RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY AND BELIEFS

Church Hierarchy, Protestant Revival, Catholic Piety, and Marginal Beliefs and Practices

Church Hierarchy• Church still important to communities• Catholic monarchs took greater leadership• Different because Protestant princes assumed direct

control.• In Spain, Papal proclamations were not read without

approval of the Crown.

Jesuits• Highly educated, missionaries and teachers.• Agents of the papacy.• Typically held high roles in the government.• Gained many enemies because of their influence.• Louis XV kicked them out of France, returned after

Revolution.

Protestant Revival• Protestant reforms complete by 1700• Growth of state causes complacency,

leads to Revival• Began in late 1600’s Germany, spreads

to Scandinavia and the Baltic.

Pietism• Warm and emotional religion• Focus on enthusiasm in prayer, worship,

and life• Aspired to the return of Universal

Priesthood• Made the Bible accessible to all• Boosts literacy and religious development

Methodists• A traveling Englishman witnesses the Revival,

takes it back to England• Unique Anglican Revival creates the

Methodist denomination• John Wesley was the driving force behind this• Desire to halt corruption and Deism, bring

religion and life closer• Wesley popularizes it by delivering 40,000

sermons across 40 years.

Catholic Piety • Different because of baroque art,

iconoclasm• Catholicism was still popular because of the

Church’s active role• Festivities were crucial to Catholic success.• Festivities were part of folklore and tradition,

a day of recreation.• Protestants had abolished many of these

celebrations.

Jansenism• Started with Cornelius Jansen, the Bishop of

Ypres.• Focused on original sin, and predestination.• Accepted by French nobility, despite being

outlawed by the Pope.• Encouraged opposition to the French

monarch.• The urban poor created their own type of

Jansenism.• Jansen wanted to go back St. Augustine’s

Christianity.

Marginal Beliefs and Practices• Drenched in superstition• Included things like burying a live bull to

prevent hoof-and-mouth disease.• French priests were key figures in

denouncing these beliefs.• Vigorously assaulted pagan remnants of

these practices.• Caused tension between the elites and

commoners, who viewed it as an attack on their lifestyle.

• Witch trials were disposed of because of this, last witch died in England in 1682.