Christianity retained its identity as a state church were Greece and Cyprus.The fall of Constantinople in 1453 was viewed by Russian Christians as God’s punishment for its reunion with the heretical Rome. They regarded Moscow as the “3rd Rome” and the new capital whose task was to uphold Orthodoxy. In 1547, Ivan IV took the title “czar,” drawn from the ancient “Caesar” a proper name that had come to mean “emperor.” The Russian rulers deemed themselves the spiritual heirs to the Roman Empire. Fifty years later, the Metropolitan of Moscow took the title of Patriarch. The Russian Church then churned out a barrage of polemics against the Greek Orthodox Church, Roman Catholics, and Protestants. By the 17th C, the Russian Orthodox Church was so independent when attempts were made by some to re-integrate the Church with its Orthodox brothers, it led to a schism in the Russian church and a bloody rebellion.Now—I just used the term “metropolitan.” We mentioned this in an earlier episode, but now would be a good time for a recap on terms.The Roman Catholic Church is presided over by a Pope whose authority is total, complete. The Eastern Orthodox Church is led by a Patriarch, but his authority isn’t as far-reaching as the Pope. Technically, his authority extends just to his church. But realistically, because his church is located in an important center, his influence extends to all the churches within the sphere of his city. While there is only one pope, there might be several Patriarchs who lead various branches of the Eastern Orthodox Church.A Metropolitan equates loosely to an arch-bishop; someone who leads a church that influences the churches around it.Peter the Great’s desire to westernize a recalcitrant Russia led to an interest on the part of Russian clergy in both Catholic and Protestant theology. Orthodoxy wasn’t abandoned; it was simply embellished with new methods. The Kievan school adopted a Catholic flavor while the followers of Theophanes Prokopovick leaned toward Protestantism. In the late 19th C, a Slavophile movement under the leadership of Alexis Khomiakov applied some of Hegel’s analytics to make a synthesis called sobornost; a merging of the Catholic idea of authority with the Protestant view of freedom.Obviously, the Russian Revolution at the beginning of the 20th C put an end to all this with the arrival of a different Western Philosophy - Marxism. In 1918, the Church was officially separated from the State. The Russian Constitution of 1936 guaranteed “freedom for religious worship” but also “freedom for anti-religious propaganda.” In the 1920s, religious instruction in schools was outlawed. Seminaries were closed. After the death of the Russian Patriarch in 1925, the Church was forbidden to name a successor until 1943. The State needed all the help it could get rallying the population in the war with Germany. The seminaries were re-opened and permission was given to print a limited number of religious books.In the late 20th C, after 70 years of Communist rule, the Russian Orthodox Church still had 60 million members.In a recent conversation I had with a woman who grew up in Czechoslovakia during the Soviet Era, she remarked that under the Communists the Church survived, though few attended services. Freedom of religion was the official policy under the Soviets. But in reality, those who professed faith in God were marked down and passed over for education, housing, and other amenities, thin as they were under the harsh Soviet heel. You could be a Christian under Communism; but if you were, you were pretty lonely.Several years ago, when Russia opened to the rest of the world, I had a chance to go in with a team to teach the Inductive Study method as part of Russia’s attempt to teach its youth morality and ethics.A senior citizen attended the class who between sessions regaled us with tales of being a believer under Communism. He looked like something straight out of an old, grimy black and white photo of a wizened old man with thinning white hair whose wrinkled face speaks volumes in the suffering he’d endured. He told us that he’d spent several stints in Russian prisons for refusing to kowtow to the Party line and steadfastly cleaving to his faith in God.It’s remarkable the Church survived under Communism in the Soviet Bloc. Stories of the fall of the Soviets in the early ’80s are often the tale of a resurgent Church.There are other Orthodox churches in various parts of the world. There’s the Orthodox Church of Japan, China, and Korea. These communions, begun by Russian missionaries, are today, indigenous and autonomous, with a national clergy and membership, as well as a liturgy conducted in their native tongue.Due to social strife, political upheavals, persecution, and the general longing for a better life, large numbers of Orthodox believers have moved to distant lands. But as they located in their new home, they often transported the old tensions. Orthodoxy believes there can only be a single Orthodox congregation in a city. So, what to do when there are Greek, Russian or some other flavor of Eastern Orthodox believers all sharing the same community?Keep in mind not all churches in the East are part of Eastern Orthodoxy. Since the Christological controversies in the 5th C, a number of churches that disagreed with established creeds maintained their independence. In Persia, most Christians refused to refer to Mary as Theotokos = the Mother of God. They were labeled as Nestorians and declared heretical; though as we saw way back when we were looking at all this, Nestorius himself was not a heretic. Nestorians are more frequently referred to as Assyrian Christians, with a long history. During the Middle Ages, the Assyrian church had many members with missions extending as far as China. In modern times, the Assyrian Church has suffered severe persecution from Muslims. Early in the 20th C and again more recently, persecution decimated its members. Recent predations by ISIS were aimed at these brethren.Those churches that refused to accept the findings of the Council of Chalcedon were called Monophysites because they elevated the deity of Christ over His humanity to such a degree it seemed to make that humanity irrelevant. The largest of these groups were the Copts of Egypt and Ethiopia. The Ethiopian church was the last Eastern church to receive State support. That support ended with the overthrow of Haile Selassie in 1974. The ancient Syrian Monophysite Church, known more popularly as Jacobite, continued in Syria and Iraq. Its head was the Patriarch of Antioch who lived in Damascus. Technically under this patriarchate, but in reality autonomous, the Syrian Church in India has half a million members.As we saw in a previous episode, the Armenian Church also refused to accept the Chalcedonian Creed, because it resented the lack of support from Rome when the Persians invaded. When the Turks conquered Armenia, the fierce loyalty of the Armenians to their faith became one more spark that lit the fuse of ethnic hostility. In 1895, 96, and again in 1914 when the world was distracted elsewhere by The Great War, thousands of Armenians living under Turkish rule were massacred. A million escaped to Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Greece, France, and other Western nations where the memory of the Armenian Holocaust lives on and continues to play an important role in international relations and the development of foreign policy.

This episode is titled Coming ApartEurope in the late 19th C was recovering from the Napoleonic Wars. War-weary, nations longed for a prolonged peace in which to take a breath, and consider HOW they were going to rebuild from the devastation recent conflicts had left. A plethora of new economic and political theories were available for them to choose from as they rebuilt. Most settled on economic and political ideas that were more liberal toward individual rights. The prosperity that marked Holland became a model for a good part of Europe as they moved to a free-market system. With few exceptions, the governments of Europe adopted modified parliamentary systems.This is the time when Europe moved from kingdoms to the more modern notion of nation-states.  Religious affiliation keying off the Reformation and Counter-reformation often played a part in defining borders. For instance, under the influence of Prussian leadership, Germany was fiercely Protestant while Austria was doggedly Roman Catholic. Belgium was Catholic while The Netherlands were Protestant.But maybe the most important development that occurred from the mid to late 19th C in Europe was the escalating divide between church and state.Following the Reformation, in those regions where Protestantism reigned, the church maintained a relationship with the State, much as the Catholic Church had before. But after the French Revolution, things changed. This was due to the emerging power of civil governments no longer beholden to clerical authority. The laisse-faire economics practiced across Europe birthed an economic boom that had a remarkable impact on the way people regarded much more than just economics. While many nations kept a State church subsidized by public funds, there was a boom in free churches supported solely by the offerings of their members. Being economically independent, they didn’t see the need to comply with some overarching ecclesiastical hierarchy. Freedom of thought and the freedom of the individual conscience so exalted by Enlightenment philosophy was linked solidly to the Reformation principle of Sola Scriptura, so that people valued their right to read and interpret the Bible for themselves. It got to the point where the free churches considered themselves as the real bastions of orthodoxy since their doctrine wasn’t tainted by economic interests and the need to endorse the State in order to keep their subsidy.While Great Britain followed a parallel track to that of the Continent in the 19th C, the Industrial Revolution had a greater impact there. The Industrial Revolution benefitted the middle class and those entrepreneurs who rode its wave, while diminishing the wealth and influence of the old nobility and pulverizing the poor. The too-rapid growth of cities led to overcrowding, slums, and increased crime. The poor lived in miserable conditions and were exploited at work. That led to a mass migration to the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. It also led to the birth of the Labor Party which became a potent force in British politics. It was in England, against the back-drop of the abuses of the Industrial Revolution, that Karl Marx developed many of his economic theories.All this influenced the Church in England. During the French Revolution, it held several of the evils that had characterized the worst of the medieval church: Errors such as clerical absenteeism and holding multiple church offices for nothing more than personal gain. Then, a major renewal shook the Church of England. A reform-minded clergy took charge and bolstered by laws enacted by Parliament, were able to roll back the abuses. These reformers where of the Evangelical movement within Anglicanism, Pietists who longed to move away from the high-church magisterialism of Anglicanism to a greater solidarity with Continental Protestantism. A counter-movement responded in the Oxford movement, which  produced a kind of Anglo-Catholicism. Heavily influenced by Romanticism and Eastern Orthodoxy, the Oxford movement emphasized the authority of tradition, apostolic succession, and Communion, rather than preaching, as the center of Christian worship.But it was in the free churches in England that most spiritual vitality was found during the late 19th C. The growth of the middle-class resulted in an surge in membership at free churches. Outreaches to the poor helped alleviate the suffering of tens of thousands. Others worked to enact laws to curb abuse of workers. This was also a time a massive missionary outreach from England. In a desire to help the poor, Sunday Schools were started. Others organized the Young Men’s Christian Association, the YMCA, as well as a women’s version, YWCA. New denominations were born, like the Salvation Army, whose primary focus was to help urban poor.Methodists, Quakers, and others led in the founding of labor unions, prison reform, and child labor laws. But the most important accomplishment of British Christians during the 19th C was the abolition of slavery. Quakers and Methodists had condemned slavery for yrs. But now, thanks to the leadership of William Wilberforce and other believers, the British government ended slavery. They first ended the slave trade. Then decreed freedom for slaves in the Caribbean. Following that, slavery ended in other English colonies. The British prevailed on other nations to end the slave trade. The British Navy was authorized to use force against slavers. Soon, most Western nations had abolished slavery.In the Portuguese and Spanish colonies of Latin America in the 19th C, the tension between the immigrants recently arrived from Europe called peninsulares;, and the criollos; descendants of earlier immigrants, was high. The criollos had become wealthy by exploitation of Indians and slaves. They thought themselves more astute at running the affairs of the colony than the recently arrived peninsulares. The problem was, the peninsulares had been appointed to both governmental and ecclesiastical positions by officials back home. Despite the fact that the wealth of the colonies had been dug out by the sweat and toil of the native population and imported slaves, the criollos claimed they were the cause of the wealth. So they resented the intrusion of the peninsulares. Although remaining faithful subjects, they abhorred laws that favored the home country at the expense of the colonies. Since they had the means to travel to Europe, many of them returned home imbued with the new political and economic ideologies of the Continent. The criollos were to Latin America what the bourgeoisie was to France.In 1808, Napoleon deposed Spain’s King Ferdinand VII, and replaced him with his brother Joseph Bonaparte. Resistance to King Joe centered at Cadiz, where a council called a “junta” ruled in the name of the deposed Spanish monarch. Local juntas were also set up Latin America. The colonies began ruling themselves, in the name of the Spanish king. Then when Ferdinand was restored in 1814, instead of gratitude for those who’d preserved his territories, he reversed all that the juntas had done. When he abolished the constitution the Cadiz junta had issued, the reaction was so strong he had to reinstate it. In the colonies, the criollo resentment was so strong to his iron-fisted attempt to re-assert control, they rebelled. In what is today Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay—the junta simply ignored the mandates from Spain and continued governing until independence was proclaimed in 1816. Two years later, Chile followed suit. To the north, Simón Bolívar’s army defeated the Spanish and proclaimed independence for Greater Colombia; which was eventually broken up into Colombia, Venezuela, and Panama. Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivar soon joined the independence parade.Brazilian independence came about as fallout from the Napoleonic Wars. In 1807, fleeing Napoleon’s armies, the Portuguese court took refuge in Brazil. In 1816, João [joo-auo] VI was restored to rule but showed no desire to return to Portugal until forced to 5 years later. He left his son Pedro as regent of Brazil. When HE was called back to Portugal, Pedro refused and proclaimed Brazilian independence. He was crowned Emperor Pedro I. But he was never really allowed to rule as his title implied. He was forced to accept a parliamentary system of government.Events in Mexico followed a different course. The criollos planned a power-grab from the peninsulares but when the conspiracy was discovered, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, proclaimed Mexican independence on Sept 16, 1810 at the head of a motely mob of 60,000 Indians and mestizos—persons of mixed Indian and Spanish blood. When Hidalgo was captured and killed, he was succeeded by the priest José María Morelos. The criollos regained power for a time, but under the leadership of Benito Juárez, native Mexicans re-asserted control. Central America, originally part of Mexico, declared independence in 1821, and later broke up into Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.Haiti’s independence was another result of the French Revolution. As soon as the French Revolution deprived the white population on the island of military support, the majority blacks rebelled. Independence was proclaimed in 1804, acknowledged by France in 1825.Throughout the 19th C, the overarching ideological debate in Latin America was between liberals and conservatives. Leaders of both groups belonged to the upper class. And while conservatives tended to be located in a landed aristocracy, liberals found their support among the merchants and intellectuals in urban centers. Conservatives feared freedom of thought and free enterprise while those were cardinal virtues for liberals, because they were modern and were suited to their interests as the merchant class. While conservatives looked to Spain, liberals looked to Great Britain, France, and the USA. But neither group was willing to alter the social order so lower classes could share the wealth. The result was a long series of both liberal and conservative dictatorships, of revolutions, and violence. By the turn of the century, many agreed with Bolívar that the continent was ungovernable. The Mexican Revolution seemed to make the point. It began in 1910 and led to a long period of violence and disorder that impoverished the land and caused many to emigrate.Throughout this colonial period in Latin America, the Church was under Patronato Real = Royal Patronage. The governments of Spain and Portugal appointed the bishops for the colonies. Therefore, the higher offices of the church were peninsulares while criollos and mestizos formed lower clergy. While a few bishops came to support the cause of independence, most supported the crown. After independence, most returned to Spain, leaving their seats empty.Now, we might think, “Well, that’s not difficult to sort out. Why didn’t those local sees just appoint their own bishops?” They wanted to, but in the tussle between Spain claiming the right to appoint bishops and the locals claiming the right, the Pope wavered. He did so because Spain was still a much-needed ally, while the new nations of Latin America were a substantial part of the Catholic flock. Papal encyclicals tried to walk a thin line between honoring European monarchs while at the same time culling back to the Vatican the ability to name its own bishops. It was a political sticky wicket that dominated the diplomatic scene for years.The attitude of the lower clergy, again, made up mostly of criollos and mestizos, contrasted with that of the bishops who tended conservative. In Mexico, three out of four priests supported the rebellion. Sixteen out of the twenty-nine signatories of Argentina’s Declaration of Independence were priests.You may remember the Liberation Theology movement popular across Latin America in the early 80’s. It was led largely by Roman Catholic priests. They followed in the footprints of earlier priests from a century before.

The title of this 132nd episode is “Off with Their Heads.”In this installment, we give a brief review of the French Revolution, which may not seem at first blush to have much to do with Church History. Ahh, but it does. For this reason: What we see in the French Revolution is a proto-typical example of the Church, by which the institutional church, not necessarily the Christian Gospel and Faith, collided with Modernity.Some astute CS subscribers may take exception to this, but I’ll say it anyway è In the French Revolution we see the boomerang of the Enlightenment that sprang FROM the Renaissance, come back round to give the Church a mighty slap in the face. The Renaissance opened the door to new ways of thinking, which led first to the Reformation, which cracked the Roman Church’s monopoly on religion and made it possible for people to not only believe differently, but to go even further to choose not to believe at all. Rationalism may have ended up agnostic and atheistic, but it didn’t begin there. Some of the first and greatest scientists worked their science in the context of a Biblical worldview, as we’ve shown in previous episodes. And the earliest rationalist philosophers based their work on the evolving theology of Protestant scholastics.It was during the French Revolution when the dog bit the hand that had fed it. Or maybe better, when the lion mauled its trainer.The French monarch Louis XVI was a weak ruler and an inept politician. Economic conditions grew worse, especially for the poor, while of the king and his court were profligate in spending. In a desperate need to raise funds, the king convened the Estates General, the French parliament.It was composed of three orders, three Estates; the clergy, the nobility and the middle-class bourgeoisie. Louis’ advisors suggested he enlarge that Third Estate of the middle class so he could coerce the other two estates of clergy and nobility to comply with his request for more taxes. The ranks of the clergy were then enlarged as well by adding many parish priests to offset the bishops who were largely drawn from the French nobility. These priests were no friend to the nobles.When the assembly gathered in early May, 1789, the Third Estate had more members than the other two combined. And among the clergy less than a third were nobles. The Third Estate insisted the Parliament function as a single chamber. The Clergy and Nobility were used to operating separately so that there were three votes. They usually united to vote down anything the Third Estate of the Middle class came up with. A row ensued, but when priests sided with middle class members, it was decided things would be decided by a united house and simple majority vote. The nobility balked so Priests and Bourgeoisie formed anew body they called the National Assembly, claiming they were now the legal government and represented the nation. Two days later the entire Clergy joined the National Assembly.The economy worsened, and hunger was widespread. Fearing what the National Assembly might do, the Crown ordered it to disband and forcibly closed the doors. Its members refused to comply and continued working on a new Constitution. The king moved troops to the outskirts of Paris and deposed a prominent and popular member of the opposition government named Jacques Necker. Parisians expressed their outrage by rioting in a bout of civil unrest that reached a climax on July 14, when they took the Bastille, a fortress that served as an armory, bunker, and prison for those who’d run afoul of the Crown.From that point on, things moved quickly toward full-fledged revolution. Three days later the king capitulated and recognized the authority of the National Assembly as the new government. The Assembly then issued the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, which became foundational to democratic movements in France and other nations. But when Louis reneged and refused to accept the Assembly’s decisions, Paris rioted yet again. The royal family became prisoners in the capital.The National Assembly then moved to reorganized France’s government, economy, and religion. The most important step in this was the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, put into effect in 1790.For centuries the French church had been governed by Gallican liberties, protecting it from interference by Rome. French bishops had a buddy-system with the French Throne. But now, with the Crown gutted of authority, the National Assembly assumed the role in the Church the king had played. Recognizing the need for reform, they set to work. A the peak of church hierarchy were members of the aristocracy. These prelates weren’t used to the real work of shepherding God’s flock. Their seat was a matter of income and prestige, pomp and ceremony. Monasteries and abbeys had become private clubs filled with debauchery. Abbots were known, not for their simple homespun smocks and bare feet, but for their excessive luxury and crafty political intrigues.Some members of the Assembly wanted to reform the church. Others were convinced the Church and the Faith it was supposed to stand as the eternal servant of, was naught but a lot of hog-wash, silly superstition from times long past, and ought now be swept away. Those voices were few at first, but their numbers grew and took the foreground later in the Revolution.Most of the measures the Assembly proposed aimed at reform of the Church. But the deeper challenge leveled by some was, did the Assembly even have authority to make changes? Since when did the civil government have a say in Church affairs? And hold on – since the Reformation introduced a divide between Protestants and Catholics, which church was being addressed? A suggestion was made to call a council of French bishops. But the Assembly quashed that because it put power back in the hands of aristocratic bishops. Others suggested the Pope be invited to weigh in. But the French were reluctant to surrender their Gallicanism by giving Rome a foothold.Pope Pius VI sent word to Louis XVI the new Constitution was something he’d never accept. The king feared the Assembly’s reaction if they found out about the Pope’s resistance so he kept it secret. Then, at the insistence of the Assembly, the king agreed to the Constitution, but announced his approval was contingent on the Pope signing off. The Assembly tired of the delay and decreed that all who held ecclesiastical office had to swear allegiance to the Constitution. Those who declined would be deposed.The Church was divided.You see, in theory, those who refused were to suffer no more than a loss of office. On the basis of the Assembly’s declaration on rights, they couldn’t be deprived of their freedom of thought. And anyone who wanted to maintain them as their clergy were welcome to do so. But they were on their own. Those who signed on to the new Constitution would be supported by the state. à Again, all that was in theory. In practice, those who refused to swear allegiance were persecuted and branded as dangerous counterrevolutionaries.Revolutionary movements gained strength across Europe. Such movements in the Low Countries and Switzerland failed, but monarchs and the nobility feared the French movement would spread to other lands. That inspired French radicals to more extreme measures. In 1791, the National Assembly morphed into the Legislative Assembly, with far fewer voices calling for moderation. Half a year later, France went to war with Austria and Prussia—beginning a long series of armed conflicts that continued till the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815.The day after securing victory at the Battle of Valmy, the Legislative Assembly again reformed into the National Convention. In its first session, the Convention abolished the monarchy and announced the French Republic. Four months later, the king was accused of treason, convicted and executed.But that didn’t put an end to France’s problems. The economy was in shambles in every village, town, and city. Every social class suffered. But the peasants suffered most, as they always do. They revolted. Fear of foreign invasion grew. All this led to a wave of terror where everybody was suspected of counterrevolutionary conspiracies, and many major figures of the revolution were put to death one after another at the guillotine.Combined with all this was a strong reaction against Christianity, of all stripes. The new leaders of the revolution were convinced they were prophets and engineers of a New Age where science and reason would overcome superstition and religion. They claimed that as the new age was born, time had come to leave behind the silly ideas of the old.The Revolution created its own religion, called first the Cult of Reason; later the Cult of the Supreme Being. By then the Constitution with its rights for individuals was forgotten. The revolution wanted nothing to do with the Church. The calendar was changed to a more “reasonable” one where a week was 10 days and months were named after nature. Elaborate spectacles were staged to celebrate the new age of reason and new holidays were established to replace the old religious ones. Temples to Reason were built to replace churches, and a list of saints was issued—among whom were Socrates, Marcus Aurelius, and Rousseau. New rites were devised for weddings, funerals and the dedication of children, not to God but to philosophical ideals like Liberty.As I record this, and you listen, with whatever activity you’re doing, all these radical rationalist ideas may seem ridiculous, in light of their short lifespan. Like demanding everyone suddenly call red blue, and blue is from now on going to be called green. Just because we say so. It would be ridiculous, were it not for the fact they were deadly earnest about it and killed thousands for no more reason than being under suspicion of calling their changes absurd.“Off with their heads” became a slogan that literally saw people slipped under the guillotine’s blade. Christian worship was supposedly permitted; but any priest who refused to swear before the altar of Freedom was accused of being a counterrevolutionary and sent to the guillotine. Somewhere between two and five thousand priests were executed, as well as dozens of nuns and countless laypeople. Many died in prison. In the end, no distinction was made between those who’d sworn allegiance to the Constitution, those who refused to, and Protestants. Although the reign of terror ended in 1795, the government continued to oppose Christianity. Where ever French troops marched and asserted their presence, their policies followed. In 1798, they invaded Italy and captured Pope Pius VI, taking him to France as a prisoner.Napoleon, who risen through the ranks of the French army, became ruler of France in November of 1799. He believed the best policy for France was to seek a reconciliation with the Catholic Church, and opened negotiations with the new pope, Pius VII. In 1801, the papacy and French government agreed to a Concordat that allowed the Church and State to work together to appoint bishops. Three years later, Napoleon decided he wanted to be more than just the First Consul of France, and fancied the title “Emperor.” He had Pope Pius officiate his coronation. Then Napoleon turned around and decreed religious freedom for Protestants.So, Pope and Emperor fell out wit one another and France once again invaded Italy ending with the Pope again in chains. But in his captivity Pius refused to endorse Napoleon’s actions. He was especially critical of his divorce from Josephine. Pius remained a prisoner until Napoleon’s fall, when he was restored to his seat at Rome. There he proclaimed a general amnesty for all enemies, and interceded for Napoleon before his British conquerors.

This 131st, episode is titled, Behind Enemy Lines.Following up their conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the Turks conquered most of the Balkans. They now controlled the former Byzantine Empire and the substantial region of Armenia. They required the Eastern Orthodox patriarchs in Constantinople to obey their rules and policies. Ottoman Turks employed their Christians subjects in key positions in the military and government. Bureaucrats who’d served the labyrinthine Byzantine system made excellent court officials in the new realm. And thousands of young Christian boys were inducted into the Janissaries; elite fighting units renowned for their ferocity and loyalty to the Sultan. If you want to read some fascinating history, dig into the story of the Janissaries.Throughout Turkish lands, Christians and Jews were given a measure of autonomy in running their own affairs. Note I said “a measure.” They weren’t free to live however they pleased. While there was a general, persistent low-grade animosity between Christians and their Turkish masters, there were periods of intense oppression and outright persecution.Western Europeans were indifferent to the plight of Eastern Christians. They were anxious to maintain a favorable posture toward the Ottomans so as to have access to the rich trade that flowed between East and West. The conspiracies and conniving that went on between the competing nations of Europe for this rich trade was a thing of legend. Sadly, it was a prime example of how the desire for wealth trumped a deeper and more pressing humanitarian directive.Thank God we’ve moved past that today, huh?Keeping our historical perspective, the lack of concern on the part of Western Europeans for their Oriental brothers and sister living under the Ottoman yoke isn’t so hard to understand. After all, how many years had it been since the rift broke East from West? It had been almost exactly 400 years. And the LAST time West met East was in the brutality of the Fourth Crusade that shattered Constantinople and ultimately left it vulnerable to the Turkish conquest.At the end of the 16th century, Jeremias II, patriarch of Constantinople, ordained Bishop Job as the first patriarch of Russia. That made Moscow a patriarchate on the same footing as the much older centers of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.In the final yrs of the 16th century, four bishops along with the metropolitan of Kiev, created what became known as the Uniate Church. These churches became an Eastern branch of the Catholic Church. They looked to the Roman Pope as their spiritual head and embraced Roman doctrine. But they kept the Byzantine liturgy and the right of their priests to marry. For three centuries, Uniate Christians were the target of fierce persecution by Cossacks. During the Cossack-Polish War of 1648–57, many Uniates were slaughtered.Eastern Orthodox or as they’re sometimes called, Greek Orthodox, theologians rejected the Protestant Reformation’s emphasis on the doctrine of justification by faith alone. But when Cyril Lucaris, patriarch of Constantinople, published a work in 1629 that seemed influenced by the theology of John Calvin, it sparked a firestorm of controversy and fierce opposition from other Orthodox theologians. One chapter said Scripture was infallible and inerrant, its authority superseding that of the Church. Another chapter said sinners are justified by faith rather than works and that it’s Christ’s righteousness applied by faith to repentant sinners that alone justifies.The Turk Sultan Murad IV conspired to assassinated Patriarch Cyril Lucaris, because he was regarded as a theological as well as a political troublemaker. The Janissaries were sent to kill him on June 27, 1638; his body was dumped over the side of a ship.The years 1598-1613 we labeled the “Time of Troubles” in Russia. It was a time of transition from the Rurik Dynasty to the Romanovs. The years saw a famine that killed some two million Russians, one-third of the populace. It also witnessed the Polish-Muscovite War when Russia was occupied by a Polish-Lithuanian Consortium and endured endless civil uprisings. The Romanovs went on to rule Russia for the next 300 years. During the period from Peter the Great thru Catherine the Great, Russia emerged as a military competitor to the French, Spanish, English, Prussians, and Hapsburgs. Her army and navy grew and she gained large tracts of land at the expense of Sweden, Poland, and Turkey.Russia’s conquests brought many non-Orthodox Christians under her control; mostly Roman Catholics. It also brought in many Jews. East European rulers were wary of the new Russian bear and how it’s aggression could unsettle the careful balance European diplomats had managed to secure. In 1763, King Louis XV of France declared, “Everything that may plunge Russia into chaos and make her return to obscurity is favorable to our interests.”The impact of the reign of Peter the Great on Russian society was profound. Fascinated by all things military, Peter was as ruthless with enemies as he was charming with those aimed to woo. He assumed the arduous task of transforming Russia from an agricultural backwater into a modern economic powerhouse. During a more than year-long tour of Germany, the Netherlands, England, and Austria in 1697–8, he gained a working knowledge of economics, farming, munitions, and ship-building. He visited schools, hospitals, and factories. He was warmly received by kings and queens.Once back in Russia, Peter used forced labor to build the port city of Petersburg as a “window on the West.” In 1713, it became the capital of Russia. He finally defeated the Swedes, gaining more territory. His trip to western European countries provided him with new insights into how to streamline Russia’s military, government, and schools.His opponents came from the clergy of the Russian Orthodox Church as well as what was called the “Old Believers and Ritualists” drawn from the ancient Russian nobility and the Cossacks. The clergy said Peter was engaged in a blasphemous arrogance by moving the capital from Moscow, which they regarded as a “Third Rome” to Petersburg.Unlike the clergy, the Old Believers had a different beef with Peter. They were enraged by what they called his irreligious behavior. He failed to support their departure from the Russian Orthodox Church due to a bruhaha over how to make the sign of the cross. These Old Ritualists broke with the Russian Church in the 1650s when the Metropolitan Nikon revised the liturgy along a more Byzantine fashion. Nikon said the sign of the cross was to be made with the first 3 fingers of the right hand, not 2 fingers as was the usual practice. Those who refused to put up 3 fingers were deemed heretics.So à “Off with is head.”In 1682, a leader of the Old Believers was burned at the stake. Some of his followers living in their separate communities engaged in mass suicides.Peter’s opponents among the clergy were worked up about his requiring them to adopt modern and Western clothes. Russian nobles were ordered to shave unless they paid a tax. Some Russian men assumed being bearless would bar them from heaven.Peter professed faith in Christ, but it’s questionable if he did so for purely pragmatic reasons. He venerated icons, quoted Scripture at length, cited the Liturgy by heart, and sang on occasion in church choirs. But he had little patience with the Patriarch of Moscow who opposed his “Western” innovations.One critic claimed Peter the Great’s actions toward the Church in Moscow “led to a cultural shock from which Russia never recovered.” When Patriarch Adrian died in 1700, Peter postponed the election of a new patriarch. That dealt a major blow to the traditions and the structure of the Russian Orthodox Church. In 1716, Peter declared that he alone ruled Russia, setting himself over the church.The reigns of the next several Romanovs were marked by intrigue and palace coups.For example, Peter III had a brief reign. He married the German-born and Lutheran-raised Catherine II, who converted to Orthodoxy so as to make entry into marriage smoother. Peter disbanded the secret police and favored religious toleration. He despised the Orthodox Church and was accused of leaning toward “Lutheranism.” A conspiracy headed by his wife’s illicit lover forced Peter’s abdication, then she had him murdered.Catherine became the ruler of Russia being assigned the title Catherine the Great. She built on the expansionist policies of Peter, adding 200,000 square miles to Russia. Her armies put down the Cossack Rebellion of 1773–5 and extended the borders of Russia in Crimea and Poland, Belarus, and western Ukraine. She centralized and streamlined the government, which was then run by civilians with skills like those of their counterparts in Western Europe. Russia, traditionally introspective and self-congratulatory, looked for a while to be opening to the outside world, willing to embrace the culture of its neighbors.Catherine has sometimes been portrayed as an “Enlightened Despot.” She was steeped in the literature of the French philosophes. Diderot and Grimm spent time at her court, as did other western thinkers. She mostly refrained from terror in dealing with her opponents in bringing reforms.In 1773, Catherine promoted a measure of religious toleration. She defended the Jesuits after the papacy dissolved their Order. Both Roman Catholics and Protestants enjoyed limited religious rights.But, Catherine’s openness to Enlightenment ideas had limits. She took over monasteries and turned them into state property. She was hostile to the Masons and feared the spread of subversive republican ideas by partisans of the French Revolution. She made three decrees that forced Jews to settle in a region called “the Pale” stretching from the Black to the Baltic Sea. It encompassed present-day Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Belarus. Jews lived in the Pale under harsh poverty and frequent pogroms.18th-century religious life in Europe and Asia is a harbinger of what lies ahead for us as we wrap up our narrative of church history over the next episodes.The concern expressed by Roman Catholic leaders in the face of the Reformation was that if the Protestants were allowed to break away to form their own churches and movements, the fracturing would never end and Mother Church would disintegrate into a bo-zillion daughters who looked nothing like their mother. That concern has largely proven true, as is evidenced by the literally tens of thousands of different denominations, movements, groups, and independent churches existing worldwide, all calling themselves faithful followers of Jesus and Home of the True Gospel.It’s during the 18th C in Europe, Asia, and to a lesser extent in the New World that we see that splintering reaches an exponential rate.And that’s why our review of the narrative of church history must necessarily come to a close soon. Because to carry one we’d need to track the growth and development of literally dozens of groups and that would be a royal pain in inflicted tedium. We could deprogram hardened terrorists by making them listen to that; or torture them.But, that might be a good place for burgeoning podcasters to start their own podcast. I know you’re out there. You’ve listened to CS for a while and regularly say to yourself, “I could do a better job than this.” I’ll bet you could. So--why don’t you? Start your podcast where we’ll leave off. Track the origins of your group to where we end and take it from there.As we end, I again say thanks to all you subscribers who write such glowing reviews on iTunes & Apple Podcasts, as well as those who check-in and give the CS FB page a like or leave comments.As you may or may not know, or care for that matter, I’m a pastor at an independent Evangelical Christian church in SoCal. If you like CS, don’t find my voice too annoying, and would like to hear something a little different, check out the church podcast. I teach twice a week; one is a general expository survey of the Bible. The other is a sermon where we go in-depth in the same passage. You can find it in iTunes & Apple podcasts by searching for Calvary Chapel Oxnard or going to the calvaryoxnard.org website.And for those who are really interested, I’ll soon be starting a YouTube channel where the first project with be a video version of CS.

This 130th episode is titled Up North, Then South.This is the last episode in which we take a look at The Church in Europe following the Enlightenment. The narrative is nowhere near exhausTIVE. It’s more an exhaustING summary of Scandinavia, the Dutch United Provinces, Austria, and Italy. We’ve already looked at Germany, France, and Spain.The end of the 17th century proved to be a brutal time in Scandinavia. Some 60% of the population died from 1695-7 due to warfare and the disease and famine of its aftermath. As if they hadn’t had enough misery, the Great Northern War of 1700–1721 then followed. In the desperation of the times, Lutherans provide devotionals offering hope and comfort, while calling for prayer and repentance.Along with northern Germany -- Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland were Lutheran strongholds. Citizens were required to swear loyalty to a Lutheran State Church in league with absolutist monarchs.But during the Great Northern War, Swedish King Charles XII suffered a massive defeat by the Russian armies of Peter the Great. Sweden lost large tracts of land and the throne lost clout with the people. A so-called “Age of Liberty” followed that lasted most of the rest of the 18th century. The Swedish Parliament gained power and reformers gave a rationalist slant to Swedish education. They battled with Lutheran clergy who wanted to retain some  theology in the education of Sweden’s young.Many returning captured Swedes imprisoned in Russia, had converted to Pietism by missionaries sent by Francke and the University at Halle we talked about last time. The soldiers became advocates for Pietism back home. Moravians also promoted revivals in Scandinavia.After a grab for power in 1772, Gustavus III nullified the Swedish Constitution restraining the reach of royal power. He imposed a new Constitution designed to reinforce Lutheranism as the basis of government. He said, “Unanimity in religion, and the true divine worship, is the surest basis of a lawful, concordant, and stable government.” But in 1781, limited toleration came to Sweden when other Protestant groups were once again allowed. Catholicism, however, remained banned.From 1609, when the Dutch won their liberty from Spain, until Louis XIVth’s invasion in 1672, the Dutch United Provinces had its “Golden Age” and enjoyed what Simon Schama called an “embarrassment of riches.” This was due mostly to their lucrative international trade and free market economy. The Dutch eschewed the traditional monarchy dominating the rest of Europe in favor of a far more egalitarian Parliamentary system.Amsterdam was a thriving commercial and cultural center. Its population more than doubled from 1600 to 1800. Amsterdam’s docks were always packed. Its warehouses stuffed with goods from all over the world and the trade of the massive and powerful Dutch East India Company. From its earliest days, this trading enterprise supported Reformed missionary work at posts in the Malay Archipelago, Sri Lanka, and South Africa. In July 1625, Dutch traders established New Amsterdam, later known as New York City.The United Provinces were intellectual a religious crossroads for Europe through its universities, publishing houses, and churches. Protestant students from Germany, Finland, and France flocked there to study at the University of Leiden and other schools.The main task of the faculty at the University of Leiden was the study of Scriptures. Its chief professor was Joseph Scaliger whose knowledge of the classics and biblical textual criticism made him one of Europe’s premier scholars. Others notable scholars were scholars included Arminius and Gomarus.As many of our listeners know, the 17th century was the Dutch golden age of art. Thousands of painters created millions of paintings with scenes ranging from battles and landscapes, to churches, still life, and portraits. Among the more famous masters were Rembrandt, Frans Hal, and Vermeer. But by the 18th century, the quality of Dutch art had somewhat fallen.The Dutch Reformed Church affirmed the 1561 Belgic Confession of Faith. It addressed topics ranging from the Trinity, the work of Christ, and the sacraments, to Church-State relations. Although the Reformed Church was the “official” faith, the United Provinces were known for their toleration of other groups. That didn’t mean there weren’t heated theological rows. Two parties emerged in the Dutch Reformed Church: the “precise” Calvinists who wanted churches to possess binding doctrinal authority, and the “loose or moderate” Calvinists who desired greater freedom of religious thought.The Dutch Provinces often served as a haven for those seeking relief from persecution in other parts of Europe. Amsterdam was a notable home to a large Jewish community. Some 70,000 French Huguenots took refuge there and married into the populace. An Anabaptist community flourished. Religious dissidents like Baruch Spinoza and Anthony Collins, an exile from England, weren’t much respected but they were at least not beat up.Many Europeans admired the Dutch Republic for its successful war of liberation from the Spanish, its egalitarian government, as well as its vital free market economy. By 1675, there were fifty-five printing presses and 200 booksellers in Amsterdam, adding to the burgeoning base of middle-class scholars.During the 18th century, the Dutch, while continuing to be officially Reformed, saw an increase in the number of those they’d been less tolerant toward; namely=Catholics, Dissenters, and Jews. Revivals frequently passed through more rural domains. In 1749 and 50, emotionally-charged revival meetings took place with the ministry of Gerard Kuypers. Villages in the Netherlands and nearby Germany experienced similar revivals.In a foreshadowing of Intelligent Design and the fine-tuning of the universe arguments, a number of Dutch theologian-scientists wrote works in which they sought to demonstrate that the intricacy of designs in nature prove God’s existence. Until the 1770s, the Reformed Church played a dominant role in Dutch public life. Some 60% of the population was Reformed, 35% Catholic, 5% percent Anabaptists and Jews.There really never was a Dutch version of the Enlightenment. Most of its participants never espoused a militant atheism, but sought to accommodate their faith to educational reforms and religious toleration. They appreciated the new science and advances in technology.Now we turn back to Geneva; adopted home of John Calvin.During the early 1750s, Geneva was the home of both Voltaire and Rousseau, well-known Enlightenment thinkers and scoffers at Christianity.Several of Geneva’s pastors proposed a reasonable and tolerant form of Christianity that warmed to some of the more liberal Enlightenment ideas. This was a huge turn from the position of Francis Turretin who in the mid-17th century, led the Reformed and conservative theologians of Geneva to the idea that the City was a theocracy with God as its ruler. Turretin said the government ought defend “the culture of pure religion and the pious care of nurturing the church.” Turretin’s party defended the Masoretic pointing of the Hebrew text, making this belief binding on the Swiss church. These pastors feared if Hebrew vowels were left out, the Hebrew words of the Old Testament were susceptible to interpretations that varied from those they approved. They also tried to force pastoral candidates to repudiate the doctrine of “universal grace” being championed by an emerging class of theologians.But in 1706 Turretin’s son, Jean, repudiated his father’s work and embraced a more liberal theology that advocated the role of reason in determining truth. He denied his father’s soteriology, doctrine of salvation, and eschewed limited atonement. By the 1720s, Arminianism had taken firm root in Geneva.In Feb, 1670, the Hapsburg, Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor and a devout Roman Catholic, ordered all Jews to leave Austrian lands. Vienna became a major center of cultural. After the defeat of the Turks, it’s population boomed, growing from about 100K in 1700 to twice that 80 years later. The construction of the Schwarzenberg and Schönberg Palaces enhanced its prestige while the music of Haydn and Mozart made Vienna famous across Europe.The Hapsburg Emperors Joseph I and Charles VI supported Jesuit missionary efforts to convert Protestants. Jesuits created a baroque Catholic culture in Austria and Bohemia with the construction of magnificent churches in cities and the countryside.Though loyally Catholic, the Hapsburgs rejected the pope’s interference in Austria’s religious and political life. They’d proven their devotion to Rome when in 1683, Leopold saved The Church from the Turks. Austria was the “rock” on which the Catholic Church was built. It was the Hapsburgs who saved the faith form the infidel, not the pope.In October of 1740, at the death of her father, Maria Theresa took the titles Archduchess of Austria, Queen of Bohemia, and Queen of Hungary. In 1745, her husband, Francis Stephen, became the Holy Roman Emperor under the name Francis I. Disturbed by the Prussian Frederick II’s seizure of Silesia, Maria Theresa attempted to reform the military and governmental structures of Austria after Enlightenment ideals. She became the proponent of what’s called “Enlightened Absolutism.” At the same time, she was ready to apply repressive measures against those who resisted her reforms. On one occasion she warned that he is “no friend to humanity who allows everyone his own thoughts.”Maria Theresa was a devout Catholic influenced by counselors favorable to Jansenism. With the advice of her chancellor, she tried to establish a national Catholic Church in which the pope had authority only in spiritual matters.Maria Theresa did not allow Protestants to sell their property or leave her lands. She required those who refused to convert to Catholicism to emigrate to Transylvania, where Protestantism was permitted. Nor did Maria Theresa intercede to save the Jesuits when their society was dissolved. She allowed 2000 Protestants to live in Vienna, but she forced the city’s Jews to live in a ghetto.Upon the death of Maria Theresa, Joseph II passed Edicts of Toleration that allowed greater freedoms for non-Catholics and continued the policy of subjugating Church power to that of the State. He confiscated the property of over 700 monasteries, displacing 27,000 monks and nuns and used the proceeds to build new churches.Like Germany, during the 18th century, Italy didn’t exist as a nation as we know it. It was a hodge-podge of various principalities. They didn’t even share a common language.The population of the peninsula grew from eleven to fifteen million in the first half of the century. But in the 1760’s a severe famine struck Florence, Rome, and Naples.The region of Tuscany was a hot-bed of the Jansenists who, as you’ll remember, were a kind of Calvinist-Catholics.A handful of Italian academics promoted rationalist views in the Catholic church, eliminating what they regarded as backward features of Italian culture. But the Enlightenment just didn’t gain the traction in Italy it did in the rest of Europe.The popes of the 18th century had difficulty dealing with the now powerful secular rulers of Europe, no longer threatened by Church power or political machinations.Even the Papal States were frequently invaded by foreign powers. Conquerors only left after they’d secured hefty ransoms. Popes were forced to make concessions that made their weakness evident to all. Despite that, Rome continued to attract large numbers of pilgrims, students, and artists. Pilgrims hoped for a blessing from the Pope or a healing while visiting the many shrines.Then there were the youth on the Grand Tour, as it was called. They were most often graduates of Cambridge, Oxford, the University of Paris or some other school who headed to Italy to gain knowledge in classical culture. In 1776, Samuel Johnson underscored the importance of Italy as a destination for those making the Grand Tour: “A man who has not been in Italy, is always conscious of an inferiority. The grand object of traveling is to see the shores of the Mediterranean. On those shores were the four great Empires of the world; the Assyrian, the Persian, the Grecian, and the Roman.”Several popes supported the establishment of academies, colleges, and universities and encouraged general scholarship. Under their generous patronage Rome’s artistic riches in painting, sculpture, music, and monuments flourished. Pope Clement XI initiated plans for the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps in the early 18th century.But to give you an idea of how the tables had turned and now kings dominated popes, it was this same Clement, who became a pawn in the hands of Emperor Joseph I and Louis XIV. Louis forced Clement to issue a papal bull dealing with the Jesuit-Jansenist controversy.Papal prestige suffered seriously during the French Revolution. Pope Pius VI was obliged to condemn the “Declaration of the Rights of Man” as well as the “Civil Constitution of the Clergy.” This split the French between those revolutionaries who wanted to throw off the Absolutist government of the French monarchy but maintain their Catholicism, and those French who wanted to be done with religion as well.Bottom Line: The Enlightenment witnessed serious challenges to both the papacy’s temporal and spiritual authority.

This episode is title “Pressed.”In our last episode, we took a look at the French church of the 17th C and considered the contest between the Catholic Jansenists and Jesuits.It’s interesting realizing the Jansenists began as a theological movement that looks quite similar to Calvinism. Their theology eventually spilled over into the political realm and undercut the Divine Right of Kings, a European political system that had held sway in for centuries, and reached its apex in France under Louis XIV, granting him the august title of The Sun KingIn this episode, we’ll take a look at what happened to the French Protestants, the Huguenots.By the mid 16th century, Huguenots were 10% of the French population. They hoped all France would one day adopt the Reformed Faith. But their hopes were shattered by defeat in nine political and religious wars.You may remember from an earlier episode that Henry IV, a convert to Catholicism from Protestantism, that conversion being a purely pragmatic and political maneuver, granted the Huguenots limited rights in the Edict of Nantes in 1598. Thirty years later, those rights were revoked by the Peace of Alais. Then the fortified Protestant city of La Rochelle surrendered in 1628, ending any hope of France’s conversion to Protestantism.For twenty-four years, Louis XIV waged a devastating anti-Protestant campaign. Nearly 700 Reformed churches were closed or torn down. And in 1685, Louis replaced the Edict of Nantes with the Edict of Fontainebleau.He ordered uniformed troops called dragoons to move into the Huguenot homes in Protestant centers. These troops were allowed by the king’s decree to use whatever means they wanted, short of murder and rape, to intimidate Huguenots into converting to Catholicism.Some 200,000 Huguenots fled France. They took refuge in Geneva, Prussia, England, and North America. Those refugees were often people of great learning and skill who enriched the intellectual and economic life of their adopted realms.But thousands of Huguenots stayed in France. Many made a show-conversion to Catholicism, while secretly remaining Protestants. They formed an underground church known as the “Church of the Desert.”  From 1684 to 98, twenty Huguenot pastors were hunted and killed.Louis XIV feared the Huguenots because he equated them with the Puritan rebels who’d executed Charles I in England in 1649. Louis was also in competition with the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I, for hegemony in Europe. Allowing a large and politically powerful Protestant base in his realm didn’t commend Louis as a strong Catholic leader. He already faced criticism for not sending troops to defend Vienna from invading Turks while Leopold had. It was Louis’s plan to attack the Turks AFTER they’d taken Vienna! His plan fell apart when the Europeans managed to defeat the enemy before Vienna’s walls.Louis’ suspicion of the Huguenots seemed justified by the Camisard War of 1702 to 4. They called for “freedom of conscience” and “no taxes.” Protestant prophets predicted a liberation from their oppressors. But the prophets were proven to be of the false variety when the revolt was put down.In 1726, an underground seminary for young men was established in Lausanne, Switzerland. It received financial support from Protestants in Switzerland, England, and the Netherlands. Studies lasted from six months to three years. After that, graduates returned to minister to outlawed churches in France. If captured, they were executed.During the Seven Years War, known in the US as the French and Indian War, French Protestants became the beneficiaries of unofficial toleration. While no friend to Christianity, Voltaire assisted Huguenots by writing a book defending toleration. Finally, in the Edict of Toleration of 1787, Louis XVI gave Huguenots the right to worship.But in the three years BEFORE that, 7000 Huguenots were executed, another 2000 forced to serve in the French Navy, a kind of living death if you know anything about the life of a lowly sailor at that time.After 1760, some Reformed pastors, influenced by Voltaire, moved toward theological liberalism.From the late 17th to late 18th century, what we know as Germany today was a patchwork quilt of over 300 mostly autonomous principalities, kingdoms, electorates, duchies, bishoprics, and other political enclaves. Rarely used, the term “Germany” meant a nebulous region that included many of these regions, much like the term “Europe” refers to a continent with many nations. Germany was just one part of a larger entity known as the Holy Roman Empire. That realm included 1,800 territories. Places like Poland, the Hapsburg Empire, Bohemia, Moravia, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Transylvania, and Italy.A Council of Electors, ranging from seven to nine, picked the Holy Roman Emperor.The Emperor’s ability to raise armies, collect taxes, and make laws was often hampered by the many groups in the empire that enjoyed a measure of their own sovereignty. The fiction known as the Holy Roman Empire ended under Napoleon.In the 1740s, Frederick the Great, King of Brandenburg-Prussia from the Hohenzollern family and Calvinists since 1613, challenged the Hapsburg’s power. At the outset of the War of the Austrian Succession, Frederick’s troops seized Silesia and Prussians became THE military power in Europe.In Germany, the leading kingdoms were Brandenburg-Prussia, Saxony, the Rhineland Palatinate, Hanover, and Bavaria. Following the principle established by the Peace of Westphalia, the religion of these kingdoms was that of their prince.While Bavaria was staunchly Catholic, Brandenburg-Prussia was Calvinist with strong pietistic leanings. The rest of Germany was Lutheran of the pietist mold. A unified Germany nation would not emerge until the days of the “Iron Chancellor” Otto von Bismarck in the second half of the 19th century.The emergence of Prussia as a great military power in the 18th century impressed their European neighbors. The kingdom’s army of some 83,000 ranked fourth in size among the European powers, though its landmass was a tenth of the area and only thirteenth in population. Its rulers promoted a disciplined lifestyle like that of the Pietists as a model for Prussian bureaucrats, military, and nobles (called Junkers). The highly militaristic Frederick III ruled Brandenburg from 1688 to 1713. Being reformed in theology, he encouraged French Huguenots who’d fled France to settle in his kingdom. In 1694, he founded the University of Halle as a Lutheran university. He welcomed Pietists like Jakob Spener and Hermann Francke. In 1698, Francke began teaching theology there. Frederick III made the University of Konigsberg another Pietist center.In his work Pious Desires, published in 1675, Spener, who you’ll remember was the founder of Pietism, centered his call for reform of the Church in the faithful teaching and application of Scripture. He called for daily private Bible reading and meditation and the reading of Scripture in small groups.Spener urged that pastoral training schools should not be places for theological wrangling, but as “workshops of the Holy Spirit.” Nor should seminary professors seek glory by authoring lofty tomes filled with showy erudition. They ought instead to be examples of humble service. Spener emphasized the priesthood of ALL believers. Ministers should seek help from laypeople to assist in the task of tending to the needs of a congregation instead of assuming they had to do everything themselves. Spener took this idea from what the Apostle Paul had written in Ephesians 4. As described there, pastors were to equip believers so they could do ministry.At the University of Halle, Hermann Francke insisted that those training for pastoral ministry ought to study Scripture in its original languages of Hebrew and Greek. Francke wrote: “The exegetical reading of Holy Scripture is that which concerns finding and explaining the literal sense intended by the Holy Spirit Himself.”In 1702, Francke founded the Collegium Orientale Theologicum. Advanced students could learn Aramaic, Arabic, Ethiopian, Chaldean, Syriac, and Hebrew.Francke established an orphanage in Halle in 1695. He created schools and businesses including a printing house where orphans could learn a trade. By 1700, Francke’s various institutions gained the support of Emperor Frederick III, who valued their contribution in fostering Christian discipline among his students, the Prussian populace, and his soldiers. Francke wanted to make Halle a center for Christian reform and world missions. In anticipation of what George Mueller would later give testimony to, Franke wrote of examples of how he prayed for specific needs and provision came to feed the poor and keep the schools open, sometimes arriving at the last moment. He wrote: “These instances I was willing here to set down so that I might give the reader some idea both of the pressing trials and happy deliverances we have met with; though I am sufficiently convinced that narratives of this kind will seem over-simple and fanciful to the great minds of our age.”On one occasion, Frederick IV, King of Denmark, gave a direct order to his chaplain: “Find me missionaries.” That chaplain asked Francke for help. Francke proposed two students from the University of Halle. The Danish-Halle Mission was launched. On Nov. 29, 1705, Bartholomew Ziegenbalg and Heinrich Plütschau set sail for India. Eight months later they arrived. They were dismayed to discover the horrid immorality of the Europeans there. Claiming to be Christians, the Indians assumed all believers in Christ were immoral. There was great resistance to the Gospel at first, but the missionaries’ faithfulness eventually softened the hearts of the Hindus. Ziegenbalg translated the Bible into Tamil and set up a school and a missionary college before he died at the age of 36.Christian Schwartz also served as a missionary in India. Johann Steinmetz ministered in Teschen, Silesia, Moravia, and Bohemia. Others took the gospel to Russia during the reign of Peter the Great. Halle missionaries met the physical and spiritual needs of captured Swedish troops who, when they returned to Sweden, spread Pietism in their homeland. Sixty students went forth from the University of Halle as missionaries.The press of the Bible Institute in Halle produced more than 80,000 copies of complete Bibles and another 100,000 copies of the New Testament.In 1713, the Pietitst Frederick William I became king. He not only built up the military, he funded the production of thousands of Bibles so that all his subjects could read it for themselves. When he died in 1727, some 2000 students attended the school in Halle. His orphanage served as a model for George Whitefield’s in Savannah, Georgia.We need to do a bit of summarizing now so we can avoid that thing we’ve talked about before – the reporting of history as a bunch of dates and names. I’ll do so by simply saying the Enlightenment that swept France and England, also impacted Germany. The original faculty of the University at Halle would have been shocked to see the way later professors turned away from what they considered orthodoxy.We’ll jump ahead to a bit later in the 18th century and the work of Johann Semler considered the Founder of German Higher Criticism.Semler began teaching at Halle in 1751. He’d been a student of professors who merged Enlightenment philosophy with the Faith. For twenty-two years, from 1757 till ‘79, Semler was the most influential of the German theologians. He called for a more liberal investigation of the Bible, one not tethered to long-held orthodox assumptions about the canon of Scripture or its infallibility.Semler held forth that religion and theology ought not be linked. He also set a divide between what he called the “Word of God” and “Scripture.” He maintained that not all the books or passages of the Bible were in truth God’s Word and that God’s Word wasn’t limited to the Bible.He taught that the authors of scripture accommodated their writings to the errant ideas of their times, especially the Jews. Sifting out the authentic Word of God from the mythological, local, fallible, and non-inspired dross in Scripture, by which he meant a belief in the supernatural, was the task of the wise Bible student. Then, once the authentic canon within the Bible was identified, real doctrines would need to be parsed.Astonishingly, Semler claimed his ideas were faithful to the work of Martin Luther, which they most certainly were NOT!The reaction to Semler was mixed. Some scholars supported him because his work opened a lot of wiggle-room that allowed them to accommodate the growing popularity of Enlightenment skepticism. But his critics pounced, accusing him of abandoning the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible.When Frederick the Great died in 1786, his nephew Frederick William II became King of Prussia. He attempted to rein in the growing volume of literature now exposing the German populace to heterodoxy; that is, ideas outside the pale of orthodoxy, by passing an edict calling for censorship of any work about God and morality. Any such work was to be submitted to a government commission of censors for approval.  Several Lutheran pastors resigned in protest, and the main publisher of such works moved his operations out of Berlin. The government feared radical expressions of the German Enlightenment would subvert the faith of the people and their loyalty to the State.In March 1758, Johann Hamann was converted to Christ and became a brilliant counter to the Enlightenment. He pointed out the errors in Kant’s philosophy and said the light of the so-called “Enlightenment” was cold, more like the moon, compared to that which comes from the Sun of Christian revelation in Scripture and nature.

Este episodio 56 de CS es la tercera parte de nuestra serie sobre Las Cruzadas.Uno de los principales resultados de la Primera Cruzada fue un mayor distanciamiento entre las Iglesias de Oriente y Occidente. La ayuda prestada a Bizancio por los cruzados no fue la que esperaba el emperador oriental Alejo.También dio lugar a una alienación de los musulmanes aún mayor que la que existía antes. 200 años de cruzadas por el Mediterráneo oriental envenenaron permanentemente las relaciones entre musulmanes y cristianos y acabaron con el espíritu de tolerancia moderada hacia los cristianos que vivían bajo el dominio musulmán en una amplia franja de territorio. Los únicos que dieron la bienvenida a los cruzados fueron un puñado de minorías cristianas que habían sufrido bajo el dominio bizantino y musulmán: los armenios y los maronitas que vivían en el Líbano. Los coptos de Egipto vieron las Cruzadas como una calamidad. Ahora los musulmanes sospechaban que tenían simpatías occidentales, mientras que la Iglesia de Occidente los trataba como cismáticos. Una vez que los cruzados tomaron Jerusalén, prohibieron a los coptos peregrinar allí.Las cosas se agriaron realmente entre Oriente y Occidente cuando la Iglesia romana instaló patriarcados latinos en los centros históricamente orientales de Antioquía y Jerusalén. Luego, durante la 4ª Cruzada, se nombró un patriarca latino para la iglesia en la propia Constantinopla.Para que te hagas una idea de lo que habría sentido el cristiano de Constantinopla, imagina cómo se sentirían los bautistas del Sur si un obispo mormón fuera nombrado presidente de la Convención Bautista del Sur. Ya te haces una idea = No Bueno.Otro efecto duradero de las Cruzadas fue que debilitaron el Imperio Bizantino y aceleraron su caída ante los turcos otomanos un par de siglos después. También desestabilizaron a los gobiernos árabes, dejándolos susceptibles de ser invadidos por turcos y mongoles.En esta época se produjo un nuevo e importante desarrollo en la historia monástica con el surgimiento de las órdenes monásticas de caballería. La primera de ellas fue la de los Caballeros Templarios, fundada en 1118 bajo Hugh de Payens. El rey Balduino dio a los templarios su nombre, y de ellos pasó a otras órdenes la idea de luchar por el Temple. Bernardo de Claraval, aunque no fue el autor de la regla de los Templarios, como dice la leyenda, sí escribió una influyente obra titulada Elogio de la nueva milicia de Cristo, que alababa las nuevas órdenes de caballeros.Los Templarios fueron imitados por los Hospitalarios, que tuvieron un origen anterior como orden caritativa. Fueron organizados en 1050 por mercaderes de Amalfi que vivían en Jerusalén para proteger a los peregrinos. Proporcionaban hospitalidad y atención a los enfermos, y contribuyeron a transformar la palabra "hospitalidad" en "hospital". Con Gerardo, en 1120, los Hospitalarios obtuvieron la sanción papal. El sucesor de Gerardo fue Raimundo de Provenza, que reorganizó a los Hospitalarios como una orden militar según el modelo de los Caballeros Templarios. Los Hospitalarios, también conocidos como Caballeros de San Juan, se trasladaron finalmente a las islas de Rodas y luego a Malta, donde resistieron en 1565 en un prolongado asedio contra los turcos en una de las batallas más importantes de la historia.Otra importante orden militar, los Caballeros Teutónicos, surgió en 1199, durante la 3ª Cruzada.Las órdenes monásticas caballerescas tenían ciertos rasgos en común. Consideraban la guerra como una forma de vida devocional. La antigua idea monástica de luchar contra los demonios, como se veía en los antiguos ermitaños del desierto egipcio, evolucionó hacia el combate real con personas consideradas agentes del mal. La guerra espiritual se convirtió en una batalla real. Los caballeros y sus ayudantes hicieron votos similares a los de otros monjes. Profesaban pobreza, castidad y obediencia, junto con la promesa de defender a otros por la fuerza de las armas. Aunque se juraba la pobreza personal, se consideraba adecuado el uso de la violencia para asegurar la riqueza, de modo que pudiera utilizarse en beneficio de otros, incluida la propia orden. Los templarios se convirtieron en objeto de envidia por su inmensa riqueza.Al estudiar las relaciones entre el cristianismo y el islam durante la Edad Media, debemos recordar que hubo muchos intercambios pacíficos. Algunos cristianos defendían las misiones pacíficas con los musulmanes. Estos encuentros pacíficos pueden verse en el intercambio de arte. Los cristianos valoraban mucho la metalistería y los tejidos musulmanes. Los ornamentos de las iglesias eran a menudo confeccionados por tejedores musulmanes. Una de estas vestimentas se encuentra hoy en Canterbury. Contiene una escritura árabe que dice: "Grande es Alá y Mahoma es su profeta".Desde el punto de vista positivo, si hubo algo positivo que extraer de las Cruzadas, fue que promovieron un mayor sentido de unidad en Europa Occidental. Recuerda que una de las razones por las que el Papa Urbano desencadenó la Cruzada fue para desahogar los hábitos violentos de los nobles europeos, que se enfrentaban constantemente entre sí. En lugar de guerrear entre ellos de un lado a otro de Europa, regando sus campos de sangre, se unieron para ir contra los infieles "de allá".Las Cruzadas también supusieron un aumento del prestigio del papado, ya que pudieron movilizar a un gran número de personas.  Las Cruzadas también estimularon un renacimiento intelectual en Europa, ya que los cruzados regresaron con nuevas experiencias y conocimientos de otra parte del mundo.Tras la 1ª Cruzada, durante los siguientes 60 años, Jerusalén vio una sucesión de gobernantes débiles, mientras que los musulmanes, desde Damasco hasta Egipto, se unieron bajo una nueva dinastía de líderes competentes y carismáticos. El último de ellos fue Saladino o, más propiamente, Salah ad-Din. Fundador de la dinastía ayubí del Islam, se convirtió en califa en 1174 y se propuso retomar Jerusalén.El rey de Jerusalén en aquella época era (y aviso: voy a destrozar el nombre de este pobre hombre) Guy de Lusignan. Llamémosle simplemente "Guy". Dirigió a los cruzados a una colina al oeste del mar de Galilea llamada los Cuernos de Hattin. Tanto los Templarios como los Hospitalarios se encontraban allí con fuerza, y la tan cacareada "verdadera cruz" era llevada por el obispo de Acre, que a su vez iba vestido con armadura. El 5 de julio de 1187 se libró la batalla decisiva. Los cruzados fueron completamente derrotados. Perecieron 30.000 personas. El rey Guy, los líderes de los templarios y los hospitalarios, junto con algunos otros nobles, fueron hechos prisioneros. Saladino les dio clemencia. El destino de Tierra Santa estaba decidido.El 2 de octubre de 1187, Saladino entró en Jerusalén después de que ésta opusiera una valiente resistencia. Las generosas condiciones de la rendición fueron, en su mayoría, dignas de la caballerosidad del comandante musulmán. No hubo escenas de carnicería salvaje como las que siguieron a la entrada de los cruzados 90 años antes. A los habitantes de Jerusalén se les dio la libertad si pagaban un rescate. A los europeos y a todo aquel que lo deseara, se les permitió salir. Durante 40 días continuó la procesión de la partida. Las reliquias almacenadas en la Iglesia del Santo Sepulcro fueron rescatadas por la suma de 50.000 bezantes. Llamados así por Bizancio, donde eran el medio de cambio, el bezante era una moneda de oro de 5 gramos.Así terminó el reino latino de Jerusalén. Desde entonces, el culto del Islam ha continuado en el Monte Moría sin interrupción. Las demás conquistas europeas de la 1ª Cruzada estaban entonces en peligro por las interminables disputas de los propios cruzados y, a pesar del constante flujo de reclutas y tesoros procedentes de Europa, cayeron fácilmente ante Saladino.Permitió que un gobernante latino meramente ceremonial ostentara el título de rey de Jerusalén, pero el último rey real fue Guy, que fue liberado y luego viajó reclamando el título de rey, pero sin corte ni capital. Finalmente se estableció en Chipre.Entraremos en menos detalles sobre el resto de las Cruzadas cuando las terminemos en el próximo episodio.La 2ª Cruzada fue provocada por 2 acontecimientos: la caída del estado cruzado de Edesa en Siria y la predicación de Bernardo de Claraval. Y ten en cuenta que la 2ª Cruzada tuvo lugar ANTES de la llegada de Saladino a la escena.Edesa cayó en manos de los turcos en diciembre de 1144.  Hicieron un fuego en una gran brecha que habían abierto en la muralla de la ciudad. El fuego estaba tan caliente que agrietó una sección de la muralla de cien metros de largo. Cuando la muralla se derrumbó, los turcos se abalanzaron sobre ella y desencadenaron el mismo tipo de brutalidad que los cruzados cuando conquistaron Jerusalén.El Papa Eugenio III vio la victoria turca en Edesa como una amenaza para la continuidad de los cruzados en Palestina y pidió al rey de Francia que marchara en su ayuda. Se prometió el perdón de todos los pecados y la entrada inmediata en el cielo a todos los que se embarcaran en una nueva Cruzada. Eugenio convocó a Bernardo de Claraval para que abandonara su abadía y predicara la cruzada. Bernardo era la persona más famosa de su tiempo y esta llamada del Papa se produjo en el cenit de su fama. Consideró la llamada del Papa como una llamada de Dios.En la Pascua de 1146, el rey Luis de Francia juró liderar la Cruzada. La promesa del Papa de la remisión de los pecados le era muy querida, ya que estaba afectado por la culpa de haber quemado una iglesia con 1300 personas dentro. ¡Qué grandioso es poder obtener el perdón matando a más personas! Reunió un concilio en Vézelai, en el que Bernardo causó una impresión tan poderosa con su mensaje que todos los presentes se lanzaron a la causa de las cruzadas. Bernardo se vio obligado a cortar su propia túnica en pequeños fragmentos, para regalarlos a todos los que quisieran algo suyo que pudieran llevar a Oriente. Escribió al Papa Eugenio que el entusiasmo era tan grande que "los castillos y las ciudades se vaciaron de sus habitantes. Apenas se podía encontrar un hombre para 7 mujeres, y las mujeres enviudaban en todas partes mientras sus maridos aún vivían". Es decir, la mayoría de los hombres partieron a la Cruzada, dejando a la población de Francia con 7 mujeres por cada hombre. ¡Qué suerte tuvieron!Desde Francia, Bernardo se dirigió a Basilea, en la actual Suiza, y luego subió por las ciudades a lo largo del Rin hasta llegar a Colonia. Al igual que en la 1ª Cruzada, la persecución contra los judíos estalló en esta zona cuando un monje llamado Radulph se preguntó por qué era necesario ir a Oriente Medio para deshacerse de los que odian a Dios y matan a Cristo. Había muchos en Europa.  Bernardo se opuso con vehemencia. Pidió que la Iglesia intentara ganarse a los judíos mediante la discusión y el respeto, no matándolos.Bernardo era LA celebridad de la época y miles de personas acudían a escucharle. Se le atribuyeron varios milagros y curaciones notables. El emperador alemán Konrad III se sintió profundamente conmovido por su predicación y se convenció de que debía apoyar la Cruzada.Konrad reunió un ejército de 70.000 personas, de las cuales una décima parte eran caballeros. Se reunieron en Ratisbona y se dirigieron a través de Hungría hacia el Bósforo. A lo largo de su ruta no fueron bien recibidos. Konrad y el emperador oriental Manuel eran cuñados, pero eso no impidió que Manuel hiciera todo lo posible por acabar con la fuerza alemana. Los guías que les proporcionó condujeron a los alemanes a emboscadas y trampas y luego los abandonaron en las montañas. Cuando finalmente llegaron a Nicea, el hambre, la fiebre y los ataques habían reducido la fuerza a una décima parte de su tamaño original.El rey Luis partió en la primavera de 1147 y siguió la misma ruta que había seguido Konrad. Su reina, Leonor, famosa por su belleza y habilidad como líder, junto con muchas otras damas de la corte francesa, acompañó al ejército. Los franceses se reunieron con lo que quedaba de la fuerza de Konrad en Nicea.Las fuerzas se dividieron entonces en diferentes grupos que llegaron a Acre en 1148. Se reunieron con el rey Balduino III de Jerusalén y se comprometieron a unir sus fuerzas para intentar conquistar Damasco antes de retomar Edesa. El asedio a Damasco fue un fracaso total. Los nobles europeos cayeron en tales luchas internas que su bando se fragmentó en grupos beligerantes. Konrad partió hacia Alemania en el otoño de 1148 y Luis regresó a Francia unos meses después.Bernardo se sintió humillado por el fracaso de la Cruzada. Lo atribuyó al juicio de Dios por los pecados de los cruzados y del mundo cristiano.Un poco más sobre la esposa del rey Luis, Leonor. Leonor de Aquitania era realmente extraordinaria. En un mundo dominado por los hombres, la carrera de Leonor fue algo especial. Fue una de las personas más ricas y poderosas de Europa durante la Edad Media.Leonor sucedió a su padre como gobernante de Aquitania y Poitiers a la edad de 15 años. Era entonces la novia más codiciada de Europa. Tres meses después de su ascenso, se casó con el rey Luis VII. Como reina de Francia, participó en la 2ª Cruzada. Después, con su derrota y de vuelta a Francia, consiguió la anulación de Luis sobre la base de que eran parientes, y luego se casó con Enrique Plantaget, duque de Normandía y conde de Anjou, que pronto se convirtió en el rey Enrique II de Inglaterra en 1154. Esto a pesar de que Enrique era un pariente aún más cercano que Luis y 9 años más joven que ella. Se casaron sólo 8 semanas después de su anulación. Durante los 13 años siguientes, Leonor dio a Enrique 8 hijos: 5 hijos, 3 de los cuales llegarían a ser reyes, y 3 hijas. Sin embargo, Enrique y Leonor acabaron distanciándose. Ella fue encarcelada entre 1173 y 1189 por apoyar la revuelta de su hijo contra su marido.Leonor enviudó en julio de 1189. A su marido le sucedió su hijo, Ricardo I, conocido como Corazón de León. En cuanto ascendió al trono, Ricardo hizo que liberaran a su madre de la prisión. Leonor, ahora reina viuda, actuó como regente mientras Ricardo iba a la Tercera Cruzada. Sobrevivió a Ricardo y vivió hasta el reinado de su hijo menor, Juan, conocido como el peor rey de la larga historia de Inglaterra. Es este rey Juan el que aparece como el principal villano en la historia de Robin Hood.La 3ª Cruzada se conoce como la Cruzada de los Reyes debido a los monarcas europeos que participaron en ella. Fue un intento de reconquistar Tierra Santa a los musulmanes que, bajo Saladino, habían recuperado las tierras que los cruzados tomaron en la 1ª Cruzada. La 3ª tuvo éxito en su mayor parte, pero no alcanzó su objetivo final, la reconquista de Jerusalén.Cuando Saladino capturó Jerusalén en 1187, la noticia sacudió a Europa. Se cuenta que el Papa Urbano III quedó tan traumatizado que murió de shock. Enrique II de Inglaterra y Felipe II de Francia pusieron fin a su disputa entre ellos para dirigir una nueva cruzada. Cuando Enrique murió 2 años después, Ricardo Corazón de León se puso al frente de los ingleses. El anciano emperador del Sacro Imperio Romano Germánico, Federico Barbarroja, también respondió a la llamada a las armas y dirigió un enorme ejército a través de Turquía. Barbarroja se ahogó mientras cruzaba un río en junio de 1190, antes de llegar a Tierra Santa. Su muerte causó un gran dolor entre los cruzados alemanes. La mayoría estaban tan desanimados que volvieron a casa.Tras expulsar a los musulmanes del puerto de Acre, el sucesor de Federico, Leopoldo V de Austria, y el rey Felipe de Francia abandonaron Tierra Santa en agosto de 1191, dejando a Ricardo para que siguiera solo. Saladino no consiguió derrotar a Ricardo en ningún enfrentamiento militar, y éste se aseguró varias ciudades costeras clave. Pero el rey inglés se dio cuenta de que la conquista de Jerusalén no era posible para sus ahora debilitadas fuerzas y, en septiembre de 1192, hizo un tratado con Saladino por el que Jerusalén permanecería bajo control musulmán, pero permitía a los peregrinos y mercaderes cristianos desarmados visitar la ciudad. Ricardo partió de Tierra Santa un mes después.Los éxitos de la 3ª Cruzada permitieron a los cruzados mantener un reino considerable basado en Chipre y a lo largo de la costa siria. Su fracaso en la reconquista de Jerusalén condujo a la convocatoria de una 4ª Cruzada 6 años después.La 3ª Cruzada fue una prueba más de la incapacidad de los europeos para formar una unión eficaz contra los musulmanes. Los líderes y la nobleza de Europa hicieron grandes promesas de unidad cuando se embarcaron en una Cruzada, pero los rigores del viaje, junto con la inminente perspectiva de la victoria, les hicieron caer la mayoría de las veces en incesantes y mezquinas disputas.En su viaje de regreso a Inglaterra, Ricardo fue apresado por el mencionado Leopoldo, duque de Austria, cuya enemistad se había ganado en la batalla por la ciudad de Jope. El duque entregó a su cautivo al emperador del Sacro Imperio Romano Germánico, Enrique VI, que también tenía un rencor que saldar. Corazón de León fue liberado bajo las humillantes condiciones de pagar un enorme rescate y consentir que su reino fuera un feudo del Imperio.  Esta toma de rehenes de Ricardo Corazón de León es el telón de fondo de la historia de Robin Hood.Saladino murió en marzo de 1193, siendo con mucho el más famoso de los enemigos de los cruzados. La cristiandad se ha unido a los escritores árabes en la alabanza de su valor, su cultura y la forma magnánima en que trató a sus enemigos.Los historiadores debaten sobre cuántas Cruzadas hubo. No es que los reyes Enrique y Felipe dijeran: "Oye, hagamos las paces y lancemos la 3ª Cruzada". No las numeraron como lo han hecho los historiadores desde entonces. La historia tiende a atribuir 9 como número de Cruzadas, pero luego añade 2 más asignándoles nombres en lugar de números; la Cruzada Albigense y la Cruzada de los Niños, que tuvieron lugar entre la 4ª y la 5ª Cruzada.En general, las Cruzadas 5ª a 9ª se consideran movimientos armados menores, mientras que las 4 primeras se denominan Grandes Cruzadas.Terminaremos con un rápido repaso de la 4ª Cruzada.Inocencio III se convirtió en Papa en 1198.  Convocó la 4ª Cruzada, que fue el golpe final que separó para siempre las iglesias de Occidente y Oriente, aunque ciertamente ése nunca fue su objetivo. De hecho, advirtió a los cruzados que no lo hicieran.El plan del Papa Inocencio era simplemente destruir una base militar musulmana en Egipto. Los mercaderes de Venecia habían prometido suministrar barcos a los cruzados con un gran descuento, que los cruzados no podían dejar pasar. Así que, en el verano de 1202, llegaron a Venecia esperando navegar hacia Egipto. Pero había un problema: sólo se presentó un tercio del número esperado de guerreros. Y llegaron con poco más de la mitad de la cuota de navegación requerida.Un príncipe de Oriente se ofreció a financiar el resto con una condición: Que los cruzados navegaran primero a Constantinopla, destronaran al actual emperador y se la entregaran. Entonces podrían seguir su alegre camino hacia Egipto. El Papa Inocencio prohibió esta diversión, pero nadie le hizo caso.El 5 de julio de 1203, los cruzados llegaron a la capital oriental. El pueblo de Constantinopla estaba ya harto de que los europeos se entrometieran en sus asuntos y formó una contrarrevolución que barrió del trono al emperador de turno, pero sólo para poder instalar a su propio gobernante ferozmente anticruzado. Al verse excluido de sus esperanzas, el aspirante a emperador que había pagado a los cruzados el camino a Constantinopla se negó a pagarles el camino a Egipto, dejándoles abandonados en un territorio cada vez más hostil.Estaban furiosos. Sus líderes decidieron intentar sacar lo mejor de la situación y convocaron un rápido saqueo de Constantinopla. Uno de los capellanes de la Cruzada proclamó, haciendo caso omiso de los deseos del Papa: "Si tenéis la intención de conquistar esta tierra y someterla a la obediencia romana, todos los que mueran participarán de la indulgencia del Papa".  Eso fue como soltar la cadena a un perro rabioso. Para muchos de los cruzados, esto no sólo era una excusa para enriquecerse con el botín, sino que significaba una licencia para hacer lo que quisieran en Constantinopla.El Viernes Santo de 1204, los cruzados, con cruces rojas en sus túnicas, saquearon Constantinopla. Durante 3 días, violaron y mataron a compañeros cristianos. Las estatuas de la ciudad fueron descuartizadas y fundidas. La Santa Sofía fue despojada de sus vasos de oro. Una ramera realizó bailes sensuales en la Mesa del Señor, entonando viles canciones para beber. Un escritor oriental se lamentó: "Los musulmanes son misericordiosos comparados con estos hombres que llevan la cruz de Cristo sobre sus hombros".Ni el Imperio ni la Iglesia de Oriente se recuperaron jamás de aquellos 3 días. Durante los siguientes 60 años, los cruzados de la Iglesia romana gobernaron lo que antes era el Imperio de Oriente. El emperador oriental estableció una corte en el exilio en Nicea. En lugar de adoptar las costumbres romanas, muchos cristianos orientales huyeron allí. Allí permanecieron hasta 1261, cuando un gobernante Oriental retomó Constantinopla.

The title of this 128th Episode is Backing Up.… because once again we’re backtracking a bit to hop into the story of Church History earlier than where our last few episodes have taken us. We’re focusing this time on what happened in France during the late 17th and into the 18th century.This period saw a massive struggle between the French monarchy and two groups; Catholic  Jansenists and Protestant Huguenots. At stake was the throne’s claim that it alone had the power to determine the religion of the French people.France was the most populous and wealthy country in Europe. It was also the most feared,  admired, and imitated. By the time of the French Revolution in 1789, the population was 28 million.From the late 17th century to the Revolution, the Court at Versailles, the main residence of the French kings, was the center of political life. But a mix of disparate factors led to a growing disillusionment with the Crown. Philosophes engaged each other in Parisian salons in political discussions that implemented dangerous new ideas; to the Crown anyway. And once the King found out about these dangerous liaisons, they became downright lethal to those who engaged in them. As the power of the French court grew, Masonic lodges popped up all over, advocating more subversive ideas. Illegal books and broadsides were printed by a clandestine press. All these challenged Versailles’s political dominance in the second half of the 18th century. A powerful “court of public opinion” emerged to dare the status quo into change.France’s monarchs wanted to protect their inheritance rights while expanding the kingdom’s economic and political power over more of Europe and overseas. Continental Wars often spilled over into the colonies. Louis XIV occasionally referred to “French Europe” and France’s ongoing conflict with Spain. But after his passing, France often teamed with Spain in opposition to England and other European powers.After the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga in 1778 during the War for Independence, Louis XVI, to spite the English, supported the Americans in their quest to gain independence from the British. But this French aid took an ironic turn. Louis abetted revolutionaries who aimed to throw off a monarchy in favor of a democratic republic, while at the same time adding to France’s already massive debt.In Late Spring of 1789, Louis was forced to call a meeting of the French Parliament, called the Estates-General to deal with the now intense fiscal crisis. After intense debate, delegates of the French people declared they represented the “nation” choosing that word rather than ”kingdom” and invited members of the clergy and nobility to join them. Many did. On June 17, the Assemblée Nationale formed and claimed it, rather than the King, represented the realm.This was a severe blow to a principle that had found varying degrees of expression in Europe for hundreds of years; that is, the Divine Right of Kings.Earlier, in his work Politics Drawn from the Very Words of Holy Scripture, Jacques Bossuet [boo-sway], advisor to Louis XIV, justified the divine right of kings by citing Scripture. He wrote, “God is the King of kings: it is for Him to instruct them and to rule them as His ministers. Listen then, Monseigneur, to the lessons which he gives them in His Scripture, and learn from the examples on which they must base their conduct.” He said, “Rulers act as the ministers of God and as his lieutenants on earth. It is through them that God exercises his empire.” Bossuet argued the king’s power was absolute.  But the king wasn’t to act like a despot issuing arbitrary and selfish decrees. He was in covenant with his subjects and was called to care for them the way a father cares for his children.According to divine right theory, kingship was a sacred position, manned by someone uniquely called to occupy the center of the religious sphere. Without him, chaos would descend. His lineage stretched back to Adam thru mythical figures like Pharamond, Clovis, Pepin, and Charlemagne. From the Middle Ages on, writings knowns as the Mirrors of Princes called on the French monarch to be pious, just, and good; while avoiding wanton luxury, cruelty, and moral weakness.At the king’s coronation, the archbishop of Reims anointed him with sacred oil and blessed his gloves, scepter, and ring. The king swore an oath to uphold the Catholic faith. If his subjects rebelled against, since he was a God-ordained sacred person in a sacred office, they deserved death. In 1757, Robert Damiens attempted to assassinate Louis XV. He was pulled apart before a cheering crowd of thousands. A subversive word against His Majesty earned the author time in prison.Louis XIV became king at age five but due to his age, wasn’t allowed to rule till he was 22. As he waited for the throne, France was torn apart by civil war in which his agents were barely able to eke out a victory. Traumatized by what he saw during this time, Louis determined to short-circuit future revolts by establishing an absolute monarchy. He learned well how to rule under the watchful eye of the shrewd politician Cardinal Mazarin. He came to control of France by a sophisticated system of rewards and honors that kept everyone beholden to his favor. He understood the threat of various religious factions all vying for control and set a Gallican, a French form of Catholicism for the realm, regardless of what they might profess to believe.Since 1516, the year before Luther published his 95 Theses, French kings selected bishops for the French church. They filled the positions with loyal nobles. When Pope Innocent XI rejected Louis XIV’s naming of bishops and his appropriation of funds from vacant bishoprics, the king, with approval of the Clergy, encouraged Bossuet to draw up a Declaration of Gallican Liberties of 1682, stipulating that kings “were not subject to any ecclesiastical power in temporal affairs.”The result was that French bishops had sweeping authority to rule both in temporal and spiritual matters. Besides ordinations and baptisms, they mandated that religious books could be published only with their permission. They regularly called on censors in the National Librairie to condemn what they called “wicked books.” The bishops’ personal privileges were extreme. They ruled over a church that owned 10% of the land. In exchange for immunities from taxation, they gave a [uh-humm] “gift” to the king.In 1690, Pope Alexander VIII condemned the Declaration of Gallican Liberties. Three years later, Louis XIV rescinded the declaration. Then two years after that gave his bishops authority over all priests. The French throne and church both exhibited a willingness to defy the papacy in temporal and spiritual matters. There was only one realm in which the Gallican Church and Vatican united; in the contest between the Jansenists and Jesuits.As we saw in a previous episode, Jansenists were followers of Cornelius Jansen, a professor of theology at the University of Louvain and for a time, the bishop of Ypres. Jansen proposed an interpretation of Augustine’s theology in his posthumous work Augustinus that extolled God’s sovereignty and denied any role humans have in salvation thru free will. Jansen said the elect are saved by God’s grace alone. As their lives are transformed, the elect do the will of God by performing acts of love for God and others. In seeking assurance of salvation, the elect overcome temptation by following an austere lifestyle of rigorous penance and frequent celebration of the Mass. Yep; They were Catholic Calvinists; an oxymoron if there ever was one.Jansenists argued forcefully for the inviolability of the individual conscience of the believer; even to the point of refusing to accept a church teaching, they deemed errant.Jansenists were especially critical of Jesuits, whom they believed had succumbed to the teachings of Molinism, a theology based on the work of Luis Molina who advocated free will. Molina was a Spanish Jesuit who’d argued that God provides sufficient grace to move someone to repentance, but didn’t force it. Molina said God elects according to His foreknowledge of our choices.Jansenists also rejected the Jesuits’ defense of a papal monarchy. Like the Gallicans, they held a conciliarist position: that the authority of the church was vested in all the members of the body of Christ, including themselves as a Catholic minority.The Jansenists criticized the Jesuits for their rule-based ethics, their love of classical pagan culture, and their worldliness. In the Provincial Letters, the Jansenist Blaise Pascal parodied the Jesuits to the delight of most Parisians. But Louis XIV wasn’t amused and ordered the book burned.The Jesuits fired back; accusing Jansenists of being anti-monarchical Protestants.To clear themselves of that charge, leading Jansenists of the mid-17th century, became major combatants in the Eucharistic Controversy of the 1660s and 70’s. This was the debate that raged in Reformed churches over how to understand the elements in Communion. Just as the Controversy had run in the 9th century in the Catholic Church, now it ran in the Reformation churches of Europe in the 17th. Jansenists believed in the classic Catholic position of Transubstantiation, which all reformed churches had rejected to one degree or another. The Jansenists knew by adhering to it, they could set themselves over against the label Protestant being tossed at them by the Jesuits.Despite their best anti-Protestant efforts, the Jansenists failed to win Louis XIV’s favor. In 1678, they were forced to leave France.On September 1, 1715, Louis XIV died, leaving the French church deeply divided. Though the Jansenists had been officially exiled, many of the French were secret, and some, not-so-secret Jansenists. Numerous appeals were made to Rome by high-ranking clergy for a repeal of anti-Jansenist rulings.Then, a series of reported healings took place at a Jansenist leader’s graveside. This seemed to mark God’s favor on the movement.  Throngs of Parisians flocked to the cemetery. In 1732, the government closed it to curb its propaganda value. A jokester posted a sign on the cemetery’s entrance: “By order of the king: God is prohibited to do miracles in this place.”The Jansenists may have lost the support of the religious and political hierarchy, but their popularity soared with commoners.  Priests were regarded as successors to Christ’s disciples. This undercut the authority of bishops. Then the law courts reasoned if priests had as much authority as bishops, THEY had as much authority as bureaucrats and nobles.  As adjudicators of the Law, collectively they had as much authority, maybe MORE, than the king.So, although originally a theological movement, Jansenism took on a political dimension; as theology often eventually does. Jansenists effectively used the printed page to keep the public current regarding their struggles in France and the rest of Europe.Rumors swirled through Paris in December 1756 and into January of armed revolt. Three-fourths of Paris backed the Jansenists. A rumor said the Jesuits would soon be slaughtered.On the bitterly cold afternoon of Jan 5, 1757, Robert-François Damiens broke through the king’s guards and drove a knife into the side of Louis XV. He was immediately arrested. The wound was superficial. The assassin’s short knife didn’t make it far enough through the king’s thick coat to inflict a fatal wound. But Parisians were shocked and profoundly saddened. They feared another St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre was upon them.Despite torture, Damiens remained resolute in denying the existence of co-conspirators. After a trial in which judges assumed his guilt, Damiens’s body was literally pulled apart at a public execution witnessed by a large and boisterous crowd.Louis XV was badly shaken by the attempt on his life and the rumor his own cousin was behind it.  In September, he lost the will to enforce anti-Jansenist and Protestant restrictions.In Nov. 1764, Jansenists scored a victory against the 3,300 Jesuits in France when the court ordered them to vacate the kingdom and its colonies, and Louis XV reluctantly agreed. The Jesuits had stumbled rather badly in some mission ventures in China and South America which tarnished their reputation and raised a public outcry against them.Three years later, Charles III of Spain, King of Naples and Duke of Parma, expelled the Jesuits from their lands. Eventually, in 1773, the papacy dissolved the order with its 26,000 members worldwide and its nearly 1,000 colleges and seminaries. It wasn’t till 1814 that the Society of Jesus was re-established.Despite complaints Protestants brazenly touted their new toleration under Louis XV, the French Church affirmed Catholicism as the only legitimate religion in France. In 1765, the Assembly of Clergy declared, “There is, Sire, in your Kingdom, only one master, one single monarch whom we obey: there is only one single cult and one single faith.” They called on the king to uphold anti-Protestant legislation. Louis XV said he would, but as stated, he didn’t have the will to enforce it.In 1774, Louis XV died of smallpox. Louis XVI was crowned king in the cathedral of Reims. During a magnificent coronation service, he affirmed his desire to uphold the Catholic religion and to reinvigorate the sacred character of his union with the people of France. In 1776, a resurgence of Roman Catholic devotion took place in Paris. But in 1787, Louis yielded to a well-orchestrated campaign by Jansenists and the Protestant Pastor Rabaut Saint-Etienne. He issued the Edict of Toleration for Protestants.We wrap this episode by noting that as the religious landscape opened up in France, so too did the political. New ideologies and political theories were popping out of the Enlightenment like fleas off a mongrel. John-Jacques Rousseau was popular, and his ideas began to infiltrate the minds of the French public. If the individual was free to think for him and herself, and worship according to one’s own conscience, why not extend that idea to the lesser realm of human governments? If bishops aren’t supreme, the Bishop of the bishops, the Pope isn’t either. And if the Pope isn’t supreme, neither is the king. The Divine right of kings was an ideology on the way out.

In this 127th episode of CS, titled “Then Away,” we give a brief account of the rise of Theological Liberalism.In the previous episodes, we charted the revivals that marked the 18th and 19th centuries. Social transformation is a mark of such revivals. But not all those engaged in the betterment of society were motivated by a passion to serve God by serving their fellow Man. At the same time that revival swept though many churches, others stood aloof and held back from being carried away into what they deemed as “religious fanaticism.”As Enlightenment ideas moved into and through the religious community, some theologians shifted to accommodate what had become the darling ideas of academia. Instead of becoming outright agnostics, they sought to wed rationalism with theology and arrived at an amalgam we’ll call Theological Liberalism.Not to be outdone by Revivalists transforming culture through the power of The Gospel and a conviction they were to be salt and light in a dark and decaying world, Liberalism developed what came to be called The Social Gospel; a faith that emphasized doing as much, if not more than, believing.The name most associated with the Social Gospel is Walter Rauschenbusch. He began pastoring a Baptist church in New York in 1886. It was there that he came face to face with the desperate condition of the poor.  He joined the faculty of Colgate-Rochester Theological Seminary, where over the course of 10 years he wrote 3 books that were hugely influential in promoting the Social Gospel.Someone might say at this point >> You’ve used that phrase a couple of times now. What’s ‘The Social Gospel’?”The Social Gospel was a movement among Protestant denominations in the early 20th century, mainly in the United States and Canada, but a limited expression in Europe. It addressed social problems with Christian ethics. Its main targets were issues of social justice like poverty, addiction, crime, racism, pollution, child labor, and war. Advocates of the Social Gospel sought to implement that line in the Lord’s Prayer that says, “Your Kingdom Come, Your will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.”Advocates of the Social Gospel were usually post-millennialists who believed the Second Coming would not occur unless humanity rid itself of injustice and vice. The leaders of the movement were largely connected to the liberal wing of the Progressive Movement.The Social Gospel movement peaked in the early 20th century. It began to decline due to the trauma brought about by WWI, when the ideals of the movement were so badly abused by world events. A couple of under-pinnings of theological liberalism are the Brotherhood of Man and the innate goodness of human beings. WWI conspired to prove the lie to both assumptions and create doubt in the minds of millions that humans are good or could be a brotherhood.Though Rauschenbusch’s early theology included a belief in original sin and the need for personal salvation, by the time he’d written his last tome, he regarded sin as an impersonal social ill and taught that reform would arrive with the demise of capitalism, the advance of socialism, and the establishment of the Kingdom of God by human effort. His views were accepted by such prominent spokesmen as Shailer Matthews and Shirley Jackson Case of the University of Chicago.Rauschenbusch’s impact was combined with other developments in liberalism during the 19th century. Unitarianism had made deep inroads into mainline denominations under the leadership of William Ellery Channing and Theodore Parker. Channing’s sermon “Unitarian Christianity” in 1819, deserves credit for launching the Unitarianism movement.Another influential figure of the 19th C was Horace Bushnell. He published Christian Nurture in 1847, arguing that a child ought to grow up in covenant with God, never knowing he was anything but a Christian. This was contrary to the Pietist emphasis on having a datable conversion experience. Bushnell’s ideas of growing a child up from birth in a covenant of grace had a huge impact on Christian educators for generations.In addition to Theodore Parker’s support of Unitarianism, he introduced German biblical criticism into American Christianity. By doing so, the way was opened for Darwinian evolution and the ideas of Julius Wellhausen. Wellhausen was one of the originators of the Documentary Hypothesis, which forms the core of much of modern liberal scholarship on the Bible to this day.These influences led to a creeping theological liberalism based on the twin postulates of the evolution of religion and a denial of the supernatural. In their place emerged the idea of the Fatherhood of God, the Brotherhood of Man, and the establishment of God’s Kingdom as a natural outcome of evolution.Three German scholars were also central to the development of Theological liberalism: Schleiermacher, Ritschl, and Harnack.Friedrich Schleiermacher adapted the ideas of Existentialism to Christianity and said that the core of faith wasn’t what one believed so much as what one FELT, what we experience. Religion, he urged, involved a feeling of absolute dependence on God. For Schleiermacher, doctrine hung on experience, not the other way around. Today, a mature Christian might counsel a neophyte, saying something like, “Don’t let feelings control you.” Or, “We need to evaluate our experiences by God’s Word, not the other way around.” Schleiermacher would disagree with that. In his view, experience VALIDATES doctrine. Feels are key. A Faith that isn’t felt is no faith at all, he maintained.Albert Ritschl claimed Christ’s death had nothing to do with the payment of a penalty for sin. He said it resulted from loyalty to His calling of bringing about the Kingdom of God on Earth, and that it was by His death that He could share his experience of Sonship with all people, who would then become the vehicle and means by which the Kingdom could be constructed. The practice of a communal religion was of vital importance to Ritschl because Christ best shared Himself through the community of the Church. Ritschl’s impact on other scholars was great.Probably the most affected by Ritschl’s works was Adolf Harnack. Harnack regarded the contributions of the Apostle Paul to the Gospel as a Greek intrusion on the Christian Faith. His goal was to get back to a more primitive and Jewish emphasis that centered on ethical imperatives as opposed to doctrine. As a professor in Berlin in 1901 he published his influential What Is Christianity? This focused on Jesus’ human qualities, who preached not about Himself but about the Father; the Kingdom and the Fatherhood of God; a higher righteousness; and the command to love.The views of these three German scholars came ashore in America to further the liberal ideas already underway.If Theological Liberalism with its Social Gospel were a reaction to the Revivals of the 18th and 19th centuries, those who’d been revived were not going to sit idly by as that liberalism grew. They responded with a movement of their own.Charles Briggs, a professor at Union Theological Seminary in New York, was put on trial before the Presbytery of New York and suspended from ministry in 1893 for promulgating liberal ideas. Henry Smith of Lane Seminary in Cincinnati was likewise defrocked that same year, as was AC McGiffert for holding and teaching similar views. Other denominations had heresy trials and dismissed or disciplined offenders. The most famous conflict of the 20th century concerned Harry Emerson Fosdick, who in 1925 was removed as pastor of First Presbyterian Church of New York City to became an influential spokesman for liberalism as the pastor of Riverside Church.Roman Catholicism wasn’t immune to the impact of theological liberalism and reacted strongly against it. Alfred Loisy, founded Roman Catholic Modernism in France, but was dismissed in 1893 from his professorship at the Institut Catholique in Paris. He was further excommunicated in 1908. The English Jesuit George Tyrrell was demoted in 1899 and died out of fellowship with the church. Liberalism invaded American Roman Catholicism. To silence the threat, Pope Pius X issued the decree Lamentabili in 1907, and in 1910 he imposed an anti-modernist oath on the clergy.In contest with Liberalism, Evangelicals had a number of able scholars during the latter part of the 19th and early part of the 20th centuries. Charles Hodge defended a supernaturally-inspired and inerrant Bible during his long tenure as professor of biblical literature and theology at Princeton. AA Hodge carried on his father’s work. In 1887, BB Warfield followed Hodges as professor of theology. Fluent in Hebrew, Greek, modern languages, theology, and biblical criticism, Warfield staunchly defended the inerrancy of Scripture and basic evangelical doctrines in a score of books and numerous pamphlets. In 1900, the scholarly Robert Dick Wilson joined the Princeton faculty, and J Gresham Machen [Mah khen] arrived shortly after. In 1929, when a liberal realignment occurred at Princeton, Machen and Wilson joined Oswald Allis, Cornelius Van Til, and others in founding Westminster Theological Seminary. Other scholars could be mentioned, but these were some of the most prestigious.This movement came to be known as Fundamentalism; a word with a largely negative connotation today as it conjures up the idea of wild-eyed religious fanatics who advocate violence as a means of defending and promulgating their beliefs. Christian Fundamentalism was simply a theologically conservative movement that sought to preserve and articulate classic, orthodox beliefs on the essentials of the Christians Faith. They were called Fundamentals because they were regarded as those doctrines essential to the integrity of the Gospel message; things that had to be believed in order to be saved.Fundamentalism was largely a reaction to Theological Liberalism which appeared to many Evangelicals to be taking over the colleges and seminaries. Liberalism wasn’t popular with the average church-goer. It founds it’s base among academics and those training clergy. But evangelical leaders knew what began in classrooms would soon be preached in pulpits, then practiced in pews. So they began the counter-movement called Fundamentalism.Since Theological Liberals had already managed to co-opt the chairs of many institutions of higher learning, they cast their Fundamentalist opponents as uneducated and unsophisticated nincompoops. Knuckle-dragging theological Neanderthals who couldn’t comprehend the complexities of higher criticism and the latest in theological research. That image has, for many, become part and parcel of the connotative meaning of the word Fundamentalist today. And it’s grossly unfair since those early Evangelical scholars who shaped the Fundamentalist movement were some of the brightest, best-educated, and most erudite people of the day.

This 126th episode of CS is titled, Yet Again.Donations to keep the CS host site up are welcome and needed. You can do so at sanctorum.us. Just look for the “Donate” link.In the last episode, we considered the Second Great Awakening and ended with this . . .By the 1850s the United States was thriving, largely because of the benefits brought by the Awakening. The Mid-West was being developed, the economy booming. People made 18% interest on their investments. But as is so often the case, economic prosperity turned into a neglect of the Spirit. The pursuit of pleasure replaced the pursuit of God. The nation was politically divided over the issue of slavery.  And it wasn’t just States that were divided. Churches and denominations split over itInto this national argument that ended up tearing the country in two was added a dose of religious turmoil.A veteran and farmer named William Miller rediscovered the doctrine of the 2nd Coming. For generations, most of the Church considered Bible prophesy a closed book. Miller began teaching on the Return of Christ. But he made the mistake many have and said Christ would return in 1844. About a million people followed his views.  When it didn’t happen, they were bitterly disillusioned because they’d sold their homes, businesses, and farms. Skeptics piled on the fanaticism of the Millerites and fired up a new round of mocking faith.  Then, in 1857, things began to change.Another revival began as a movement of prayer. It was leaderless, though it produced several notable leaders.In September 1857, a businessman named Jeremiah Lanphier printed up a leaflet on the importance of prayer. It announced there would be a weekly prayer meeting at Noon, in the upper room of the North Dutch Reformed Church in Manhattan. When the time for the first meeting came, only Lanphier was there. He prayed anyway and at 12:35, six more businessmen on their lunch break came up the stairs. They prayed till 1 pm. As they broke up to return to work, they agreed they’d been so moved, they’d meet the following week at the same time and place.The next week, their number doubled to 14. They sensed something special was about to happen and agreed to meet every day, Monday-Saturday in that room at Noon. A few weeks later the room overflowed and they filled the basement, then the main sanctuary. A nearby Methodist Church opened its doors for noontime prayer. When it filled, Trinity Episcopal Church opened. Then church after church filled with people praying at noon, Monday-Saturday; mostly businessmen on their lunch break.Throughout the remainder of 1857, prayer meetings spread throughout the States. In Feb. 1858, New York newspaper editor Horace Greeley sent a reporter out to cover the story of the growing movement. The reporter went by horse and buggy and was able to make a dozen stops during the noon hour. He estimated there were over 6000 businessmen praying at those stops. Greeley was so surprised he made the story the next day’s headline. Other papers didn’t want to be outdone, so they began to report on the revival.The publicity further fanned the flames and more began showing up. Soon every auditorium and hall in downtown NY was filled.  Then, theaters filled.We might wonder what were these prayer meetings like. They were run by laymen, not professional clergy. Pastors were often present but did not conduct the meetings. They might be asked to open pray or read a scripture, but then the meeting was turned over to fifty minutes or more of prayer.There was a remarkable sense of unity that marked the meetings. Those who attended came from different churches but were cautious about debating doctrines. There was more a concern to focus on the things they agreed on. They were there to pray and that’s what they did.At one prayer meeting in Michigan led by a layman, he said, “I see my pastor and the Methodist minister are here. Will one of you read a scripture and the other pray, then we’ll get started.”  They did, then the laymen said, “I’m not used to this kind of public and impromptu prayer so we’ll follow the example we’ve read about in the NY papers. We have so many here today please write your request down then pass them to the front. We’ll read them one at a time, and pray over each one.”The first request said, “A praying wife asks the prayers of this company for the conversion of her husband who’s far from God.” (That’s certainly a common request.) But immediately a blacksmith stood up and said, “My wife prays for me. I must be that man. I need to be converted. Would you please pray for me?” A lawyer said, “I think my wife wrote that note because I know I’m far from God.”  Five men all claimed the request was surely for them. All were converted in a matter of just a few minutes.This was common at the beginning of the revival. People were converted during the prayer meetings. They’d simply express their need for salvation then would be prayed for by the rest.One minister stood up and said he’d stayed till 3 PM the day before answering the questions of those who wanted Christ. He announced his church would be open each evening from then on for the preaching of the Gospel. Soon, every church was holding similar meetings.As the revival spread across the States, 10,000 were converted each week. In Newark, NJ, of a population of 70,000; 2,785 were brought to faith in 2 months. At Princeton University, almost half the students came to Christ and half of those entered full-time ministry.The revival swept the colleges of the nation.On Feb. 3rd, 1858 in Philadelphia, a dozen men moved their daily prayer meeting from the outskirts of the city to downtown. They met at the James Theater, the largest in The City. A couple weeks later sixty were attending. By the end of March, 6,000 were literally crammed in.That Summer, churches united to hold mass services. They erected big-top tents and conducted evangelistic meetings that thousands flocked to. In Ohio, 200 towns reported 12,000 converts in just two months. In Indiana, 150 small towns saw 4,500 come to Christ.In two years, of a national population of 30 million, 2 million made a profession of faith.

1. Edwin Orr remarks that this points up the difference between Evangelism and Revival. In evangelism, the evangelist seeks the sinner. In revival, sinners come running to God.

It was during this Revival that a young shoe salesman went to the Sunday School director of the Congregational Church in Chicago and said he wanted to teach a class. He was turned down because there were sixteen ahead of him waiting to teach. They put him on the wait-list. He told the director, “I want to do something NOW.”The director said, “Okay – start a class.”  He asked, “How?”He was told to “Go get boys off the street, take them to the country and teach them how to behave, then bring them in.”He went out to the alleys, gathered up a dozen street urchins and took them to the beach on Lake Michigan. He taught them Bible games and Scripture. Then brought them to the church where he was given a closet to hold his class.  That was the beginning of the ministry of Dwight Lyman Moody who went on to preach all over the US and England and led tens of thousands to Christ.Today, we’re accustomed to the secular press giving a cold shoulder to the things of God. That’s not new; it’s usually that way. Even during times of revival, the world tends to stand back and wait for it to pass. They may give grudging acknowledgment of the good fruit revival brings, but they always dig up some critic who dismisses it as religious fanaticism and emotionalism.  So the Revival of 1857-8 stands out because the secular press received it with enthusiasm. Maybe because it was a movement that began in the sophisticated urban centers of the nation and spread their first. It was called The Businessman’s Revival. These weren’t backwoods, country hicks who were “getting religion.” They were educated, literate, successful people being profoundly changed for the better. In a day when nearly everyone read the newspaper, they were familiar with the revival because it consistently made headlines. There was near-universal approval of it.Yes, it had a few critics, but their objections were dismissed as the grousing of unreasonable skeptics and the envious. The Anglicans were at first against it, until their churches began filling with seekers; then they approved of it as they saw its glorious effect. The same happened among the Lutherans.The prayer meetings were marked by order. And the conversions were as frequent among the older and more mature members of a community as the younger.It quickly spread up into Canada, then across the Atlantic to Ireland, Scotland, and England where conservative estimates say 10% of the population was brought to faith in Christ.  In London, every theater and auditorium was filled for prayer. It was during this time Charles Spurgeon built the Metropolitan Tabernacle and Hudson Taylor started the China Inland Mission.  Just a mile from where Taylor started, William Booth formed the Salvation Army.All of these came out of the Revival of 1857-9. The revival spilled over into Europe and reached India. The Dutch Reformed Church of South Africa still celebrates the revival for the huge impact it had on them. Jamaica was covered as were numerous other cities and nations.What I’d like to note as we end this episode is the date of this revival. Its peak was from 1857-60. A few years later the US was torn in two by the Civil War; a bloody chapter in my nation’s history. Many of those who died in the war were saved in the Revival.This seems to be a consistent pattern of revival; that it takes place just prior to a major war. Dr. Orr says that this has been a consistent pattern throughout our nation’s history.The First Great Awakening occurred shortly before the Revolutionary War. The Second before the War of 1812. The Revival of 1857-8 before the Civil War. The Welsh Revival that so affected Great Britain, Europe, and the US came right before WWI. It’s as though God pours out His Spirit to reap a harvest before evil falls and there’s a great loss of life.

This 125th episode of CS is titled A Second Awakening.I usually leave this announcement for the end but will insert it here at the beginning.Donations to keep the CS host site up are welcome and needed. You can do so at sanctorum.us. Just look for the “Donate” link.We ended our last episode with the dour spiritual condition of both the United States and Europe at the end of the 18th C.I mentioned Dr. J Edwin Orr a couple of episodes back. He was the 20th C’s foremost expert on Revival and Spiritual renewal. While he could speak with eloquence on literally dozens of Revivals, one of his favorite subjects was what’s come to be known as the Second Great Awakening.Before it began, there were many who worried if God did not intervene, Christianity might die out of Europe and the US.Following Independence from England, many American intellectuals fell in love with France. But France was throwing off religious faith as fast as it could. The French Revolution made a mockery of the Church and Christianity.  A well-known prostitute in Paris was crowned Goddess of Reason IN the Cathedral of Notre Dame. A majority of churches in France closed and the famous skeptic Voltaire claimed Christianity would be consigned to the dustbin of history in only 30 years. Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands were taken over by Rationalism. England was afflicted by a sophisticated Skepticism led by the philosopher David Hume. His attacks on faith are still used on campuses today.French radicals contributed millions of francs to propagandize and seduce American students. In Christian colleges like Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, students welcomed the new French ideas, not because they promised justice, but because of they welcomed immorality. It was a time of great moral decline. Of a population of 5 million--300,000 were alcoholics.  They buried 15,000 of them annually.To give you an idea of just how prolific drinking was, President Washington had to call out troops to put down an armed revolt over alcohol in what’s come to be known as the Whiskey Rebellion. There was a plague of lawlessness with bank robberies a daily occurrence. Out-of-wedlock births and STDs sky-rocketed. Public profanity soared, cheating was epidemic. The turn toward immorality was so dramatic Congress appointed a special commission to investigate what had happened and how to correct it. The Commission discovered that in Kentucky, there’d been only one court of law held in five years. They simply could not administer justice on the frontier. It became so bad, a group of vigilantes formed and fought a pitched battle with the outlaws è and LOST!A poll taken at Harvard found most students were atheists. At Princeton, a far more evangelical college; there were only two believers in the entire student body. All but five were members of the Filthy Speech Movement. Christians were so unpopular they had to meet in secret. Students burned down buildings and forced college presidents to resign.  A mob of students attacked a Presbyterian church, breaking windows and burning the pulpit Bible. Students often entered churches during Communion to interrupt the service by spitting on the floor.The largest and fastest-growing denomination had been Methodists. But they were now losing thousands each year. The second-largest were the Baptists. They described this time as their “most wintry season.” Presbyterians met in Philadelphia to express their dismay at the immorality of the nation. Lutherans and Episcopalians were so far gone they held talks to consider merging.Samuel Provost, Bishop of NY had not confirmed anyone as a new member in so long, he quit and looked for other work. Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Marshal wrote to Bishop Madison of Virginia that the Church in the US was too far gone to ever recover. Charles Lee, a popular hero of the Revolutionary War loudly advocated pulling down all the churches claiming they were obstacles to progress.The church historian Dr. Kenneth Scott Latourette summed it up by saying it looked as though Christianity was about to be ushered out of the affairs of man. But it wasn’t. On the contrary, a mighty outpouring of God’s Spirit was about to come.In 1784, Pastor John Erskin of Edinburgh, Scotland published a plea for prayer by all Christians in Scotland.  He sent a copy to Jonathan Edwards in America.  Edwards replied in what became a book titled A Humble Attempt to Promote Explicit Agreement and Visible Union of God's People in Extraordinary Prayer for the Revival of Religion and the Advancement of Christ's Kingdom on Earth.Erskin published both his book and Edwards’ reply as one-volume and sent it to Dr. John Rylands, a Baptist leader in Britain. Rylands read it, was profoundly moved, and pondered what to do with it.He gave it to two men of prayer who determined to spread it among church leaders. They convinced dozens of Baptist churches to set aside the first Monday of each month to pray for a spiritual awakening. Other denominations found out about what the Baptists were doing and joined. Congregationalists, Evangelicals in the Churches of England and Scotland, and the Methodists all held monthly prayer meetings devoted to praying for revival. Within seven years Britain was covered with a network of prayer.Then in 1791, the first evidence of an answer to their prayers began in the churches at Yorkshire. Mockers went to the monthly prayer meetings intending to disrupt them but went home converted. Some of these meetings were quiet prayer, others noisy.Then in the city of Leeds, the Methodist Church there saw a thousand unbelievers brought to faith in just a few months. Soon all the churches were experiencing the same. What they saw was the renewal of believers and the conversion of the lost. And this winning of so many to Christ stunned both Baptists and Congregationalists. They didn't believe in instantaneous conversion. They assumed it took three months of challenge, another three months of instruction to prove someone had been converted. That an alcoholic could attend a church meeting and go away converted and dramatically changed was hard to believe à Until they saw it happening in their own services.  It revolutionized their understanding of conversion, changing it forever.The revival strengthened Evangelicals in the Church of England like William Wilberforce who went on to lead the abolition movement in England.The revival moved into Scotland. It swept Wales. By 1796 it had covered Norway.One of the products of real revival is the new ministries it gives rise to. A pastor named Thomas Charles was moved by the story of Mary Jones, a serving girl who’d saved up her pennies to by a Bible. The nearest store was thirty miles away, so on her day off, she walked there, to find they were sold out. She returned home in tears. Pastor Charles was so moved he went to London and asked the publishers to print more Bibles. They refused saying the revival was a fad, a temporary emotionalism that would quickly pass and no one would want any Bibles then. So Charles formed the British and Foreign Bible Society, the first of all the Bible societies that would end up printing millions of Bibles that went all over the world.The Second Great Awakening resulted in a massive missionary outreach as well as major social reforms. It led to the abolition of slavery, thousands of schools, and a host of organizations to help the poor and needy.In the US and Canada, the first glimmers of revival began in 1792. It started in Boston where all but a couple of the churches had gone off into the error of Unitarianism. In Lenox, Mass. not a single young person had been received into the Church in 16 years. So a couple of churches agreed to hold special prayer for revival. They prayed for two years, then in 1794, a few pastors sent out a letter to every congregation in the US calling for a concert of prayer.  They’d heard about what was happening in England and determined to do the same.The Presbyterians adopted it in mass. Congregationalists, Baptists, and Moravians all took it up. Soon Christians across the nation were praying the first Monday of every month for spiritual awakening. Their prayers were desperate as they realized the urgency of the need. The momentum built over the next four years until 1798 when the Second Great Awakening began in earnest in the US.One church in NYC began with 80 members. They prayed for revival and three years later had grown to 720. This was typical for most churches during the revival.In the Eastern States, there was little to no emotional extravagance. But in the Western states of Kentucky and Ohio things were different. Remember the horrible conditions that existed on the Western frontier. People were brought under such conviction of sin they were often in an agony that once confessed and repented of, was replaced by unbound joy in salvation.  Many would go from unrestrained weeping to dancing and celebration.James McCready was the pastor of three small churches in Kentucky. McCready’s chief claim to fame was that he was so ugly he attracted attention. His voice was coarse and his style of preaching was far from elegant.  In 1799 he said the ministry was “Weeping and mourning with the people of God.” But a year later, an outpouring of the Holy Spirit began in Kentucky.The churches of the frontier were small buildings inadequate to house all those who wanted to attend, so ministers like McCready rode to outdoor campsites where thousands gathered to hear the Word of God and take Communion.At these camp meetings, as many as 20,000 would show up and stay for 3-4 days as one preacher after another preached.The revival swept Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio. Dr. George Baxter, a Presbyterian minister from Philadelphia heard about what was happening and went to investigate. He said Kentucky was the most moral place he’d ever seen in his life. He heard not a word of profanity the entire time he was there. He said a sense of religious awe hovered over the entire countryside.There was a great movement for the further evangelization of the Western frontier. Those who were converted traveled back East to attend college and get their degree in theology so they could return and continue the revival. So, revival broke out in those godless colleges of the East we talked about earlier. The Westerners returned home and started dozens of colleges in what today we call the Midwest. ¾’s of all Midwest colleges were the result of the Second Great Awakening.The Revival swept the South and was as evident among the slaves as among the white population.The War of 1812 interrupted the revival, but historians mostly agree that the Second Great Awakening marked the US as a thoroughly Christian nation.As the Awakening began to lose steam, Charles Finney came on the scene with his revival efforts. Beginning in New York State in 1824, he conducted effective meetings in several Eastern cities. The greatest took place in Rochester, New York, in the fall and winter of 1830–31, when he reported a thousand conversions in a city of 10,000. The revival affected nearby towns as well, with over 1,500 making professions of faith. At the same time, there were about 100,000 conversions in other parts of the country from New England to the Southwest.In 1835, Finney became president of Oberlin College in Ohio, where he continued to be an influential revivalist through personal campaigns and the wide distribution of his book Lectures on Revival. It was from the Oberlin school that the Holiness and Pentecostal churches emerged. Not only did Finney’s work make a great impact on America, he also made two trips to Europe, where he experienced extensive success.Finney is credited with introducing something called the anxious bench in his meetings. This was a place for people who wanted to express a desire for conversion to sit and await someone leading them to faith by walking them through an understanding of the Gospel then praying with them. The modern-day altar call practiced in many Evangelical churches and meetings is the descendant of Finney’s anxious seat.Fast-forward 50 years from the Second Great Awakening and it seemed the tide had gone out again. By the 1850s the country was thriving, largely because of the benefits brought by the Awakening. The Mid-West was being developed, the economy was booming. People made 18% interest on their investments. But as is so often the case, economic prosperity turned into a neglect of the Spirit. The pursuit of pleasure replaced the pursuit of God. The nation was politically divided over the issue of slavery.  It wasn’t just States that were divided. Churches and denominations split over it.Into this national argument that ended up tearing the country in two was added a dose of religious turmoil.A veteran and farmer named William Miller rediscovered the doctrine of the 2nd Coming. For generations most of the Church considered Bible prophesy a closed book. Miller began teaching on the Return of Christ. But he made the mistake many have and said Christ would return in 1844. About a million people followed his views.  When it didn’t happen, they were bitterly disillusioned because they’d sold their homes, businesses, and farms. Skeptics piled on the fanaticism of the Millerites and fired up a new round of mocking faith.  Then, in 1857, things began to change. What that change was, we’ll take a look at it next time.

This is episode 124-Decline.Following the Great Awakening, which produced a deep-seated sense of Faith in so many Americans prior to the Revolutionary War, as the new nation organized itself around its new national identity, it realized something unique was taking place. A genuine religious pluralism had taken root. That was very different from the centuries of conflict that marked the Europe their ancestors had come from.There are several reasons for the religious pluralism of the United States. But when we speak of pluralism at that point in history, let’s make sure what we mean is a lack of the establishment of a specific Christian denomination as a National or Federal Church. 18th Century pluralism didn’t extend to other major religions. There were no Buddhist or Hindu temples; no Islamic mosques nor Shinto shrines. Americans were Christians, if not of the committed stripe, at least nominally.The first reason for the religious pluralism of the US was immigration after 1690. It brought a mixture of people with various faiths so that no group was dominant. The Quakers of Pennsylvania opposed a formal church structure which prevented the rise of a State church there. Please note this: While the first Amendment prohibited the FEDERAL govt from establishing a National Church, there was no ban on the States establishing a State Church. Several states in fact HAD State churches. But the Quaker dominance of Pennsylvania resisted an established church. Their presence in New Jersey contributed to the religious mixture in that colony, and Pennsylvania’s control over Delaware during most of the colonial period meant freedom of religion there as well. French Huguenots took refuge in several colonies. Having suffered brutal persecution back home, they had no desire to persecute others.A second wave of immigrants in 1700, consisted mostly of some 200,000 Germans. While most were either Lutheran or Reformed, several smaller sects were also present. Most shared the Pietistic emphasis on a deeply felt personal faith. They had no desire to dominate others’ religious persuasion. These Germans settled in Pennsylvania and northern New York.Last came a wave of about a quarter-million Scotch-Irish from Northern Ireland. Nearly all Presbyterians, they’d been persecuted by the Anglican Church of Ireland. They spread throughout the Middle & Southern colonies. By 1760, the population of the colonies was about 2½ million. A third born in a foreign land.A second influence favoring religious pluralism was that many of the colonies were Proprietary, meaning they were business ventures. For the sake of the business, religious feuds needed to be tamped down lest they prove a distraction to the colony’s profitability. Even where a specific church or denomination was favored, large numbers of people from others faiths meant the requirement to get along for the greater good.Third, the revivals we looked at in the last episode proved a leveling influence. They crossed denominational lines as if there was no distinction whatever. Revival preachers and promoters universally stressed the equality of all in the sight of God.Fourth, the Western frontier was another leveler. Pioneers were self-reliant individualists or they didn’t survive. In case you haven’t noticed, rugged individualism and religious institutionalism don’t mix. Frontiersmen were suspicious of and opposed to attempts by them City-folk back East asserting their will over the Frontier – in any form, including dictating what church would be built where and led by who.Fifth, following the revivals of the 18th century, spiritual apathy began to grow once more. The churches that had filled during the Great Awakening began to empty. And without new ministers in training, it meant more churches were left without gifted leaders. Let me be clear—While the Frontier resisted Eastern denominations reaching into their realm, they still wanted their own churches. But the rapid evolution of the Western Frontier meant churches weren’t built or manned quickly enough. The Frontier became a largely unchurch region.  In proportion to the population, probably more than anywhere else in Christendom during the first third of the 18th century, the Western frontier of the British colonies was the least churched.Sixth, the philosophy of natural rights percolating for a couple of centuries coalesced during the Enlightenment. It now began to influence many. One of those natural rights people came to accept was the privilege of deciding what religion they’d follow. John Locke’s Letters on Toleration argued for the separation of church and state and a voluntary religious affiliation for any and all. Most leaders of the generation that saw the American Revolutionary, such as Thomas Jefferson, were enamored with this philosophy and were active in bringing down the church establishment in Virginia soon after the new nation won its independence.When the Revolution began, the Anglican church suffered greatly because many of its ministers remained Loyalists who supported England. When the war was over, there were few Anglican ministers left in the country and many churches had been destroyed.In all, the disestablishment of religion seemed a foregone conclusion in the United States. With the founding of the new nation, one after another, State churches toppled. The last to go was Congregationalism in New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Massachusetts in the first half of the 19th century.I realize the narrative I’ve just shared appears to challenge the picture some modern apologists paint of the role of Christianity in the Early American Republic. A deeper look makes it clear there’s no challenge at all. To say the United States saw a disestablishment of churches doesn’t mean Americans were irreligious. On the contrary; remember what we saw in the last episode. The Great Awakening had such a huge impact on the colonies that for a time, to be an American meant to be a Christian. And not just as a default label derived at by the process of elimination. You know, that attitude some have that says, “Well, I’m not a Hindu, Buddhist or Muslim; so I must be a Christian.” Coming out of the Great Awakening, the American identity was one that was thoroughly and sincerely Christian of the pietistic stripe; where having a personal testimony of the experience of being born again was paramount.So à IF there was so much religious diversity and agitation against an established Church during the 18th century, what were the attitudes of the different denominations toward the Revolution?As noted, Anglicans in the Church of England were divided, but dominated by a loyalist majority. In the north, Anglicans leaned heavily toward the loyalist cause. In the south, many of the great planters, men like George Washington, favored the Revolutionary cause. Congregationalists gave enthusiastic support to the Revolution, their ministers preached fervent sermons favoring of the patriot cause.Presbyterians leaned that way as well in a continuation of the old conflict back home between themselves and Anglicans. Presbyterian John Witherspoon, was a signer of the Articles of Confederation, the only clergyman to sign the Declaration of Independence. Lutherans also supported the Revolution under the leadership of the Muhlenbergs. Though divided, Roman Catholics were generally patriots.Baptists supported the Revolution because they felt the cause of separation of church and state was at stake. They believed a British victory would bring a round of new political control and a tightening on the religious scene.Methodists were suspect because at the beginning of the war Wesley urged neutrality. Then colonial preachers came out in support of the Revolution. Although Quakers, Mennonites, and Moravians were pacifists, most of them were in sympathy with the Revolution and some joined the army.The Revolution dissolved the ties between many religious groups in America and their spiritual relatives in Europe. This meant the need for new organizations in America. Though the Anglican church had been handed a serious setback, it didn’t completely evacuate the new Nation. William White and Samuel Seabury attempted to rebuild the Anglican church after the war under the new label of the Protestant Episcopal Church.Loosed from English Methodism, in 1784 Methodists organized as the Methodist Episcopal Church, under the leadership of Francis Asbury. That same year, American Roman Catholics ended their affiliation with the British Bishop. In 1789, John Carroll became the first Roman Catholic bishop, with Baltimore as his See. The Baptists formed a General Committee in 1784. And the Presbyterians in Philadelphia drew up a constitution for their church at the same time as the national Constitution was being formed in 1787.The Revolutionary War proved to be hard on religious life in America. Because most local churches supported the Revolution, when the British took an area, they often poured out their wrath on houses of worship. Churches were destroyed when they were used as barracks, hospitals, and storehouses of munitions. Pastors and congregations were absorbed in the cause of the Revolution rather than in building up the churches. French deism and its philosophical cousin atheism became fashionable among certain elements of American society because of the alliance with France. Rationalism took control of colleges and other intellectual centers. In some schools, there was hardly a student who’d admit to being a Christian.Conditions were so bad during the years when the Constitution was being forged, politicians and ministers alike virtually gave up hope for the role of religion in American society. Bishop Samuel Provost of the Episcopal Diocese of New York saw the situation as so hopeless, he ceased to function. A committee of Congress reported on the desperate state of lawlessness on the frontier. Of a population of five million, the United States had 300,000 drunkards, burying 15,000 a year. In 1796, George Washington agreed with a friend that national affairs were leading to a crisis he was unable to see the outcome of.The closing years of the 18th C were dark. But its always darkest just before the dawn.

This episode of CS is titled Awakening.The tide of Pietism that swept portions of Europe in the 17th C, arrived in North America in the 18th. Like the Charismatic Movement of the 1960s, Protestant denominations were split over how to respond to Pietism. Presbyterians were divided between those who insisted on strict adherence to the teachings of the Westminster Confession and those whose emphasis was on having an experience of saving grace. The two sides eventually reunited, but not before the contention became so sharp, it led to a rift. That reached its zenith, or nadir might be a better descriptive, during The Great Awakening.As we saw in our last episode, the Half-Way Covenant of New England allowed people to be members of the Church, without being saved; a formula for disaster. The Half-Way Covenant, along with the assault of the pseudo-intellectualism of the Enlightenment, resulted in a creeping spiritual lethargy among the churches of the English colonies. Jonathan Edwards, who became one of the main luminaries of The Great Awakening, remarked before it began that the spiritual condition of New England was abysmal.The first stirrings of revival began as movements in local churches five to ten years before the Great Awakening. There’d even been some minor revivals in Northampton during the time of Edwards’ grandfather, Solomon Stoddard in the 1720s.Theodore Frelinghuysen was a Dutch Reformed pastor who’d come to North America to pastor four churches in New Jersey. Frelinghuysen was what’s called a Precisionist, a Dutch version of an English Puritan. Puritanism was exported to Holland by William Ames where it was referred to as Precisionism.Pastor Frelinghuysen discerned a general spiritual malaise in all four of his congregations there in New Jersey; an appalling lack of practical piety. So he decided to embark on a program of reform. He started visiting people in their homes. He enforced church discipline and preached fervent evangelistic sermons. A few opposed these innovations, but he persevered and the churches began to grow with genuine conversions resulting in a warming up of the entire congregation in their fervency for the things of God. It was the first stirrings of revival, which spread to other Dutch Reformed churches. By 1726, Frelinghuysen was recognized as a leader of revival.The Presbyterians of New Jersey saw what was happening among their Dutch neighbors and soon joined the revival under the work of the father and son team, William and Gilbert Tennent.But when it comes to The Great Awakening, the name most closely associated with it is Jonathan Edwards.Edwards is considered by many to be one of the most brilliant minds in American history. He wasn’t just a great theologian. He was a top-rank philosopher and scientist. Edwards is sometimes presented as a fiery preacher in the Puritan vein. The popular notion of him is that he was a revivalist-preacher of a mien similar to George Whitefield. His most famous sermon was Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. The title alone gives one the impression of a wild-eyed and crazy-haired pulpit-pounder. But that image is far from what Edwards was really like. He was reserved and tended toward shyness. He was more at home in his study among his books than in a pulpit. Edwards spent ten hours a day studying. His messages were filled with theology and their delivery was not the kind of fire and brimstone preaching many assume. His style was to virtually read his messages. That’s not to say his delivery was wooden, but descriptions of it remarked on the lack of gestures or inflection of voice. Flamboyance was nowhere in sight when Edwards spoke. He trusted in the eloquence and logic of his message to persuade, rather than by affecting a dramatic persona. If there was grandeur in his message, it was due to WHAT he said, rather than in HOW he said it.Edwards was a PK; a pastor’s kid. His father Timothy was a minister in the town of East Windsor, Connecticut. By the age of thirteen, he’d master Greek, Hebrew, and Latin. He wrote essays on scientific matters and penned one on the behavior of insects that became famous. As a teen, he read and consumed the ideas of Sir Isaac Newton. He graduated from Yale at seventeen.It was during his college years his relationship with God deepened into rich intimacy. All of that grew out of the time he spent studying the nature and character of God.Edwards added two more years of post-graduate studies then took a pastorate at a small church in New York for only a couple of months. That was followed by a stint as a tutor at Yale for another two years. In 1727, he became an assistant pastor to his grandfather, Solomon Stoddard at Northampton, Mass. Also at that time, he married Sarah Pierpont.When Edwards took up his ministry at Northampton in 1727, he found the church to be spiritually dull, even though it had been the scene of earlier stirrings of the Spirit under Stoddard’s leadership. When Stoddard died in 1729, Edwards stepped into the role of senior pastor.He decided to address the spiritual apathy of the congregation by preaching a series of five sermons on justification by faith. He rightly diagnosed the real problem at Northampton wasn’t laziness or moral sloppiness; it was an absence of good theology. Instead of preaching the need for repentance and obedience, he focused on the glory of God in the Gospel of Christ. Sure enough, a season of renewal came as people recommitted themselves to follow Jesus. The messages weren’t calculated to elicit an emotional response, but they did. People responded with a remarkable moral and spiritual change, often with intense emotion.After several months, the movement spread thru out Massachusetts and into Connecticut. After three years it began to diminish. But the memory of revival endured, with many hoping for it to be renewed.In 1737, Edwards decided to pen a chronicle of what had happened over the previous three years. It was titled, A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God in the Conversion of Many Hundreds of Souls in Northampton. That’s the title; not the actual text of the whole thing. The Narrative as it’s more conveniently referred to, is what established Jonathan Edwards as the main person associated with Revival.In 1739, George Whitefield visited New England. Though Edwards and Whitefield represented different flavors of the Faith, they were both deeply committed to the Preaching of the Gospel. Edwards helped arrange Whitefield’s campaign through the area of Boston then on to Northampton where Edwards turned his pulpit over to the great preacher. The winds of renewal that had waned a few years before strengthened once more.Then Edwards was invited to speak at the church in Enfield, Connecticut in 1741. His message was titled, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Reading the text of the sermon today one might assume it was delivered in the ham-fisted, “fire and brimstone” manner of a fanatic. But as we’ve seen, that was not Edward’s style. Nor did he deliver it in the monotone some later reports suggest. He spoke as a man convinced of his topic; urging his listeners to make sure they’d embraced the Grace of God. The sermon paints a terrifying picture of eternal damnation; something Edwards aimed to make clear. Because as historian George Marsden says, Edwards didn’t preach anything new to his hearers. They were well acquainted with the Gospel as a remedy for sin. The problem was getting them to seek it.While revival was already building, Edwards’ sermon at that church in Enfield was a crystalizing moment in The Great Awakening. If the coals had been getting hot they now burst into flames that spread all over New England and to the other colonies, even across the Atlantic to settle in England and the Continent.As welcome as The Great Awakening might have seemed, some ministers opposed it. Their opposition stemmed from their resistance to the emotionalism that became a mark of the Revival. People wept in repentance then shouted for joy at being saved. Some were so emotionally wrought over the process of their conversion, they fainted. A few who were psychologically fragile exhibited what can only be called bizarre behavior.Such reactions led the enemies of the Great Awakening to accuse its leaders of undermining the solemnity of worship, and of substituting emotion for scholarship. Since it’s the tendency to stick labels on movements, supporters of the Awakening were called New Lights, while those who opposed it were called Old Lights.Edwards made clear in his writings that he believed emotion was important. But emotion, including the intense experience of conversion, should never eclipse doctrine and orderly worship.At first, Baptists opposed the Awakening, labeling it frivolous and superficial. But so many of the new converts were inclined to agree with Baptist positions that they ended up becoming Baptists. When the Baptists saw all these new members, their opinion of the Revival changed. Most notable was the conviction among the new converts that baptism ought to be of those who profess faith in Christ, not infants. Entire Congregationalists and Presbyterian congregations became Baptists.The Great Awakening sent Baptists and Methodists to the Western frontier. Settlers continually pushed the Frontier westward. It was Methodist and Baptist missionaries who took up the task of preaching to them and planting frontier churches. So those two groups became the most numerous out West.It’s difficult to estimate how many conversions took place during the Great Awakening but gauging by fairly accurate church records taken over that time indicate a conservative number of ten percent of Americans came to Faith. In some communities, it was much higher than that. Keep in mind that was in the midst of a society already considered thoroughly Christian.Besides the obvious spiritual effects of the Great Awakening, it had a notable political impact in the British colonies of North America. It was the first movement to include all thirteen colonies. A new sense of commonality developed in which the emerging unique identity as Americans, as opposed to British, took root alongside the idea that to be an American meant to be a Christian of Protestant stripe.The Great Awakening propelled a wave of missionary activity. David Brainerd, Jonathan Edwards, and others preached to the Indians, and some effort was made to reach blacks with the gospel. Among the colleges birthed at that time were Princeton, Rutgers, Brown, and Dartmouth. Dartmouth trained Indians to serve as missionaries to their own people.Edwards continued in his role as pastor till 1750 when a controversy saw him removed.Edwards believed Communion ought to be given only to those church members who’d demonstrated a genuine conversion experience, as per the Pietistic belief. His grandfather, the previous pastor, had relaxed the traditional Puritan practice and allowed what we’ll call ‘unconverted church members’ to partake of the Lord’s Supper. Stoddard regarded Communion as a “converting experience.” He thought regular attendance at the Lord’s Table would be something the Holy Spirit could use to bring conviction and salvation to a needy soul. Edwards disagreed, viewing Communion as open only to those who were converted.By 1750, Edwards had come to this position though at odds with the tradition of the church he pastored. When he tried to implement a change in practice, they released him. Yep, they canned him. It was then that he embarked on his mission of taking the Gospel to the Indians at Stockbridge, Mass. It was while engaged in that work that he wrote his most famous work – Freedom of the Will.I want to share a little story from the life of Jonathan Edwards that may give us some insight into the man. After fourteen years of marriage, in January of 1742, something happened to his wife Sarah. She had an intense religious experience. Some historians think it was a nervous breakdown. Edward was away on a preaching tour. His pulpit was being filled by Samuel Buell who gave a series of sermons with profound impact on Sarah. She was overwhelmed to the point of fainting. Her condition was such that she was unable to take care of her children, who were sent to stay with neighbors till John returned a few weeks later.The town was abuzz with the nature of her condition. Was it some kind of spiritual ecstasy or an emotional breakdown? When John returned, he of course immediately went to her to see what was wrong. She related to him that she’d experienced God’s goodness as never before; as she didn’t even know was possible. She said the joy and security she now had was so intense it was at times debilitating.John’s reaction was interesting. He affirmed she’d had a visitation from God. Keep in mind we’re talking here about hard-core, strict Calvinist; not a Pentecostal or even a more mild Charismatic.After a few weeks, Sarah recovered and returned to the normal activities of life. But John said from then on Sarah maintained a peace and joy that transformed her. In writing about the effects of the revival, while Edwards doesn’t name his wife, it’s clear some of what he chronicled were things he witnessed in his own wife when she was filled with the Holy Spirit in 1742.In 1757, Edwards was appointed president of Princeton, known then as the College of New Jersey. A short time later, he volunteered to be a test subject for a smallpox vaccine. Which instead of inoculating him against the disease, claimed his life in 1758.One of my favorite teachers is J. Edwin Orr. When Orr died in 1987, he was recognized by many as the 20th Century’s foremost expert on Revival. He spent his last years living a few miles from where I am now, in CA. My good friend and fellow pastor David Guzik befriended Orr’s widow, who passed many of Dr. Orr’s books, writings, and recordings on to him for posterity’s sake. David has faithfully made that material available online at jedwinorr.com .The eminent New Testament scholar FF Bruce said, “Some men read history, some write it, and others make it. So far as the history of religious revivals is concerned, J. Edwin Orr belongs to all three categories.”Orr tells remarkable stories of the impact of revival on society. The many revivals he chronicles don’t merely add a bunch of new church members; they have an astounding impact in moral revolution. Orr shares that during some revivals, because there was no crime, the Police organized singing groups to sing in churches because they had nothing else to do. There were a number of business failures; pubs and other enterprises that thrive on vice folded.One unforeseen effect during the Welsh Revival was that there was a work stoppage in the coal mines of Wales. For years, the mules that pulled the coal carts were used to hearing the miners curse at them. But when so many miners converted during the Revival, they refused to curse anymore and the mules no longer heard the profane commands telling them to move. Work in the mines stalled till the mules were retrained to respond to the now clean speech of the joyous miners.If you’re interested in more such interesting stories, I encourage you to head over to jedwinorr.com for more.And I want to also encourage you to check our David Guzik’s website at enduringword.com.David is one of the premier Bible expositors online today. His free commentary is used by many thousands of pastors, professors, Bible teachers and students all over the world.Donations of any size to CS are welcome. You can do so at sanctorum.us // Thanks.

This episode is titled Colonies.The 16th C saw the growth of the Spanish and Portuguese overseas empires. The Spanish Empire included Mexico, extending well into what is now the western half of North America. In the 17th C, other Europeans began their own empire-building. The most successful of the new colonial powers was Great Britain. Among its first overseas enterprises were the thirteen colonies in North America. Though we’ve already talked about the settling of Plymouth and the Puritan settlements of Massachusetts, we’ll do a little review.The first British colonial ventures in North America failed. In 1584, Sir Walter Raleigh was granted a charter for colonization. He named the area Virginia, after the Virgin Queen Elizabeth. But his first two ventures failed. The first group of settlers returned to England, while the second disappeared.Then, in 1607 the first permanent colonization of Virginia began at Jamestown, named after the new British King James. There was a chaplain among them since the Virginia Company who sponsored the venture hoped to establish the Church of England in the new land and to offer its services both to the settlers and Indians. It also hoped the new colony would halt Spanish expansion, which was feared for its spread of the dreaded “popery,” as Puritans called Catholicism. But the colony’s main purpose was economic rather than religious. The Church of England never had a bishop in Virginia or in any of the other colonies. The stockholders of the Virginia Company simply hoped trade with the Indians, along with whatever crops the settlers grew, would bring a profit.The founding of Virginia took place at the high point of Puritan influence in the Church of England. // Several of the stockholders and settlers believed the colony should be ruled by Puritan principles. Its early laws required attendance at worship twice a day, strict observance of Sunday as a day of rest and worship, and the prohibition of profanity and immodesty. But King James detested Puritans, and would not allow his colony to be ruled by them. A war with the native Americans in 1622 became the excuse to bring Virginia under his direct rule. After that, Puritan influence waned. Later Charles I, following James’s anti-Puritan policy, carved out a large part of Virginia for a new colony called Maryland and placed it under the Catholic proprietor, Lord Baltimore. Maryland was intended to be a Roman Catholic enclave in the British North American colonies. While many Catholics did move there, Protestants outnumbered them.The Puritan Revolution in England made little impact on Virginia. The colonists were more interested in growing the new cash crop of tobacco and opening new lands for its cultivation than in the religious strife going on back in merry old England. Puritan zeal lost its vigor in the midst of economic prosperity. One of the things that led to this spiritual decline was the acceptance of slavery.Tobacco is a labor-intensive crop. The importation of cheap labor in the form of African slaves allowed the colonists to grow the tons of tobacco now all the rage in Europe. But the Protestant work ethic that lay at the heart of so much of the Puritan mindset was gutted by slavery. Simply put, Puritan colonists lost touch with why the Puritans back in England wanted to reform the government and Church of England.Prior to Abolition, the Church of England neglected evangelizing slaves. They did so because of an ancient principle prohibiting Christians from holding fellow believers in slavery. If a slave got saved, his owner was obliged to free her/him. Then, in 1667, a law was passed saying baptism didn’t change a slave’s legal status as the property of his owner.While the new and emerging American aristocracy of Virginia remained Anglican, many in the lower classes turned to dissident movements. When strict measures were taken against them, hundreds migrated to Catholic Maryland, where there was greater religious freedom. The Quakers and Methodists took turns making successful forays into Virginia’s church scene.Other colonies were founded south of Virginia. The Carolinas, granted by the crown to a group of aristocratic stockholders in 1663, developed slowly. To encourage immigration, the proprietors declared religious freedom, which attracted dissidents from Virginia and England. It didn’t take long before the people who settled in the new colonies claimed little to no religious affiliation other than a generic “Christian.”Georgia was founded for two over-arching reasons. The first was to halt Spanish expansion. The second was to serve as an alternative for England’s overcrowded debtors’ prisons. At the beginning of the 18th C, there were many who wanted to help the sorry lot of those in England who’d fallen into poverty and couldn’t get out. One of the leaders of this campaign was a military hero named James Oglethorpe. He thought a colony ought to be founded in North America to serve as an alternative to the imprisonment of debtors. A royal charter was granted in 1732, and the first convicts arrived the next year. To these, others were soon added, along with a large group of religious refugees. Although Anglicanism was the official religion of Georgia, it made little impact on the colony. The failure of the Wesleys as Anglican pastors in the colony was typical of others. The Moravians had a measure of success, although their numbers were never large. The most significant religious movement in the early years of Georgia was the response to Whitefield’s preaching. By the time of his death in 1770, he’d left his stamp on much of Georgia’s religious life. Later, Methodists, Baptists, and others harvested what he’d sown.As we’ve seen in previous episodes, it was farther north, at Plymouth and around Boston that Puritanism made its greatest impact. When Roger Williams was banished, he settled Providence, around which the colony of Rhode Island eventually coalesced.The Hutchinsons and their supporters started Connecticut.The Puritans, who baptized their children, were influenced by the Pietistic belief in the necessity of a conversion experience in order to be a genuine Christian. The question then rose; “Why do we baptize children if people don’t become Christians till they are converted?” Wouldn’t it be wiser to wait till someone was converted, then dunk ‘em – like, BTW, the Baptists do in Rhode Island? Some wanted to follow this new course. But that clashed with the Puritan goal of founding a Christian society, one in covenant with God and guided by biblical principles. A Christian commonwealth is conceivable only if, as in ancient Israel, one becomes a member by birth, so that the civil and the religious communities are the same. So children HAD to be baptized because that’s how you become part of the Church, and the Church and society were one and the same, just as in ancient Israel they entered the covenant by circumcision as infants.To make matters even MORE complicated à If infants were baptized so as to make them  “children of the covenant,” what was to be done with infants born of baptized parents who never had a conversion experience?Many came to the conclusion there needed to be a kind of “halfway covenant,” that included those who were baptized but had no personal conversion experience. The children of such people were to be baptized, for they were still members of the covenant community. But only those who had experienced a conversion were granted full membership in the church and were vested with the power to participate in the process of making decisions.This controversy engendered bitter arguments and monumental ill-will which turned the original optimism of the settlers into a dark foreboding. The tension over the Half-Way Covenant spilled over into new debates over how churches ought to be governed and over relations between local congregations who took different sides in the controversies that began to swirl. The majority settled on a form of church government called Congregationalism. They managed to maintain a grip on doctrinal orthodoxy by adhering to the Westminster Confession.As mentioned, the main center of Roman Catholicism in the North American British colonies was Maryland. In 1632, Charles I granted Cecil Calvert, whose noble title was Lord Baltimore, rights of colonization over a region claimed by Virginia. Calvert was Catholic, and the grant was made by Charles in an attempt to garner Catholic support. Catholics in England wanted a colony where they could live without the restrictions they faced at home. Since it was politically unwise to establish a purely Catholic colony, it was decided Maryland would be a realm of religious freedom.The first settlers arrived in 1634, with only a tenth being Catholic aristocrats. The other nine-tenths were their Protestant servants. Tobacco quickly became the colony’s economic mainstay, giving rise to large, prosperous plantations. Maryland was governed by Catholic landowners, but the majority of its residents were Protestants. Whenever the shifting political winds in Britain gave opportunity, Protestants sought to wrest power from the Catholic aristocracy. They succeeded when James II was overthrown. Anglicanism then became the official religion of Maryland and Catholic rights were restricted.Because of the religious liberty practiced as policy in Pennsylvania, a good number of Catholics settled there. Catholicism then made significant gains after the Stuarts were restored to the throne in England. But after the fall of James II, the growth of Catholicism in all thirteen colonies was restricted.The colonies of New York & New Jersey, weren’t, at first, religious refuges for any particular group. Pennsylvania was founded as a home for Quakers. But not solely so. William Penn envisioned the colony as a place of religious freedom for all. The same was true for Delaware, which Penn purchased from the Duke of York, and was part of Pennsylvania until 1701.The religious history of New Jersey is complex. East New Jersey leaned toward the strict Puritanism of New England, while the West favored the tolerance of the Quakers. Sadly, many Quakers in New Jersey became a slaveholding aristocracy whose relations with the more traditional abolitionist Quakers of Pennsylvania became strained.What became New York was first colonized by the Dutch, whose East India Company established headquarters in Manhattan, and whose Reformed Church came with them. In 1655, they conquered a rival colony the Swedes founded on the Delaware River, then they were in turn conquered by the British in 1664 in a minor contest. What had been New Netherland became New York. The Dutch who stayed, most of them it turned out, became British; which they happily consented to, since their homeland hadn’t given them support. The British replaced the Dutch Reformed Church with the Church of England, whose only members were the governor’s party until more British arrived and settled.We end this episode noting religious motivations played an important role in the founding of several of the British colonies in America.  Although at first, some were intolerant of religious diversity, time softened that policy, and the colonies tended to emulate the example of Rhode Island and Pennsylvania, where religious freedom existed from their inception. Such tolerance eased the natural tensions that rival colonies had as they vied for economic prosperity. The colonies also witnessed from afar the religious tensions ripping the mother country apart. That may have moved them to cool their intolerance in favor of a more liberal policy of religious freedom. But other factors were at work that combined to erode the religious fervor of the early settlers of the thirteen colonies. Slavery, the social inequality of a plantation-based economy, the exploitation of Indians and their lands, combined to work against the conscience of the English settlers. They found it difficult to follow the pattern of New Testament Christianity while engaging in practices they knew violated the Spirit of Christ. They entered a phase of national life where a desire for wealth eclipsed the conviction of the Spirit. The result was a spiritual malaise that deadened the religious fervor of the colonies.But as we’ve seen repeatedly in our study of Church History, a period of spiritual declension either resolves in widespread apostasy or spiritual renewal. What would it be for the British colonies in North America? We find out, in our next episode.A donation of any amount to keep CS up and running is appreciated. You can donate by going to the sanctorum.us page and following the link. Thanks.

This episode of CS is titled Results.Now that we’ve taken a look at some of the movements and luminaries of the Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment, it’s time for a review of the results and their impact on The Church.Once we embark in the next Era of Church History, we’ll find ourselves in the weeds of so many movements we’re going to have to back up and take it in an even more summary form than we have. Turns out, the warning Roman Catholics sounded when Protestants split off turned out to be true. They warned if Luther and other Reformers left the Mother Church, they’d commence a fragmenting that would never end. They foretold that anyone with their own idea of the way things ought to be would run off to start their own group, that would become another church, then a movement of churches and eventually a denomination. The hundreds of denominations and tens of thousands of independent churches today are testimony to that fragmenting.The problem for us here with CS is this – There’s no way we can chronicle all the many directions the Church went in that fragmenting. We’ll need to stand back to only mark the broad strokes.Though the Enlightenment heavyweight John Locke was an active advocate of religious tolerance, he made it clear tolerance didn’t apply to Catholics. The fear in England of a Catholic-Jacobite conspiracy, valid it turned out, moved Locke and the Anglican clergy to be wary of granting Catholics the full spectrum of civil rights. On the contrary, the English were at one point so paranoid of Rome’s attempt to seize the throne, a 1699 statute made the saying of a Latin mass a crime.Many Roman Church apologists were talented writers and challenged Anglican teachings. In 1665, Bishop Tillotson answered John Sergeant’s treatise titled Sure Footing in Christianity, or Rational Discourses on the Rule of Faith. Sergeant worried some Protestants might convert to Catholicism for political reasons. His anxiety grew in 1685 when the Roman Catholic Duke of York, James II, became king. King James’s Declaration of Indulgences removed restrictions blocking Catholics from serving in the government.The arrival of William III and the Glorious Revolution ended James’ efforts to return England to the Catholic fold. He was allowed to leave England for France at the end of 1688. Then in 1714, with the Peace of Utrecht ending the War of the Spanish Succession, France’s King Louis XIV, promised he’d no longer back the Stuart claim to England’s throne.During the 18th C, Catholics in England were a minority. At the dawn of the century, there were only two convents in England, with a whopping 25 nuns. By 1770, the number of Catholics still only numbered some 80,000. They lacked civil and political rights and were considered social outsiders. The Marriage Act of 1753 disallowed any wedding not conducted according to the Anglican rite, excepting Quakers and Jews.This is not to say all English Protestants were intolerant of Roman Catholics. Some of the upper classes appreciated varied aspects of Roman culture. They owned art produced by Catholic artists and thought making the continental Grand Tour a vital part of proper education. One of the chief stops on that Tour was, of course, Rome.Still, anti-Catholic feelings on the part of the common people were seen in the Gordon Riots of 1780. When the 1699 statute banning the Mass was removed, a mob burned down Catholic homes and churches. Catholics didn’t receive full civil liberty until the Emancipation Act of 1829.While Anglicans, Baptists, and Catholics sniped at each other, they all agreed Deism represented a serious threat to the Christian Faith. England proved to be Deism's most fertile soil.In 1645, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, Father of English Deism, proposed five articles as the basis of his rationalist religion.1) God exists;2) We are obliged to revere God;3) Worship consists of a practical morality;4) We should repent of sin;5) A future divine judgment awaits all people based on how they’ve lived.Charles Blount published several works that furthered the Deist cause in England. John Toland’s Christianity not Mysterious in 1696 opened the floodgates of Deistic literature. Contemporaries of John Locke viewed his The Reasonableness of Christianity as preparing the way for Toland’s explicitly Deist work. Locke tried to blunt the accusation by saying while Toland was a friend, his ideas were his own and had no connection to his own.The first half of the 18th C saw an onslaught of literature from Deists that seemed to batter Anglicans into a corner and make the Gospel seem insipid. So much so that in 1722 Daniel Defoe complained that “no age, since the founding and forming the Christian Church was ever like, in openly avowed atheism, blasphemies, and heresies, to the age we now live in.” When Montesquieu visited England in 1729 he wrote “There is no religion, and the subject if mentioned, excites nothing but laughter.” The Baron certainly over-stated the case since other evidence indicates religious discussion was far from rare. But in his circle of contacts, the place theological discussion had once played was now greatly diminished.Eventually, in response to this wave of Deist literature, Christian apologists embarked on a campaign to address a number of -isms that had risen to silence the Faith. They dealt with Deism, Atheism, a resurgent Arianism, Socinianism, and Unitarianism. Their task was complicated by the fact many of their Deist opponents claimed to be proponents of the “true” teachings of the Christian faith.Richard Bentley observed that the claims of Deists attacked the very heart of the Christian faith. He summarized Deist ideas like this – “They say that the soul is material, Christianity a cheat, Scripture a falsehood, hell a fable, heaven a dream, our life without providence, and our death without hope, such are the items of the glorious gospel of these Deist evangelists.”A number of Deists argued that God, Who they referred to as the Architect of the Universe, does not providentially involve Himself in His creation. Rather, He established fixed laws to govern the way the world runs. Since the laws are fixed, no biblical miracles could have taken place. So, the Bible is filled with errors and nonsense, a premise deists like Anthony Collins claimed was confirmed by critics like Spinoza. Prophetic pointers to a Messiah in the Old Testament could not have been fulfilled by Christ since prophecy would violate the fixed law of time.Deists maintained that salvation is NOT an issue of believing the Gospel. Rather, God requires all peoples to follow rationally construed moral laws regarding what’s right and wrong. Since a measure of reason is given to everyone, God is fair, they contended, in holding everyone accountable to the same rational, moral standards.The astute listener may note that that sounds close to what some scientists advocate today. We hear much about the growing number of once atheist scientists coming to a faith in God. That report is true, but we need to qualify the “god” many of them are coming to faith in. It’s a god of the small ‘g’, not a capital “G” as in the God of the Bible. The god of many recent scientist converts is more akin to the Watchmaker deity of the Deists than the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and The Apostle Paul.Deists believed what they called “natural religion” underlying all religion. We learn of this religion, not from the special revelation of Scripture. We learn it from, as Immanuel Kant would say “the starry heavens above, and the moral law within.”Christian apologists unleashed scores of books in an anti-deist counterattack. One of the most effective was Jacques Abbadie’s Treatise on the Truth of the Christian Religion. Published in 1684, it was one of the earliest and most widely circulated apologetics for the truthfulness of the Christian faith based on “facts.” Abbadie was a Protestant pastor in London. He countered Deist arguments against the resurrection and alleged discrepancies in Scripture. The points he made remain some of the most potent apologetics today. He pointed out the public nature of Christ’s appearances after the resurrection. The change in the disciples’ attitudes, from trembling in fear to confidence in the truthfulness and power of The Gospel as evidenced by their preaching and willingness to die for the Faith. In the 18th C, Abbadie’s work was found in the libraries of more French nobles than the best-selling works of Bossuet or Pascal.You may remember a couple of episodes back, our brief coverage of the work of the skeptic David Hume. Hume attacked the concept of “cause and effect,” claiming it was only an unsubstantiated presupposition allowing for it that made cause and effect a rule. Hume’s criticism turned those who bought his ideas into inveterate critics unable to come to conclusions about anything. John Wesley described Hume as “the most insolent despiser of truth and virtue that ever appeared in the world, an avowed enemy to God and man, and to all that is sacred and valuable upon earth.”The Scottish philosopher Thomas Reid developed an erudite response to Hume’s skepticism. In his An Essay on Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense, published in 1764, Reid critiqued Hume’s theory: “The theory of ideas, like the Trojan horse, had a specious appearance both of innocence and beauty; but if those philosophers had known, that it carried in its belly death and destruction to all science and common sense, they would not have broken down their walls to give it admittance.” Hume’s principles, Reid showed, led to absurd conclusions.While Skepticism and Deism gained many adherents early on, and Christianity struggled for a while as it adjusted to the new challenge, it eventually produced a plethora of responses that regained a good measure of the intellectual ground. This period can be said to be the breeding ground for today’s apologetic culture and the core of its philosophical stream.In 1790, Edmund Burke rejoiced that Christian apologists had largely won out over the Deists.At the dawning of the 18th C, the Scottish clans with their rough and tumble culture and the warlike tradition continued to reign over a good part of the Scottish Highlands, which accounts for about a third of the total area. In contrast, the capital of Edinburgh was a small city of no more than 35,000 crowded into dirty tenements, stacked one above another.By the Act of Union of 1707, Scotland and England became one. The Scottish Parliament was dissolved and merged with the English. Scots were given 45 members in the House of Commons. But tension remained between north and south.In the Patronage Act of 1712, the English Crown claimed the right to choose Scottish pastors; an apparent end-run by the Anglican Church of England around the rights of Presbyterian Scotland. Seceder Presbyterians refused to honor the pastors appointed by England. They started their own independent churches.Then, in 1742 the Cambuslang Revival swept Scotland. For four months, the church in Cambuslang, a few miles from Glasgow, witnessed large numbers of people attending prayer meetings and showing great fervency in their devotion to God. In June, George Whitefield visited and preached several times. In August, meetings saw as many as 40,000. The pastor of the church wrote, “People sat unwearied till two in the morning to hear sermons, disregarding the weather. You could scarcely walk a yard, but you must tread upon some, either rejoicing in God for mercies received, or crying out for more. Thousands and thousands have I seen, melted down under the word and power of God.”Whitefield then preached to large crowds in Edinburgh and other cities. Other centers of revival popped up.In the second half of the 18th C, Scotland gained a reputation as a center for the Enlightenment under such men as David Hume, Thomas Reid, Adam Smith, and Francis Hutchison. Voltaire wrote that “today it is from Scotland that we get rules of taste in all the arts, from epic poetry to gardening.”An interesting development took place in Scotland at that time, maybe born by a weariness of the internecine conflict endemic to Scottish history. A cultured “literati” in Edinburgh participated in different clubs, but all aimed at striking some kind of balance where people of different persuasions could hold discourse without feeling the need to come to blows. They sought enlightened ways to improve society and agriculture. In the inaugural edition of the Edinburgh Review, 1755, the editor encouraged Scots “to a more eager pursuit of learning themselves, and to do honor to their country.”Evangelicals like Edinburgh pastors John Erskine and Robert Walker hoped to reform society using some of the new ideas of Enlightenment thinkers. They embarked on a campaign to safeguard and expand civil liberties. But unlike more moderate members of the Church of Scotland, they believed conversion to personal faith in Christ was a prerequisite for reform. Erskine appreciated George Whitefield and edited and published a number of Jonathan Edwards’ works.In Ireland, the Glorious Revolution was not at all “glorious” for Catholics. On July 1, 1690, the armies of the Protestant King William III defeated the forces of the Catholic James II at the Battle of the Boyne and seized Dublin. In 1691, Jacobites in Ireland either fled or surrendered. The Banishment Act of 1697 ordered all Catholic clergy to leave Ireland or risk execution. Poverty and illiteracy made life miserable for large numbers of Irish Catholics.English restrictions on Ireland were brutal. Power resided in the hands of a small group of wealthy Anglican elite of the official Church of Ireland. Even Scottish Presbyterians who had settled in Ulster were excluded from civil and military roles. And the Irish had to pay the cost of quartering English troops to keep the peace.Not to be denied, some Catholic priests donned secular clothes so as to continue to minister to their spiritual charges without putting them in danger.In the last decades of the 18th Century the Irish population grew rapidly. Methodists numbered some 14,000 in 1790 and allied with other Protestants who’d come over from England, settled the north of the Island. Protestants in Ireland, whatever their stripe, typically held fierce anti-Catholic sentiments, just as Catholics were hostile toward Protestants.In 1778 the Catholic Relief Act allowed Catholics to buy and inherit land. In 1782 the Irish Parliament gained independence, and laws against Catholics were changed. But the English monarchy managed to maintain its authority and put down the Irish Rebellion of 1798.The upshot is this à The Gospel faced a withering barrage from some of the most potent of Enlightenment critics, skeptics, and foes. The Church was slow to respond, which allowed the ideas of rationalism to poison the well of much Western philosophical thought. The challenge was eventually answered, not only with an eloquent reply but by the stirring of the Holy Spirit Who brought winds of revival for which the most elite skeptic had no comeback.Christianity was tested in the British Isles during the 18th C, but it passed the test.

This episode is titled, Kant.At the conclusion of episode 115 –Part 2 of The Rationalist Option, I said we’d return later to the subject of the philosophy of the Enlightenment to consider its impact on theology and Church History. We do that now.We saw that John Locke placed a wedge between faith and reason when his system of Empiricism said the only genuine knowledge was that of experience. But repeated experiences generated a kind of knowledge he called probability. Because we experience the same thing again and again, we have reason to assume the likelihood of it continuing to happen. I used the example of a friend we’ll call “George.” We see and hear George at least weekly. So, even when George isn’t in our immediate presence, we have good reason to conclude he probably still exists.Using the rule of probability, Locke regarded the Christian Faith as reasonable. His repeated experience of the world logically required a sufficient cause for it. He found the Bible’s explanation of creation and the subsequent course of history to align with his experience of it. But, Locke maintained, Christianity provided no knowledge a reasoned examination of experience would discover on its own.Then along came the empiricist David Hume who wielded Doubt like a cudgel. If Locke placed a wedge between faith and reason, Hume is the one who wielded the sledge and broke them apart. His skepticism went so far as to claim the common-sense notion of cause and effect was an illusion. He had nothing but disdain for Locke’s idea of Probability.Hume said all we can know for certain is what we are experiencing at that moment, but we can’t know with certainty that one thing gives rise to another, no matter how many times it may be repeated. It may in fact at some time and place NOT repeat that pattern. So to draw universal laws from what we experience is forbidden. Hume didn’t just regard faith as irrational, his critique cast doubt on reason itself. Empiricists and Rationalists were set at odds with each other.Hume and his Empiricist buddies weren’t without their opponents. A Scot named James Reid published An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense in 1764. Reid argued for the value of self-evident knowledge or what he called “common sense.” His position came to be known as Common Sense Philosophy. It had many adherents among the growing number of Deists.In France, Baron de Montesquieu, applied the principles of reason to theories of government. He came to the conclusion a republic was the preferred form of government. Since power corrupts, Montesquieu said government ought to be exercised by three equal branches that would balance each other: the legislative, executive, and judicial. He proposed these ideas thirty years before either Americans or the French adopted them for their political systems.Shortly after Montesquieu, Jean Jacques Rousseau suggested what the rationalists called  Progress, wasn’t! Enlightenment thinkers generally regarded human history as a record of advance from lesser to greater sophistication = Progress! Societies were moving on from backward barbarianism to advanced civilization. The Enlightenment’s emphasis on Reason was evidence humanity was emerging from the pre-scientific belief in religious superstition into a new era of rationalism. But Rousseau argued much of what people considered progress was in reality a departure from their natural state that was contrary to human flourishing. He called the modern world of his day “Artificial.” Rousseau advocated a return to the original order, whatever that was. He lauded the noble savage who lived in a pure state unfettered by the conventions and inventions of modernity. Whatever government there was ought to serve rather than rule. Religion ought to be a thing of the lowest common denominator with no one telling anyone else what to believe or how to worship. Rousseau defined that lowest common religious denominator as belief in God, the immortality of the soul, and moral norms. Which sounds a lot like Rousseau contradicted the very thing he said no one could do; tell others what to believe. It’s a classic case of “Believe whatever you want, as long as you agree with me.” An oft-repeated position of skeptics.At the close of the 18th C, along came a German philosopher who blew everything up. Many consider Immanuel Kant the central figure of modern philosophy.Before we dive in, I need to pause and say I barely grasp Kant’s ideas. Seriously. Right about the time I think I’m getting a handle on his philosophy, he says something that makes it all slip away. I hope when I teach, I make things clearer, not more obscure. Kant tries to clarify but his thoughts move in a realm far beyond my minuscule capacity. I just can’t get Kant.The best I can do is seek to explain Kant’s ideas as others have expressed them.Kant was born in 1724 in the city of Konigsberg in Prussia to Pietist parents. He was a capable student but no standout. At 16, he began studies at the University of Konigsberg where he ended up spending his entire career. He studied the philosophy of Leibniz and Wolff and the new mathematical physics of Englishman Isaac Newton. When his father had a stroke on 1746, Kant began tutoring in the villages around his hometown.Kant never married but had a rich social life. He was a popular author and teacher, even before publishing his best-known philosophical works.Kant was a firm believer in rationalism until he was awakened from his, as he called it, “dogmatic slumber” by reading David Hume.In the work for which Kant is best known, his 1781, Critique of Pure Reason, he proposed a radical alternative to both the skepticism of Hume and the rationalism of Descartes. According to Kant, there’s no such thing as innate ideas. But there are fundamental structures of the mind, and within those structures, we place whatever our senses perceive. Those first and most important structures are time and space; then follow what he called twelve categories; unity, plurality, quantity; quality; reality, negation, limitation, subsistence, causality, relation; possibility, and necessity. Did you get that? Don’t worry there won’t be a quiz.Kant said time, space, and the twelve categories aren’t something we perceive with our senses. Rather, they’re structures our minds use to organize our perceptions. In order to be able to USE or process a sensation, we have to put it into one of these mental structures. It’s only after the mind orders them within these categories that they become intelligible experiences.Kant claimed no one really knows a thing as it is in itself. What we know is only what’s going on in the activity of our minds. It’s our perception of a thing we know – not the thing ITSELF as it is.Let me say that again because it’s the key to understanding Kant’s contribution to Modern Philosophy, and in that, to a large part of how the modern world thinks. It’s our perception of a thing we know – not the thing ITSELF as it is.An illustration may help. We’ll make this pleasant too.Let’s say you and I are on the Big Island of Hawaii. We’re both looking at a black sand beach at sunset. The sun is a golden orb sinking into a blue ocean. A half dozen palm trees stand in dark silhouette against a multi-colored sky of deep blue, fading to indigo, and morphing to scarlet and orange.Now, I just gave names to several colors. But those are just labels that come from categories in my mind I sort what my eyes see into. You do the same. But how could we know if what I experience as “orange” is the same as what you know as “orange.” Maybe my orange is your blue. My black might be your white. But since we’ve always labeled what we perceive by those labels, that’s what they are to us. Maybe if what you and I perceive were to be somehow traded, we’d freak because of the messing with our categories it just played.Kant said that with knowledge, what we know isn’t things as they are in themselves, but rather what our minds interpret them as. So à There’s no such thing as purely objective knowledge, and the pure rationality of Cartesians, Empiricists, and Deists is an illusion.If true, Kant’s work meant many of the arguments used to support Christian doctrine no longer worked. If existence isn’t an objective reality, but just a category of our mind, there’s no way to prove the existence of God, the soul, or anything else. Descartes would be stuck at “I think, therefore I am.” He could go no further than that.Kant, like many Enlightenment thinkers, was loath to give up completely on the existence of God. They wanted to hang on to it. But with Kantian philosophy, faith and reason become utterly separated from each other. While many found Hume’s determined skepticism hard to accept, Kant’s redefinition of knowledge as merely a state of the mind was far more appealing.Kant dealt with religion in several of his works—particularly in his Critique of Practical Reason, published in 1788. There he argued that, although pure reason can’t prove the existence of God or the soul, there’s “practical reason” that has to do with the moral life, and whose procedure is different from that of pure reason. But this practical reason, becomes a concession, a nod to those who can’t operate by the higher pure reason. It didn’t take long for others to realize practical reason was like philosophical training wheels that had to come off if humanity was to move forward as rational creatures.Kant’s significance to religion and theology goes far beyond his uninspired attempts to ground religion in practical morality. His philosophical work dealt a death blow to the easy rationalism of his predecessors, and to the notion it’s possible to speak in purely rational and objective terms of matters like the existence of God and the soul. Following Kant, theologians tended to accept his divorce of faith and reason. Eventually, some questioned the universality and immutability of his categories of the mind, arguing that things like psychology, culture and even language shape the categories. Kant’s work, which in some ways was the high point of modern philosophy, set the stage for the post-modern critique of the insistence on objectivity and universality as signs of true knowledge.And, we’ll call it quits for this episode for two reasons.First - I’m on vacation and my wife is calling me to watch that sunset with her.Second - My head hurts. I can’t deal with Kant’s mental gymnastics.

The title of this episode is Moravians and Wesley.We took a look at Pietism in an earlier episode. Pietism was a reaction to the dry dogmatism of Protestant Scholasticism and the reductionist rationalism of Enlightenment philosophers. It aimed to renew a living faith in a living Christ.As a movement, it was led in the 17th C by Philip Jakob Spener and August Francke.Spener’s godson was a German Count named Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf, who even as a child bore a deep devotion to God.  His parents were devout Pietists and sent him to the University of Halle, where he studied under the Pietist leader Francke. Later he went to Wittenberg, a center of Lutheran orthodoxy, where he repeatedly clashed with his teachers. After travel and study at law, he married and entered the service of the Court of Dresden. There Zinzendorf first met a group of Moravians who changed the course of his life.Moravia lies in the southeast of what today is the Czech Republic. Moravians were Hussites; long-time adherents to the renewal begun by Jan Hus. They were forced by persecution to forsake their native lands. Zinzendorf offered them asylum. There they founded the community of Herrnhut. It so appealed to Zinzendorf he resigned his cushy post in Dresden and joined it. Under his direction, the Moravians became part of the local Lutheran parish. But the Lutherans were unwilling to trust foreigners who were also Pietists.In 1731, while visiting Denmark, Zinzendorf met a group of Inuit believers brought to faith in Christ by the Lutheran missionary Hans Egede.  This kindled in the Count an interest in missions that would dominate the rest of his life. Soon the community at Herrnhut was on fire with the same zeal, and in 1732 its first missionaries left for the Caribbean. A few years later there were Moravian missionaries in Africa, India, and the Americas. They founded the communities of Bethlehem and Nazareth in Pennsylvania, and Salem, North Carolina. In just twenty years a movement that began with two hundred refugees had more missionaries overseas than had been sent out by all Protestant churches since the Protestant Reformation a couple of centuries earlier.In the meantime, conflicts with Lutherans back home in Germany grew. Zinzendorf was banned from Saxony and traveled to North America, where in 1741 he was present at the founding of the Bethlehem township. Shortly after his return to home, peace was hammered out between Lutherans and Moravians. It failed to last. Zinzendorf agreed to become a bishop for the Moravians, from a spiritual line of ecclesiastical authority reaching back to Jan Hus. Lutherans didn’t recognize Hus; they wanted the Count’s authority to link to Luther. This is odd since Luther honored Hus as an influence in the development of his own ideas.A personal aside. What silly things Christians bicker over. Doesn’t a person’s spiritual authority rest in their being called by God, not man? What matter is it that it comes through this or that one-time leader? It’s the original source that matters.Zinzendorf died at Herrnhut in 1760, and shortly after, his followers broke with Lutheranism. Although the Moravian church never had a large membership and was unable to continue sending so many missionaries, its example contributed to the great missionary awakening of the 19th C. Perhaps the greatest significance of the movement was its impact on John Wesley and, through him, the Methodist tradition.In late 1735, early ‘36, a group of Moravians sailed to North America hoping to preach to the Indians of Georgia. Onboard was a young Anglican priest, named John Wesley, whom the Georgia Governor Oglethorpe had invited to serve as a pastor in Savannah. The young Wesley accepted the offer and hoped to preach to Indians. The early part of the voyage was calm and Wesley learned enough German to communicate with the Moravians. Then the weather turned and the ship was soon in real danger. The mainmast split, and panic nearly ruined the crew. The Moravians, by contrast were utterly calm and sang hymns throughout the ordeal. Meanwhile, Wesley, chaplain of the vessel, came to the realization he was more concerned for himself than his shipmates. After the storm, the Moravians told him they were able to brave the storm and reality of death because of their conviction their lives were in God’s hands, and should they perish at sea, they would but pass into the Hands of their glorious King. Wesley simply couldn’t relate to that kind of peace born of faith in the God he served.Arriving in Savannah, Wesley asked one of the Moravians named Gottlieb Spangenberg for advice regarding his work as a pastor and missionary. He left a record in his diary of the conversation:Spangenberg asked, “My brother, I must first ask you one or two questions. Have you the witness within yourself? Does the Spirit of God bear witness with your spirit, that you are a child of God?”Wesley wrote, “I was surprised, and knew not what to answer. He observed it, and asked, ‘Do you know Jesus Christ?’ I paused, and said, ‘I know he is the Savior of the world.’ ‘True,’ replied he; ‘but do you know he has saved you?’ I answered, ‘I hope he has died to save me.’ He only added, ‘Do you know yourself ?’ I said, ‘I do.’Then Wesley adds, “But I fear they were vain words.”These experiences left Wesley both profoundly moved and confused. He’d always thought himself a good Christian. His father, Samuel, was an Anglican priest, and his mother Susanna the daughter of another. She’d been particularly careful in the religious instruction of her (get this) nineteen children. When John was five, fire broke out in their home. He was miraculously saved, and after that his mother thought of him as “a brand plucked from the burning.” There was little doubt in her mind God had a special plan for him.At Oxford, Wesley distinguished himself academically and in religious devotion. After helping his father’s parish work, he returned to Oxford, where he joined a religious society founded by his brother Charles and a group of friends. Its members made a covenant to lead a holy and sober life, to take communion weekly, to be faithful in private devotions, to visit prisons, and spend three hours every afternoon, studying scripture and reading devotionals together. Since John was the only ordained priest among them and since he possessed an aptitude to teach, he was the group’s leader. It didn’t take long before other students mocked the group, calling it the “holy club” because of their methodical lifestyle è Leading to them being called “Methodists.”All that preceded his trip to Georgia. But now, he began to doubt the depth of his faith. Adding to this was the fact he failed miserably as a pastor. He expected his parishioners to behave as his holy club back in England. For their part, his parishioners expected him to be content with their attendance in church. John’s brother Charles, also in Georgia serving under Governor Oglethorpe, was disappointed with his work as well and decided to return to England. John stayed on, only because he refused to give up. Then he was forced to leave under messy circumstances. A young woman he’d courted but broken up with married another. Wesley, judging her fickle, denied her communion. He was sued for defamation. Angry at this treatment, though mostly self-inflicted, he returned to England, to the rejoicing of the people of Georgia glad to be rid of their depressed and depressing minister.At a low point and not knowing what else to do, Wesley contacted the Moravians. Peter Boehler became Wesley’s counselor and confidant. He concluded while Wesley had the facts of theology down, he has yet to personally trust in Christ. He recommended that until John possessed the confidence he was indeed born again, he should stop preaching.Finally, on May 24, 1738, Wesley had the experience that changed his life. He wrote …In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ alone for salvation: And an assurance was given me, that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.Wesley no longer had any doubt of his salvation. The obsession he’d had before about wondering if he was saved was replaced by a confidence that freed him to turn his considerable intellect to other things. Mostly, to the salvation of others. He went immediately to visit the Moravian community at Herrnhut. Although inspiring, the visit convinced him Moravian spirituality was ill-suited to his temperament and involvement in social issues. In spite of his gratitude at the role they played in leading him into saving faith, he decided to not become a Moravian.While all that was taking place, another former member of the “holy club,” George Whitefield, had become a famous preacher. A few years earlier Whitefield was moved by an experience similar to Wesley’s at Aldersgate. He now divided his time between his parish in Georgia and preaching in England, where he had remarkable success, especially at the industrial center of Bristol. Whitefield’s preaching was emotional, and when critics objected to the way he used the pulpit he began preaching in outdoors; in the open air, as he had in Georgia where the rules about when and where pastors could preach were less strict than back in England. When the work in Bristol multiplied and he knew he’d need to soon return to Georgia, Whitefield asked Wesley to help by taking charge during his absence.Wesley accepted Whitefield’s invitation. But Whitefield’s fiery preaching was not Wesley’s cup of tea. He objected to open-air preaching. Later he commented on those early days, declaring that at that time he was so convinced God wished everything to be done in order, that he assumed it a sin to save souls outside a church. Over time, in view of the incredible results and dramatic conversions, Wesley gave a reluctant nod to open-air work. He was also worried about the response to his preaching since it was so very different from Whitefield’s. But people often exhibited the same kind of response to his preaching they had to Whitefield’s. Some wept loudly and lamented their sins. Others collapsed in anguish. They’d then express great joy, declaring they were wonderfully cleansed. Wesley preferred more solemn proceedings but eventually decided what was taking place was a struggle between the devil and the Holy Spirit, and he ought not hinder God’s work. Over time, these emotion-filled reactions of new converts diminished.Wesley and Whitefield worked together for some time, although Wesley eventually became the leader of the movement. They eventually parted due of theological differences. Both were Calvinists in most matters; but, on the issue of predestination and free will, Wesley departed from orthodox Calvinism, preferring the Arminian position. After several debates, the friends decided each should follow his own path, and that they’d avoid controversies. That agreement was kept well by their followers. With the help of the Countess of Huntingdon, Whitefield organized the Calvinist Methodist Church, the strongest in Wales.Wesley had no interest in founding a new denomination. He was an Anglican, and throughout his life remained so. His goal was to cultivate the faith of the populace of England, much as Pietism was doing in Germany among Lutherans. He avoided scheduling his preaching in conflict with the services of the Church of England, and always took for granted that Methodist meetings would serve as preparation to attend Anglican worship and take communion there. For him, as for most of the Church through the centuries, the center of worship was communion. This he took and expected his followers to take as frequently as possible, in the official services of the Church of England.Although the movement had no intention of becoming a separate church, it did need some organization. In Bristol, the birthplace of the movement, Wesley’s followers organized into societies that at first met in private homes and later had their own buildings. When Methodist societies grew too large for the effective care of their members, Wesley followed a friend’s suggestion and divided them into classes, each with eleven members and a leader. These met weekly to read Scripture, pray, discuss religious matters, and collect funds. To be a class leader, it wasn’t necessary to be wealthy or educated. That gave significant participation to many who felt left out of the Church of England. It also opened the door to women who took a prominent place in Methodism.The movement grew rapidly, and Wesley traveled throughout the British Isles, preaching and organizing his followers. The movement needed more to share the task of preaching. A few Anglican priests joined. Most noteworthy among them was John’s brother Charles, famous for his hymns. But John Wesley carried the greatest burden, preaching several times a day and traveling thousands of miles on horseback every year, until the age of seventy.Conflicts in the movement weren’t lacking. In the early years, there were frequent acts of violence against Methodists. Some of the nobility and clergy resented the authority the new movement gave people from the lower classes. Meetings were frequently interrupted by thugs and toughs hired by the movement’s opponents. Wesley’s life was often threatened. As it became clear opposition did nothing to slow or stop it, they gave up.There were theological conflicts. Wesley grudgingly broke with the Moravians, whose inclination toward a contemplative Quietism he feared.But the most significant conflicts were with the Anglican Church, to which Wesley belonged and in which he hoped to remain. Until his last days, he reprimanded Methodists who wanted to break with the Church of England. They saw something he seemed unwilling to see, that a breach was unavoidable. Some Anglican authorities regarded the Methodist movement as an indication of their shortcomings and resented it. Others felt the Methodist practice of preaching any and everywhere, without regard for ecclesiastical boundaries, was a serious breach of protocol. Wesley saw and understood these concerns, but thought the needs of the lost trump all such concerns.A difficult legal decision made matters tenser. According to English law, non-Anglican worship services and church buildings were to be allowed, but they had to be officially registered. That put Methodists in a difficult place since the Church of England didn’t acknowledge their meetings and buildings. If they registered, it would be a declaration they weren’t Anglicans. If they didn’t, they’d be breaking the law. In 1787, after much hesitation, Wesley told his preachers to register, and the first legal step was taken toward the formation of a separate church. Three years earlier, Wesley took a step that had even more drastic implications, at least theologically. For a long time, as a scholar of Patristics, the study of the Church Fathers, Wesley was convinced that in the early church the term bishop was synonymous with elder and pastor. That led him to the conviction all ordained presbyters, including himself, had the power to ordain. But he refrained from employing it to avoid further alienating the Anglican leaders.The independence of the United States posed different difficulties. During the Revolutionary War, most Anglican clergy were Loyalists. After independence, most of them returned to England. That made it difficult, impossible even, for US citizens to partake of communion. The bishop of London, who still had jurisdiction over the former colonies, refused to ordain clergy for the United States. Wesley deplored what he took to be the unwarranted rebellion of Britain’s former colonies, both because he was a staunch supporter of the king’s authority and because he could not fathom how the rebels could claim that they were fighting for freedom while they themselves held slaves. But, convinced communion was the heart of Christian worship, Wesley felt that no matter what their political stance, US citizens ought not to be deprived of the Lords’ table.So in 1784, he ordained two lay preachers as presbyters for the new country and made Anglican priest Thomas Coke their bishop. Later, he ordained others to serve in Scotland and elsewhere. In spite of having taken these steps, Wesley continued insisting on the need to avoid breaking with the Church of England. Charles told him the ordination of ministers for the New World was a break. In 1786, the Methodist leaders decided that in those places where the Anglican church was neglecting its Gospel duties, it was permitted to hold Methodist meetings at the same time as Anglican services.Although Wesley refused to acknowledge it, by the time of his death in 1791, Methodism had become a separate church.

Episodio 55 - Las Cruzadas, 2ª parteComo afirma acertadamente Bruce Shelly en su excelente libro Church History in Plain Language, durante los últimos 700 años los cristianos han intentado olvidar las Cruzadas, aunque ni los judíos ni los musulmanes se lo permitan. Los cristianos modernos quieren descartar esa época de la Historia de la Iglesia como el fanatismo alocado de los analfabetos y supersticiosos. Pero hacerlo es mostrar nuestro propio tipo de fanatismo, uno que descuida el contexto histórico de la Edad Media europea.Los cruzados eran seres humanos que, como nosotros, tenían motivos encontrados, a menudo en conflicto. La palabra cruzada significa "tomar la cruz", esperemos que sea siguiendo el ejemplo de Cristo. Por eso, de camino a Tierra Santa los cruzados llevaban la cruz en el pecho. Al volver a casa la llevaban en la espalda.Al reunir a la nobleza europea para unirse a la Primera Cruzada, el Papa Urbano II les prometió el perdón de los pecados pasados. La mayoría de ellos sentía una profunda reverencia por la tierra que había pisado Jesús. Esa devoción fue captada más tarde por Shakespeare cuando hace decir al rey Enrique IVEstamos impresionados y comprometidos a luchar...Para perseguir a esos paganos en esos campos sagradosSobre cuyos acres caminaron esos benditos pies,Que hace mil cuatrocientos años fueron clavadosPor nuestra ventaja en la amarga cruz. Para Urbano y los papas posteriores, las Cruzadas eran una Guerra Santa. Agustín, cuya teología dio forma a la Iglesia medieval, estableció los principios de una "guerra justa".  Decía que debía ser conducida por el Estado; su objetivo general era defender una justicia en peligro, lo que significaba más estrechamente que debía ser defensiva para proteger la vida y la propiedad. En la conducción de esa guerra justa debe haber respeto por los no combatientes, los rehenes y los prisioneros. Y aunque todo esto pudo estar en la mente del Papa Urbano y de otros líderes eclesiásticos cuando convocaron la Primera Cruzada, esos ideales no pasaron de los límites de Europa. Una vez que los cruzados llegaron a Oriente, las dificultades de su paso conspiraron para justificar en sus mentes el saqueo al por mayor de los inocentes. Incluso aquellos que originalmente habían tomado la cruz de los cruzados con intenciones nobles, no querían quedarse al margen de la adquisición del tesoro una vez que comenzara el saqueo. Al fin y al cabo, todos los demás lo están haciendo...Volviendo a nuestra narración de la Primera Cruzada, recapitulemos...Lo que desencadenó la Cruzada fue una petición de ayuda del emperador bizantino Alejo I Komnenos. Alejo estaba preocupado por los avances de los turcos Selyúcidas musulmanes, que habían llegado hasta el oeste de Nicea, un suburbio de Constantinopla. En marzo de 1095, Alejo envió enviados al Concilio de Piacenza para pedir al Papa Urbano II ayuda contra los turcos. La respuesta de Urbano fue positiva. Es probable que esperara sanar el Gran Cisma de 40 años antes que había separado a las iglesias de Occidente y Oriente.En el verano de 1095, Urbano se dirigió a su tierra natal, Francia, para reclutar personal para la campaña. Su viaje terminó en el Concilio de Clermont, en noviembre, donde pronunció un apasionado sermón ante una gran audiencia de nobles y clérigos franceses, detallando las atrocidades cometidas contra los peregrinos y los cristianos que vivían en Oriente por los musulmanes.Malcolm Gladwell escribió un bestseller en el año 2000 titulado El Punto de Inflexión. El discurso del Papa fue uno de ellos, un punto de inflexión épico que envió a la historia en una nueva dirección. Urbano comprendió que lo que proponía era un acto tan costoso, largo y arduo que equivalía a una forma de penitencia capaz de descargar todos los pecados de los que iban a la cruzada. Y comprendía cómo funcionaba la mente de su público. Procedente de una casa noble y habiendo ascendido en las filas del monasterio y de la Iglesia, comprendía el rompecabezas que había en el corazón del sentimiento religioso popular. La gente era muy consciente de su pecaminosidad y buscaba expurgarla emprendiendo una peregrinación, o si eso no era posible, dotar a un monje o monja para que viviera una vida de santidad secuestrada en su nombre. Pero su inevitable inmersión en el mundo significaba que era imposible llevar a cabo todas las penitencias que consumían tiempo y que podían seguir el ritmo de su siempre creciente catálogo de pecados. Urbano vio que podía cortar el nudo gordiano prescribiendo una Cruzada. Por fin había una forma de que los hombres entregados a la violencia, una de las más graves de sus fechorías, la utilizasen como acto de penitencia. De la noche a la mañana, los más necesitados de penitencia se convirtieron en la causa del éxito de la Cruzada.Aunque existen diferentes versiones del sermón de Urbano, todas nombran los mismos elementos básicos. El Papa habló de la necesidad de acabar con la violencia que los caballeros europeos mantenían entre sí, de la necesidad de ayudar a los cristianos orientales en su contienda con el Islam y de volver a hacer seguros los caminos de los peregrinos a Jerusalén.  Propuso hacerlo mediante un nuevo tipo de guerra, una peregrinación armada que conduciría a grandes recompensas espirituales y terrenales, en la que se remitirían los pecados y quien muriera en la contienda eludiría el purgatorio y entraría inmediatamente en la dicha del cielo.El discurso del Papa en Clermont no mencionaba específicamente la liberación de Jerusalén; el objetivo al principio era sólo ayudar a Constantinopla y despejar los caminos hacia Jerusalén.  Pero el mensaje posterior de Urbano, mientras viajaba por Europa recabando apoyo para la Cruzada, sí incluía la idea de liberar la Ciudad Santa.Aunque el discurso de Urbano parecía improvisado, en realidad estaba bien planificado.  Había hablado de lanzar una cruzada con dos de los líderes más importantes del sur de Francia, que le dieron un apoyo entusiasta. Uno de ellos se encontraba en Clermont, el primero en tomar la causa. Durante lo que quedaba de 1095 y hasta el 96, el Papa Urbano difundió el mensaje por toda Francia e instó al clero a predicar en sus propias regiones e iglesias de toda Europa.A pesar de esta planificación, la respuesta al llamamiento a la Cruzada fue una sorpresa. En lugar de instar a la gente a UNIRSE a la campaña, los obispos tuvieron que disuadir a ciertas personas de unirse.  Las mujeres, los monjes y los enfermos estaban prohibidos, aunque muchos protestaron por su exclusión. Algunos hicieron algo más que protestar; desafiaron a los funcionarios e hicieron planes para ir de todos modos. Cuando el Papa Urbano concibió originalmente la cruzada, imaginó a los caballeros y a la nobleza liderando ejércitos entrenados. Fue una sorpresa que miles de campesinos se unieran a la causa.¿Qué debía decir el obispo a estos campesinos cuando indicaron su intención de ir? "No pueden. Tienen que quedarse y cuidar sus campos y rebaños". Cuando los campesinos preguntaron por qué, los obispos no tuvieron una buena respuesta, así que formaron compañías y se pusieron en marcha. El clero se vio obligado a dar un permiso a regañadientes. Reunieron grupos locales de campesinos y les hicieron hacer un voto de devoción a la Santa Causa, fijando como destino la Iglesia del Santo Sepulcro de Jerusalén.Junto al entusiasmo de los campesinos, Urbano cortejó a la nobleza de Europa, especialmente de Francia, para que liderara la Cruzada. Los caballeros del norte y el sur de Francia, Flandes, Alemania e Italia se dividieron en cuatro ejércitos. Lamentablemente, a menudo se veían en competencia unos con otros en lugar de estar unidos en una causa común. Compitieron por el protagonismo para dar gloria a Dios; y, por supuesto, por el botín que ello conllevaba.Mientras que los vástagos de las casas nobles dirigían algunos de los ejércitos, el grueso de los caballeros eran hijos menores de la nobleza cuyo único camino hacia la riqueza era la conquista. El hermano mayor estaba destinado a heredar el nombre y los bienes de la familia. Así que cientos de estos hijos menores vieron en las Cruzadas una forma de hacerse un nombre y de labrarse su propio dominio en las tierras recién adquiridas. Si no regresaban a Europa cargados de tesoros, esperaban establecerse en las tierras que habían ganado con la espada.Uno de los muchos y tristes resultados del giro de la Primera Cruzada fue la persecución de los judíos en el norte de Francia y en la zona Alemana de Renania. El antisemitismo burbujeó bajo la superficie de esta región durante generaciones. Ahora se desbordó cuando los campesinos y plebeyos se movilizaron para expulsar a los infieles de Tierra Santa. Algunos empezaron a preguntarse por qué era necesario un viaje al Oriente Medio cuando había personas que odiaban a Cristo que vivían justo al lado. Así que se atacó a los judíos, se quemaron sus casas y se saquearon los negocios.Como vimos en nuestro último episodio, los campesinos se formaron en bandas y se abrieron camino a través de Europa hasta Constantinopla. Carecían de la disciplina y los suministros de los caballeros, así que se abrieron camino hacia el Este, como Sherman en su marcha hacia el Mar durante la guerra civil americana. Aunque no conocemos las cifras, miles de estos cruzados campesinos fueron asesinados por el camino, ya que los defensores armados salieron a oponerse a su camino a través de sus tierras.Cuando finalmente llegaron a Constantinopla, fueron escoltados a toda prisa a través del Bósforo en agosto del año 1096. En ese momento se dividieron en dos grupos. Uno intentó reconquistar Nicea, pero fracasó cuando los turcos los rodearon y los aniquilaron. El otro grupo fue emboscado y masacrado en octubre.Esta fase de la Primera Cruzada se llama Cruzada del Pueblo porque estaba formada por entre 20 y 30.000 plebeyos. Su liderazgo incluía a algunos nobles menores, pero su líder más visible era el extraño Pedro el Ermitaño.El liderazgo de Pedro en la Cruzada del Pueblo se debía a sus encendidos sermones de reclutamiento. No era tan hábil en la gestión táctica de 30.000 aspirantes a guerreros. Una vez que llegaron a Constantinopla, su falta de habilidad administrativa se hizo evidente y el puñado de caballeros que se había alistado se dio cuenta de que tenía que tomar el control. Pero se negaron a someterse los unos a los otros y se fragmentaron en diferentes grupos basados en la nacionalidad. Esta falta de liderazgo resultó fatal. Perdieron el control de su supuesto ejército, que se dedicó a saquear los hogares y las ciudades de los cristianos orientales. El contingente alemán consiguió apoderarse de una ciudad Selyúcida y los franceses comenzaron a agitar a sus líderes para que hicieran lo mismo. Un par de espías turcos difundieron el rumor en el campamento francés de que los alemanes marchaban hacia Nicea. Así que los franceses se apresuraron a adelantarse a ellos. Al pasar por un estrecho valle, fueron aniquilados por las fuerzas Selyúcidas que los esperaban.Un remanente consiguió volver a Constantinopla, donde se unió a los caballeros que justo entonces, al final del verano, llegaban de Europa. Esta fuerza se formó en contingentes agrupados en torno a los grandes señores. Este era el tipo de fuerza militar que el Papa Urbano II y el emperador Alejo habían previsto.Los cruzados se dieron cuenta de que tenían que conquistar y ocupar primero Antioquía, en Siria, o la victoria sobre Jerusalén sería efímera. Tomaron la ciudad, pero luego sobrevivieron a duras penas a un asedio de los turcos. Al romper el asedio en la primavera del año 1099, los líderes de la Cruzada pusieron fin a sus disputas y marcharon hacia el Sur. Su ruta los llevó a lo largo de la costa hasta Cesárea, donde se dirigieron hacia el interior, hacia su objetivo. Llegaron a las cercanías de Jerusalén a principios de junio.Para entonces el ejército se había reducido a 20.000 hombres. El efecto de ver la Ciudad Santa por primera vez fue electrizante. Estos hombres habían luchado y se habían abierto paso a través de miles de kilómetros, dejando sus hogares y culturas para encontrar nuevas vistas, sonidos y sabores. Y en cada paso del camino, su objetivo era Jerusalén, el lugar donde Jesús había vivido y muerto. Los relatos de ese momento dicen que los guerreros se arrodillaron y besaron la tierra sagrada. Se quitaron la armadura y, con los pies descalzos y llorando, clamaron a Dios en confesión y alabanza.Cinco días después se produjo un ataque desesperado pero inútil contra la Ciudad. Los defensores de Jerusalén utilizaron brea y aceite hirviendo, con lluvias de piedras y cualquier otra cosa que pudiera hacer daño. Entonces los cruzados iniciaron un asedio que siguió el curso habitual. Se construyeron escaleras, torres de escalada y otros motores de asedio. El problema es que tenían que recorrer kilómetros para conseguir madera.  Todos los árboles de los alrededores de Jerusalén habían sido cortados por el general romano Tito doce siglos antes. Nunca habían vuelto a crecer.La ciudad estaba rodeada por tres lados por Raymundo de Tolosa, Godofredo, Tancredo y Roberto de Normandía. Era un verano caluroso y el sufrimiento de los sitiadores era intenso, pues el agua escaseaba. Pronto, los valles y colinas que rodeaban las murallas de la ciudad se cubrieron de caballos muertos, cuyos cadáveres putrefactos hacían insoportable la vida en el campamento.Alguien tuvo la brillante idea de duplicar el plan de batalla de Josué en Jericó. Así que los cruzados se quitaron los zapatos y, con los sacerdotes a la cabeza, empezaron a marchar alrededor de Jerusalén, con la esperanza de que las murallas cayeran. Por supuesto, no lo hicieron. Me pregunto qué hicieron con el que tuvo la idea. La ayuda llegó por fin con la llegada al puerto de Jope de una flota procedente de Génova que transportaba obreros y suministros que se pusieron a trabajar en la construcción de nuevos equipos de asedio.Por fin llegó el día del asalto final. Una enorme torre rematada por una cruz dorada fue arrastrada hasta las murallas y se dejó caer un enorme puente de tablones para que los cruzados pudieran precipitarse desde la torre hasta la cima de la muralla. Los debilitados defensores no pudieron detener la masa de guerreros que inundaron su Ciudad.La matanza que siguió es un capítulo más de las muchas escenas de este tipo que ha conocido Jerusalén.Una vez asegurada la Ciudad, los cruzados, salpicados de sangre, hicieron una pausa para arrojar un hueso a Dios. Dirigidos por Godofredo, recién cambiado de traje de lino blanco, los cruzados se dirigieron a la iglesia del Santo Sepulcro y ofrecieron oraciones y acciones de gracias. Luego, terminadas las devociones, se reanudó la masacre. Ni las lágrimas de las mujeres, ni los gritos de los niños, sirvieron para frenar el terror. Los líderes trataron de contener a sus tropas, pero se les había soltado la cadena y estaban decididos a dejar salir toda la sangre posible de los cuerpos.Cuando por fin terminó, los prisioneros musulmanes se vieron obligados a limpiar las calles de cadáveres y sangre para salvar la ciudad de la peste.¿Recuerdas a Pedro el Ermitaño, que había conducido al ejército de campesinos al desastre? Llegó a Jerusalén antes de regresar a Europa, donde fundó un monasterio y murió en el año 1115.El Papa Urbano II también murió apenas dos semanas después de la caída de Jerusalén, antes de que le llegara la noticia.Mirando hacia atrás, está claro que la Primera Cruzada llegó probablemente en el único momento en que podía tener éxito.  Los turcos Selyúcidas se habían dividido en facciones rivales en 1092. Los cruzados entraron en la región como un cuchillo antes de que se abriera una nueva era de unión y conquista musulmana. Eso es lo que tendrían que afrontar ahora los cruzados recién llegados.Sólo ocho días después de capturar Jerusalén, se estableció un gobierno permanente. Se llamó "Reino de Jerusalén". Godofredo fue elegido rey, pero rechazó el título de realeza, no queriendo llevar una corona de oro donde el Salvador había llevado una corona de espinas.  Adoptó el título de Barón y Defensor del Santo Sepulcro.Desde el momento de su nacimiento, el Reino de Jerusalén tuvo problemas. Menos de un año después, pidieron refuerzos a los alemanes. Y Godofredo sobrevivió a la toma de Jerusalén por sólo un año. Fue enterrado en la Iglesia del Santo Sepulcro, donde aún se exhiben su espada y sus espuelas. En su tumba está la inscripción "Aquí yace Godofredo de Bouillon, que conquistó todo este territorio para la religión Cristiana. Que su alma descanse con Cristo".Roma se movilizó inmediatamente para que el Reino de Jerusalén formara parte de su región de hegemonía. El arzobispo de Pisa, Dagoberto, que había participado en la Cruzada, fue elegido patriarca de Jerusalén.Los nuevos gobernantes pasaron de la conquista a la defensa y el gobierno. Intentaron aplicar el sistema feudal de Europa a la sociedad de Oriente Medio. El territorio conquistado se distribuyó entre los barones cruzados, que mantuvieron sus posesiones bajo el rey de Jerusalén como señor. Los cuatro feudos principales eran Jaffa, Galilea, Sidón y, al este del río Jordán, una región llamada Kerat. Los condes de Trípoli y Edesa y el príncipe de Antioquía eran independientes de Jerusalén, pero estaban estrechamente aliados debido a la cercana amenaza musulmana.La ocupación de Israel por parte de los cruzados estuvo lejos de ser pacífica. El reino se vio desgarrado por constantes intrigas de gobernantes civiles y clérigos religiosos. Todo ello mientras se enfrentaba a interminables amenazas desde el exterior. Pero fue la lucha interna la principal causa de debilidad. Los monjes se instalaron en enjambres por todo el país. Los franciscanos se convirtieron en guardianes de los lugares santos. Los hijos de los cruzados con mujeres musulmanas, llamados Pullani, se convirtieron en una plaga, ya que se entregaron a la codicia implacable y a la inmoralidad más grotesca.Cuando murió Godofredo, le sigio su hermano Balduino, conde de Edesa. Balduino era inteligente y el rey más activo de Jerusalén. Murió al cabo de ocho años; su cuerpo fue depositado junto al de su hermano.Durante el reinado de Balduino, el reino creció considerablemente. Cesárea cayó en manos de los cruzados en el año 1101, luego Ptolemais en 1104. Beirut en 1110. Pero Damasco nunca cayó en manos de los cruzados. Con el progreso de sus armas, construyeron castillos por todas sus posesiones en Oriente Próximo. Las ruinas de esas fortificaciones se mantienen hoy en día y son lugares turísticos de primer orden.Muchos de los cruzados, que comenzaron la aventura planeando volver a Europa, decidieron más bien quedarse una vez terminada la obra de conquista. Uno de ellos escribió: "Nosotros, que éramos occidentales, somos ahora orientales. Hemos olvidado nuestra tierra natal". Otros cruzados sí regresaron a Europa, pero lo hicieron más tarde. Incluso varios reyes europeos pasaron largas estancias en Tierra Santa.Durante el reinado de Balduino, la mayoría de los líderes de la Primera Cruzada murieron o volvieron a casa. Pero sus filas se reponían continuamente con nuevas expediciones procedentes de Europa. El Papa Pascual II, sucesor de Urbano II, envió un llamamiento a los reclutas. Las ciudades italianas proporcionaron flotas y se coordinaron con las fuerzas terrestres. Los venecianos, pisanos y genoveses establecieron cuarteles propios en Jerusalén, Acre y otras ciudades. Miles de personas se adhirieron a la causa de los cruzados en Lombardía, Francia y Alemania. Estaban dirigidos por Anselmo, arzobispo de Milán, Esteban, duque de Borgoña, Guillermo, duque de Aquitania, Ida de Austria y otros. Hugo, que se había ido a casa, regresó. Bohemundo también regresó con 34.000.  Dos ejércitos cruzados atacaron la fortaleza islámica de Bagdad.El sobrino de Balduino, también llamado Balduino, sucedió a su tío y reinó durante 13 años, hasta 1131. Conquistó la estratégica ciudad de Tiro en la costa. Era el año 1124 y eso marcó el punto álgido del poder de los cruzados.Durante los siguientes 60 años, Jerusalén vio una sucesión de gobernantes débiles mientras los musulmanes, desde Damasco hasta Egipto, se unían bajo un nuevo grupo de líderes competentes y carismáticos. El último de ellos fue Saladino. Se convirtió en califa en el año 1174 y se dispuso a retomar Jerusalén.Pero esa historia es para nuestro próximo episodio . . .

In this episode, we’ll take a brief look at what came to be called Spiritualism.Coming out of the 16th C, the, what seemed to many at the time,

• endless debates on doctrine and dogma,
• the intolerance of Christians toward one another,
• and the lack of any apparent movement toward resolving the mess,

moved many across Europe and the New World to seek refuge in more of an abstract religious sentiment than a rigid faith of set doctrines. Another factor encouraging this mindset was a burgeoning European middle-class. You see, it was only the wealthy nobility who possessed the resources for higher education need to foster an excessive emphasis on correct doctrine. Those who didn’t have that opportunity; who couldn’t wax eloquent on complicated matters of theology, were regarded as unsophisticates who depended on their betters to tell them what to believe.The Spiritualist Movement of the 17th and 18th Cs attracted people from all classes. From the cultured who’d tired of narrow-minded dogmatism, to uneducated commoners tired of having their lives turned over by endless religious tussles.The history of the Spiritualist movement is difficult to trace because it devolved into several streams that constantly mixed. Just as its beliefs were a hodge-podge, so is its history. We’ll examine it by taking a look at three of its leaders.Jakob Boehme was born in Silesia, Germany in 1575. His parents were strict Lutherans of humble means. By all accounts, the young Jakob had a real and rich faith.The sermons of that time were long dissertations on the theological debates of the day. These bored Jakob to tears and did nothing to spark a relationship with God.At fourteen, he was apprenticed to a shoe-maker. Shortly after, he began having visions. It might have been one thing if he’d kept these to himself, but he didn’t; he shared them. His master threw him out, saying he wanted an apprentice, not a prophet.Boehme became a traveling cobbler, moving here and there mending shoes. As he traveled and visited different churches, he came to the conclusion Church leaders had built a kind of confusing doctrinal Tower of Babel. He determined to set dogmatics aside and cultivate his inner spiritual life.  He read everything he could lay his hands on that might help in that pursuit.His meditations led him to some conclusions on the nature of the world and man’s place in it. These were then “confirmed” by visions and other spiritual experiences. But he kept his new-found convictions to himself for a time as he plied his shoe-mending-trade.At twenty-five, Jakob ended his wanderings and set up shop in Goerlitz, on the border between Germany and Poland, where he made a comfortable living as a cobbler.Although Boehme didn’t see himself as a preacher, he was convinced God wanted him to record his visions. The result was a book titled Brilliant Dawn.  In it, Boehme repeatedly asserts he’s writing what God dictated word for word, and that he’s no more than a pen in His hand. Boehme didn’t publish, but a manuscript reached a local pastor, who accused Boehme to the magistrates. Under threat of exile, Boehme promised to teach or write no more on religious matters.  For five years he kept his promise. But in 1618, compelled by new visions and the encouragement of admirers, he wrote anew. Without permission, one of his followers published three of his works. These reached the same pastor, who again accused Boehme of heresy. He was forced to leave Goerlitz.He ended up in the court of the Elector of Saxony, where several theologians examined his teachings without reaching a conclusion.  They confessed themselves unable to understand his meaning. They recommended Boehme be given time to clarify his ideas. Not long after, he fell ill and returned to Goerlitz to die among friends and followers. He passed at the age of fifty.The Saxony theologians’ response wasn’t just a dodge to avoid passing judgment on a likable guy. Boehme’s writings continue to be difficult to sort out. They’re a confusing mish-mash of this and that; which, to be frank, is a hallmark of much of what goes under the title “spiritualism.”  Boehme’s tomes are a mixture of traditional Christian themes with others taken from magic, alchemy, occultism, and theosophy. At points, it looks like Boehme gives a metaphor to help explain his point, but it never does. You read it and say, “What does THAT have to do with anything?” So the metaphors, striking as they may be, only serve to add to the confusion. And THAT may very well be the overall point of his inkings. There may not BE a meaning to be parsed from it all. There’s every possibility Boehme used words to produce phrases that conveyed singular ideas that weren’t connected.  He may have aimed for a state of mind that suspended rationality and logic; one that arises out of frustration at trying to make sense of what is senseless, so one gives up, lays reason down, and becomes hyper-suggestible.While the specifics of what Boehme aimed for aren’t clear, their basic direction is. He took aim at the lifeless dogmatism of theologians and the empty liturgy of the Church. Against these, Boehme exalted the freedom of the spirit with a belief in direct revelation from God to individuals. He declared that since “the letter kills,” believers ought not to be guided by Scripture, but by the Holy Spirit, who inspired the biblical writers and presently inspires believers. He said, “I have enough with the book that I am. If I have within me the Spirit of Christ, the entire Bible is in me. Why would I wish for more books? Why discuss what is outside, while not having learned what is within me?”Huh – ironic then that he wrote books.Boehme had few followers during his lifetime but later his writings gained admirers. In England, some formed a Boehmenist-movement. Some clashed with the Quakers who we’ll take a look at next. So, the Spiritualist Movement, born in part as a protest against the doctrinal debates of traditional theology, was eventually embroiled in similar controversies.George Fox was born in a small English village the same year Jakob Boehme died, 1624. Like Boehme, Fox was of humble origin and a cobbler’s apprentice. At 19, disgusted at the immorality of his fellow apprentices, he quit and began the life of an itinerant religious seeker. He attended meetings of all sorts, seeking spiritual illumination. He devoted himself to the study of Scripture until he’d committed most of it to memory.Fox’s pursuit of spiritual illumination was a roller coaster of highs and lows. There were times when he had a mystical experience that thrilled, followed by a season where he despaired of finding the path that would lead to what he sought. He came to the conviction all the various sects in England were wrong, and their worship was an abomination to God.Fox challenged much of traditional Christianity. He reasoned if God doesn’t dwell in houses made by human hands, as the Scripture said, how dare anyone call buildings where they gather “churches”? They are in truth no more than houses with bell towers.For Fox, pastors paid a salary aren’t real shepherds, but “priests” and “journeymen.” Hymns, orders of worship, sermons, sacraments, creeds, ministers—are all human hindrances to the freedom of the Spirit.Over against all these, Fox placed what he called the “inner light.” This was a seed that existed in all people, and was the true way to find God. Fox said the Calvinist doctrine of total depravity was a denial of God’s love. On the contrary, he maintained, there’s an inner light in all, no matter how dim it may be. Thanks to that light, pagans can be saved as well as Christians. This light, however, must not be confused with the intellect or conscience. It’s the capability all have to recognize and accept the presence of God. By it we’re able to believe and understand Scripture. So, communication with God thru the inner light is previous to and independent of, any communication by external means.Although those close to George Fox knew of the fire burning within him, for several years he abstained from proclaiming what he was convinced he’d discovered regarding the true meaning of faith and Christianity.At that time there were in England several religious sects, and Fox attended all without finding contentment in any. Finally, he felt called to speak out at a Baptist meeting, announcing what he now believed. From that point on, such urgings became more frequent. In gatherings of various religious groups, Fox declared he’d been commanded by the Spirit to announce his new vision of The Faith. He was often treated with contempt and hostility and was thrown out of meetings, beaten, and stoned. But all such didn’t stop him. Soon he was in another “house with a belfry,” interrupting the service and proclaiming his message.Fox’s followers grew rapidly. At first they called themselves “Children of Light” but Fox preferred the title Friends, which later become their official name. They were soon called Quakers by outsiders. The name came from their tendency to tremble with fervency as they prayed.In 1652, George Fox gained the support of Margaret Fell, a noble-woman widowed in 1658. She became a leader in the movement and used her position to lend it an air of credibility and protection. But political opposition grew and she was arrested for supporting the movement. Her property was confiscated and she was sentenced to life in prison. After being released by the king, she married Fox in 1669. The rest of their lives were spent teaching and in missions, which were repeatedly interrupted by rounds of imprisonment. Fox died in 1691, his wife Margaret a decade later.Since the Friends believed structure in worship was an obstacle to the Spirit, their services took place in silence. Any who felt called to speak or pray aloud were free to do so. When the Spirit moved them, women had the same right to speak as men. Fox himself did not prepare a message but simply allowed the Spirit to move him in the moment. There were times when many gathered, hoping to hear him speak, but he refused. Also, Quakers didn’t include the traditional sacraments of baptism and communion. They feared that physical water, bread, and wine would draw attention away from the spiritual.Fox was aware of the danger his emphasis on the freedom of the Spirit might lead to excessive individualism. Other movements with a similar emphasis hadn’t lasted long. The exercise of individual freedom inevitably leads to the dissolving of a group. Fox avoided this by underscoring the importance of community and love. In Friends’ meetings, decisions aren’t made by a majority. If a unanimous agreement was not reached, the decision was postponed, and the meeting continued in silence until the Spirit offered a solution. If one was not received, the matter was left pending for another occasion.Many disliked the teachings and practices of the Quakers. Religious leaders resented the way they interrupted their services to preach or read Scripture. Authorities saw the need to teach a lesson to these Friends, who refused to pay tithes, swear oaths, bow to their “betters,” or uncover their head before any but God. Quakers argued that, since God was addressed in the familiar “Thou,” no one else ought to be addressed by the more respectful “You.” To those used to the submission of their “inferiors,” that was intolerable insubordination.So Fox was repeatedly beaten and spent years in prison. He was sent to prison the first time for interrupting a preacher who declared the ultimate truth was to be found in Scripture. Fox said that wasn’t true; the ultimate truth was in the Spirit who inspired Scripture. On other occasions, he was accused of blasphemy and of conspiring against the government. When the authorities offered a pardon, he refused, declaring he wasn’t guilty. To accept a pardon for something he hadn’t done was to lie. On another occasion, when serving six months for blasphemy, he was offered freedom in exchange for service in the Army. He refused, declaring Christians ought not use weapons other than those the Spirit provided. His sentence was prolonged by an additional six months.When he wasn’t in prison, Fox spent his time in Margaret’s home, Swarthmoor Hall. It became the headquarters of the Friends. The rest of the time he traveled England and abroad, visiting Quaker meetings and taking his message to new areas. First, he went to Scotland, where he was accused of sedition; then to Ireland. He spent two years in the Caribbean and North America; and made two visits to the Continent. In all these places he gained converts, and by the time of his death, in 1691, his followers ran to the tens of thousands.Like Fox, they were persecuted. They were thrown in jail for vagrancy, blasphemy, inciting riots, and refusing to pay tithes. In 1664, Charles II issued an edict forbidding unlicensed religious assemblies. Many groups continued gathering in secret. But the Quakers declared it would be a lie to do so, and openly disobeyed the edict. Thousands were imprisoned, and by the time religious tolerance was granted in 1689, hundreds had died in prison.The most famous of Fox’s followers was William Penn, after whom the state of Pennsylvania was named. His father was a British admiral who tried to secure for him the best education available. While he was a student, William became a Puritan. Then, while studying in France, he came under the influence of the Huguenots. In 1667, back in England, he became a Quaker. His father, not knowing what to do with his “fanatical” son, threw him out of the house. Penn stayed true to his convictions and eventually spent seven months in the Tower of London. He sent word to the king that the Tower was the worst of arguments to convince him, so, no matter who was right, whoever uses force to seek religious assent is necessarily wrong. Finally, thanks to the intervention of his father and other well-placed friends, he was set free. He then spent several years raising a family, traveling throughout Europe, and writing in defense of the Friends.Penn then conceived the idea of what he called his “holy experiment.” Some friends had spoken to him about New Jersey, in North America. The crown owed Penn’s father a considerable amount of money. When William’s father died, that debt fell to the son. Since Charles wasn’t able to pay, Penn asked instead for a grant of land in the New World. It became known as Penns’ Wood – Pennsylvania. His purpose was to found a new colony in which there would be complete religious freedom. By then, other British colonies had been founded in North America. But, with the exception of Rhode Island, all were marked by religious intolerance. In Massachusetts, the most intolerant of the colonies, Quakers were persecuted, condemned to exile, mutilated, and executed. What Penn now proposed was a new colony in which all would be free to worship according to their own convictions. This seemed bad enough to an intolerant age. But even worse was Penn’s plan to buy from the Indians the land that the crown had granted him. He was convinced that the Indians, and not the crown, were the legitimate owners of the land. And he hoped to establish such cordial relations with them that the settlers would have no need to defend themselves by force of arms. The capital of this holy experiment would be called Philadelphia—the city of fraternal love.No matter how ill-conceived Penn’s experiment seemed to the more enlightened Brits, soon there were many, not only in England, but also in other parts of Europe, willing to take part in it. Many of them were Quakers, and therefore the Friends dominated the political life of the colony for some time. But there were also settlers of many different persuasions. Under the leadership of Penn, first governor of the colony, relations with the Indians were excellent, and for a long time his dream of a peaceful settlement was a reality.The last Spiritualist we’ll look at today is Emanuel Swedenborg.Born in 1688, three years before Fox’s death, Emmanuel Swedenborg was born to an aristocratic family in Sweden. He received an education at the University of Uppsala, and spent five years traveling England, the Netherlands, France, and Germany. The goal of these travels was the quest for knowledge. While Fox and Boehme pursued religious enlightenment, the young Swedenborg was after scientific knowledge.After many years of scientific inquiry, Swedenborg claimed he had a vision of being carried into the spiritual world where saw eternal truths. He wrote expansively on the true meaning of reality and Scripture. He said that all that exists is a reflection of the attributes of God.  Therefore, the visible world “corresponds” with the invisible one. The same is true of Scripture, which reflects truths that can only be known by those who’ve entered the spiritual world.Swedenborg was convinced his writings would form the beginning of a new era in the history of the world and religion. He claimed what had taken place when he received his revelations was what the Bible meant when speaking of the 2nd Coming of Christ. As expected, these ideas weren’t received well by his contemporaries. His circle of followers was small. He didn’t feel called to found a new movement, but to call the existing church to a new understanding of its nature and message.Since that didn’t work out so well, in 1784, twelve years after his death, his disciples founded the Church of the New Jerusalem, whose members were never many but which has survived to our time. In the 19th C, the Swedenborgian Society was founded with the purpose of publishing and distributing Swedenborg’s writings. 

This, the 117th episode of CS is titled, “Which Witch?” and is a brief review of the well-known but poorly understood Salem Witch Trials.They’re often brought up by critics of Christianity as examples of religious intolerance and superstition. And while they did indeed carry a bit of that, they were far more a case of a breakdown in the judicial system. The phrase “witch-hunt” refers to an attempt to find something damning in an otherwise innocent victim. What’s rarely mentioned is that while there was a brief flurry of witch-hunting that went on in the New England colonies, it was a long practice in Europe from the mid-15th thru mid-18th Cs. It reached its peak in the about fifty-year span from between 1580 and 1630. It’s difficult to sort out how many were executed but scholars say it was from a low of 40,000 to as high as 60,000.In light of such large numbers, the twenty executed in the Salem Trials seems trivial. But that even a single person was executed on the charge of witchcraft was a travesty of justice.Witch hunts began in the 15th C in southeast France and western Switzerland. The European witch craze was fueled by the publication of The Hammer of the Witches in 1486, by the inquisitors Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger.The trials included men and women of all ages and classes.In New England, there’d been three hangings for witchcraft prior to Salem. But the first sign of trouble in Salem Village occurred during the winter of 1692, when Elizabeth Parris the nine-year-old daughter of the village pastor and her eleven-year-old cousin Abigail Williams, began displaying bizarre behavior. The girls screamed uncontrollably, hurled items, groaned, and threw fits of wild contortions. Witchcraft immediately surfaced as a possible explanation.Suspicion quickly centered on three women living on the margins of village life. One was a homeless woman named Sarah Good. Another was an infrequent church-attender and so obviously suspicious woman named Sarah Osborne. The third was Tituba, a slave known for fortune-telling. These three were interrogated in March, 1692 and sentenced to jail.Tituba’s ethnic origins are difficult to sort out but she appears to have been an African slave brought from the Caribbean to serve in the home of Pastor Samuel Parris, Elizabeth’s father. She regaled the young girls with tales of the occult and indulged their desire to have their fortunes read. When the girls were caught gazing into a crystal ball, they tried to shift blame by affecting bizarre behavior that made them appear victims of spells cast on them by something malevolent or better, some-one.For anyone’s who’s worked with adolescent girls likely knows, it didn’t take long before others of their age saw all the attention this gained them. So they affected similar behavior to get a slice of the attention pie. They accused the soft targets of women already considered odd and suspicious. Tituba was the first to be accused, but soon Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne were also implicated, questioned, and remanded to custody.Making matters more complicated was a long-running feud between the Putnam and Porter families. Charges and counter-charges of the damning charge of devil-worship flew on both sides. Pastor Parris used his pulpit to fan the flames of superstition that ANYONE in Salem might in fact be in league with Satan.In March, several more women were accused. Then, anyone who questioned the girl’s veracity was suspected. Sarah Good’s four-year-old daughter Dorothy was arrested and interrogated.Accusations began pouring in. More arrests made. But now many of those arrested weren’t just on the fringe of Salem village life. They were upstanding members of the community and church. As tension grew, Governor William Phips set up a special court to adjudicate the cases.The first to be brought to trial was Bridget Bishop, who was accused of being a witch because her immoral lifestyle and affinity for darks clothes suggested she was in league with hell. She was found guilty and was executed by hanging in June, 1692. Five more women were executed in July, and then four men and one woman in August. The last executions took place in September when six women and three men were hung.Some of those arrested confessed they had practiced witchcraft, and accused others of being their mentors. But scholars now believe these confessions were made under duress and with the promise that by implicating others they might be allowed to go free.Giles Corey, an eighty-year-old farmer and husband of one of the accused, was also arrested in September. Corey refused to cooperate with the authorities and was subjected to a form of torture in which the subject is placed beneath an increasingly heavy load of stones in an attempt to compel him to enter a plea. After two days, Corey died without confessing.The last trial occurred at the end of April, and all five accused were found not guilty, bringing an end to the episode. In the final count, twenty were hung, one was crushed to death, and four died in prison.Twenty years later, the Massachusetts court declared the entire ordeal had been a gross injustice and ordered indemnifications be paid to the victims’ families.At the time, two of New England’s most influential leaders were the father and son, Increase and Cotton Mather. Increase, who became president of Harvard, believed in the reality of witchcraft and has been blamed for much of what happened in Salem. But he severely criticized the proceedings and use of spectral evidence which was central to the case.Spectral evidence was the testimony of the young girls and their supporters who claimed they saw certain things that must mean the accused were in fact witches bent on the spiritual and social unraveling of the Salem community. They saw what they described as ghost-like images. Increase Mather decried the use of such spectral evidence as being inappropriate to condemn someone to death. His son Cotton took a similar position, first writing against witchcraft, then deploring the manner in which the trials were conducted.It was the two-fold whammy of the Mather’s condemnation of spectral evidence and that the girls apparently began to stretch out a bit to see just what they could get away with that moved people to begin to wonder what was going on in Salem. It’s one thing to accuse oddballs and misfits of being witches. But when some of the community’s most respected members and people known for their upstanding virtue were accused à Well, maybe we’ve been played by a handful of teens.While religious superstition fueled the panic that fired the Salem Witch Trials, it was in fact a failure of the judicial system that saw people hanged. And while Pastor Parris stirred the pot in Salem with his use of the pulpit to fuel suspicion, it was the work of two other pastors, Increase and Cotton Mather that moved the people of Salem and Massachusetts to calm down and end the trials.We turn now in the balance of this episode to tie off the Puritanism of New England.Within a single generation, the original Puritan vision of a City on a Hill was already dimming. A new cosmopolitanism from Europe had transformed cities like Boston. By the early 18th C, American Puritanism had split into three factions.First there were Congregational churches, which down-played Calvinist doctrines and looked to the Enlightenment. These came to be called the “Old Lights.”Then there were those who continued to practice the rigid Calvinism of their forebears, referred to as the “Old Calvinists.”The third group emerged from the “Great Awakening” with its pietistic emphasis on a “new birth.” The “New Lights.”Puritanism wasn’t static on either side of the Atlantic. It couldn’t be since their political contexts were vastly different. English Puritans were engaged in a civil war, while New England Puritans were carving a life out of a new world. Despite minor variations like the New England Halfway Covenant, the Puritan theological core remained the same. The Westminster Confession of Faith is a solid guide in identifying the theological tenets of Puritanism.The Confession was the work of the Westminster Assembly which met from 1643-9.The Assembly was a committee appointed by Parliament. It was charged with drawing up a new liturgy to replace the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and for implementing a new plan for church government. It met in what’s called the Lady Chapel of Westminster Abbey for the first time on July 1, 1643. Parliament appointed 121 clergy and 30 laypeople to the assembly.It replaced the Book of Common Prayer with the Directory of Public Worship in 1645, and the 39 Articles of the Church of England were replaced by the Westminster Confession in 1646. The House of Commons returned the original draft of the Confession with instructions to add biblical proof texts. Revisions were made, and the Confession was ratified by Parliament. Two catechisms were added. The Larger Catechism (designed for instructing adults) and the Shorter Catechism (a bit easier for children) were approved in 1648.The Church of Scotland also adopted it without amendment, satisfying compliance with the Solemn League and Covenant. Its work completed, the Westminster Assembly dissolved in 1649.

This episode is titled, A City on a Hill, and returns to our look at the Propagation of the Christian Faith in the Americas.Back in Episodes 105 and 6, we breached the subject of Missions in the New World. We looked at the role the Jesuits played in the Western Hemisphere. While the post-modern view of this era tends to reduce all European missionaries in a monochromatic Euro-centrism that leveled native American cultures, that simply wasn’t the case. Yes, there were plenty of Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestants who conflated the Gospel with their mother culture. But there were not a few missionaries who understood the difference and valued the uniqueness that was native American cultures. They sought to incarnate the Christian message in those cultures and languages. That often got them in trouble with officials back home who wanted to exploit indigenous peoples. In other words, it isn’t just modern Liberation Theology advocates who sought to protect the peoples of the New World from the exploitive injustices of the Old. Many early missionaries did as well.So, we considered the work of men like Jean de Brébeuf and Madame de la Peltrie in the northeast of North America. We considered the work of the Russian Orthodox Church in the far northwest and down the west coast to California. They were met by the Spanish coming north out of Central America.Protestants were a bit late to the game. One of the first real attempts was near Rio de Janeiro when the French Huguenot Admiral Villegagnon established a short-lived Calvinist settlement in 1555. It folded when the French were expelled by the Portuguese. A more permanent settlement was made by the Dutch when they captured Pernambuco at the easternmost tip of Brazil. This settlement remained a Calvinist enclave for forty years.North America presented a very different scene for missions than Central and South America. The voyage of the Mayflower with its ‘Pilgrims’ in 1620 was a historical pointer to the strong influence of Calvinism in what would become New England. The states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire were strongly Congregationalist or Presbyterian in terms of church polity and heavily influenced by English Puritanism. At least some of these pioneers felt a responsibility for spreading the Christian faith to native Americans.In episode 106, we talked about John Eliot, the Mayhews, William Carey, David Livingstone, David Brainerd, and, Jonathan Edwards. Besides Presbyterians and Congregationalists, Episcopalians achieved some success in evangelizing the Indians.And again, for those who missed my earlier comment … While it’s fashionable in some circles to eschew the use of the label “Indian” in favor of the assumed-moniker “Native American” for indigenous people of the New World, many of their modern day descendants have made clear their desire to be called “Indians” or referred to by their tribal identity, rather than “Native American.”  So please, those of non-New World descent who take umbrage at the label “Indian” on behalf of others, assuming you’re defending People of Color, no nasty emails or snarky reviews because you speak that of which you know not.If some frustration came through in that >> Sorry, Not Sorry. It’s just tiresome dealing with the comments of those who want to apply fleeting social concepts that appeared two-seconds ago as a blanket over hundreds and even thousands of years of history. It’s simply unconscionable to apply contemporary values and untested, highly-questionable social theories on prior ages, as though just because we live now, we’re somehow more enlightened, more civilized, in a word better than those who are thus cast as “worse” only because they lived before this moment of grand-enlightenment. The arrogance of that perspective is stunning.Okay, end of my tirade of personal pique …Being that we’ve just come up to the age of the Puritans in England, now would be a good time to take a little closer look at Puritanism in the New World.During the reign of James I, some Puritans grew discouraged at the pace of reform in England and separated entirely from the Church of England. After a sojourn of about eleven years in the Netherlands, a group of these “separating Puritans,” known to us as “Pilgrims,” set sail for the New World. The Dutch were generally welcoming of these English dissenters because they shared the same faith and as the English were such hard workers, added to their booming economy. But the English grew distressed after a little more than a decade that their children were becoming more Dutch, than English. They couldn’t return to England where tension was thick between the Crown and Puritans. So they decided to set sail for the New World and try their fortune there. They established a colony at Plymouth in 1620 in what is now southeastern Massachusetts.While it struggled greatly, it eventually succeeded and became something of a model for other English settlements in the region.Back in England, when Archbishop Laud suppressed Puritans, emigration to the New World increased. As the Puritans’ relationship with the new king soured, a Puritan lawyer named John Winthrop began plans for a colony in New England. In March 1629, Winthrop obtained a royal charter to establish the Massachusetts Bay Colony. A year later he was joined by 700 colonists on eleven ships and set sail.While aboard the Arbella, Winthrop preached a sermon declaring to his fellow travelers, “We shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us.” Others were soon captivated by this vision of a Christian commonwealth, and from 1630 to the beginning of the English Civil War, well over 20,000 Puritans settled in New England. “The Great Migration” had begun.These later Puritans were different from the Separatists Pilgrims of Plymouth. They regarded themselves as loyal members of the Church of England, now established in NEW England. They had the chance to install the reforms they’d ached to achieve back in England. They may have separated geographically, but not in loyalty to The Church of England.The New England Puritans held a vision, not just of a pure church, but of a purified society, one committed to Biblical principles, not just in church affairs but in all facets of public life. The idea of “covenant” between God and his people was at the center of their enterprise. Following the pattern of God’s covenant with Israel, they promised to obey God and in turn, He’d bless them. This is why one often encounters the terminology that Massachusetts was a kind of New Israel. That required strict observance of the Sabbath. Families were structured as “little churches,” with the father bestowing blessing for obedience and vice-versa.This social structure required public piety. It prohibited what was called “secular entertainments”, like games of chance, dancing around maypoles, horse racing, bear-baiting, and the theater. Christmas celebrations were regarded as pagan rituals. Puritans adopted a rich view of piety that at times became excessive and became à What’s the word? Let’s just call it, odd.Following the Pietist tradition, New England Puritans required a genuine public declaration of conversion as a condition for church membership. Problems arose when children, who’d grown up in pious homes and had always counted themselves as Born Again, to give testimony to their dramatic conversion event. That led to many of them being excluded from membership in the Church, which was the heart and center of social life in the New England town. Divisions erupted, leading Puritan minister Richard Mather to developed the so-called “Half-Way Covenant” to solve the problem. The Half-Way Covenant gave a kind of quasi-membership that included baptism but not Communion to the children of church members. Puritan leaders hoped this would expose “halfway members” to an example that would see them having their own “born again” experience and usher them into full membership.Some historians assert the Puritans aimed for a theocracy. While Winthrop was governor, he certainly wanted to base the colony’s laws on biblical principles, but he didn’t permit clergy in civil governing. Church officials had no authority over civil magistrates. Winthrop and government officials sought the advice of ministers, but political authority rested in the hands of the laity. Theocratic tendencies certainly existed, but the colony’s congregationalism restrained them. New England never had enough unity to be a theocracy.While a minority in England, Puritans were the majority in New England. A less careful recounting of American history would say they fled the Old World for the New to obtain religious liberty. Not really. They left so they could establish a PURITAN system of Church and State. There was no religious liberty as we conceive it today. Puritan New England was quite IN-tolerant of dissenters; like Roger Williams and Anne Hutchison.Historian Ed Morgan describes Roger Williams as a “charming, sweet-tempered, winning man, courageous, selfless, God-intoxicated — and stubborn.” Arriving in Boston just a year after Winthrop, he was quickly asked to be pastor of the local congregation. Williams refused. He was a staunch Separatist who vehemently disagreed with the Puritan connection to the Church of England. It stunned his neighbors that a man would turn down the invitation to be a pastor. This and other behaviors so infuriated the leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, they expelled him.Five years later, Williams settled at the tip of Narragansett Bay on land purchased from the Indians. He named the settlement Providence and declared religious freedom — the first colony in the world in which religious liberty for all was genuine. Infant baptism was banned since Williams believed baptism was for those old enough to make a real profession of faith. He established the first Baptist Church in America in 1638.The Hutchinsons, William and Anne, arrived in Massachusetts in 1634. They’d followed their minister John Cotton, pastor of a Boston congregation. Like many Puritans, the Hutchinsons hosted a group in their home to discuss Pastor Cotton’s sermon from the previous week. Anne excelled at breaking down the message into topics that were engaging. The group grew to upwards of eighty adults.Then, controversy arose when Anne began to argue that all people are under either a covenant of works or grace. She was reacting against the public piety of the people of Boston who assumed good works proved the presence of salvation. She posited that works and grace were opposites and those who depended on works were lost.But Anne crossed the line in 1637 when she denounced some ministers as preaching a Gospel of Good Works. Critics accused her of antinomianism; that is the idea that the elect don’t have to obey God. It didn’t help her case that a woman was teaching the Bible to men.Anne was called to give an account before the General Court. She was anything but contrite. Sparks flew when she proved more adept at citing Scripture than her judges. The die was cast when she said that her knowledge of the issue had come “by revelation.” The magistrates, already suspicious of her orthodoxy, seized on this to banish her from the colony.We’ll pick it up at this point and the infamous Salem Witch Trials in the next episode.

This is Part 2 of The Rationalist Option on Communio Sanctorum, History of the Christian Church.In our last episode, we took a look at the genesis of the Enlightenment in England and France. We’ll come back to France a bit later after taking a brief look at the Enlightenment in German and Russia.Germany took a bit longer to join the Enlightenment. That was due in part to the condition of the land following the Thirty Years War. It’s estimated the population shrank from twenty million to just seven after it. There’s also the issue of Germany not really being a country. It was at that time a collection of independent statelets, united by language and culture, but divided between Catholics and Lutherans.The low regard for contemporary culture at that time in Germany is illustrated by the fact that while Newton, Locke, and Voltaire were regarded as heroes in their realms, Germany’s equivalent, Gottfried von Leibniz, was never popular during his lifetime. Yet he was one of the most brilliant men, not just of his day, but of all time. Born in 1646 in Leipzig, Leibniz was the son of a professor of philosophy. He studied law before taking up with a disreputable group of alchemists and worked for the Elector of Mainz.Leibniz came to the attention of the world in 1672, when he was sent on an unofficial ambassadorial mission to Paris. The purpose of this trip was to present Louis XIV with a plan he’d worked out for the invasion of Egypt, by which he hoped to distract the Sun King from ambitions he might have toward Germany. Nothing came of Leibniz’s diplomacy,  although Napoleon seems to have adopted his strategy a century later. In any case, while in Paris, Leibniz took the opportunity to meet with all the luminaries in the foremost city of culture in Europe. He studied mathematics, quickly becoming one of the foremost mathematicians in the world, and made a number of important discoveries, including differential calculus, for which tens of thousands of students have hated him ever since. He also proudly demonstrated an extraordinary mechanical calculator he had built.Leibniz’s interests were so wide-ranging he could never keep his mind on what he was doing. In 1676, he became Court Chancellor of Hanover and was put in charge of the library. But he was more interested in the mines at Harz and spent several years devising increasingly ingenious devices to solve the problem of draining them. He eventually worked for several German states, as well as the cities of Berlin and Vienna, for which he designed a number of civic improvements. In his spare time, he traveled extensively around Europe, meeting other rationalist luminaries, and carrying out his work in mathematics, chemistry, physics, metaphysics, and theology. He produced hardly any books of importance, but his vast correspondence, much of which is still in the process of being edited and published, dwarfed the output of most of his contemporaries; and there cannot have been any subject, however obscure, with which he did not deal, and on which he was not an authority. Leibniz died in 1716, an increasingly marginalized figure, defiantly wearing his long brocade coat and huge wig which had gone out of style decades before.Despite Leibniz’s virtual single-handed attempt to kick-start the German Enlightenment, it didn’t get rolling until the 18th C. Prussia, the largest of the German states, took the lead, as its rulers sought to drag their country into the modern era. Frederick Wilhelm, who came to the throne in 1713, reformed the economy after staying with relatives in the Netherlands.Wilhelm, a careful Lutheran, had no love for Catholic France, but his son, Frederick II, known as Frederick the Great, was a quite different person than his father. Upon his accession to the throne in 1740, he set about building on his father’s practical reforms with a program of cultural renovation. Among his first acts as ruler was to recall from exile Christian Wolff, the leading German philosopher, and Leibniz’s heir. Frederick II’s enthusiasm for French culture meant the usual coldness between the two realms saw a remarkable thaw. French was even spoken in his court, and it was at his invitation Voltaire moved to Prussia in 1749. Frederick was also keen to bolster the position of Prussia in Europe, which he did by engaging in a series of wars between the 1740s and 60s.During the late 17th C, the Russian Czar Peter the Great traveled all over Europe on a mission to learn all he could about the Enlightenment. He was eager to see what impact it had had on the realms of culture, economics, and engineering. His plan was to return to Mother Russia and drag it, if need be, into the modern world.Although Western Russia geographically is considered a part of Europe, it had for centuries been isolated. It was ruled by the Mongols for much of the late Middle Ages and was a bastion of Orthodox Christianity, a separate denomination from the Catholics and Protestants in the West. Westerners knew virtually nothing about Russian religion, and Russians cared virtually nothing for the West.It’s hardly surprising that, when Peter returned home, he had to enforce his reforms with an iron hand if he was going to make headway. Beards, a revered symbol of Orthodoxy, were banned in an attempt to get people to look more Western. Young men were happy to comply, as many women preferred. But most older men kept their beards in boxes, fearing they were bereft of salvation without them. Traditional Russian dress, which reached the ankle, was banned. Everyone had to dress like the French, and anyone who refused had their clothes force-tailored. English hairstyles were mandatory for women. Schools were built, the calendar reformed, military conscription introduced, and church hierarchy was placed firmly under State control. Like Louis XIV’s France, Peter’s Russia was an avowedly Christian country. As a symbol of the new, Westward-leaning Russia, Peter transferred the capital to a new city, St Petersburg, on the Baltic coast.But Peter was hardly a model of Enlightenment tolerance. In 1718, he had his son tortured to death for treason. Still, his reforms were extended and completed by Catherine the Great, a Prussian who became Empress of Russia in 1762. She organizing a coup against her own husband. Unlike Peter, Catherine grew up in Western Europe and had thoroughly imbibed Enlightenment principles. She corresponded with Voltaire and other leading cultural figures; patronized the arts, and founded the famous Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. Catherine was also a skilled diplomat, and as the most powerful monarch in Europe, extended Russian influence throughout the continent.Okay, so, you’re wondering how this is church history. I thought it wise to spend a little time charting the broad outlines of the Enlightenment so we could see how the thinking it produced affected theology.That happens with the advent of Rationalism.Rationalism reached its apex in the 18th and 19th Cs. It’s characterized by an interest in the physical world and its confidence in the powers of reason. In Western Europe, there’d been a growing interest in Nature since the 13th C. That was the era of Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas, who reintroduced Aristotelian philosophy as a tool for doing theology. One of the points of contrast between Aristotelianism and the earlier Platonism that dominated theological thought was precisely that the new philosophy emphasized the importance of the senses and perception. The later Middle Ages, with its distrust of speculation, continued in the same vein. The art of the Renaissance, with its appreciation for the beauty of the human body and the world, was an expression of this interest. By the 17th C, many thought the goal of reason was understanding the world of nature.Parallel to that, there appeared growing confidence in the powers of reason. Often, these two trends were combined in an effort to show the degree to which the order of nature coincides with the order of reason. This can be seen, for instance, in the work of Galileo, who was convinced the entire natural world was a system of mathematical relations, and that the ideal of knowledge was the reduction of all phenomena to their quantitative expression. Every success of such efforts seemed to confirm the most optimistic expectations of the power of reason.This all led to the philosophy of René Descartes in the first half of the 17th C. His system was based on great confidence in mathematical reasoning, joined to a profound distrust of all that is not absolutely certain. He compared his philosophical method to geometry, a discipline that accepts only what is an undeniable axiom or has been rationally proven.In applying his method, Descartes felt he ought to begin with an attitude of universal doubt, making sure that, once he found something he could not doubt, he would be certain of its truth. He then found that undeniable first truth in his own existence. He could doubt everything, but not that the doubting subject existed. “I think, therefore I am,” became the starting point for his philosophy. But this I whose existence cannot be doubted is only the subject as a thinker. The existence of his body wasn’t proven, so must be doubted.Before proving his existence as a body, Descartes felt he could, get this >> Prove the existence of God. He found in his mind the idea of a “more perfect being,” and since his mind could not produce such an idea, which was above itself, it must have been placed there by God. Therefore, Descartes’s second conclusion was that God exists. It was only then, on the basis of the existence of God, and of trust in the divine perfection, that Descartes felt free to move on to prove the existence of the world and of his own body.Descartes was a profoundly religious man who hoped his philosophy would be found useful by theologians. But not all agreed with him. Many theologians feared the challenge of Cartesianism—as his philosophy was called. The universal doubt Descartes proposed as his starting point seemed to some a kind of crass skepticism. The faculties of several universities declared Aristotelianism was the philosophical system best suited to Christian theology, and there were those who declared Cartesianism lead to heresy. Dismayed, Descartes decided to leave his native France. He moved to Sweden, where he lived the rest of his life.But he was not without supporters. In France, those intellectual circles where Jansenism had been popular embraced Cartesianism. Eventually, others among the more orthodox also took it up, and debates continued for a long time.The main point at which Cartesianism led to further theological and philosophical developments was the question of the relationship between spirit and matter, between soul and body. It’s at this point we could really get into a sticky wicket as we parse all the various ways theologians and philosophers offered ideas on the inter-relationship between the thinking self and the thing that occupies space in the form of a body. But we won’t go into the theories of Occasionalism, Monism, and Preestablished Harmony.Let me just say this became a realm of contentious debate between a Dutch Jew named Baruch de Spinoza and our friend Leibniz.While these philosophical developments took place on the Continent, in Britain, philosophy took a different route in what’s called Empiricism. It’s drawn from a Greek word meaning experience. Its leading figure was Oxford professor John Locke, we considered in the previous episode. In 1690, Locke published his Essay on Human Understanding. He read Descartes and agreed the order of the world corresponded to the order of the mind. But he didn’t believe there was such a thing as innate ideas to be discovered by looking inward. He contended that all knowledge is derived from experience; the experience of the senses, and the working of our minds. That meant the only genuine knowledge is based on three levels of experience: Experience of self, Experience of the world around us, and Experience of God, whose existence is manifest by the existence of ourselves and the world.To this Locke added another level of knowledge, that of probability. Probability works like this; You and I have repeatedly experienced someone’s existence; let’s call him George. We know George. He’s a friend we see a couple of times a week. When George isn’t standing in front of us, we still have reason to believe He exists, even though at that moment, we have no purely empirical basis to believe in his existence. Still, sound judgment gives us reason to discern the probability of George’s existence. Locke said that this judgment of probability allows us to get on with the practical affairs in life.Faith, Locke said, is assent to knowledge derived from revelation rather than reason. Therefore, although highly probable, knowledge derived by faith can’t be certain. Reason and judgment must be used in order to measure the degree of probability of what we believe by faith. For this reason, Locke opposed the “fanatical enthusiasm” of those who think that all they say is based on divine revelation. For the same reason, he defended religious toleration. Intolerance is born out of the muddled thinking that confuses the probable judgments of faith with the certainty of empirical reason. Besides, toleration is based on the very nature of society. The state does not have the authority to limit the freedom of its citizens in matters such as their personal religion.In 1695, Locke published a treatise, The Reasonableness of Christianity, in which he claimed Christianity is the most reasonable of religions. He said the core of Christianity is the existence of God and faith in Christ as Messiah. But Locke didn’t believe the Christian Faith had added anything of importance to what could, in any case, have been known by the proper use of reason and judgment. In the final analysis, Christianity was little more than a very clear expression of truths and laws that others could have known by their natural faculties.Others would come along later and drive a wedge between faith and reason, divorcing them into different camps. And in the settlement, Faith would be left impoverished while Reason drove off with all the goodies.One of those who drove the wagon was David Hume in the mid-18th C. In my estimation, Hume can be blamed for the post-modern tendency of knee-jerk negativity toward absolutes. An illustration may best help to describe his philosophy, or better, his anti-philosophy. Hume was skeptical of reason, saying the only reason, reason seems to work is because of mental habits we’ve developed. In other words, In Hume’s system, Descartes’ doubt didn’t go far enough; he ought to have doubted his own ability to reason.Hume maintained, for instance, that no one has ever experienced what we call cause and effect. We’ve seen, for instance, when a pool ball collides with another ball, there’s a noise and the second ball moves off in some direction. If we repeat that several times, we see similar results. So we conclude by the power of reason that the movement of the first ball caused the movement of the other. But, Hume contended, we’ve not seen any such thing. All we’ve witnessed is a series of phenomena, and our mind has linked them by means of the notion of cause and effect. This last step, Hume claimed, taken by any who see a series of phenomena that are seemingly related, has no basis in empirical observation. It is rather the result of our mental habits. So, by an empiricists’ definition, that’s not rational knowledge.Hume’s uber-skepticism places such strict rules on interpreting what our senses tell us, there’s no room left for the working of logic and deduction. He cripples us and turns his followers into inveterate skeptics.It wasn’t long until some Enlightenment thinkers washed their hands of faith altogether and began to envision a world without God or religion.We’ll talk about later developments in Philosophy and their impact on theology in a later episode.

The title of this episode is, The Rationalist Option Part 1. I want to give a brief comment at the outset that this episode doesn’t track much of church history per se. What we do over the next minutes is take a brief look at the European Enlightenment. We need to because the ideas that came out of the Enlightenment influenced theology and the modern world.The 30 Years War ended in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia. But decades of bitter conflict left Europe a ravaged land. People were weary of conflict whatever its nature; political, religious, or martial. And though the War was over, the following decades were by no means peaceful. Among other things, they witnessed the English Civil War with its execution of Charles I, and yet more wars between European powers, albeit on a smaller scale. Against this turmoil-laden backdrop, a new spirit was brewing in Europe: one desperate to make a break with the past with its religious tension, dry scholasticism, incessant bickering and the numerous occult fetishes the Renaissance spun off. By the mid-17th C, the seeds of the Enlightenment were well sown.A new breed of thinkers inhabited a Continent quite different from their ancestors. At the dawn of the 16th C Europe was dominated by the resolute Catholic power of Spain. In 1492, Spain both ended the lingering presence of Islam and discovered the New World. Italy, while having little political power, exercised massive cultural influence due to its claim as the birthplace of the Renaissance.Fifty years later, everything had changed. Spain was exhausted by the 30 Years War and political hegemony had moved to France, finally free of the threat of its powerful neighbors, Spain and Germany.  The Netherlands, previously under Spanish rule, won their freedom with the Treaty of Westphalia and almost overnight became the world’s leading trade nation. Amsterdam was the exchange capital of the world, and the Dutch merchant fleet was the largest on the planet.The threat once posed by Islam was uprooted. Though Constantinople fell to the Ottomans in 1453, 40 years later saw the Spanish remove the last Muslim strongholds from the Iberian Peninsula.  In 1683, despite being outnumbered five to one, the Polish king Sobieski routed the Ottomans besieging Vienna.Europe was a land of independent nations: of trade and colonialism, and a rising middle-class. Instead of the hegemonies of the past, when a single power, whether emperor or pope, sought to govern the Continent, a new idea arose of a ‘balance of power’ between states—and between churches too. The Pope’s hand was declawed, even in Catholic countries, by the Treaty of Westphalia, which permitted every state to follow whatever religion it saw fit. Although France, the new dominant force in Europe, was mostly Catholic, it tended not to listen too closely to Rome. The Netherlands were strict Calvinists. It was a world in which the notions of nationhood, human rights, and law were going to play an increasingly important role, and they were going to be rethought along rationalist rather than religious lines.The most vaunted ideal of the Age of Reason was Reason itself: the human capacity, by means of investigation, rather than by relying on external authority, to, in a word = Understand. In the first half of the 17th C, two philosophers, the Englishman Thomas Hobbes and the Frenchman René Descartes pioneered a new way of understanding the world and the mind. Instead of the Neoplatonic world of the Renaissance, dominated by occult forces, where objects exerted mysterious ‘influences’ on each other, they sought to understand the world in mechanistic terms. The universe was conceived as a complicated system of levers, pulleys, and bearings. Given enough time and the proper intellectual tools, the cosmos was comprehensible to almost anyone who took the time to study it.At the same time, there was a desire to forget the old divisions of the past and embrace what was common to all humanity. One important movement of the time we’ll talk about later was ‘syncretism’, which sought to reunite the churches of Europe. A leading figure in this was the Dutch Reformed thinker Hugo Grotius, who contended Christians of all denominations should come together on the basis of their common faith and heritage. Grotius was arrested in The Netherlands and spent some years in prison until he made a daring escape and fled the country.Despite his work as a theologian, Grotius is most remembered as a legal theorist. His On the Law of Peace and War of 1625 was the first major study of the theory of international law. In it, he sought to place binding human laws—transcending national boundaries—on a naturalistic and rational footing. This vein of thought was the result of the application to philosophy and theology of the laissez-faire principles which nations like the Netherlands applied to economics with such remarkable success.It took eighty years of on-and-off warfare before the Netherlands finally achieved its independence from Spain in 1648. The country had already become a great trading nation, and during the 17th C entered a golden age, quickly becoming one of the most powerful nations in Europe. Culture, the arts, and science flourished, with the works of the 17th C Dutch painters quickly becoming classics to rank alongside the best the Italian Renaissance had produced.The Netherlands was (not “were” I looked it up. So, The Netherlands was - the premier bastion of the Reformed faith in Europe. It was there Calvinists who’d suffered persecution elsewhere, emigrated. Dutch theologians defined and refined their faith, a process that led to the Arminian controversy. And while the persecution of Arminians was carried out in the Netherlands, it was nothing compared to what the French and English were dishing out to their religious dissidents. The rule of merchants meant the Netherlands were renowned for tolerance—racial, philosophical, and national. It was to the Netherlands a substantial Jewish community, fleeing the persecutions of Philip II in Spain, had come. Charles II of England sought refuge there after his father’s execution. It was there, too, fringy-ish philosophers and theologians like Descartes and his disciple Spinoza, found sanctuary and carried on their work. In providing an environment in which their ideas could develop, free of interference, the wealthy mercantile ruling class of the Netherlands played a key role in the evolution of the Enlightenment in the 17th C.If one person could have claimed to be the most powerful man in the world in the late 17th C, it would have to have been Louis XIV of France. The ‘Sun King’ of legend ascended to the throne at the age of four, in 1643. He remained there until his death in 1715. When Cardinal Mazarin, effectively the prime minister, died in 1661, the 23-year-old king decided not to appoint a successor to run the country and did it himself. Whether or not he really uttered the famous words, “I am the State,” under his personal rule, France was established as a leading force for culture and enlightenment. The magnificent palace of Versailles, completed in 1682 after twenty years of construction, symbolized the spirit of the age. It was an era of formalism, geometry, beauty, and intellect. And where France led, Europe followed. Fifty years earlier, scholars spoke Latin. Now, French became the language of scholarship.At the same time, Louis did everything he could to extend France’s political power, which he achieved by means of an aggressive foreign policy. The wealth of the Netherlands, so close at hand, tempted him into a series of wars with the Dutch. In 1689, he plunged the world into a conflict that threatened a level of devastation not seen for a half-century. This was the War of the Grand Alliance, during which the fighting covered Europe, Ireland, and North America. Barely had that finished, in 1697, before Louis launched the War of the Spanish Succession of 1701–14, which left his grandson occupying the throne of Spain.The age over which Louis presided was an avowedly Catholic one. His favored slogan was “One faith. One law. One king.” The Catholicism of France at that time was nationalistic, rather than a papal. People were devoted to the Church more because of the ancient roots of Catholicism in France than out of a sense of duty to Rome. This came to be called ‘Gallicanism.’ One of its leading proponents in the court of the Sun King was Jacques Bossuet [BOO-sway], the Catholic bishop of Meaux [Muh].Despite the pacific influence of men like Bossuet, Louis XIV’s determination to unite his subjects under a single faith became heavily coercive. Of the roughly fifteen million inhabitants of France—the largest population of any European state—about a million were Protestants-Huguenots. Their freedom to worship was guaranteed by the Edict of Nantes of a half-century before Louis, but he saw to it that things were not easy for them. They suffered restrictions on where they could go, what professions they could take up, where they could worship, and what schools they could attend. In 1681, oppression became suppression, when the army was ordered to harass Huguenots until they converted. Four years later, the king revoked the Edict of Nantes.Little wonder, then, that a growing number of French intellectuals began to think religion didn’t seem to offer much of a basis for an enlightened modern society. It wouldn’t be long before some questioned the point of religion altogether. In the meantime, many were impressed by their Dutch neighbors who’d worked out a far more satisfactory social philosophy of reason and liberalism.England had a harder time than France. Politically, most of the 17th C was something of a disaster, involving civil war, a short-lived republic, the overthrow of two monarchs—a Revolution and the eventual coronation of the Dutch William of Orange as King of England; who was invited to invade by a Parliament desperate to secure a Protestant monarch.As England finally established some political stability, it fostered major intellectual developments that would put the country on a cultural par with France. British thinkers pioneered new ideas about government, politics, ethics, and economics; ideas that aimed to avoid the extremes absolutist monarchs such as Charles I and despots like Cromwell had slipped into. While the nations of the Continent developed an ever-higher reverence for their monarchs, the political and military struggles of 17th C England saw an erosion of the monarchy. The idea took hold that kings rule by consent of the governed, who retain the ability to judge and even remove him if they don’t approve of his policies.The process was started by Thomas Hobbes, who sought to create a new political theory that was rational and humanist, without any reliance on religion. In his famous Leviathan of 1651, Hobbes put forward the claim that government is based on natural law, not on divine sanction, and that a government exists only by the will of the people.The appearance of modern ‘liberalism’, is associated above all with John Locke, one of the most prominent British intellectuals at the turn of the 18th C. Locke is most famous for his political ideas, and his values of tolerance and liberalism, which would have an enormous impact in both America and France. Like Hobbes before him, Locke was determined to develop a new understanding of how society and its members operate and interact. He was inspired in this by the advances in science over the preceding century—climaxing in the work of Isaac Newton, revered throughout England as a genius, a new Aristotle. If the exercise of cool mathematical reason could produce Newton’s Principia, regarded by many as the final word in the study of physics, who could say what it might produce in other spheres as well?Locke’s attempts to do this in philosophy, psychology, politics, and religion resulted in his starting the English Enlightenment virtually single-handedly. Locke believed human reason should be the final arbiter of what we believe, in politics, ethics, and religion alike; and he believed the values of tolerance and individual liberty, of education and freedom, would provide the proper environment for the exercise of reason. This was the philosophy of the Enlightenment in a nutshell. Yet despite his enormous prestige at home, Locke’s influence was greatest in Continental Europe. French intellectuals were impressed by the commonsense political philosophy coming from across the Channel. Between them, Britain and France were responsible for the most characteristic trends and movements of the Enlightenment.If Hobbes was the Enlightenment’s midwife and Locke birthed it, the man who epitomized its values and dreams was François Marie Arouet [Ah-roo-eh]; known by his pen name, Voltaire. He was the dominant cultural force of his day, and the smiling figure he presents in contemporary paintings, with a wicked glint in his eye, conveys the intellectual power, wit, and irreverence that characterized his version of the Enlightenment.Born in 1694 in Paris, Voltaire was educated by the Jesuits and quickly became known for his satirical poetry and biting wit. His penchant for attacking the aristocracy saw him holed up in the Bastille for almost a year. That wasn’t enough to teach him what the authorities hope and in 1726, we was sent into exile. He spent three years in England learning the values of liberalism, rationalism, and religious tolerance. On his return to France in 1729, Voltaire set out to enlighten France by extolling the virtues of the British philosophers, above all Locke and Newton. In his Philosophical Letters of 1734, which he called ‘the first bomb against the Old Regime’, he compared France’s government, science, and philosophy unfavorably to England’s. And as might be expected, he was expelled once again from Paris. Voltaire headed for the French countryside, where he immersed himself in the study of the natural sciences. In 1749, at the invitation of Frederick the Great, he moved to Prussia for a few years. He eventually ended up in Switzerland, where he devoted himself to writing plays, essays, novels, and articles. His success was so great, and his influence so enormous, his estate became a place of pilgrimage to writers, philosophers, and the celebrities of the time. So popular was his home he became known as ‘the innkeeper of Europe’. In 1778, in order to direct one of his own plays, Voltaire returned to Paris to enormous acclaim and died shortly after.Voltaire devoted his life and work to the principles of reason and tolerance that he saw exemplified in British philosophy. His slogan was ‘Crush infamy!’ and to Voltaire, the most infamous institution in France was the Roman Catholic Church, an organization which in his eyes demanded loyalty from its members, which forced on them a ridiculous and barbarous mythology, and which put down dissenters with the sword. Voltaire was not an irreligious man, and was one of the foremost proponents of ‘deism.’ Yet he was notorious as an arch-heretic and enemy of Christianity for the contempt with which he held what he regarded as the superstitious and authoritarian elements of the Faith. Voltaire attacked the doctrines and practices of Christianity as mercilessly as he lampooned the secular rulers of society.There is a story that his local bishop once ordered that under no circumstances was Voltaire to be admitted to Mass. Voltaire, who had no intention of letting a mere bishop exercise authority over him, therefore faked a terminal illness and forced a priest to give him the sacrament, which could not be denied to a man on his deathbed. The moment he had consumed it, Voltaire jumped out of bed and went for a walk. The notion that one could eat God was as blasphemous to him as it was ludicrous, and mockery seemed to him the only appropriate response.At the time of his death, Voltaire had produced some two thousand books and pamphlets. Probably the greatest was his Philosophical Dictionary of 1764, devoted primarily to ethical and religious subjects. The fact that this work was burnt throughout France showed that few in authority had heeded his Treatise on Tolerance of the previous year, in which Voltaire had condemned the atrocities that had been perpetrated throughout history in the name of religion and called for the freedom of each individual to practice whatever religion they chose.Because Voltaire was such a towering figure, his celebrity tends to diminish the many others who shared his views, though with less aplomb. He was no iconoclast, no lone voice in the wilderness. On the contrary, while he may have been the loudest voice, it was accompanied by a chorus of French critics, writers, and philosophers, all of whom extolled reason and human progress and critical of the traditional authorities and mores. The first and most famous of these philosophes, as they were known, was Baron Montesquieu. His Persian Letters, published in 1721, took the form of a series of letters by two fictitious Persians traveling Europe. Montesquieu bitterly satirized the Establishment of his day: the French king, government, society and, above all, the Catholic Church, which Montesquieu hated for much the same reasons as Voltaire. However, Montesquieu’s attitude to Christianity softened over the years, and he was much more sympathetic to it in his most famous work, The Spirit of the Laws of 1748, which attempted to set out legal principles.One philosophe who never moderated his views was Baron d’Holbach, another French aristocrat. D’Holbach wasn’t only an atheist, which was a much more daring position than the deism of Voltaire; he believed atheism was the only possible basis for a reasonable ethical system. Politically, he opposed all kinds of absolutism, including even the enlightened monarchies of the sort Louis XIV had tried. Here again, we see the influence of British thought. In his System of Nature of 1770, d’Holbach set forth a wholly materialistic and mechanistic understanding of the world. It’s hard to imagine a more different figure from Bossuet a century earlier: such was the radical turnaround, from supporting religion to undermining it, that the French Enlightenment had taken.Next on our stop will be the German Enlightenment. But we’ll have to leave that for next time.

This is the second episode in which we look at English Puritanism.We left off last time with King Charles I fleeing London after breaking into The House of Commons to arrest the Puritan members of Parliament he accused of treason. The men had been warned and had fled. What Charles had hoped would be a dramatic show of his defense of the realm against dangerous elements, ended up being an egregious violation of British rights. So in fear for his own life, he packed up his family and headed out of town.Back in London, John Pym, a leader of Parliament, ruled as a kind of king without a crown. The House of Commons proposed a law excluding the royalist faction of bishops in the House of Lords from Parliament. Other members of the House of Lords surprisingly agreed, so the clergy were expelled. This commenced a process that would eventually disbar anyone from Parliament who disagreed with the Puritans. The body took on an ever-increasing bent toward the radical. Feeling their oats, Parliament then ordered a militia be recruited. The king decided the time had come to respond with decisive action. He gathered loyal troops and prepared for battle against Parliament’s militia. Civil War had come to England.Both sides began by building forces. Charles’ support came from the nobility, while Parliament found it among those who’d suffered most in recent royal shenanigans. Parliament’s army came from the lower classes, to which were added some from the emerging merchant middle-class, as well as a handful of those nobles who’d not been in favor at Court. The king’s strength was the cavalry, which of course was traditionally the noble’s military specialty. The Parliamentary forces strength was in their infantry amd navy, which controlled trade.At the outset of the war, there were only minor skirmishes. Parliament sought help from the Scots, while Charles sought it from Irish Catholics. In its efforts to attract the Scots, Parliament enacted a series of measures leaning toward Presbyterianism. English Puritans didn’t agree with the Presbyterian plan for church government, but they certainly didn’t like the episcopacy of the Church of England’s royalist bishops. English Puritans ended up adopting the Presbyterian model, not only because it irked those Bishops, but because it made more Biblical sense at the time, and because confiscation of bishops’ property meant Parliament could fund the war without creating new taxes.Parliament also convened a groups of theologians to advise it on religious matters. The Westminster Assembly included 121 ministers, 30 laymen and 8 Scottish representatives. Being that the Scots had the strongest army in Great Britain, though they numbered only 5% of the total participants in the assembly, their influence was decisive. The Westminster Confession which they produced became one of the fundamental documents of Calvinist orthodoxy. Although some of the Assembly’s members were Independents who followed a congregational-form of government, and others still leaned toward an episcopacy, the Assembly settled on a Presbyterian church government, and urged Parliament to adopt it for the Church of England. In 1644, Parliament joined the Scots in a Solemn League and Covenant that committed them to Presbyterianism. The following year the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud, was executed on the order of Parliament.As Parliament built up its army, Oliver Cromwell came to the fore. A relatively wealthy man, he descended from one of Henry VIII’s advisors. Oliver was a devoted Puritan, convinced that every decision, both personal and political, ought to be based on the will of God as revealed in Scripture.  Though he was often slow in coming to a decision, once set upon a course, he was determined to follow it through to its conclusion, believing it to be, in fact, God’s Will. Respected by fellow Puritans, until the Civil War he was simply known as a member of the House of Commons. But when he was convinced armed conflict was inevitable, Cromwell returned home where he recruited a cavalry corps. He knew cavalry was the king’s main weapon, and that Parliament would need their own. His zeal was contagious, and his small force accomplished great deeds. They charged into battle singing psalms, convinced they were engaged in a holy cause. That attitude spread to the rest of the Parliament’s army which crushed the royal army at the Battle of Naseby.That was the beginning of the end for the king. The rebels captured his camp, where they found proof he’d been asking foreign Catholic troops to invade England. Charles then tried to negotiate with the Scots, hoping to win them with promises. But the Scots took him prisoner and turned him over to Parliament. Having won the war, Parliament adopted a series of Puritan measures, including setting the precedent that Sunday was to be reserved for solemn religious observances rather than the frivolous pastimes increasingly being adopted by the English nobility and emerging middle-class.The Puritans, who’ had to unite due to war, now returned to what they best at, arguing among themselves. Most of Parliament supported a Presbyterian form of church govt, which made for a national church without bishops. But the Independents who made up the majority of the army leaned toward congregationalism. They feared a Presbyterian church would begin to limit their ability to pursue their faith the way their conscience demanded. Tension grew between Parliament and the army.In 1646, Parliament unsuccessfully tried to dissolve the army. Radical groups gained ground. A wave of apocalyptic fervor swept England, moving many to demand a transformation of the social order thru justice and equality. Parliament and the leaders of the Army began to square off with each other.Then è The king escaped. He opened negotiations with the Scots, the army, and Parliament, making contradictory promises to all three. Somehow he managed to gain support from the Scots by promising to install Presbyterianism in England. When the Scots invaded, the Puritan army defeated them, captured Charles I, and began a purge of those factions in Parliament they deemed inconsistent with the reforms they envisioned. Forty-five MPs were arrested. What remained was labeled by its enemies the Rump Parliament because all that was left was the posterior of a real parliament.The Rump Parliament began proceedings against Charles, accused of high treason and of having thrust England into a bloody civil war. The fourteen lords who appeared for the meeting of the House of Lords refused to agree to the proceedings. But the House of Commons carried on, and Charles, who refused to defend himself on the grounds his judges had no legal standing, was beheaded at the end of Jan, 1649.Now, I’m sure someone’s likely thinking, “Is this Communio Sanctorum or Revolutions?” Yeah, this doesn’t sound much like CHURCH history. It’s more English History. So what’s up? Well, it’s important we realize the roll Puritanism and Presbyterianism played in this period of English history. The Reformation had a huge impact on the course of events in the British Isles.Fearing the loss of their independence from England, the Scots quickly acknowledged Charles’ son Charles II, as their sovereign. And in the South, England descended into chaos among several factions all vying for powerThat’s when Cromwell took the reins. He commandeered the Rump Parliament, stamped out a rebellion in Ireland and the royalists in Scotland. Charles II fled to the Continent.When Parliament moved to pass a law perpetuating its power, Cromwell expelled the few remaining representatives, and locked the building.  Seemingly against his will, Cromwell had become master of the nation. He tried to return some form of representative government, but eventually took the title Lord Protector. He was supposed to rule with the help of a Parliament that would include representatives from England, Scotland, and Ireland. In reality, the new Parliament was mostly English, and Cromwell was the real government.He set out to reform both church and state. Given the time, his policies were fairly tolerant. Although he was an Independent, he tried to develop a religious system with room for Presbyterians, Baptists, and even advocates of episcopacy. As a Puritan, he tried to reform English society through legislation. These laws were aimed at keeping the Lord’s Day devoted to sacred rites, ending horse races, cockfights, the theater, and so on. His economic policies favored the middle-class at the expense of the nobility. Among both the very wealthy and the very poor, opposition to his rule, which is called the Protectorate, grew.Cromwell retained control while he lived. But his dream of a stable republic failed. Like the monarchs before him, he was unable to get along with Parliament—though his supporters kept his opponents from taking their seats. Since the Protectorate was clearly temporary, Cromwell was offered the crown, but refused it, hoping to create a republic. In 1658, shortly before his death, in a move that seems politically schizophrenic, Cromwell named his son as his successor. But Richard was most definitely not his father. He resigned his post.Parliament then recalled Charles II to England’s throne. This brought about a reaction against the Puritans. Although Charles at first sought to find a place for Presbyterians within the Church of England, the new Parliament opposed it, preferring a return to the bishops’ episcopacy. The Book of Common Prayer was reinstalled after being out of favor for several years, and dissenters were banned. But such laws weren’t able to curb the several movements that had emerged during the previous unrest. They continued outside the law until, late in that 17th C, toleration was decreed.In Scotland, the consequences of the restoration were more severe. With the episcopacy reinstalled in England, the staunch Presbyterianism of the North was challenged anew. Scotland erupted in riot. Archbishop James Sharp, prime prelate of Scotland, was murdered. This brought English intervention in support of Scottish royalists. The Presbyterians were drowned in blood.On his deathbed, Charles II declared himself a Catholic, confirming the suspicions of many that he’d been an agent of Rome all along and thus all the blood of Puritans and Presbyterians.  His brother and successor, James II, moved to restore Roman Catholicism as the official religion of his kingdom. In England, he sought to gain the support of dissidents by decreeing religious tolerance. But the anti-Catholic sentiments among the dissidents ran so strong they preferred no tolerance to the risk of a return to Rome. Conditions in Scotland were worse, for James II placed Catholics in positions of power, and decreed death for any who attended unapproved worship.After three years under James II, the English rebelled and invited William, Prince of Orange, along with his wife Mary, James’s daughter, to take the throne. William landed in 1688, and James fled to France. In Scotland, his supporters held on for a few months, but by the next year, William and Mary were in possession of the Scottish crown as well. Their religious policy was tolerant. In England, tolerance was granted to any who subscribed to the thirty-nine Articles of 1562, and swore loyalty to the King and Queen. Those who refused, were granted tolerance as long as they didn’t conspire against the crown. In Scotland, Presbyterianism became the official religion of State, the Westminster Confession its doctrinal norm.But even after the Restoration, the Puritan ideal lingered and greatly influenced British ethics. Its two great literary figures, John Bunyan and John Milton, along with Shakespeare, long endured among the most read of English authors. Bunyan’s most famous work, known by its abbreviated title Pilgrim’s Progress, became a hugely popular, and the subject of much meditation and discussion for generations. Milton’s Paradise Lost determined the way in which the majority of the English-speaking world read and interpreted the Bible.

In this episode, we’ll take a look at English Puritanism.In Episode 96, English Candles, we considered the arrival of the Reformation in England and the career of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of the Anglican Church. When Catholic Queen Mary ascended the throne, she persecuted Protestants. But when Elizabeth became queen, a new day dawned for the Reformation there.Queen Elizabeth followed a median course between religious conservatives who sought to retain as much of the ancient practices and beliefs as possible, and Reformers who believed the entire life and structure of the church ought to adjust to what they saw as a Biblical norm. During Elizabeth’s reign, that delicate balance was maintained though tensions surfaced repeatedly. Her strength and decisiveness managed to restrained both sides, barely.Elizabeth left no heir when she died in 1603. But she’d made arrangements for the succession to pass to James, son of Mary Stuart, already serving as king of Scotland. The transition was fairly smooth, bringing the House of Stuart to reign over England. James VI of Scotland became James I of England. He didn’t find ruling his expanded realm an easy matter. The English regarded him a foreigner. His plan to unite both kingdoms earned him determined opponents on both sides.Elizabeth’s reforms of England’s economic policies were bearing fruit, especially among the growing merchant class, who resented the James’ royalist policies favoring the nobility. But James’s greatest troubles were with Reformers who wanted to see the English church purged of all Romanish influences. They regarded James as standing in the way. His native Scotland had moved further along that Reformation Road under the work of John Knox. English Calvinists felt the time was ripe for similar changes in their land.These Reformers didn’t comprise a single group, nor did they agree on all matters. So it’s difficult describing them in general terms. One of the most influential groups was given the name Puritans because they insisted on the need to purify the Church. They opposed many of the traditional aspects of worship the Church of England retained; things like the use of the Cross as a symbol, priestly garments, and the celebration of communion on an altar. They differed over whether there even ought to be an altar; wasn’t a simple table good enough? And if a table, should it be placed so as not to give anyone the idea it WAS an altar. Things like this led to bitter disputes They may have left behind the Scholastic argument of how many angels can dance ion the head of a pin, but they argued over now less inconsequential issues as how much lace their ought to be in a collar.Puritans insisted on the need for a sober life, guided by the commands of Scripture, and abstinence from luxury and ostentatious displays of wealth. Since a great deal of the worship of the Church of England appeared to them as needlessly elaborate, this caused further objection to such worship. Many insisted on the need to keep the Lord’s Day sacred, devoting it exclusively to religious exercises and charity. They also rejected the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and the use of written prayers in general, declaring such led to insincerity, so that even the Lord’s Prayer, rather than a set of words to be repeated, was to be used as a model for prayer. They weren’t opposed to the use of alcohol, for most of them drank moderately, but they were quite critical of drunkenness. They were also critical of all they considered licentious; like the theater, because immorality was often depicted and because of the inherent duplicity required for acting. They considered it a kind of lying because someone pretended to be someone else.This tone of super-critical Puritanism would much later move HL Mencken to describe Puritanism as, “the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be having a good time.”A precise definition of Puritanism has been a matter much debate, due in part to its multifaceted influence in not only religious and theological matters but in its impact on England’s politics and society.Some of the difficulty in defining Puritanism comes from its caricatures that began in the 16th C. As with so many of the labels that have been attributed to movements in Church History, the word “Puritan” was originally a slam applied by critics. They considered Puritans to be peevish, censorious, conceited hypocrites. That reputation, once applied, stuck to them all the way to our day.In truth, there was a surprising diversity among Puritans. They shared a common theological confession, while differing on how the Church ought to be organized. Some Puritans thought the existing Anglican hierarchy of bishops was fine while others wanted to restructure the Church along more Presbyterian lines. Still others embraced a congregational form of church government. Some advocated separation from the established church, while others remained. Some were royalist, others revolutionary, even to the point of regicide. While Puritans differed in worship styles and expressions of piety, they ALL wanted the English Church to more closely resemble the Reformed churches on the Continent.Many Puritans were opposed to bishops. They argued that the highly-structured church hierarchy of the Church of England was a late invention, not found in the Bible. They said the Church ought to look to Scripture as its constitution not only for doctrine, but also in its organization and governance. Moderate Puritans responded that the Bible didn’t actually give a prescription for a specific form of Church government. What it had were principles that could be applied in different ways. Others insisted that the New Testament Church was ruled by elders called “presbyters.” Then others claimed each congregation ought to be independent. They were creatively dubbed “Independents.”Baptists rose mostly among this last group. One of their early leaders was John Smyth, an Anglican priest who decided the Church of England had not reformed far enough. He established an independent, and at that time, illegal, congregation. As it grew, Smyth and his followers fled to Amsterdam. There he continued his study of the Bible, and came to the point of refusing to use translations of the Bible in worship, for only the original text had absolute authority. At church, he would read Scripture in Hebrew or Greek, and translate the text as he preached. Partly through his study of Scripture, and partly through contact with Mennonites—whose pacifism and refusal to take oaths, he adopted—e eventually becoming convinced infant baptism was wrong. He then re-baptized himself with a bucket and ladle and proceeded to baptized his followers.The move of Smyth and his flock to Holland was financed by a wealthy lawyer named Thomas Helwys, who eventually broke with the ever-reforming Smyth. The breaking point of contention was over the taking of vows.  Smyth rejected any form of vow while, as a lawyer, Helwys considered them a necessary convention safeguarding social order. Helwys and his followers returned to England, where in 1611 they founded the first Baptist Church in England.Eventually, to really no one’s surprise, a disagreement arose among English Baptists over theological issues similar to those that had risen between Calvinists and Arminianists. Those who favored the Arminian-flavored path were called General Baptists while Calvinist-leaning Baptists were referred to as Particular Baptists.The balance Elizabeth maintained in the Church of England began to wobble under James. While its theology was moderately Calvinist, its worship and governance followed the older Roman order. Puritans feared a movement was under way to return to what they called “Romanism.”They didn’t trust the new king, whose mother was none other than the Catholic Mary Stuart, AKA Mary, Queen of Scots, who’d been executed by Elizabeth on the charge of treason in plotting to assassinate Elizabeth and take her throne. James didn’t, in fact, favor Catholicism though Puritans assumed he would and hoped to gain concessions. They were repeatedly disappointed. James’ goal was the same kind of absolutist monarchy then in place in France. In Scotland, his Presbyterian subjects hadn’t allowed him to reign as he wished. He thought his chances for absolutism were better in the South. To that end he strengthened the bishops of the English Church as a prop to his own power. He declared, “Without bishops, there is no king,” meaning monarchy is better supported by a hierarchical church structure.James’ religious policy was similar to Elizabeth’s. The Anabaptists were persecuted because James was offended by their egalitarianism that threatened to up-end the highly stratified English society. For goodness sake; we can’t have peasants thinking they’re as important as nobles. What a catastrophe if humble commoners mixed with blue bloods. So, the Anabaptists with their calling everyone “brother” and “sister” had to be repressed. They were; brutally. And Catholics, who thought James would be their guy, were regarded by him as agents of the Pope, who everyone knew wanted to get rid of James. James said if the pope acknowledged his right to rule and condemned regicide, which a few of the more extreme Catholics pushed for, James would tolerate the presence of Catholics in his realm. Presbyterians, whom the king had come to hate in Scotland, were barely tolerated in England. James did grant them minor concessions, but only to keep them from making trouble.Tension between Anglican bishops and Puritans grew to a boil during James’s reign. In 1604, Richard Bancroft, archbishop of Canterbury, had a series of canons approved offensive to Puritans. One affirmed that episcopal hierarchy was an institution of divine origin, and that without it there could be no true church. This ostracized the many Protestant churches in Europe that had no bishops. Puritans saw it as provoking a showdown between themselves and the Church of England. Some assumed it was all preparation by the Church of England to reunite with Rome.James called Parliament to sit for the approval of new taxes to complete some of England’s projects. The House of Commons included many Puritans who joined others in an appeal to the king against Bancroft’s canons. James convened a committee at Hampton Court to consider the canons, over which he presided. When one of the Puritans made reference to the church being governed by a “presbytery,” James announced there would be no closer connection between the monarchy and a presbytery than there COULD be between God and the Devil. All attempts at compromise failed. The only result of meeting was that a new translation of the Bible was approved.  It appeared in 1611 and is known today as the KJV. Produced at a high-point in the development of the English language, along with the Book of Common Prayer—the King James Bible became a classic that profoundly influenced later English literature.But, this marks the beginning of a growing hostility between the House of Commons and the bishops of the Church of England.Late in 1605, what’s known as the Gunpowder Plot was discovered. A repressive law against Catholics was issued the previous year on the pretext they were loyal to the pope rather than the king. The real purpose of the law was to collect funds. Authorities used it to impose heavy fines and confiscate property. Catholics came to the conclusion the solution was to be rid of the king. A property was rented whose cellars extended below the room where Parliament met. Several wine barrels were filled with gunpowder and set under the room. The plan was to detonate them as the king opened Parliament. This would rid England of James and many Puritans leaders. But the plot was discovered; the conspirators executed. This unleashed a wave of anti-catholic sentiment in England that saw many arrested and imprisoned. James used the whole affair a way to lay heavy fines on Catholics and confiscate more property.After those first years of his reign, James tried to rule without Parliament. But English law stipulated it alone could approve new taxes. So in 1614, when his finances were desperate, James relented and again convened Parliament. New elections brought in a House of Commons even more stubborn than the previous. So James dissolved it and again tried to rule without it. He turned to the few tariffs he could levy without Parliament’s approval. He borrowed from bishops and nobility.Then the Thirty Years’ War broke out. Frederick, King of Bohemia, was James’s son-in-law. But James offered no support. English Protestants named James a traitor and coward. Je replied that he WANTED to help, but that the Puritans held the purse and war is expensive! Finally, in 1621, James re-convened Parliament, hoping the House of Commons would agree to new taxes with the proviso that some, at least, of the revenue would support German Protestants in the war. But it was discovered James planned to marry his son and the heir to England’s throne to a Spanish princess, a Catholic Hapsburg! Such an alliance was regarded by the Puritans as an abomination. So, James once again dissolved the House of Commons and arrested several of its leaders. The marriage plans were abandoned for other reasons, and in 1624 James once again called a meeting of Parliament, only to dissolve it anew without obtaining the funds he required. Shortly thereafter, he died, and was succeeded by his son Charles, who’d been a good student of his father’s routine with Parliament.English Puritans welcomed Charles I to his throne with less enthusiasm than they had his father. Charles said that kings are “little gods on Earth.” Puritans knew this didn’t bode well for their future relations. Nor did it help that Charles immediately married a Roman Catholic princess, Henrietta-Marie de Bourbon, raising the specter of a Catholic heir to the English throne.The relationship between the Crown and the mostly Puritan Parliament went from bad to worse. Puritan antagonism toward the King rose in 1633 when the King appointed William Laud as archbishop of Canterbury. Laud embarked on a policy of High Anglicanism with a strong sacramentalism and a theological slant toward Arminianism that tweaked the Calvinist Puritans.In what proved his undoing, Charles tried to impose on the Scottish Church the Anglican Book of Common Prayer in 1637, which one Scot called the “vomit of Romish superstition.” When a marketplace grocer named Jenny Geddes heard the dean of St. Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh read from the new prayer book, she stood up and threw her stool at him, yelling, “Devil cause you colic in your stomach, false thief: dare you say the Mass in my ear?”Yep – them Scots! Peaceful lot they are. Which, I get to say, because I am one.Jenny’s reaction was a foretaste of a brewing rebellion. Riots broke out in Edinburgh, and in early 1638, the Scottish formalized their opposition to King Charles innovation by establishing the National Covenant. Many signed it in their own blood, making it clear they’d die before submitting to Laud’s Anglicanism. Charles led two military campaigns, known as the Bishops’ Wars (1639–40), in an effort to quell the Scottish rebellion. Both were turned back.The Scottish army then occupied northern England and threatened to march south. In November, 1640 King Charles HAD to once again convene Parliament. Never had there been a body more hostile to the monarch. They immediately passed a law forbidding him to dissolve it without its consent. This came to be known as the “Long Parliament,” since it stayed in session for 20 years.Archbishop Laud was charged with treason and imprisoned in the Tower of London.The conflict between King and Parliament reached a boiling point. Charles was convinced Puritan members of Parliament had committed treason by conspiring with the Scots to invade England. Charles, accompanied by 400 soldiers, burst into the House of Commons in January 1642, planning to arrest them. But the men had been warned and fled. This attack on Parliament by armed troops was an egregious violation of British rights. Charles realized his error and a few days later, fearing now for his own safety, fled London.We pick it up at this point in our next Episode.

Although it surely would have grieved him had he lived to see it, Martin Luther’s legacy in the years after his death a Century of war. This war didn’t only pit Catholics against Protestants. Various factions among the Protestants warred with each other. If the Reformers hoped to purify the Church of both theological error and political corruption, they may have succeeded in the first endeavor but failed miserably in the second. Those who want to use religion for personal ends don’t care what face the mask bears, so long as it gets the job done. Some of the more devastating wars included the French wars of religion, the Dutch revolt against Philip II of Spain, the attempted invasion of England by the Spanish Armada, the 30 Years War in Germany, and the Puritan revolution in England.The 17th C was a time of theological and political entrenchment. European Christendom was now divided into four groups: Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed, and the Anabaptists. The first three became officially associated with regions and their governments, while Anabaptists, after their disastrous failure at Munster, learned their lesson and sought to live out their faith independently of entanglements with civil authority. During the 17th C, Catholics, Lutherans, and Reformed developed impenetrable confessional bulwarks against one another.As we saw in a previous episode, Catholic orthodoxy achieved its definitive shape with the Council of Trent in the mid-16th C. The Jesuits played a major role at Trent, especially in answering the challenge presented by Luther’s view on justification and grace. The Council affirmed the importance of the sacraments and the Roman church’s theological position on the Eucharist. At Trent, the Jesuits affirmed the importance Thomism, that is, the work of Thomas Aquinas, in setting doctrine. The triumph of Thomism at Trent set the future trajectory of Catholic theology.In the last episode, we looked at the rise of Protestant Scholasticism in post-reformation Europe. While Protestant orthodoxy is concerned with correct theological content, Protestant Scholasticism had more to do with methodology.From the mid-16th thru 17th C, Protestant orthodoxy clarified, codified, and defended the work of the early Reformers. Then, after the careers of the next generation of Reformers, it’s convenient to identify three phases orthodoxy moved through. Early orthodoxy runs from the mid-16th to mid-17th C. It was a time when Lutheran and Reformed groups developed their Confessions.  High orthodoxy goes from the mid- to late 17th C. This was a time of conflict when the Confessions hammered out earlier were used as a litmus test of faith and formed battlelines to fight over. Late orthodoxy covers the 18th C, when the people of Europe began to ask why, if Protestant confessions were true, rather than leading to the Peace the Gospel promised, they lead instead to war, death, and widespread misery.In truth, people had been asking that question for a lot longer than that; ever since the Church and State became pals back in the 4th C. But it wasn’t till the 18th they felt the freedom to voice their concerns publicly without the certainty they’d be set on by the authorities.As Protestants and Catholics identified their differing theological positions, they became increasingly mindful of their methodology in refining their Confessions. Each appealed to the intellectual high ground, claiming a superior method for defining terms and reasoning. This was the age when there was a return by Christian theologians to Aristotelian logic.Once the Council of Trent concluded and the Roman Church fixed its position, the opportunity for theological dialogue between Protestants and Catholics came to a firm end. After that it was simply up to the various major groups to fine tune their Confessions, then fire salvos at any and everyone who differed. It was the Era of Polemics; of diatribes and discourses disparaging those who dared to disagree.In a previous episode we dealt with the career of Jacob Hermanzoon; AKA Jacobus Arminius. Arminius rejected the Calvinism promulgated by Calvin’s protégé Theodore Beza. Arminius’ followers developed what they called the Remonstrance, a five-part summary of what they understood Arminius’ positions to be on key issues of Reformed Theology. A theological and, wouldn’t you just know it, political controversy ensued that was addressed at the Synod of Dort. The Synod declared Arminius a heretic, the Remonstrance in error, and the five-petals of the Calvinist Tulip were framed in response to the five-points of the Remonstrance. A few Arminianist leaders were either executed or jailed while some two-hundred pastors were removed and replaced with Dort-aligned ministers. Despite this, the Arminianist-position endured and continued to hold sway over the conscience of many.A couple decades after the Synod of Dort, another controversy surfaced among Reformed churches in France. It centered on the work of the brilliant theologian Moses Amyraut, professor at the then famous School of Samur. Amyraut took issue with one of the articles of the Canons of Dort, the doctrine of limited atonement. He argued for unlimited atonement, believing that Christ’s atonement was sufficient for all humanity, but efficient only for the elect. His view is sometimes known as “Hypothetical Universalism” far more commonly as four-point Calvinism.In A Short Treatise on Predestination published in 1634, Amyraut proposed that God fore-ordained a universal salvation through the sacrifice of Christ for all but that salvation wouldn’t be effectual unless appropriated by personal faith.Amyraut’s modification of Calvinism came to be labeled as Amyraldism and led to recurring charges of heresy. Amyraut was exonerated, yet opposition endured in many churches of France, Holland, and Switzerland.Sadly, after Luther’s death, the movement that bore his name fell into disarray and in-fighting. Lutherans broke into 2 main camps. Those who claimed to stay strictly loyal to Martin, and those who followed his cheif assistant, Philip Melancthon. They remained at something of a theological stalemate until the Formula of Concord in 1577, the definitive statement of Lutheran orthodoxy. Much of the destruction of the Thirty-Years War took place on German soil. Agriculture collapsed, famine spread, and universities closed. By the end the war, there were at least 8 million fewer people in Germany.The Peace of Westphalia made room for Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists, depending on the religious leaning of the ruler. Weary of bloodshed, the three communions withdrew behind polemic-firewalls. Instead of firing cannonballs at each other, they lobbed theological word-bombs.Pietism was a kind of war-weary reaction to the new scholasticism the theology of Lutheranism settled into. Pietists viewed what was happening in the retrenchment in Lutheran theology as a “deadening orthodoxy” that stole the life out of faith. Pietism didn’t set out to establish a new church. It simply sought a renewal that would turn dead orthodoxy in a living faith. Pietism saw itself as an Ecclesiola in Ecclesia, that is, “a little church within the larger church.”It seems Pietism has been loaded with a lot of emotional baggage and negative connotation of late. Critics today regard Pietists as aiming to privatize their faith, to withdraw from the public square and divorce faith from the wider world. To use Jesus’ term, they see pietism as an attempt to hide you light under a basket, to put the city, not just in a valley, but in a cave. While some Pietists did privatize faith, that wasn’t the goal of Pietism.It was a movement that simply sought to keep piety, the practice of godliness, as a vital and integral part of daily life. It was understood that godliness wasn’t the result of rules and regulations but of a genuine relationship with God. Pietism was a reaction to the dead orthodoxy of the State-approved Lutheranism of the early 17th C.This is not to say scholastic theologians were all lifeless profs. Some of them produced moving hymns and stirring devotional writings. But, if we’re honest, we’d have to say the practical faith of a large portion of Protestant scholastics had indeed become moribund.Philipp Jakob Spener is known as the “Father of German Pietism.” Born at Rappoltsweiler in 1635, Spener was raised by his godmother and her chaplain, Joachim Stoll who became Spener’s mentor. Stoll introduced him to writings of the English Puritans.Spener went on to study theology at Strasbourg, where his main professor was Johann Dannhauer, a leading Lutheran theologian of 17th C. Dannhauer deeply inspired the young Spener.When he entered his first pastorate in Frankfurt in 1666, Spener was convinced of the necessity of a reformation within Lutheranism. His sermons emphasized the necessity for a lively faith and holiness in daily life. His most significant innovation was the establishment in 1670 of what today we’d call small groups. These were gatherings of about a dozen church members in homes to discuss sermons, devotional reading, and mutual edification.In 1675, Spener was asked to write a preface for a collection of sermons by Johann Arndt. The result was the famous Pia Desideria (= Pious Wishes), which became an introduction to German Pietism.While this is a bit more detailed than our usual fare here on CS, I thought it might be interesting to hear the main points Spener made in the Pious Wishes.He enumerates 6 things as important for the Church to embrace. . .1) He called for “a more extensive use of the Word of God.” To that end, Spener advocated small groups to encourage greater study of the Bible.(2) He urged a renewed focus on the role of the laity in Christian ministry.(3) He placed an emphasis on the connection between doctrine and living.(4) He counseled restraint and charity in theological disputes.(5) He urged reform in the education of ministers. They ought to be trained in piety and devotion as well as academics.(6) He said preaching ought to edify and be understandable by common folk, rather than sermons being technical discourses only an educated few could understand.Spener’s Pious Wishes won him many followers, but aroused strong opposition among Lutheran theologians and not a few fellow pastors. Despite criticism, the movement grew rapidly.Pietism had the good fortune of seeing Spener succeeded by August Francke. Francke was born in Lübeck and graduated from the University of Leipzig, where he excelled in biblical languages. While a student in 1687, he experienced a dramatic and emotionally charged conversion, which he described as the “great change.” Francke’s conversion became something of a model for Pietism. In order for conversion to be considered legitumate, it needed to be preceded by a profound conviction of sin that’s a datable event to which one can point for confirmation.Returning to Leipzig, Francke led a revival in the college that spilled over into the town. It provoked conflict, and Francke was expelled from the city. At this point the term “Pietist” was first coined by a detractor, Joachim Feller, professor of rhetoric at the university. A Pietist, Feller asserted, was “someone who studies God’s Word and, in his own opinion, also leads a holy life.”By this time, Francke had become closely associated with Spener. It was due to Spener’s influence Francke was appointed to the chair of Greek and Oriental languages at the new University of Halle. Francke emerged as the natural successor to Spener. From his position at Halle he exercised enormous influence in preparing a generation of Pietist pastors and missionaries all over the world. Under his guidance, the university showed what Pietism could mean when put into practice. In rapid succession, Francke opened a school for poor children, an orphanage, a home for indigent widows, an institute for the training of teachers, a medical clinic, a home for street beggars, a publishing house for Christian literature, and the famous Paedagogium, a preparatory school for upper-class students.For 36 years his energetic endeavors established Halle as the center of German Pietism. Together, Spener and Francke created a true Ecclesiola in ecclesia.Spener and Francke inspired other groups of Pietism. Count Nikolas von Zinzendorf, was Spener’s godson and Francke’s pupil. Zinzendorf organized refugees from Moravia on his estate and later shepherded them in reviving the Bohemian Unity of the Brethren.The Moravians carried their concern for personal piety literally around the world. This was of huge significance for English Christianity when John Wesley found himself in their company during his voyage to Georgia in 1735. What he witnessed in their behavior and heard in their faith after returning to England led to his own spiritual awakening.

The title of this episode is Faith in the Age of Reason, Part 2.In our last episode we briefly considered Jakob Hermanzoon, the Dutch theologian who’d sat under the tutelage of Theodore Beza, John Calvin’s successor at the Academy in Geneva. We know Hermanzoon better by his Latin name Jacobus Arminius. Arminius took exception to Beza’s views on predestination and when he became pastor of a church in Amsterdam, created a stir among his Calvinist colleagues. It was while teaching a series of sermons on the Book of Romans that Arminius became convinced Beza had several things wrong. The implication was that because Beza was Calvin’s successor and the standard-bearer for Calvinism, Arminius contradicted Calvin. Things came to a head when Arminius’ colleague Peter Planck began to publicly dispute with him.Arminius hated controversy, seeing it as a dangerous distraction to the cause of the Gospel and pressed for a synod to deal with the matter, believing once his views were set alongside Scripture, he’d be vindicated.In 1603, Arminius was called to the University at Leiden to teach when one of the faculty members died. The debate Arminius had been having with Planck was shifted to a new controversy with one of the other professors at Leiden, François Gomaer.This controversy lasted the next six yrs as the supporters of both Calvinism and Arminius grew in number and determination. The synod Arminius had pressed for was eventually held, but not till nine years after his death in 1609.In the meantime, just a year after his death, Arminius’ followers gathered his writings and views and issued what they regarded as a formal statement of his ideas. Called the Five Articles of the Remonstrants, or just the Remonstrance, it was a formal proposal to the government of Holland detailing the points of difference that had come to a head over the previous years in the debate between Arminius and Gomaer.Those 5 points were –

1. That the divine decree of predestination is conditioned on Faith, not absolute in Election.
2. That the intent of the Atonement is universal;
3. Man cannot of himself exercise a saving faith;
4. That though the grace of God is a necessary condition of human effort it does not act irresistibly in man; and finally -
5. By the enabling power of the Holy Spirit, believers are able to resist sin but are not beyond the possibility of falling from grace.

In 1618, the Dutch Church called the Synod of Dort to answer the Remonstrance. The results of the Synod, called the Canons of Dort, strongly upheld Theodore Beza’s formulation of the Calvinist doctrine of predestination and developed their own five-point response to the Remonstrance.It comes as a major surprise to most students of Church history to learn that TULIP, or the famous Five Points of Calvinism were a RESPONSE to the challenge of Arminianists; that they’d come up with their 5 points first. Most people who’ve heard of Calvinism and Arminianism have never even heard of the Remonstrance; yet it’s the thing that formalized the debate between the two camps; a debate that’s continued to today and has led to some prolific arguments and controversies among Christians.Put a Presbyterian elder and Methodist deacon in a room together and let the fun begin!Now, lest we think the Protestants fell out in the Calvinist-Arminianist brouhaha while the Catholics sat back, ate popcorn and watched the show, realize things were FAR from being all united and just one big happy family over in the Roman sector of the Church. Catholics were no monolithic entity at this time. It was a mixed bag of different groups and viewpoints with their own internal disagreements.In the late 16th and early 17th Cs there was a long dispute between the Jesuits and the Dominicans over how divine grace and human free-will interacted.In the late 17th C, Pope Innocent XI, spent his reign playing a power game with Louis XIV and the Gallic theologians who believed in the authority of the Church, but not the Pope.More serious was the rise of Jansenism. This movement grew out of the work of   Cornelius Jansen, a professor at Louvain University. Jansen published a book in 1640 titled Augustinus, in which he stated what he believed were the doctrines of Augustine. Jansen sounded a lot like Calvin and argued that divine grace can’t be resisted, meaning it overrides the human will. He fiercely opposed the doctrine of the Jesuits that salvation depended on cooperation between divine grace and human will. So, the Jansenists believed in predestination, which meant that although they were Catholics they were in some ways more like Calvinists.Jansenism proved a thorn in the side of the Catholic Church, and especially the Jesuits, for quite a while. Its leading exponent after Jansen himself was Antoine Arnauld, an intellectual and cultural giant of the 17th C. Arnauld corresponded with such philosophical luminaries as Descartes and Leibniz. He possessed a penetrating critical faculty; and as a theologian he was no less brilliant.But back to our previous theme, stated at the beginning of the last episode – Protestant Scholasticism, or the Age of Confessionalism, in which the various branches of the Protestant church began to coalesce around distinctive statements of their theology.The Anglican Church of England occupied a curious position in the midst of all this. On the one hand it was a Protestant church, having been created in the 1530s when King Henry VIII took command of the existing Catholic Church in England. The Lutheran sympathies of his advisers, like Thomas Cranmer and Thomas Cromwell, influenced the new church, but so too did the Catholic tendencies of later monarchs like Charles I and churchmen such as William Laud. Unlike other churches throughout Europe, the Church of England rarely had to struggle for the soul of its nation with another movement. So it had never been forced to define its beliefs and practices in the face of opposition to others. By the turn of the 18th C, the one thing all Anglicans agreed on was a shared distrust of Roman Catholics.The doctrinal openness of the Church of England meant that it was in England that religious free-thinking had the greatest chance of taking root. In the late 16th C it was still possible to be burnt at the stake in England for denying the Trinity, but a C later those who asserted such things had no need to fear anything more damaging than government censure and a deluge of refutations by the clergy. The Church of England prided itself on its doctrinal orthodoxy, understood in terms of common sense, and a middle way between what were regarded as the bizarre excesses of continental Protestants and Catholics. This middle way was based on what its followers felt was a healthy respect, but refusal to fawn, for tradition. This took shape in the principle of the apostolic succession, an ancient Christian notion we’ve examined in previous episodes. Apostolic succession claims that Christian doctrines can be known to be trustworthy because they are taught in churches which were founded by the apostles or their immediate followers. In other words, great trust was placed in the notion of an unbroken chain of tradition going back to the apostles themselves. It was this ‘apostolic succession’, together with the Scriptures, themselves handed down as part of this authoritative tradition, that mainstream Anglicans felt guaranteed the trustworthiness of their church. By contrast, many thought, the Catholics had added to that tradition over the centuries, while the more extreme Protestants had subtracted from it.There was considerable tension between the churches. The worst example was France, where after the Revocation of the Treaty of Nantes in 1685 Protestants were an actively persecuted minority: they felt especially threatened by surrounding Catholics, and all the more determined never to give in to them. Persecution only strengthened their resolve and inspired sympathy from Protestants throughout the Continent, who by the same token became increasingly hostile to Catholicism.In England, Catholicism was the minority faith: officially banned, its priests had to operate in secrecy.There’s a story from this time of a Catholic bishop who, functioning as a kind of religious spy, held Mass in an east London pub for a congregation of Irish workers disguised as beer-guzzling patrons.Many people were scared of Catholics, whom they regarded as tools of a foreign power; those sneaky French or the Pope. There was also great suspicion of ‘Dissenters’—members of any churches other than the Church of England. ‘Dissenters’ and Catholics alike, it was feared, were eating away at the social fabric of the country, and the policies of tolerance followed by the Whig party were opposed by many. Some Anglican churchmen formed a party with the slogan ‘Church in Danger’, which spent its time campaigning against Catholics, Dissenters, deists, the principle of toleration and, essentially, everything that the Enlightenment had produced.In 1778, the English Parliament passed the Catholic Relief Act, which decriminalized Catholicism—to the enormous anger of a sizeable minority in the population. Two years later a Scottish aristocrat named Lord George Gordon led a huge mob to London, resulting in a week of riots in which Catholic churches were looted, foreign embassies burnt, and nearly 300 people were killed.But we ought not think it was all petty small-mindedness that ruled the day. There were some who worked tirelessly to effect peace between the warring camps of Christendom. In the 17th C, a number of attempts were made to open a dialogue between Roman Catholic and Protestant churches with the aim of reuniting them.The godfather of this endeavor, sometimes known as ‘syncretism’, was a German Lutheran theologian named George Callixtus. He devoted huge effort in the early 17th C to find common ground between the different groups. Like his contemporary Hugo Grotius in the Reformed Church, he believed it should be possible to use the Apostles’ Creed, and a belief in the authority of the Bible alone, as a basis for agreement among Christians.Callixtus made progress with Calvinists but the Catholics were less receptive. The Conference of Thorn, called by King Vladislav IV of Poland in 1645, attempted to put these ideas into practice, but after several weeks of discussions the Catholic, Lutheran and Calvinist theologians were unable to pull anything substantive together.Sadly, Callixtus’s efforts met with the greatest opposition from his fellow Lutherans.Let’s turn now from the acrimony and controversy that marked Protestant Scholasticism for a moment to take a look at a guy more like the rest of us; at least we probably hope so.He was an obscure, uneducated Frenchman of the late 17th C.Nicolas Herman, a manservant from Lorraine, tried to live his life around what he called ‘the practice of the presence of God’. He was not a very good manservant, having a pronounced limp from his army days and appallingly clumsy; but he performed his duties diligently until 1651, when, at the age of 40, he went to Paris and became a Carmelite monk. His monk’s name was Lawrence of the Resurrection.Brother Lawrence was put to work in the monastery’s kitchen—a task he hated, but which he did anyway because it was God’s will. To the surprise of the other monks, he not only did his work calmly and methodically, but spoke to God the entire time. Brother Lawrence declared that, to him, there was no difference between the time for work and the time for prayer: wherever he was, and whatever he was doing, he tried to perceive the presence of God. As he wrote to one of his friends:“There is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful, than that of a continual conversation with God: the only ones who can understand it are those who practice and experience it. But I do not advise you to do it from that motive. It is not pleasure which we ought to seek in this exercise, but let us do it from a principle of love, and because God would have us. If I were a preacher, I would, above all other things, preach the practice of the presence of God. And if I were a spiritual director, I would advise all the world to do it. That is how necessary I think it is—and how easy, too.”Brother Lawrence became a minor celebrity among the hierarchy of the French Catholic Church, and he was visited by more than one archbishop, anxious to see if the reports of his humility and holiness were true. Lawrence’s sixteen Letters and Spiritual Maxims testify of his sincere belief in God’s presence in all things and his trust in God to see him through all things. They also testify to the way in which holy men and women continued to devote themselves to God’s will, both in and out of monasteries, even as the intellectual revolutions of the Enlightenment were at their height.It’s easy when considering the Age of Reason, to suppose theology was increasingly being seduced by philosophy, and that the simple, heartfelt faith of the commoners of the Middle Ages and the Reformation was being replaced by rationalism. That was true in some quarters, but the 17th and 18th centuries had their share of sincere and pious saints, as well as heretics, as much as any age; and there were some important movements that recalled the faithful to a living and wholehearted religion. As the theologians bickered, ordinary Christians were getting on with things, as they always had.As we bring this episode to a close, I want to end with a look at Blaise Pascal. That’s a great name, isn’t it? Blaise. Sounds like a professional skateboarder.Pascal was a Jansenist, that is, a member of the Roman Catholic reform movement we took a look at a moment ago. While the Jansenists began as a movement that sought to return the Roman Church to the teachings of Augustine, since Augustine’s doctrines were considered as being based in Scripture, the Jansenists were a Roman Catholic kind of back to the Bible movement.A few days after Blaise Pascal’s death, one of his servants noticed a curious bulge in the great scientist’s jacket. Opening the lining, he withdrew a folded parchment written by Pascal with these words . . .The year of grace 1654. Monday, November 23rd.,… from about half past ten in the evening until about half past twelve, God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and scholars. >> Certainty, certainty, feeling, joy, peace. >> God of Jesus Christ, I have separated myself from Him. I have fled from Him, Renounced Him, crucified Him. May I never be separated from Him. Renunciation, total and sweet.For eight years Pascal had hid those words in his coat, withdrawing them now and again to read them and be reminded of the moment when grace seized his soul.Pascal’s mother died when he was only three. His father, Stephen Pascal, began the education of his children, Gilbert, Blaise, and Jacqueline. Occasionally he took the young Blaise with him to meetings of the Academy of Science. The youth’s scientific curiosity was aroused.Before he reached the age of 27 Pascal had gained the admiration of mathematicians in Paris; had invented the calculating machine for his father who was a busy tax-collector; and had discovered the basic principles of atmospheric and hydraulic pressures. He belonged to the age of the Scientific Greats.Blaise’s initial contact with the Jansenists came as the result of an accident his father had. On an icy day in January, 1646, Stephen tried to prevent a duel. He fell on the hard frozen ground and dislocated a hip. The physicians who treated him were devoted Jansenists. They succeeded not only in curing their patient but in winning his son to their doctrines.They told the Pascals physical suffering was an illustration of a basic religious truth: man is helpless; a miserable creature. Blaise had seldom enjoyed a day without pain. He knew how helpless physicians could be, so the argument struck him with unusual force. It deepened his sense of the tragic mystery of life.He also learned from these Jansenist physicians how profoundly the Bible speaks to the human condition. He became an avid student of Scripture, pondering its pages as he had atmospheric pressures. He came to see the Bible as a way to a transformed heart.In 1651, Pascal’s personal tragedy deepened with the death of his father. The loss brought him to a crisis. His sister, Jacqueline, renounced the world by entering the Port-Royal convent, and Blaise was left alone in Paris.He now gave himself to worldly interests. He took a richly furnished home, staffed it with servants, and drove about town in a coach drawn by four horses; an extravagance. He pursued the ways of elite but decadent Parisian society. After a year of pleasure he found only a “great disgust with the world,” and he plunged into quiet desperation. He felt abandoned by God.Blaise turned again to the Bible, to the 17th ch of the Gospel of John, where Jesus prepares for His sacrifice on the cross. It was then that Pascal felt a new blaze of the Spirit. As he wrote, “Certainty, certainty, feeling, joy, peace.”Pascal’s new faith drew him magnetically into the orbit of the Jansenists. Late in 1654, he joined his sister, Jacqueline, as a member of the Port-Royal community. He was then asked by one of the Jansenist leaders for assistance in his defense against the attack of the Jesuits.Pascal responded brilliantly. He penned eighteen Public Letters exposing Jesuit errors in flashes of eloquence and sarcastic wit. As each letter appeared, the public snatched them up. They were instant best-sellers. Port-Royal was no longer an obscure Jansenist monastery; it was a center of public interest. The Pope condemned the Letters, but all educated French read them, as succeeding generations did for the next two centuries.Upon completing the Letters in March, 1657, Pascal planned a book on the evidences for Christianity. He was never able to complete it. In June, ‘62, he was seized with a violent illness and, after lingering a couple months, died on August 19 at the age of just 39.Friends found portions of his writing on faith and reason, and eight years after his death they published these notes under the title Thoughts (Pensées-Pahn’-sees). In the Pensées, Pascal is a religious genius who cuts across doctrine and pierces to the heart of man’s moral problem. He appeals to the intellect by his passion for truth and arouses the emotions by his merciless descriptions of the plight of man without God.Man, Pascal said, is part angel and part beast; a Chimera. In Greek mythology the chimera was a she-goat with a lion’s head and a serpent’s tail. Pascal wrote, “What a Chimera is man! What a novelty, a monster, a chaos, a contradiction, a prodigy! The glory and refuse of the universe. Who shall unravel this confusion?”Reason, as great a faculty as it is, is no sure guide, Pascal warns. If we trust reason alone, we will doubt everything except pain and death. But our hearts tell us this cannot be true. That would be the greatest of all blasphemies to think that life and the universe have no meaning. God and the meaning of life must be felt by the heart, rather than by reason. It was Pascal who said, “The heart has its reasons which reason does not know.”He saw the human condition so deeply yet so clearly that men and women in our own time, after three centuries, still gain perspective from him for their own spiritual pilgrimage.

The title of this episode, is Faith in the Age of Reason.  Part 01After the first flush of Reformation excitement died down, the Protestant churches of Europe went into a long period of retrenchment, of digging in both doctrinally and culturally. This period lasted from the late 16th to the later 17th C and is referred to by church historians as the Age of Confessionalism. But “confession” here isn’t the personal practice of piety in which someone admits error. Confessionalism is the term applied to how the various Protestant groups were increasingly concerned with defining their own beliefs, their confessions, in contrast to everyone else. It resulted in what is sometimes referred to as Protestant Scholasticism, called this because the churches developed technical jargon to describe their doctrinal positions ever more accurately—just as medieval Roman Catholic scholastics had done three Cs before.Don’t forget; Roman Scholasticism helped spark the Reformation. It was the scholastics devotion to correct theology that highlighted the doctrinal and practical errors many in the Church began to call for reform over. But it was also the tendency of some Scholastics to forsake practical theology in favor of the purely hypothetical that fueled the Reformation’s drive to return the practice of faith to everyday life and made religion the sphere, not just of academics and sequestered clerics, but the common people.So, we might conclude Protestant churches were now headed down the same path with their own version of Scholasticism. And in some cases, that’s what happened. But instead of turning a theology back to Scripture as the Protestant Reformation had done in reaction to Roman Scholasticism, the reaction to Protestant Scholasticism was a decided turn away from Scripture to a decidedly irreligious philosophy.Many of the discussions of the Protestant Scholastics became dry and technical. Martin Luther sought to overturn centuries of medieval religious jargon and get back to the original message of the NT. John Calvin is often thought of as a more ‘systematic’ theologian, but his Institutes of the Christian Religion, though carefully arranged by topics, was intended to be no more than a faithful exposition of Scripture.Luther’s and Calvin’s heirs, however, went beyond their intended simplicity. They didn’t abandon the Reformation principle of Sola Scriptura, but they sought answers to questions not found in the Bible. A prime example was the issue of predestination and the relation between grace and free will—which, at the start of the 17th C was THE hot theological topic among Protestants and Catholics. A new kind of scholasticism was produced with some Protestant theologians happy to use the terminology of Aristotle and regarding the premier Roman Catholic Scholastic Thomas Aquinas as an authority.One of the key figures of this era was Theodore Beza, an aristocratic Frenchman who, although only ten yrs younger than Calvin, outlived him by forty and was widely regarded as Calvin’s successor. It was Beza, rather than Calvin, who was regarded by most Reformed theologians of the 17th C as the theological authority. He was especially good at recasting the terminology of Aristotle and the medieval scholastics in disputing with his opponents, who were most often Lutherans and Catholics.Beza defined the doctrine of predestination and its role in Reformed theology. In doing so, he developed the doctrine of ‘double predestination’, the notion that God deliberately predestines the reprobate to damnation and the elect to salvation. He put forward the ‘prelapsarian’ position, which says God planned the Fall and the division of humanity into elect and reprobate before Adam sinned. These ideas were present in germ-form in Calvin, but weren’t the touchstones of Reformation orthodoxy they later become.Beza was an eloquent author. That can’t be said of all who took up their pens in the service of the Lutheran and Reformed cause. In place of Luther’s and Calvin’s attempts to simply expound what Scripture said about doctrine and theology, the Protestant Scholastics were all about logical consistency and adherence to a pre-established orthodoxy.The Age of Confessionalism is often thought of as a time when theologians conducted a war of words with sharp pens, rather than sharp swords. What comes as a surprise is how so much of their angry rhetoric was aimed, not at people far across the theological divide from themselves, but at their own, much closer colleagues.With the hardening of orthodoxy, there were inevitable splits within churches as some rebelled against what their colleagues were laying down as required doctrine. The greatest of these fractures occurred in the Reformed Church at the end of the 16th C, after the preaching of Jacobus Arminius, a Dutch minister and professor taught by Beza himself. Arminius was initially a supporter of Beza’s views. But he rebelled against Beza’s distinctions regarding predestination and prelapsarianism, declaring them unjust. Arminius argued that if God condemns some and saves others, it must be on the basis of who has faith, not on the basis of some eternal decree God’s already worked out even before they’re born.Arminius died in 1609, but the controversy he started rumbled on thru the centuries and has continued right on down to today.His Dutch name was Jakob Hermanzoon – but as did many scholars of the day, he Latinized that to Jacobus Arminius; and it’s from that we get the theology derived from him – Arminianism – which as most listeners know, is usually posited as opposite to Reformed theology, or Calvinism. Now, before I get a pile of angry emails and comments – let me say what’s called Arminianism and Calvinism today would likely be disavowed by both John Calvin and Jakob Hermanszoon.  If they attended a seminary class on these topics today they’d likely say, “What’ch you talkin’ about Willis?”Both Arminianism and Calvinism have taken on theological accretions and associations their authors likely never intended. And strictly speaking, we can’t equate Calvinism with what’s known as Reformed Theology.But, back to the story. è Arminius was born in the Netherlands near Utrecht. His father was a blacksmith and armorer who died shortly after Jakob was born. He was educated at the expense of family-friends who recognized his keen intellect. He’d just entered Marburg University in Germany at the age of 16 when news reached him of a tragedy back home in his hometown of Oudewater.The Roman Catholic Spanish had occupied a good part of Holland for some time but were expelled from Oudewater when the city became a Protestant enclave. When the Spanish returned, they over-ran the town and carried out a brutal massacre that killed Arminius’ mother and siblings. Jakob spent 2 weeks in inconsolable mourning.When the new University of Leiden opened nearby in 1576, he was the 12th student enrolled. At Leiden he adopted the controversial theology of the French scholar Peter Ramus, a Protestant progressive killed during the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre. Leaving Leiden, Jakob went to Geneva where he enrolled in the Academy, then headed by Theodore Beza, Calvin’s successor.Arminius’s defense of Ramus angered the faculty of the Academy so he left for a trip to Basel where he declined the offer a doctorate, believing he’d not bring honor to the title.Returning to Geneva, Arminius seems to have been more prudent in his approach. In 1585, Beza wrote to the city magistrates of Amsterdam who’d sponsored Arminius’s education, highly commending his ability and diligence and encouraging a continuance of their support in his studies.After a short visit to Italy, Arminius returned home, was ordained, and in 1588 became one of the ministers of Amsterdam. His 1590 marriage to a merchant’s daughter gave him influential links.From the outset, Arminius’s sermons on Romans 7 drew a strong reaction from staunch  Calvinists who disliked his views on grace and predestination. The Calvinists said that while God’s saving grace is unearned, He offers it only to those He predestines to salvation. Arminius disagreed, saying God gives grace to those who believe.In 1592, a colleague accused him of Pelagianism, a 5th C heretical distortion of grace and free-will already condemned by the Church. Arminius was also accused of …1) An overdependence on the early church fathers,2) Deviation from two early Calvinist creeds, the Belgic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism, and3) An errant views of predestination.When Arminius and his supporters challenged his critics, urging them to point out specifically WHERE he was in error, they were unable to do so. The city authorities ended up on his side. The question of predestination was not raised in any substantive form until Arminius became professor of theology at Leiden, where he served from 1603–9. The last six years of his life were spent in controversy over his views as they stood in opposition to those of his old mentor, Theodore Beza.In a 1606 message titled “On Reconciling Religious Dissensions among Christians,” Arminius argued that dissension damages people both intellectually and emotionally and creates doubt about religion that leads to despair. Left unchecked, it may ultimately lead to atheism. He proposed as a remedy to the controversy his ideas had stirred, the calling of a national synod. Arminius believed the proper arbiter between feuding clergy was a good and godly magistrate. The synod was eventually held at Dort in 1618, but Arminius had already been dead nine years.In assessing Arminius’ theological position, we could say that in his attempt to give the human will a more active role in salvation than Beza’s brand of Calvinism conceded, Arminius taught a conditional election in which a person’s free will might or might not affect the divine offer of salvation.  It’s important to distinguish between Arminius’s teaching and what later became known as Arminianism, which was more liberal in its view of free will and of related doctrines than was its founder. Arminius’s views were never systematically worked out until the year after his death, when his followers issued a declaration called the Remonstrance, which dissented at several points from Beza’s description of Calvinism. It held, among other things, that God’s predestination was conditioned by human choice, that the Gospel could be freely accepted or rejected, and that a person who’d become a Christian could “fall from grace” or forsake salvation.Though he was mild–tempered, Arminius nevertheless spoke his mind in controversy and characteristically defended his position from Scripture.We’ll pick it up at this point in our next episode as we continue our look at Protestant Scholasticism. There’s a whole lot more for us to learn about this period, including the Calvinist reaction to the challenge of the Remonstrance, as well as the career of a couple of major lights in Christian history, Brother Lawrence and Blaise Pascal – as well as several others.

Episodio 54 - Las Cruzadas - Parte 1En el primer episodio de Communio Sanctorum, echamos un vistazo a las distintas formas de estudiar la historia a lo largo del tiempo. En el mundo antiguo, la historia era, la mayoría de las veces, propaganda. El viejo adagio de que "la historia la escriben los vencedores" era ciertamente cierto para los antiguos. Con la implantación del Método Científico en la Era Moderna, la investigación y el registro de la historia se hicieron más imparciales y precisos. Estaba lejos de ser un informe puro, pero ya no podía considerarse propaganda descarada. La Era Posmoderna ha visto un retorno a la parcialidad; esta vez una sospecha casi instintiva de TODOS los intentos anteriores de registrar la historia. Incluso los intentos de la Modernidad de documentar la historia son sospechosos y se asumen como culpables de registrar poco más que la parcialidad de los autores, aunque sus trabajos fueran anotados con datos bibliográficos y revisados por otras autoridades. Los críticos posmodernos adoptan la presuposición de que toda la historia registrada es una invención, especialmente si hay algo heroico o virtuoso. Si es una historia oscura de desesperanza y tragedia, bueno, entonces, tal vez pueda aceptarse. Es casi como si los posmodernos quisieran compensar la afición de los antiguos historiadores a la propaganda. Los posmodernos tachan la historia de "neg-propaganda", si puedo acuñar una palabra.Intentemos despojarnos de nuestros prejuicios, aunque no podamos hacerlo del todo, al examinar las Cruzadas. En lugar de añadir a los cristianos de Europa de los siglos XI y XII las sensibilidades de las personas que viven mil años después, intentemos comprender el razonamiento que hay detrás de la idea de tomar una horquilla o una espada y hacer un viaje que altera la vida a lo largo de cientos de kilómetros, a través de tierras extrañas, para arriesgar la vida por ¿Qué? Ah, sí, para librar a Tierra Santa de infieles paganos.Espera; Sr. Cruzado; ¿has estado alguna vez en Tierra Santa? ¿Posees allí tierras que te han robado? ¿Tienes parientes o amigos allí a los que tienes que proteger?  ¿Has conocido a alguno de esos infieles? ¿Sabes en qué creen o por qué han invadido?¿No? Entonces, ¿por qué estás tan entusiasmado con la idea de marchar por medio mundo para liberar una tierra que no te ha interesado mucho antes de un pueblo del que no sabes nada?¿Lo ves? Deben existir fuerzas poderosas en las mentes y los corazones de los pueblos de Europa para que acudan en tan gran número a una Cruzada. Puede que nos parezcan terriblemente mal concebidas sus razones para emprender una cruzada, pero estaban totalmente entregadas a ellas.Las Cruzadas reflejaron un nuevo dinamismo en el cristianismo de la Europa medieval. La gente estaba impulsada por el fervor religioso, el ansia de aventura y, por supuesto, si se podía aportar algo de riqueza personal, mejor. Durante 200 años, los cruzados intentaron expulsar a los musulmanes de Tierra Santa. Parece que todos los personajes pintorescos de esta época se involucraron en la causa, desde Pedro el Ermitaño en la 1ª Cruzada, hasta el piadoso Luis IX, rey de Francia, que inspiró la 6ª y 7ª.Muchos europeos de la época medieval consideraban la peregrinación como una forma de penitencia especialmente conmovedora. Estas peregrinaciones solían ser viajes a un lugar santo local o a un santuario erigido para conmemorar un milagro, o a catedrales donde se guardaban las reliquias de algún santo en un relicario. Pero había una peregrinación que se consideraba que obtenía una dosis especial de gracia: un viaje a la Ciudad Santa de Jerusalén. Los mercaderes de Jerusalén hacían un buen negocio al mantener la constante avalancha de peregrinos cristianos abastecidos con comida, alojamiento y, por supuesto, recuerdos sagrados. Algunos peregrinos iban solos; otros, en grupo -versiones antiguas de la actual gira por Tierra Santa-. Cuando los peregrinos llegaban a Jerusalén, hacían la ronda por todos los puntos de interés tradicionales. Recorrieron la Vía Dolorosa hasta el Calvario y luego se sentaron a orar durante horas. Cuando estos peregrinos volvían a casa, eran estimados por su comunidad como verdaderos santos; figuras elevadas de la espiritualidad.Durante siglos, los peregrinos pacíficos viajaron de Europa a Palestina. La llegada del Islam a Oriente Medio en el siglo VII no interfirió. En el siglo X, los obispos europeos organizaron peregrinaciones masivas a Tierra Santa. La más grande que conocemos partió de Alemania en 1065, con unos 7.000 viajeros. Son muchos autobuses.Impedir el viaje de un peregrino era considerado por la Iglesia medieval como una grave infracción del protocolo, porque ponías en peligro su salvación. Si su peregrinaje era una penitencia por algún pecado, podías negarle el perdón al alterar su curso. La mentalidad de los cristianos europeos pasó a ser de extremo cuidado para no interferir con los peregrinos una vez que se habían puesto en marcha.Todo esto se enfrentó a un gran problema en el siglo XI, cuando una nueva fuerza musulmana tomó el control de Oriente Medio. Los turcos Selyúcidas, nuevos y fanáticos conversos al Islam, llegaron para saquear la región. Se apoderaron de Jerusalén de sus compatriotas musulmanes y luego se desplazaron hacia el norte, a Asia Menor.El Imperio Bizantino intentó desesperadamente detener su avance, pero en la batalla de Manzikert, en 1071, los turcos capturaron al emperador oriental y dispersaron su ejército. En pocos años se perdió casi toda Asia Menor, la principal fuente de riqueza y tropas bizantinas, y el nuevo emperador bizantino envió frenéticos llamamientos a Occidente en busca de ayuda. Suplicó a la nobleza europea y al Papa, buscando mercenarios que ayudaran a rescatar el territorio perdido.Entonces, empezaron a llegar informes sobre el abuso de los peregrinos cristianos en los caminos controlados por los turcos hacia Jerusalén. El goteo se convirtió en una corriente, en un río. Incluso cuando los peregrinos no eran maltratados, estaban sujetos a fuertes multas para viajar a través de tierras musulmanas.La descripción estándar y breve del inicio de la Primera Cruzada es la siguiente En 1095, el emperador oriental Alejo I envió una petición urgente de ayuda contra los musulmanes al Papa Urbano II. El Papa respondió predicando uno de los sermones más influyentes de la historia. En un campo cercano a Clermont (Francia), dijo a la enorme multitud que se había reunido: "Vuestros hermanos orientales os han pedido ayuda. Los turcos y los árabes han conquistado sus territorios.  Yo, o mejor dicho, el Señor os ruega que destruyáis esa vil raza de sus tierras".Pero en el llamamiento de Urbano había algo más que liberar a Oriente de las hordas infieles. También mencionó la necesidad europea de más tierras. Dijo: "Porque esta tierra que habitáis es demasiado estrecha para vuestra numerosa población, ni abunda en riquezas, y apenas proporciona alimentos suficientes para sus cultivadores. Por eso os matáis y os devoráis unos a otros, entráis en el camino del Santo Sepulcro, arrebatáis esa tierra a la raza impía y la sometéis a vosotros mismos."Los papas y los obispos acostumbraban a hacer proclamas tan audaces y a lanzar llamamientos conmovedores. Casi siempre eran recibidos con fuertes "¡Amén!" y afirmaciones de la rectitud de su llamamiento. Después, la gente se iba a casa a comer y olvidaba enseguida todo lo que acababa de oír.  Así que la respuesta al sermón de Urban de aquel día fue sorprendente. La multitud empezó a corear: "Deus vult = Dios lo quiere". Pero hicieron algo más que corear. Personas de todo el espectro socioeconómico de Europa iniciaron los preparativos para hacer precisamente lo que el Papa había dicho: ir a Jerusalén y liberarla de los musulmanes. Cosieron cruces en sus túnicas, las pintaron en sus escudos, encendieron las herrerías y fabricaron espadas, lanzas y mazas. Los plebeyos que no podían permitirse una armadura o armas de verdad, fabricaron garrotes y palos afilados.Iban a realizar un nuevo tipo de peregrinación. No como humildes adoradores, sino como guerreros armados. Su enemigo no era el mundo, la carne y el diablo; era el infiel musulmán que profanaba los Santos Lugares.¡Cuando el Papa terminó su apasionado llamamiento ante la fuerte afirmación de la multitud, declaró que su lema Deus Vult! sería el grito de guerra de los cruzados en la próxima campaña.Los peregrinos acordaron dirigirse hacia el este como pudieran, reuniéndose en Constantinopla. Luego se formarían en ejércitos y marcharían hacia el sur, hacia el enemigo.La Primera Cruzada estaba en marcha.Cuando se corrió la voz en Francia y Alemania sobre la santa misión, personas de todos los niveles sociales se vieron envueltas en el fervor cruzado. Un entusiasmo similar se observó en las Fiebre del Oro de California y del Yukón. No es difícil entender por qué. Debemos tener cuidado en este punto porque, alejados por mil años, no podemos presumir de conocer las motivaciones que dieron forma a las acciones de cada cruzado, aunque no son pocos los historiadores que afirman poder hacerlo. Seguramente los motivos eran variados y diversos. Algunos, por simple obediencia a la Iglesia y al Papa, creían que era la voluntad de Dios expulsar a los musulmanes de Tierra Santa. Al ser campesinos analfabetos, no podían leer la Biblia ni conocer la voluntad de Dios al respecto. Creían que el deber del Papa era decirles lo que Dios quería y confiaban en que lo haría. Cuando el Papa declaró que todo aquel que muriera por la causa santa se libraría del purgatorio y entraría directamente en el cielo, se proporcionó todo el incentivo necesario para ir a miles de personas que vivían con el temor constante de no ser nunca lo suficientemente buenos para merecer el cielo.Otro poderoso incentivo era la oportunidad de obtener riqueza. La Europa medieval estaba encerrada en un rígido feudalismo que mantenía a los pobres en una pobreza perpetua. Sencillamente, no se podía superar el nivel social en el que se había nacido. Una Cruzada ofrecía una oportunidad de lo impensable. El botín de una campaña exitosa podía aportar una gran riqueza, incluso a un campesino. Y los que volvían se ganaban una reputación de guerreros que podía llevarlos a ellos y a sus hijos a puestos de relativo honor en el ejército de un noble.Los riesgos eran grandes; pero los beneficios, tangibles y significativos. Así que miles de personas adoptaron la causa de los cruzados.El problema para los miles de campesinos que querían ir era que ningún noble les guiaba. Al contrario, los nobles querían que sus siervos se quedaran en casa y atendieran sus campos y granjas. Pero el llamamiento del Papa se había dirigido a todos y ningún noble quería que se le viera contradiciendo a la Iglesia. Así que esperaban que nadie se levantara para dirigirlos. Fue uno de esos momentos de profundo vacío de liderazgo que pedía ser llenado; quien lo llenó fue un hombre conocido como Pedro el Ermitaño.De todos los cruzados, Pedro era seguramente el que tenía el aroma más fuerte. El monje no se había bañado en décadas. Iba montado en un burro que, según los testigos presenciales, tenía un notable parecido con su dueño. La predicación de Pedro era aún más poderosa que su olor. En 9 meses, reunió a 20.000 campesinos bajo su bandera, y luego emprendió el largo y difícil camino hacia el este, hacia Constantinopla.Crearon el caos nada más llegar. Las quejas por los robos llegaron a la oficina del emperador. Sabía que estos campesinos de Europa occidental no eran rivales para los musulmanes, pero no podía dejarlos acampar en su ciudad. Los llevaron al otro lado del río, donde inmediatamente empezaron a saquear las casas de los cristianos orientales. Muchos de estos campesinos pobres, incultos y analfabetos habían venido en busca de un botín y lo vieron en abundancia allí mismo. Ya habían viajado mucho desde su casa y ahora se encontraban entre un pueblo que hablaba una lengua diferente, vestía con estilos distintos y comía alimentos diferentes. "¡Vaya, no se parecen en nada a los cristianos! ¿Y qué es lo que dices? ¿Esta gente no sigue al Papa? Bueno, entonces quizá no sean cristianos. ¿No nos propusimos luchar contra los infieles? Aquí hay algunos. Pongámonos a trabajar"."¡Pero estos no son musulmanes!""De acuerdo. Llegaremos a un acuerdo. No los mataremos; sólo les quitaremos sus cosas".El ejército de campesinos de Pedro supuso una tensión adicional en las ya malas relaciones entre las iglesias orientales y romanas. Dos meses después, los campesinos marcharon directamente a una emboscada musulmana y fueron aniquilados. Pedro, que estaba en Constantinopla reuniendo suministros, fue el único superviviente. Entonces se unió a otro ejército, éste dirigido por la nobleza europea, que llegó mucho después que los campesinos. Estos cruzados derrotaron a los musulmanes en Antioquía y continuaron hacia Jerusalén.Los musulmanes no se tomaron en serio este segundo movimiento de la Cruzada. No es difícil entender por qué. Acababan de derrotar fácilmente a una gran fuerza de europeos. Suponían que harían lo mismo con la fuerza más pequeña que venía ahora contra ellos. Lo que no sabían era que esta fuerza, aunque efectivamente era más pequeña, era la flor y nata de la clase guerrera europea; caballeros montados y acorazados que se habían criado en la batalla.El 15 de julio de 1099, Jerusalén cayó en manos de los cruzados. Fue una masacre brutal. Alrededor del Monte del Templo, la sangre fluía hasta los tobillos. Los recién nacidos fueron arrojados contra los muros. No sólo los musulmanes conocieron la ira de los cruzados. Una sinagoga fue incendiada, matando a los judíos atrapados en su interior. Algunos de los cristianos nativos también fueron pasados a cuchillo. Hasta el día de hoy, la matanza masiva de la Primera Cruzada afecta a la forma en que los judíos y los musulmanes perciben la fe cristiana.Pero -y esto no pretende ser en absoluto una justificación de la brutalidad de las Cruzadas- parece un poco hipócrita que los musulmanes condenen las atrocidades de las Cruzadas cuando fue por los mismos medios que reclamaron la Tierra Santa en el siglo VII. Mucho antes de que el Papa ofreciera erróneamente la absolución a los cruzados y la promesa del cielo a los que murieran en la campaña, el Islam prometió el paraíso a los musulmanes que murieran en la Yihad. Históricamente, mientras que la fe cristiana se ha extendido por la labor de los misioneros humanitarios, el islam se ha extendido por la espada. O podríamos decir que, mientras el verdadero cristianismo se expande con la espada del Espíritu, el islam lo hace con la espada de acero.Tras la conquista de Jerusalén, los cruzados crearon cuatro estados en Oriente Medio: el Reino de Jerusalén, el Condado de Trípoli, el Principado de Antioquía y el Condado de Edesa.A esta Primera Cruzada le siguieron ocho más, ninguna de ellas realmente capaz de lograr el éxito de la primera, si es que podemos llamarlo éxito. En total, los logros de las Cruzadas duraron menos de 200 años. Pero un logro importante fue la reapertura del comercio internacional entre Europa y el Lejano Oriente, algo que había parado durante unos cientos de años.Las Cruzadas han resultado ser el centro de muchos estudios y debates históricos. Suelen estar relacionadas con la situación política y social de la Europa del siglo XI, el surgimiento de un movimiento reformista en el seno del papado y el enfrentamiento político y religioso del cristianismo y el islam en Oriente Medio. El Califato Omeya había conquistado Siria, Egipto y el norte de África al Imperio Bizantino, predominantemente cristiano, y España a los visigodos cristianos arrianos. Cuando los omeyas se derrumbaron en el norte de África, surgieron varios reinos musulmanes más pequeños y atacaron Italia en el siglo IX. Pisa, Génova y Cataluña lucharon contra varios reinos musulmanes por el control del Mediterráneo.Los cruzados estaban envalentonados en sus perspectivas de éxito en Tierra Santa debido a los éxitos que habían tenido en la Reconquista, la conquista de los moros musulmanes en la Península Ibérica. A principios del siglo XI, los caballeros franceses se unieron a los españoles en su campaña para recuperar su patria. Poco antes de la Primera Cruzada, el Papa Urbano II animó a los cristianos españoles a reconquistar Tarragona, utilizando gran parte del mismo simbolismo y retórica que más tarde empleó para predicar la Cruzada a los pueblos de Europa.Europa occidental se estabilizó después de que los sajones, vikingos y húngaros se incorporaran a la Iglesia a finales del siglo X. Pero la desaparición del Imperio carolingio dio lugar a toda una clase de guerreros que no tenían más que luchar entre ellos. La guerra incesante mermó la fuerza y la riqueza de Europa. Europa necesitaba un enemigo externo contra el que pudiera dirigir su ira. Como vimos en un episodio anterior, aunque la violencia de los caballeros era condenada regularmente por la Iglesia, y se intentaba regularla en los tratados conocidos como Paz y Tregua de Dios, los caballeros ignoraron en gran medida estos intentos de pacificación. La Iglesia necesitaba una amenaza externa hacia la que pudiera dirigir el ansia de batalla de los caballeros.También fue en esta época cuando los Papas estaban en constante competencia con los emperadores de Occidente por la cuestión de la investidura, es decir, la cuestión de quién tenía la autoridad para nombrar obispos: la Iglesia o la nobleza. En algunas de las disputas entre la Iglesia y el Estado, los papas no se privaron de llamar a los caballeros y nobles que les eran leales para que hicieran retroceder el poder del emperador y de los nobles recalcitrantes. Así que la movilización de una fuerza armada por parte del Papa no estaba tan fuera de contexto.Otra razón por la que el Papa Urbano convocó la Primera Cruzada puede haber sido su deseo de afirmar el control sobre Oriente. Recuerda que el Gran Cisma se había producido 40 años antes y las iglesias habían estado divididas desde entonces. Aunque los historiadores sugieren que ésta es una de las razones que impulsaron al Papa Urbano a iniciar la Cruzada, no hay pruebas en ninguna de sus cartas de que esto influyera en sus planes.Hasta la llegada de los cruzados, los bizantinos habían luchado continuamente contra los turcos musulmanes por el control de Asia Menor y Siria. Los Selyúcidas, musulmanes suníes, habían gobernado en un tiempo el Gran Imperio Selyúcida, pero en la Primera Cruzada se había dividido en varios estados más pequeños enfrentados entre sí. Si la Primera Cruzada se hubiera librado sólo una década antes, probablemente habría sido aplastada por una fuerza Selyúcida unida. Pero cuando llegaron a Oriente Medio, los Selyúcidas estaban enfrentados entre sí.Egipto y la mayor parte de Palestina estaban controlados por el Califato árabe Chiíta Fatimí, que era mucho más pequeño desde la llegada de los Selyúcidas. La guerra entre los fatimíes y los Selyúcidas causó grandes trastornos a los cristianos locales y a los peregrinos occidentales. Los fatimíes perdieron Jerusalén a manos de los Selyúcidas en 1073, y luego la reconquistaron en 1098, justo antes de la llegada de los cruzados.Como dije al principio de este episodio, esto es sólo un resumen de la Primera Cruzada. Como se trata de un momento tan crucial en la Historia de la Iglesia, volveremos a él en nuestro próximo episodio.Para terminar, quiero decir una vez más: "Gracias" a todos los amables comentarios y a los que han dado un "me gusta" a la página de Facebook de CS.De vez en cuando menciono que CS está apoyado únicamente por unos pocos suscriptores. Probablemente puedas decir que el podcast es el típico arreglo de un solo autor, "un tipo, un micrófono y una computadora". Estoy muy agradecido a los que de vez en cuando envían una donación para que CS siga adelante.

This episode of CS is the 3rd Overview in the series so far.We’ve spent quite a bit of time tracking the Reformation and need now to give a brief overview and analysis of what we’ve seen as we prepare for launching into the next era of Church History.There’s a well-worn saying in English I’m not sure other languages duplicate. It says that “you can’t see the forest for the trees.” The idea is that details can obscure the bigger picture. You fail to see a forest because all you see is a lot of trees.As we’ve spent many episodes tracking the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, we may be so distracted by all the names, places, dates and movements, we miss the larger picture and the summary effect of all this on the people of 16th C.Trends from the previous century came to fruition in the 16th that made for a monumental shift in people’s idea of what The Church was. Consider a couple of the things that happened in the 15th C.

• Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453.
• The New World was opened to Europe at the close of the Century.

Till then, European Christians felt hemmed in by Muslims to the S and E, and by the Atlantic to the W. Missions were conceived of almost exclusively as the conversion of Muslims. Challenges to Christianity were pretty much limited to the threat of an aggressive Islam. That view seemed potent when news of the Fall of Constantinople washed over Western Europe.Yet in the hundred years of the 16th C, the situation changed dramatically. To the E and S, Islam was countered by the Spanish Reconquista and the failure of the Turks to take Vienna. The Battle of Lepanto in 1571 saw the end of Muslim naval power in the Mediterranean. Muslims armies, which had seemed irresistible till then, began to roll back.Then, the Atlantic, once an impassable barrier, suddenly became a highway. New worlds opened with the discovery of The New World. Sailing W, Spanish conquistadors conquered a realm far larger than their homeland.The Portuguese sailed S around Africa, setting up trade centers and missions in the Far East. And Islam, which had appeared the greatest barrier to Christian expansion, saw its main territory surrounded by the growing economic and military power of Europe. North Africa and western Asia shifted from being Muslim realms to European colonies.In all these lands newly opened to Europeans, Christianity established a foothold. Some of them would centuries later become their own vibrant center of missionary outreach at a time when Europe was growing increasingly secular.But, few who lived in the 15th C could comprehend the massive consequences of the events they witnessed. When Spain and Portugal came near to blows over who had the rights to what, the pope thought he could work a compromise by decreeing the W belonged to Spain while the E belonged to Portugal. But what about when sailing W leads to the E, and vice versa? The inevitable conflict was played out in the Philippines.King Ferdinand of Spain and his grandson, the famous Emperor Charles V, before whom Luther appeared at the Diet of Worms, were far more concerned with the politics of Europe than the promises of a New World. That would be like a company in the Year 2000 being more concerned with the telegraph than mobile cellphones.During the 16th C, when these vast geopolitical changes were taking place, the towering edifice of medieval Christianity collapsed. The Council of Trent tried to salvage what it could and set the scene for what became modern Catholicism. Protestantism diffused into dozens of groups amid the ruins of the medieval Church. The long-held ideal of a single church, with the vicar of Christ as its visible head, never a view held by the Eastern Church, lost its power in the West as well. From then on, Western Christianity was divided among a plethora of groups divided up along cultural and doctrinal differences.In spite of corruption and the many voices calling for reform, there was agreement among Christians the Church was in essence one, and its unity ought to be manifest in its organization. Most chief figures of the Reformation at first held such an understanding of the Church. Only a few rejected it. Most Protestant leaders believed the unity of the Church was crucial to its nature, and that although it was temporarily necessary to break unity to be faithful to God’s Word, that faithfulness demanded all effort at regaining unity.As in the Middle Ages, people of the early 16th C took for granted that the survival of a nation-state required religious agreement among its subjects. That notion, which Christians rejected when a minority in the old Roman Empire, became the prevailing view after the conversion of Constantine. All who lived in a Christian state must be Christian and faithful members of THE Church. A bare-few places allowed Jews and Muslims to live among them but only as a lower-class, disenfranchised and persecuted.This view of national and concomitant religious uniformity is what led to the many wars of religion of the 16th and 17th Cs. Then, in some areas sooner than others, a conclusion was reached that religious tolerance was preferable to the devastation these wars brought. So began the long process, as one after another the various European states adopted policies of religious tolerance. That produced the modern idea of the secular state.The 16th C also witnessed the collapse of the ancient dream of political unity under an Empire. Charles V was the last emperor who would harbor such illusions. After him, the so-called emperors were little more than kings of Germany with limited power.The Conciliarist hope of reforming the Church was also shaken. For several decades, Protestant reformers hoped a universal council would set the pope’s house in order. But the opposite took place. The papacy achieved its own reformation without help from a council.  By the time the Council of Trent met, it was obvious it wouldn’t be an ecumenical council so much as a papal tool.Sincere believers, both Protestant and Catholic, saw many of the old certainties crumble around them. Discoveries taking place in the New World posed questions unanswerable by the old guidelines. Medieval foundations like papacy, empire, and tradition, no longer held. As Galileo had demonstrated the Earth wasn’t a fixed point of reference, now it seemed there was NO fixed point to be trusted.Such were the times of Erasmus, Luther, Calvin, Knox, and the other great reformers. While the world was in chaos, they resolved to stand firm in Faith and the power of the Word of God. Luther and Calvin insisted that the power of the Word was such that, as long as the Roman Church continued reading, even though the pope and his advisors refused to listen, there was always in the Roman communion a “vestige of the church.” So they anticipated the day when the Church would once again cleave to the Word and set aside their differences to emerge in a united church once more.   

This 107th episode is titled, “Reform Around the Edges.”It’s difficult living in the Modern World to understand the Late Medieval norm that a State had to have a single religion all its subjects observed. You’d be hard pressed to find a European of the 16th C who didn’t assume this to be the case. About the only group who didn’t see it that way were the Anabaptists. And even among them there were small groups, like the extremists who tried to set up the New Jerusalem at Munster, who did advocate a State Church. Mainstream Anabaptists advocated religious tolerance, but were persecuted for that stance.As we’ve seen in the story of the Church in Germany and as was hammered out in the Peace of Augsburg, peace was secured by deciding some regions would be Lutheran, others Catholic by the principle of cujus regis eius religio [coo-yoos regio / ay-oos rel-i-gio] meaning, “Whose realm, whose religion.” The religion of a region’s ruler determined that regions subjects’ religion. Under Augsburg, people were supposed to be free to relocate to another region if a ruler’s religion didn’t square with their convictions.Sounds simple enough >> for moderns who are highly mobile and have little sense of the historic connection between identity and place. Many think nothing today of packing up and moving to a new place across town, or across a state, nation, or even some other part of the globe. Not so most Europeans for most of their history. Personal identity was intimately connected to family. And Family was identified by location. That’s why long before people had surnames, they were identified by their town. John of Locksley. William of Orange. Fred of Fillsbury. Families built a house and lived in it for many generations. Losing that home to whatever cause was one of the great tragedies that could befall one. It was a betrayal of previous generations who’d handed down both a family name and home, as well as all those future generations who now would have no home to call their own.On the surface, the Peace of Augsburg sounded like a sound solution to the religious conflicts that raged after the Reformation. But it was in fact, a highly disruptive force that ultimately helped spark the Thirty Years War.The wars of religion that washed over Europe in general and France in particular is evidence that the rule a region could have but one religion wasn’t workable. Even the Edict of Nantes, passed by French King Henry IV after the bloody St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, only guaranteed the survival of French Protestantism by granting a number of Protestant cities as enclaves in an otherwise Roman Catholic realm.We’ve given a thumbnail sketch of the spread of the Reformation over Germany, France, England, Scotland, the Low Countries and in Scandinavian.Let’s take a look now at Spain.Before the Reformation reached the Iberian Peninsula, many hoped the Spanish Church would lead the way in long-overdue reform. Queen Isabella’s faith was earnest. She and Cardinal Jiménez de Cisneros implemented a massive reform—including a renewal of biblical studies centered on the Complutensian Polyglot Bible. Today a polyglot is known as a parallel Bible, where multiple versions of the bible are arranged in side-by-side columns for comparison. But in parallel Biblr, these version are all the same language. A polyglot is the comparison of different languages. The Complutensian Polyglot had the Hebrew, Latin and Greek texts of the OT as well as the Aramaic of the Torah. The NT was both Greek and Latin. Spain also had many humanists scholars similar to Erasmus—some of them in high places—who longed for reform.The arrival of the Protestant Reformation saw attitudes in Spain changed. At Worms, the upstart monk Martin Luther defied Emperor Charles V, who just happened to be King Charles I of Spain. Charles became the champion of opposition to Protestantism. The Spanish Inquisition, previously aimed at Jews and occultists, turned its attention toward those calling for reform and anything that smacked of the now-dreaded Lutheranism. Several leading humanists fled to places like the Low Countries where they were welcomed. Others stayed in Spain and tried to lay low, devoting themselves to their studies and hoping the storm would pass them by.The Inquisition wasn’t able to halt the “Lutheran contagion,” as it was called. Valladolid and Seville became centers of Reformation despite frequent burnings at the stake by the Inquisition. A monastery in Santiponce near Seville was a reform center where Bibles and Protestant books were smuggled in barrels labeled as oil and wine. When one of the smugglers was captured and burned, a dozen of monks fled, agreeing to meet in a year in Geneva. One of them became pastor to a Spanish congregation there. Another, Casiodoro de Reina, spent the rest of his life translating the Bible into Spanish; a recognized masterpiece of Spanish literature released in 1569. A few years later, another of the 12, Cipriano de Valera, revised de Reina’s version, which is known as the Reina-Valera Bible. Back in their monastery in Santiponce and throughout the area around Seville, the Inquisition cleansed the Church of all trace of Protestantism.We hop over now to Italy.Among the inaccessible valleys of the Alps, some more reachable parts of Northern Italy and Southern France, the ancient community of the Waldensians continued a secluded but threatened existence. They were repeatedly attacked by armies hoping to suppress their supposed heresy. But they’d long stood firm in their mountain fastness. By the early 16th C the movement lost steam as constant persecution suppressed them. Many among them felt that the price paid for disagreeing with Rome was too high, and increasing numbers returned to Catholicism.Then, strange rumors were heard. News of a great Reformation arrived. An emissary sent to inquire about these rumors returned in 1526 announcing they were true. In Germany, Switzerland, France, and even more distant regions dramatic change was afoot. Many of the doctrines of the Reformers matched what the Waldensians had held since the 12th C. More delegations met with leading reformers like Martin Bucer, who warmly received them and affirmed most of their beliefs. They suggested some points where they differed and the Waldensians ought to consider revising their stand to bring it into closer alignment with Scripture. In 1532, the Waldensians convened a synod where they adopted the main tenets of the Protestant Reformation. By doing so, they became the oldest Protestant church—existing more than 3 Cs before the Reformation.Sadly, that didn’t make things any easier for the Waldensians. Their communities in Southern France, whose lands were more vulnerable than the secluded Alpine valleys, were invaded and virtually exterminated. The survivors fled to the Alps. Then a series of edicts ensued, forbidding attendance at Protestant churches and commanding attendance at Mass.  Waldensian communities in southern Italy were also exterminated.Large armies raised by the Pope, the Duke of Savoy, and several other powerful nobles wanting to prove their loyalty to Rome repeatedly invaded the Waldensian mountain enclaves, only to be routed by the defenders. On one occasion, only six men with crude firearms held back an entire army at a narrow pass while others climbed the mountains above. When rocks began raining on them, the invaders were routed.Then, in what has to be a premier, “Can’t a guy catch a break?” moment, when the Waldensians had a prolonged respite from attack, a plague broke out decimating their population. Only two pastors survived. Their replacements came from the Reformed centers of Switzerland, bringing about closer ties between the Waldensians and the Reformed Church. In 1655, all Waldensians living in Northern Italy were commanded under penalty of death to forfeit their lands in three days as the lands were sold to Catholics, who then had the duty to go take them from recalcitrant rebel-Waldensians.In the same year, the Marquis of Pianeza was given the assignment of exterminating the Waldensians.  But he was convinced if he invaded the Alps his army would suffer the same fate as earlier invaders. So he offered peace to the Waldensians. They’d always said they’d only fight a war of defense. So they made peace with the Marquis and welcomed the soldiers into their homes where they were fed and housed against the bitter cold. Lovely story huh? Well, wait; it’s not over yet. Two days later, at a prearranged time, the guests turned on their hosts, killing men, women and children. This “great victory” was then celebrated with a Te Deum; a short church service of thanksgiving to God.Yet still the Waldensians resisted, hoping their enemies would make peace with them. King Louis XIV of France, who ordered the expulsion of all Huguenots from France, demanded the Duke of Savoy do as the Marquis had done with his Waldensians. This proved too much for many of them who left the Alps to live in Geneva and other Protestant areas. A few insisted on remaining on their ancestral lands, where they were constantly menaced. It wasn’t until 1848 that the Waldensians and other groups were granted freedom of worship in Italy.Ah, time for a breather, we’d hope. But again, it was not to be. Because just two years later, famine broke out in the long exploited and now over-populated Alpine valleys. After much debate, the first of many Waldensian groups left for Uruguay and Argentina, where they flourished. In 1975, the two Waldensian communities, one on each side of the Atlantic, made it clear that they were still one church by deciding to be governed by a single synod with two sessions, one in the Americas in February, the other in Europe in August.The Waldensians weren’t the only Protestant presence in Italy. Among others, Juan de Valdés and Bernardino Ochino deserve mention.Valdés was a Spanish Protestant Humanist of the Erasmian mold. When it was clear Charles V was determined to wipe Protestantism out of Spain, he fled to in Italy in 1531 where we settled in Naples and gathered a group of colleagues who devoted themselves to Bible study.  They didn’t seek to make their views public, and were moderate in their Protestant leanings. Among the members of this group was the historically fascinating Giulia Gonzaga, a woman of such immense beauty the Muslim ruler Suleiman the Great tried to have her kidnapped so he could make her the chief wife of his huge harem.  Another member of the group, Bernardino Ochino, a famous and pious preacher, was twice elected leader of the Capuchins. Ochino openly promulgated Protestant principles. When the Inquisition threatened him, he fled to Geneva, then went to Basel, Augsburg, Strasbourg, London, and finally Zürich. Ochino’s journeys from city to city marked a concurrent journey from Biblical orthodox to heresy. He became ever more radical, eventually rejecting the Trinity and defending polygamy; another reason he moved around a lot. He kept getting kicked out of town.  He died of the plague in 1564.Now we take the Communio Sanctorum train to HUNGARYAt the beginning of the Reformation, Hungary was ruled by the 10-year-old boy, King Louis II. A decade later, in 1526, the Ottoman Turks defeated the Hungarians and killed him. The Hungarian nobility elected Ferdinand of Hapsburg to take the throne while nationalists named John Sigismund as king. After complex negotiations,  western Hungary was under Hapsburg rule while the East was Ottoman. Stuck between West Hungary ruled by devoted Catholic Hapsburgs and the East ruled by Muslim Ottomans, was Royal Hungary, known as Transylvania, where King Sigismund managed to carve out a small holding.Sigismund knew that religious division would weaken his already tenuous hold on the realm, so he granted four groups to have equal standing; Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, Calvinism,  and Unitarianism, which we’ll take a closer look at when we consider Poland.The Ottomans, ever seeking to weaken the powerful Hapsburgs, supported whichever one of these four was weakest, so that it would continue to cause trouble to the others and so weaken the entire realm. If that group then began to gain power and influence, the Ottomans switched their support to the new underdog.Lutheranism reached Hungary early. There’s evidence Luther’s 95 theses circulated in Hungary only a year after their original posting in Wittenberg. By 1523, the Hapsburgs ordered Lutherans to be burned to prevent their spread. A few years later, Zwingli’s teachings entered the scene, and similar measures were taken against them.Though Ottoman rule was harsh and atrocities were committed against all Christians, it was in the territories occupied by Ottomans that Protestantism grew most rapidly.Hungarians preferred the Reformed Tradition coming out of Switzerland to the church government advocated in Lutheranism. They already suffered under a highly centralized government. In the Swiss-Reformed tradition, pastors and laity shared authority. Also, this decentralized form of church government made it more difficult for Ottoman authorities to exert pressure on church leaders. Records make it clear that Ottoman authorities accepted the appointment of a parish priest on the condition the congregation pay if the priest was arrested for any reason. So, priests were often arrested, and freed only when a bribe was paid.Both Hapsburgs and Ottomans tried to prevent the spread of what they called heresy by means of the printing press. In 1483, long before the Reformation, the Sultan issued a decree condemning printers to have their hands cut off. Now the Hapsburg King Ferdinand I issued a similar ruling; except that, instead of having hands amputated, printers were drowned. But that didn’t stop the circulation of Protestant books. Those were usually printed in the vernacular, the language of the common people, climaxing in the publication of the Karoly Bible in 1590 and the Vizsoly Bible in 1607, which in Hungary played a role similar to that of Luther’s Bible in German. It’s estimated that by 1600 as many as 4 out of 5 Hungarians were Protestant.Then conditions changed. Early in the 17th C, Ottoman power waned, and Transylvania, supported by Hungarian nationalists, clashed with the Hapsburgs.  The conflict was settled by the Treaty of Vienna, granting equal rights to both Catholics and Protestants. But the Thirty Years’ War—in which Transylvania opposed the Hapsburgs and their allies—brought devastation to the country. Even after the end of the War, the conflict among the Hapsburgs, Royal Hungary and Ottomans continued. The Hapsburgs eventually gained the upper hand, and the Peace of Karlowitz in 1699 gave them control over all Hungary—a control they retained until 1918 and the end of WWI. In Hungary, as elsewhere, the Hapsburgs imposed virulent anti-Protestant measures, and eventually the country became Catholic.We end with a look at POLAND.When Luther posted his theses on that door in Wittenberg, there was already in western Poland a growing number of the followers of the Pre-Reformer, Jan Hus; Hussites who’d fled the difficulties in Bohemia. They were amped by the prolific work of the German monk. The Poles, however, had long been in conflict with Germans, and distrusted anything coming from such a source. So Lutheranism did spread, but slowly. When Calvinism made its way to Poland, Protestantism picked up steam.The king at the time was Sigismund I who vehemently opposed all Protestant doctrine. But by the middle of the 16th C, Calvinism enjoyed a measure of support from Sigismund II, who even corresponded with Calvin.The leader of the Calvinist movement in Poland was Jan Laski, a nobleman with connections to a wide circle of people with Reformed leanings, including Melanchthon and Erasmus. He purchased Erasmus’ library. Exiled from Poland for being a Calvinist, he was called back by the nobility who’d come to favor the Reformed Faith. Laski translated the Bible into Polish, and worked for a meeting of the minds between Calvinists and Lutherans. His efforts led to the Synod of Sendomir in 1570, 10 years after Laski’s death.The Polish government followed a policy of greater religious tolerance than most of Europe. A large number of people, mostly Jews and Christians of various faiths, sought refuge there. Among them was Faustus Socinius, who denied the Doctrine of the Trinity, launching a group known as Unitarians. His views were expressed in the Racovian Catechism, authored not by Socinius, but by two of his followers. Published in 1605, this document affirms and argues that only the Father is God, that Jesus is not divine, but purely human, and that the Holy Spirit is just a way of referring to God’s power and presence.Throughout most of the 16th C and well into the 17th, Protestantism as affirmed at the Synod of Sendomir, had a growing number of Polish followers—as did Socinian Unitarianism. But as the national identity of Poland developed in opposition to Russian Orthodox Church to the East, and German Lutherans to the West, with both Russia and Germany repeatedly seeking to take Polish territory, that identity became increasingly Roman Catholic, so that by the 20th C, Poland was one of the most Catholic nations in Europe.This brief review of the Reformation around the edges of Europe reveals that within just a few decades of Martin Luther’s time the ideas of Protestant theology had covered the continent and caused large scale upheaval. What we HAVEN’T considered yet, is the impact of the Reformation further East. In a later episode we’ll take a look at the impact it had on the Eastern Church.

Since last week’s episode was titled Westward Ho! As we track the expansion of the Faith into the New World with Spain and Portugal’s immersion, this week as we turn to the other Europeans we’ll title this week’s episode, Westward Ho-Ho, because I’m tired of saying Part 2. I know it’s lame, but hey, it’s my podcast so I’ll call it what I want.Before we dive into this week’s content, I wanted to say a huge thanks to all those who’ve left comments on iTunes and the CS FB page.Last week we ended the episode on the expansion of the Faith into the New World by speaking of the Spanish missions on the West Coast. The Spanish were urgent to press north from what would later be called Southern CA because the Russians were advancing south from their base in Alaska. And as any history buff knows, they’d already established a base at San Francisco.Russians weren’t the only Old World power feared by Spain. The French had New World possessions in Louisiana and French Jesuits were active in the Mississippi Valley. Some dreamed of a link between French Canada and the South down the Mississippi River. The gifted linguist Father Marquette, sailed south along the Mississippi and attempted a mission among the Illinois Indians. While in Quebec, he’d made himself master of 7 Algonquin languages and gained a mighty reputation as an Indian-style orator. He combined preacher, pastor, explorer and geographer in one. His writings contributed to local knowledge of Indian peoples, culture, and agriculture. As any high school student knows, the French were to lose New Orleans and Western Mississippi to Spain, while Eastern Mississippi went to the British. But French Carmelites, a 16th C branch of the Franciscans known as the Recollects, and the Jesuits accomplished much in French possessions before the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1763. They’d attempted a failed mission to the Sioux. Nevertheless, French Roman Catholic influence remained strong in Canada.As I tell these ultra-bare sketches of mission work among New World Indians, it can easily become just a pedantic recounting of generalized info. A sort of, “Europeans came, Indians were preached to. Churches were planted. Movements happened, some guys died - blah, blah, blah.”Our goal here is to give the history of the Church in short doses. That means, if we’re to make any headway against the flow of it all, we have to summarize a LOT. But that works against real interest in the history and what makes the story exciting.It’s the individual stories of specific people that make the tale come alive. à Jesuit, Franciscan, and Protestant missionaries; and just ordinary colonists who weren’t set on a specific mission but were real-deal born again followers of Jesus who came to the New World to make a new life for themselves and their descendants, and just happened to share their faith with the Native Americans and they got saved and started a whole new chapter in the Jesus story. è THAT’S where the good stuff is.So, let me mention one of these Jesuit missionaries we’ve been talking about who brought the Gospel to Canadian Indians.Jean de Brébeuf was born to a family of the French nobility and entered the Jesuit order in 1617. He reached Canada 8 yrs later. He learned Algonquin and lived among the Huron for 3 yrs. After being captured by the British, he returned to France but renewed his mission in 1633. He founded an outpost called St Marie Among the Hurons in 1639. The Mission was destroyed by the Iroquois a decade later.Because De Brébeuf was tall and strongly built, he became known as the Gentle Giant. Like the Jesuits in Paraguay we looked at in the last episode, he could see ahead into how European colonists would bring an unstoppable challenge to the Indian way of life and advocated the Hurons withdraw into a secluded missionary settlement in order to preserve their culture. He’s an example of the heroic pioneer Jesuit, of which there were many, whose missionary life ended in martyrdom in the field.De Brébeuf stands as a little known, but ought to be lauded, example of the fact that not all Europeans who came to the New World, especially not all missionaries, conflated following Christ with European culture and lifestyle. That’s an assumption many moderns have; that it wasn’t until the modern era that missionaries figured out people could remain IN their culture and follow Jesus, that they didn’t have to become converts to Western Civilization BEFORE they could become Christians. While it has certainly been true that some missions and eras equated the Faith with a particular cultural milieu, throughout history, MOST believers have understood that the True Gospel is trans-cultural, even super-cultural.Many Jesuit missionaries in the New World like De Brébeuf tried to preserve the native American cultures – while filling them with the Gospel. They saw the emerging European colonies as a THREAT to the Indians and wanted to protect them.With the end of the 7 Years War, or as it’s known in the US, the French and Indian War, French Canada became a British possession. The Jesuits, on the verge of their being banned from the New World, expanded their work among the Indians to include the Mohawks, Oneidas, Cayugas, and Senecas, as well as those Algonquins yet unreached in Quebec. While converts were made among the Iroquois tribes, the majority remained hostile. Among the converts, there was a huge problem with disease introduced by the missionaries themselves, and the influence of alcohol brought by Europeans. Indian physiological tolerance to hard alcohol was low and addiction quick. Jesuit missionaries reached the Hudson Bay area and baptized thousands. Even after the British won Canada and the Jesuit order was suppressed, some remained in Canada as late as 1789.In the far NW, Russians entered Alaska in 1741. Russian Orthodox Christianity had begun on Kodiak Island, just off Alaska, in 1794. By ‘96 thousands of Kodiaks and the population of the Aleutian Islands had been baptized. They met hostility from the Russian American Company but the mission received fresh invigoration by the arrival an Orthodox priest from Siberia named Innocent Veniaminoff.  He reached the Aleutians in the 1820s and mastered the local dialect well enough to translate the Gospel of Matthew and write a devotional tract that became a classic, titled = An Indication of the Pathway into the Kingdom of Heaven. After working among the Aleutians for some years, Veniaminoff served among the Tlingit people. After his wife died, he was appointed bishop of a vast region stretching from Alaska to CA. Between 1840 and 68 he carried out a massive work. Although 40 yrs of missionary service, often in conditions of tremendous physical hardship, left him exhausted and longing to retire, he was appointed Metropolitan of Moscow, a position he used to found the Russian Missionary Society as a means of support for Orthodox missions. His outstanding service was recognized in 1977 by the Orthodox Church of America conferring on him the title of ‘Evangelizer of the Aleuts and Apostle to America.’Alaska was sold to the United States in the 1870s but the Orthodox Synod created an independent bishopric to include Alaska in 1872. By 1900 there were some 10,000 Orthodox Christians in the diocese. Of the 65,000 Alaskan and Aleutian people today, some 70% claim to be Christian and many of these belong to the Orthodox community.The Roman Catholic orders had a great advantage in missions due to their central organizing body called The Sacred Propaganda for the Faith. Today this structure is called the Congregation for the Evangelization of the Nations.In contrast to Roman monastic orders and their missionary zeal, Protestant churches had little missionary vision in the 16th C. When they engaged in missions in the 17th they had no organizing center.French Protestants, led by the Huguenot Admiral Coligny, attempted a short-lived experiment off Rio de Janeiro when Admiral Villegagnon established a Calvinist settlement in 1555. It folded when the French were expelled by the Portuguese. A more permanent Calvinist settlement was made by the Dutch when they captured Pernambuco, a region at the eastern tip of Brazil. This settlement remained a Calvinist enclave for 40 years.North America presented a very different scene for missions than Central and South America. The voyage of the Mayflower with its ‘Pilgrims’ in 1620 was a historical pointer to the strong influence of Calvinism in what would become New England. The states of Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire were strongly Congregationalist or Presbyterian in church life and heavily influenced by English Puritanism. At least some of these pioneers felt a responsibility for spreading the Christian faith to the native Americans.John Eliot is regarded as the driving force behind the early evangelization of the Indians. He was the Presbyterian pastor at Roxby, a village near Boston in 1632. He learned the Iroquois language, and like the Jesuits in Paraguay, though surely with no knowledge of their methodology, founded ‘praying towns’ for the Indians. These were communities that, over a period of 40 yrs, came to include some 3,000 Christian Indians in Natick and other settlements. Eliot translated the entire Bible into Iroquois by 1663 and trained 24 native American pastors by the time of his death.A remarkable family called The Mayhews were pioneers in missionary work in Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, and the Elizabeth Islands off Cape Cod. Thomas Mayhew bought the islands in 1641 with an Indian population of around 5,000. His son, Thomas Jr., began a mission and by 1651 200 Indians had come to faith. After the death of Thomas Sr. and Jr., John, youngest son of  Thomas Jr., along with his son Experience Mayhew continued the mission.  Experience had the advantage of fluency in the Indian language with the ability to write it. Zechariah, his son, carried on a tradition that lasted all the way to 1806 and produced many Indian clergy and a Harvard graduate. The ministry of the Mayhews spanned almost 2 centuries.Another New England figure who became a missionary icon to such great spreaders of the faith as William Carey and David Livingstone, was David Brainerd. Brainerd was born in the farming country of Haddam, Connecticut, and studied for the ministry at Yale College, from which he was wrongly expelled in 1741. He impressed the local leadership of the Scottish Society for the Propagation of the Gospel enough for them to employ him for missionary service in 1742. He worked among the Indians of Stockbridge and then, after ordination as a Presbyterian, he worked in western Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. There he experienced genuine religious revival among the Delaware Indians, which he recounted in detail in his journals.Brainerd died young but his diary and the account of his life by the great preacher, theologian, and philosopher, Jonathan Edwards, became immensely influential in the Protestant world. Edwards, also a student at Yale, was himself a missionary at Stockbridge among the Indians from 1750–58.While it’s risky to do a diagnosis on someone 270 years later, we glean from David Brainerd’s logs that he suffered from at least a mild case of a depression-disorder, and maybe not so mild. It’s his honesty in sharing with his journals his emotions that proved to be a tonic to mission-luminaries like Carey and Livingstone.New England Presbyterians and Congregationalists were matched by other Protestants in their efforts among Indians. Episcopalians and the missionary society of the Church of England achieved some success in evangelizing them.Work among the Iroquois of New York was initiated by Governor Lord Bellomont, and a converted Mohawk chief, Joseph Brant, who helped establish a Mohawk church. Queen Anne of England even presented silver communion implements to 4 Mohawk Christians in London in 1704 for use in one of their chapels.In Virginia, the royal charter declared one of the aims of the colony was the conversion of Indians. The first minister of the village of Henrico, Alexander Whitaker, did significant missionary work and introduced the Indian princess, Pocahontas, to the faith.BTW: Pocahontas was her nickname – which translates roughly to “Little Hellion.” Her real name was Matoaka, but she was so precocious as a child her nickname became her favored label.Whitaker established a college at Henrico for the education of Indians and there were appeals for funding for Indian missions back in England by King James I and his archbishops so that 1 of 6 professorships at the College of William and Mary was set apart for teaching Indians.Methodists had the example of John and Charles Wesley when they were Anglican priests and missionaries for the Society of the Proclamation of the Gospel in Georgia from 1735. Though John’s primary assignment was a chaplain for the English settlers, he tried to reach out to the Choctaw and Chickasaw. He had little response from the Native Americans. No wonder, since he’d later say he was most likely unconverted at that point.After his break with the Church of England, Wesley’s chief lieutenant in the New World was Thomas Coke who became a driving force for Methodist missionary work, attempting a mission in Nova Scotia in 1786 before being re-directed to the West Indies by a storm. Methodist missions came into their own in the 19th C after Coke’s death and took the form of frontier preachers and ‘circuit riders’ under the direction of Francis Asbury, who traveled some 300,000 miles on horseback in the cause of the Gospel and whose vision included both Indians and black slaves for Methodist outreach. By the time of Asbury’s death in 1816 Methodist membership had risen from just 13 to 200,000 over a 30-yr period.The 19th C in North America saw the far north reached by Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Methodists.The 19th C was a time of extraordinary development in North America, despite the ravages of the Civil War in the 1860’s. Great numbers of immigrants flooded into the country from Europe, estimated at 33 million between 1820 and 1950. Of British emigrants between 1815 and 1900, 65% found their way to the US. Of African-Americans, whereas only some 12% belonged to a church in 1860, by 1910 that number was 44%. Many joined the Baptist and Methodist congregations of the southern states after the abolition of slavery. In the Nation at large, the extraordinary achievement to any non-American was the blending into one nation of so many different peoples, so that their American citizenship was more prominent than their roots as Italian, Irish, Jewish, German, Scandinavian or English. This influx posed great challenges to the churches but Americans largely became a church-going people. And while differences over Religion had become the cause of so much misery and bloodshed in Post-Reformation Europe, Americans learned to live in civil harmony with people of other denominations.