The Catholic Church During The Early 16th Century

Beginning in the Middle Ages and through the seventeenth centuries, witch trials occurred in Europe. Many people were accused of being witches some of these people were accused of being witches for not following Christian beliefs at that time and others followed witch prosecutions for goods and money. Furthermore, the stereotypes of witches at this period also had a role in causing witch prosecutions. In this essay I argue how these three components led to the death of so-called witches. Firstly, I will discuss how the Catholic Church had an impact on most prosecutions. Secondly, I will explain how social stereotypes of that period have also influenced with the causes of prosecution of many alleged witches. Thirdly, I will discuss how

In addition to indulgences, Luther also wrote about “St. Peter’s Scandal.” He states, “Why does not the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the

Prior to the Reformation, many people across Europe were dissatisfied with the Roman Catholic church. Numerous commoners resented those of high ranking status in the church, including the pope, because they were openly abusing their power and not sharing their wealth with the people. Some of the wrong doings the church committed involved selling indulgences and sales of bribery for papal appointments meaning, someone could pay them to obtain an office in the church with income. Martin Luther was a monk who was deeply involved in the church and when he heard about the wrong doings of the church, he decided to confront them. Luther began writing multiple bishops about an intervention however, neither the bishops or the Pope responded because they were only interested in the money power. As a result, Luther wrote the “95 Theses” elaborating on ninety-five ways the Catholic church could change their teachings.

The Catholic Church was riddled with corruption in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. Germany was in a fragmented state and dominated by Rome, Spain, and Europe as a whole. Martin Luther’s 95 theses criticised the Church in many areas, namely its blind secularistic nature. He appealed to a wide variety of people, and thus Lutheranism was carried across Europe. Eventually, Lutheranism would disrupt the balance of Europe by weakening the Catholic Church and spurring social change.

The Catholic church played many important roles during the Middle Ages. First of all it was the only church at that time. Therefore the church did much to determine how people would live. Which means it had tremendous power over people's lives.

The history had alluded that the attempts of royal supremacy preventing papal supremacy from collecting taxes had failed tremendously. Popes, such as Pope Boniface, had objected the king’s endeavors by forbidding taxation “without papal permission (Jordan,190).” However, such power was being widely challenged during the early fifteenth century when the selling of indulgences finally ignited the rebellions. The Catholic church first started applying indulgences in Germany, indicating that by buying indulgences one could shorten one’s time in purgatory (Jensen,13). Though it appeared to be a problem of corrupted church ideals, the money that indulgences generated in Germany was used to fund a church that was being built in Rome (Jensen,14). Thus, on the other hand, the selling of indulgences was equivalent to taxing. Such action infuriated majorities of Germans, including Martin Luther. He casted doubts on churches’ rights to perform such political deed that was clearly deviated from the original catholic beliefs. With the protections of Frederick the Wise and other royal supports, Luther “wrote his 95 Theses to spur debate” and publicly established a new religion called Protestantism (Jensen,13). Thus it was a challenge to the church regarding its political

Corruption was a serious problem in large sections of the church. It created widespread unrest among the laypeople as they questioned the trustworthiness of the church. Not only was the church raking in large sums of money from the indulgences, the money was not going towards charitable needs. The money that the church gained was achieved largely through John Tetzel, the chief preacher of indulgences. Stanton illustrates, “His extreme claims and tasteless methods were challenged even before Luther.”

In the year 1378, the Roman Catholic Church became divided when the King of France decided to replace the current Italian Pope with one that he elected. During the Great Schism, there were two popes claiming authority over the Catholic Church. Following the split, the papal offices began to lose their authority. Ultimately, the cardinals of both popes decided that an ecumenical council of godly men could collectively possess more divine authority that just one pope. In 1409 at the council of Pisa, the church council was asked to elect a new pope that would unite the sides, meaning there would be three popes. Now, there was Pope Urban VI from Italy, Pope Clement VII from France, and the new member, Pope Alexander V. Neither the Roman or French popes were willing to give up their power, now creating a three way battle for the church’s authority. From 1414-1418, the Council of Constance was successful in healing the Schism, leading to the resignation of the Roman Pope. The schism was healed and there was room for an election of a single pope, Pope Martin V, who reigned from 1417-1431. The Great Schism of the West introduced a newly expanded authority for the general councils of the church.

The Middle Ages was a period from the V to XVI centuries. In the Middle Ages the power of church was at its peak. The church had a strong influence on the lives of the individuals. People followed the church laws as the church was considered to be coming directly from God. With time, many wrongdoing entered this system leading to its downfall. The Roman Catholic Church was the only universal European institution. The idea of community distinguished the medieval period. People faced real threats from famine, disease, and warfare. For instance, a medieval craftsman belonged to a guild that dictated all aspects of his business. The idea was that all craftsmen should make a good living, but no one should do substantially better than the rest.

The Church is a highly acclaimed power that is still in power to this day. The Pope is still in power and the Catholic Church has been in power for almost 2000 years. The Church has a huge following and many people follow it blindly. Though there is no feudal system to put the Church on top and there is now a separation of Church and State, it was not always like that. The Church’s history is anything but pure. It constantly used it’s power against those that relied on the Church for answers and reassurance on salvation. The illiteracy of the Middle Ages allowed the Church officials to be trusted mindlessly. Reforms were looked down upon and even resulted in the imprisonment or death of some people. The Church is responsible for taking advantage of the lower class in the Feudal system, committing the Crusades or the “Holy wars” and killing and torturing heretics during the Inquisition as the result of trying to spread Catholicism.

The Roman Catholic Church is undoubtedly the most influential institute of all time. If you ever have ever paid attention to within your own town you may notice that some of the largest buildings are churches. Why is this exactly? It’s the exact influence that I mentioned taking its form. Let’s dig deeper into this by going straight to the where Catholicism took its role as a dominant force, the Middle Ages.

During the middle ages the power and the influence that the catholic church had was very big, and like always, too much power without control leads to corruption.

The Middle Ages were a time that revolved around Christianity and converting or killing off all those who were not Christian. As a result, strict laws were put in place that prohibited the practices that weren’t Christian. This also meant anything that was pagan was prohibited and punishable by death. There were many practices that would be considered pagan, but the main ones of concern were the things the Church did not approve. Of the things the Church did not approve magic, like witchcraft, and heresy were two of the main things that were forbidden by both state and Church law. The main reason the Church wanted to block off magic practices was to stay in power (or keep its power). This is supported by the following: the influence of the Church on the kings resulted in the passing of civil laws against magic; the Inquisition making sure people did not engage in magical practices; the Church leaders downplaying witchcraft; and the persecution of the Knights Templar and followers of John Wycliffe (who led the movement against papal authority and the clergy).

I wanted to do this research paper on the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages because the church has always fascinated me. I have always found the history and the corruption of the Catholic Church to be of great interest and when I read in Robinson Crusoe, when he stated something to the effect that he would rather be captured by cannibals than catholic priests , I decided to do this paper on the Catholic Church. I thought it was a very interesting statement considering the time that it was written.

In the presence of a mass exodus from the church which took place due to opposition toward ecclesiastical misconduct and false doctrines, the Catholic Church chose to reaffirm its authority in a manner that failed to focus on the problematic concepts which caused adherents to seek salvation in the new church orders. Created by priests with the same grievances, these new protestant churches sought to directly address the problematic concepts such as the unethical sale of indulgences and simony which became commonplace within the Catholic Church. In a blatantly apparent act of papal hubris, Pope Julius II in 1506, petitioned nobility and clergy to secure funding with the intended act of demolishing a 1,200 year old church and construct St. Peter’s Basilica which was to become the most lavish in all Christendom (Dandelet 191). Although initially created to support the construction of this specific building, the implementation of this indulgence, in addition to another decreed by his successor Pope Leo X, provided the means for fiscal