2. Event: Crusades
• military campaigns sanctioned by the Latin Catholic Church
• 1095, Pope Urban II proclaimed the First Crusade
• with the stated goal of restoring Christian access to holy
places in and near Jerusalem.
• intermittent 200-year struggle for control of the Holy Land,
• six more major crusades and numerous minor ones.
• 1291, the last Christian stronghold in the Holy Land falls
• After, Roman Catholic Europe mounted no further response
• Pursuing the stated goal led to some extreme violence
4. Event: Crusades
• Crusading attracted men and women of all classes.
• Several hundred thousand Roman Catholic Christians became
crusaders by taking a public vow and receiving plenary
indulgences from the church
• Temporary Crusader states in Holy Land expanded trade to
Europe
• United Europe under the pope, though armies are still
commanded by feudal lords
• Armies pillaged, lords refused to return lands to Byzantium
• Constantinople is sacked by Western Christians – Byzantine
Empire never recovers, Muslims conquer Constantinople in
1453
• Other violence includes massacres of Jews and Muslims
5. Crusades: Unifying or Divisive?
Unity Division
Unites Western
Europe under Pope
Alienates Orthodox
Church
Opens new trade
‘overseas’
Slaughters Jews
and Muslims
Gets people
excited
Ends in failure
6. Event: Universities
• most new universities were founded from pre-existing
schools, usually when these schools were deemed to have
become primarily sites of higher education.
• Many historians state that universities and cathedral schools
were a continuation of the interest in learning promoted by
monasteries
• Bologna, Paris, Oxford were first in Europe
• Latin was the language of the university,
• used for all texts, lectures, disputations and examinations.
• Professors lectured on the books of Aristotle for logic, natural
philosophy, and metaphysics; while Hippocrates, Galen, and
Avicenna were used for medicine.
• Italian universities focused on law and medicine, while the
northern universities focused on the arts and theology.
• “an incubator of scientific thought and arguments”
10. St. Thomas Aquinas
1225-1274
• Joined the new Dominican Order against
his family’s wishes
• Studied, taught at Paris & Cologne universities
• Greatest and most influential theologian
• Used Greek philosophy to help understand the
meaning of Christian faith
• Wrote “Summa Theologica” a summary of all
Christian teaching - about 10,000 objections are proposed and
answered
• Had mystical experiences – eventually could not write any
more because all he had written was “straw” compared to the
real thing
11. Avignon Papacy
• Avignon Papacy 1309 to 1377,
• seven successive popes resided in Avignon, France, rather
than in Rome
• This situation arose from the conflict between the Papacy and
the French crown.
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12. St. Catherine of Siena
1347-1380
• A mystic and influential in the ‘real’ world
• Taught about the interior room, “a dwelling place
that is spiritual and you carry it with you constantly”
• Had repeated visions of Jesus and saints,
including “Mystical Marriage”
• Became an “at home nun” with Dominicans
• Wrote The Dialogue of Divine Providence: a dialogue between
a soul who "rises up" to God and God himself.
• “Doctor of the Church” – her work correctly expresses
Catholic belief
• Became influential in Italian and European politics
• Went to Avignon to convince the pope to return to Rome
13. Division: Western Schism
• a split within the Catholic Church from 1378 to 1418.
• Several men simultaneously claimed to be the true pope.
• Driven by politics rather than any theological disagreement
• After Gregory XI returned to Rome, cardinals elected a new pope
• Urban VI turned out to be a bit crazy
• Already, there was powerful politics for another French pope
• The same cardinals left Rome and elected a new pope, while the
first one still reigned
• Europe was divided in Papal loyalty – neither pope would resign
• 1409: tried to solve the problem by electing a third pope
• the schism was ended by the Council of Constance
• rival claims to the papacy hurt the reputation of the office
14. Inquisition
• A judicial court within the Church
• aim is to combat heresy, able to torture and kill
• Started in 12th century
• Expanded greatly, especially into the Reformation
• One historical estimate: 150,000 people were tried, of which about
3,000 were executed
• Especially in Spain and Portugal: converted Jews and Muslims were
tried to test whether they had reverted
• International inquisition ended in 19th century, but within the
Vatican continues as “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”
• «the duty proper to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is
to promote and safeguard the doctrine on the faith and morals
throughout the Catholic world: for this reason everything which in
any way touches such matter falls within its competence.»
• «spread sound doctrine and defend those points of Christian
tradition which seem in danger because of new and unacceptable
doctrines.»
