The Roman Catholic Church on the Eve of the Reformation

1. The Roman Catholic Church on the Eve of the Reformation Manuscript illumination of pilgrims leaving Canterbury, c. 1420.The British Library, MS. Royal 18 D II, folio 148

2. (1305−1378 )The Avignon Papacyor “Babylonian Captivity” In 1305, the king of France pressured the pope to move the church headquarters to Avignon near southern France. The pope complied, saying that the move was because of a breakdown of law and order in Rome. In Avignon, the papal court fell deeper under French influence and found itself cut off from the traditional source of revenues the pope had used to operate the church: taxes from the Papal States. With the pope gone, these states declared independence. An artist’s rendering of the meeting of the new Pope and the King of France,

3. Papal Fiscalism To finance the church, the Pope resorted to charging fees and dues for services provided to ordinary churchgoers; exploiting church appointments, indulgences, and dispensations for revenue; and setting up an elaborate new bureaucracy to collect taxes. Many people came to see the papacy as greedy and materialistic. A wave of anti-clericalism arose. Rulers resented the flow of tax money out of their kingdoms to the papacy, as well as the French influence over the pope. When a new Papal Palace was built, there was mass resentment . This is the building created for the Avignon Popes, still a tourist attraction.

4. The Great Schism (1378−1415) • In 1378, Pope Gregory XI finally decided that the church must move back to Rome or risk total loss of public confidence. He successfully moved the church back but died shortly thereafter. The cardinals, many of whom were French, went into session and elected a new pope, the Italian Urban VI. But Urban turned out to have ideas about church reform that the cardinals were not aware of at the time of his election; thus, the French cardinals returned to session, declared Urban deposed, and elected a new French pope. When Urban refused to recognize his deposition, the French pope and cardinals moved back to Avignon, leaving Urban and the Italian cardinals in Rome. Each pope claimed to be the true pope, and each group, the true church. The Great Schism had begun. Apparently Urban VI was pretty tough on those Cardinals who didn’t support him. But then torture was pretty much the order of the day.

5. Then there were Three Popes!!! Everyone in Europe, from kings to university scholars to ordinary people, was forced to choose sides in this dispute and declare loyalty to one pope or the other. Church bureaucracy and taxes were duplicated. The Roman Catholic church was humiliated, its public image sinking even further. Meanwhile, because of national and factional rivalries, the schism continued after the deaths of both initial claimants. Both Boniface IX, crowned at Rome in 1389, and Benedict XIII, who reigned in Avignon from 1394, maintained their rival courts. When Boniface died in 1404, the eight cardinals of the Roman conclave offered to refrain from electing a new pope if Benedict would resign; but when his legates refused on his behalf, the Roman party then proceeded to elect Pope Innocent VII….. A contemporary artist, Kyle Farley, has his own take on this bizarre chapter of Papal history. The “1 twice refers to the confusion of their being two Clement VII’s because later the Avignon Papacy was not recognized.

6. The Conciliar Movement Out of this disaster arose A group of prominent cardinals who decided that only a council of all the church’s bishops deliberating together could decide which pope was the true leader of the Church. The Council of Constance in 1414 secured the resignations of John XXIII and the successor in Rome of Urban VI, Pope Gregory XII (who had abdicated in 1415, but not before formally empowering the Council of Constance to elect the new pope, thus ensuring the legitimacy of the Roman line), and excommunicated the claimant who refused to step down, Avignon Pope Benedict XIII. The Council then elected Pope Martin V. The idea that the Church would be run by committee gradually died out. a procession of clergymen attending the Council of Constance (1414-1418), from the Chronicle of the Council of Constance by Ulrich Riechental (c1360-1436/1437), the scribe of the city of Constance. Source: UNESCO Memory of the World Program.

7. Pope Martin V The election of Martin V served to end the Great Schism of the West. Martin also made extensive use of both diplomacy and military might to reestablish papal authority over the Papal States. But the damage to the Church’s legitimacy was incalculable. • Chronicle of Council of Constance (1414 - 1418) is Ulrich Riechental (1360's - 1436/1437), the scribe of the city of Constance

8. . 15th century Popes were strong, but not very spiritual. After the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism and the re-conquering of most of the Papal States, Fifteenth century popes focused on ruling the church and lands rather than spiritual leadership. They became immersed in Italian and European politics, were always in search of revenue, and became patrons of the arts and humanism, just like other rulers. Pope Sixtus IV (1414−1484) spent his time on re-conquering the remaining Papal States, and he put his relatives in charge of them. Detail of a large painting by Melozzo da Forli of Pope Sixtus IV meeting with the future prefect of the Vatican Library, Bartolomeo Platina. Between them, in the red robes of a cardinal, stands Guiliano dela Rovere, the pope's nephew and the future Pope Julius II .Painted in 1477, it is in the collection of the Vatican Museums in Rome.

9. Handmade oil painting reproduction of Pope Julius II ordering Bramante, Michelangelo and Raphael to construct the Vatican and St. Peters, 1827 2, a painting by Horace Vernet. Pope Alexander VI (1431−1503) used bribes to secure his election, then moved into the Vatican with his wife and seven children. While there, he had a child with his daughter Lucretia. He put his Borgia family in charge of the Papal States. His son Cesare ruled with such ferocity that he became the model for Machiavelli’s prince. Pope Julius II (1443−1513) was called the warrior pope because he spent his time at the head of his armies fighting such powers as France, Spain, and Venice. Pope Clement VII and Pope Leo X, who reigned in the 1520s, were both sons of the house of Medici. They had all the political interests of the Medicis, helping the family back to power in Florence after the fall of Soderini. They were patrons of the arts and learning, true Renaissance princes.

10. Popular Religion in an Age of Adversity While Popes came and went interest grew in making pilgrimages and securing relics, and in performing acts of charities. Relics are fragments of bone, coffin, etc from Saints-- above are relics from some aspect of the lives St Crispin and St Joseph. In the middle is a piece of the True Cross.

11. Destinations for Pilgrimages often involved Relics. • An important shrine at Walsingham in Norfolk was said to hold a sealed glass jar said to contain the milk of the Virgin Mary. There was also a spring with waters thought to be curative. • Other shrines held the teeth, bones, shoes, combs etc. that were said to have once belonged to important Christian saints, or nails and pieces of wood said to be from the cross used to crucify Jesus. • Pilgrims would pay money to be allowed to see, touch, kiss these holy relics. the pilgrim usually received a metal badge stamped with the symbol of the shrine. This cover is adapted from a Manuscript illumination of pilgrims leaving Canterbury, c. 1420 from the British Library. The cathedral and walls of Canterbury appear in the background of the original.

12. Christian Humanism • “Northern” Humanists”, scholars in England and the Netherland influenced by the Italian Humanism, sought a revival and renewal of religious life. • They felt that most of the church’s problems came from the medieval period, so they called for a return to what they called the apostolic church, the first church of Christ and the apostles. This ancient church had been pure and uncorrupted, they felt, and by following its example, the church of the present could be purified and reformed. • The key was to read the classics of the early church, including the writings of the church fathers, such as Augustine, Ambrose, and Jerome, but also, and especially, the Bible itself. The Humanists believed that new translations of all these classics were needed, purified of translation errors that had crept in during the Middle Ages as monks copied and recopied the works. Erasmus of Rotterdam is the most famous of the Christian Humanists--Gravure van Desiderius Erasmus door Hendrik Bary

13. A recent book, Sisters and Brothers of the Common Life by John Van Engen of Notre Dame. • "The Devotio Moderna, or Modern Devout, puzzled their contemporaries. Beginning in the 1380s in market towns in the Netherlands they formed households organized as communes and forged lives centered on private devotion. They defended their self-designed style of life as exemplary and sustained it in the face of opposition. Yet the movement grew, drawing in women and schoolboys, priests and laymen, and spreading outward toward Minister, Flanders, and Cologne.-- from a description of the book at the Notre Dame faculty website

14. Many People Strove to Live in Imitation of Christ • The Brothers of the Common Life and Sisters of the Common Life lived like a monastic order. • Imitation of Christ, by Thomas á Kempis and other such books were widely read. • Books of Hours, which allowed people to say prayers as if they were in a monastery were widely sold.

15. The Brotherhood was influential • In 15th and 16 century Europe dozens of Brotherhood schools enrolled as many as two-thousand students apiece. • Erasmus of Rotterdam attended the Deventer school. • Brotherhood houses produced twenty-five percent of Europe’s pre-Reformation books. In fact Johann Gutenberg was close to the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood had developed a tradition of copying books-- particularly classsics, so it was natural that he trained fifty Brotherhood laymen in printing, and from 1460 to 1500. According to the Schiller Institute 450 books were printed at Deventer, a sort of headquarters for the Brotherhood. • http://www.schillerinstitute.org/fid_91-96/942_bro_common_life.html A sixteenth century printing press. Reproduced in J.R.Green, A Short History of the English People (1900).

16. Religious Mystics Were Widely Admired • Catherine of Siena • Lived on cold water, herbs and Communion wafers, to encourage a mystical union with Christ. • She had many imitators. Relics live! St Catherine’s head is preserved as a article of veneration in her hometown of Siena, 630 years after her death. This is a contemporary Icon drawn by Donna Rathert.

17. Many Mystic Christians were Women The medieval period produced many people who claimed visions of Christ and Mary, uttered prophecies, gave voice to ecstatic experiences, recited poems and songs said to emanate directly from God and changed their ways of life as a result of these special revelations. Many recipients of these alleged divine gifts were women: Richeldis de Faverches (founder of the Holy House at Walsingham), the learned Hildegard of Bingen, Hadewijch of Brabant), charismatic traveller and pilgrim Margery Kempe, Julian of Norwich all challenged traditional male scholastic theology. --paraphrased from publisher’s book description. Professor Dickens,who teaches at UTS in Ohio.

18. Wealthy People Built and Furnished Private Chapels The famous Ghent altarpiece or ‘The adoration of the Mystic Lamb’ was painted by the van Eyck brothers to decorate the private chapel of a rich couple, Judocus (Joost) Vijd and his wife Elisabeth Borluut. Both influential citizens of Ghent. Still a huge tourist attraction The inside panels are only shown to the public on Sundays and religious holidays.

19. Wealthy People Founded Hospitals and other Charities • Bishop Walter Suffield founded St Giles' hospital in Norwich, England around 1249, the 14th and 15th century saw much more of this sort of charity. When the sick entered the sacred environment hospital, it was believed that their burden of sin would be erased. Yet, more importantly for rich men like Bishop Suffield, founding a hospital was thought to guarantee their own spiritual health. In fact, a patron, by supplying the necessary funds, hoped to ease his or her passage through Purgatory.

20. Rules of St Giles Hospital, not changed until the 16th century * There was to be a master to take good care of the hospital, and to work for the remission of Bishop Suffield's sins (3). * There were to be at least three or four women, aged over fifty, who were to change the sheets and take care of the sick (5) * Everyone had to get up at the crack of dawn to say prayers (7) * There was to be a weekly mass in honour of St Giles (9) * There were to be thirty beds or more (11) * Thirteen poor men were to fed daily (14) * There was to be a poor box from which poor people passing by could receive alms and charitable assistance (15) * The sisters were to sleep in a separate dormitory (24) * No women were allowed to stay in the hospital as patients (32) * There was to be a free chantry in the chapel of the hospital (42) Livre de Vie Active, Musée de l'Assistance Publique, Paris.

21. The Waldensians • Waldo (Valdes or Valdesius), a rich merchant of Lyons, decided to dedicate himself to the preaching of the gospel to the lower classes of society. At the Third Lateran Council (1179), Valdes and his followers sought ecclesiastical recognition. The pope expressed approval of Valdes' vow of voluntary poverty, but he and his companions were forbidden to preach except by invitation of the clergy. Valdes and his community refused to obey, and the Council of Verona (1184) placed the "poor of Lyons" under the ban of excommunication. The Waldensians grew rapidly and spread, first in southern France, then in Piedmont, Lombardy and Germany. Despite persecution over the centuries, there are still Waldensians around today in Switzerland and Italy, as well as North and South America Where’s Waldo? This Statue of Peter Waldo is at the Luther Memorial at Worms, Germany

22. John Wyclif and the Lollards • John Wyclif, educated at Oxford. He rejected the Roman church, preferring a church comprising the body of the elect with all authority derived from the scriptures ( 'lordship depended on grace’). Also, he denied transubstantiation and believed in the spiritual Eucharist rather than the physical one. Because of his beliefs, Wyclif wanted the church reformed and its wealth removed. He translated the Bible into English. • Followers of Wyclif came to be known as "Lollards." The sect was driven out of Oxford in 1382, but stricter suppression drove the movement underground, where it survived until the 16th cent.

23. The Pope Condemns Wyclif ...it has come to our ears that John de Wyclif, rector of the church of Lutterworth, in the diocese of Lincoln, professor of the sacred scriptures (would that he were not also Master of Errors), has fallen into such a detestable madness that he does not hesitate to dogmatize and publicly preach, or rather vomit forth from the recesses of his breast certain propositions and conclusions which are erroneous and false. He has cast himself also into the depravity of preaching heretical dogmas which strive to subvert and weaken the state of of the whole Church…..He has polluted certain of the faithful of Christ by besprinkling them with these doctrines, and led them away from the right paths of the aforesaid faith to the brink of perdition. This is what a Papal Bull looks like, but this one is not a condemnation of Wyclif

24. Wyclif’s bones were burned in the late 16th century.

25. Jan Huss and the Hussites • Jan Huss, Czech, born 1372, as dean of Charles University in Prague, he criticized church practices such as selling indulgences. Finally, Jan Hus was invited to the Council in Constance and he was asked to renounce his ideas. He refused, and he was burnt at the stake as a heretic on 6 th July 1415. • People in the Czech Kingdom were outraged by Hus’s death provoking a rebellion (Hussite Wars)The Hussites held out for several years, but. the movement was finally defeated because the rebels quarreled among themselves.Statue completed in Prague about 1910 Diebold Schilling the Older, Spiezer Chronik (1485): Burning of Jan Hus at the stake

26. Question to think about: • Jan Hus said most of the same things Martin Luther did, but Hus was burned at the stake and Luther lived a long, happy life. What happened in the hundred years that intervened to make that difference?