Everything about Catholic Reformation totally explained
The
Counter-Reformation (also
Catholic Reformation) denotes the period of
Catholic revival from the pontificate of
Pope Pius IV in 1560 to the close of the
Thirty Years' War, 1648.
The Catholic Reformation was a comprehensive effort, composed of five major elements:
» #Doctrine
#Ecclesiastical or Structural Reconfiguration
» #Religious Orders
#Spiritual Movements
» #Political Dimensions
Such reforms included the foundation of
seminaries for the proper training of priests in the spiritual life and the theological traditions of the Church, the reform of religious life by returning orders to their spiritual foundations, and new spiritual movements focusing on the devotional life and a personal relationship with
Christ, including the
Spanish mystics and the
French school of spirituality.
Name
The two terms highlight different aspects of the movement. The term Counter-Reformation, used primarily by non-Catholics, emphasizes the view that these reforms were prompted largely by the rise of Protestants and the threat they posed to Catholic institutions. In this view, the reforms were aimed primarily at reducing the loss of the faithful to Protestantism,and the term "Catholic Reformation" identifies it as an action of the Church, not a reaction to Protestant Reformers.
Scholars such as John C. Olin, late of
Fordham University, and
Henri-Daniel Rops, began using the term "Catholic Reformation" in the last half of the 20th century to emphasize the attempts at reform, theological and disciplinary, within the Roman Catholic Church that began before the traditional date of the launch of the
Protestant Reformation by
Martin Luther or before the
Council of Trent (events such as the
Fifth Lateran Council, the sermons on reform delivered by
John Colet in England, the publication of
Consilium de Emendanda Ecclesia by
Gasparo Contarini, the founding of the
Oratory of Divine Love, and so on), and to point out that many of Trent's reforms and the work of such reformers as St.
Philip Neri, St.
Ignatius of Loyola and St.
Teresa of Avila, while influenced by the response to the Protestants were far wider and more comprehensive than a mere response to the challenge of growing Protestantism. They argue that much of this was about suppressing abuses and corruption within the Roman Catholic Church for the sake of its own virtue, and that the reforms included more than just stamping out Protestant "heresy."
The Council of Trent
Pope Paul III (1534-1549) initiated the
Council of Trent (1545-1563), a commission of cardinals tasked with institutional reform, addressing contentious issues such as corrupt bishops and priests,
indulgences, and other financial abuses. The Council clearly rejected specific Protestant positions and upheld the basic structure of the Medieval Church, its sacramental system, religious orders, and doctrine. It rejected all compromise with the Protestants, restating basic tenets of the Catholic faith. The Council clearly upheld salvation appropriated by grace through faith
and works (not just by faith, as the Protestants insisted).
Transubstantiation, during which the consecrated bread and wine were held to be transformed wholly and substantially into
the body, blood, humanity and divinity of Christ, was upheld, along with the other six
Sacraments. Other practices that drew the ire of Protestant reformers, such as indulgences,
pilgrimages, the veneration of saints and relics, and the veneration of the Virgin Mary were strongly reaffirmed as spiritually vital. The Council also commissioned the
Roman Catechism, which still serves as authoritative Church teaching (the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, issued in 1992, updates the language and contains modern explications, but doesn't differ doctrinally).
While the basic structure of the Church was reaffirmed, there were noticeable changes to answer complaints that the Counter Reformers tacitly were willing to admit were legitimate. Among the conditions to be corrected by Catholic reformers was the growing divide between the clerics and the laity; many members of the clergy in the rural parishes, after all, had been poorly educated. Often, these rural priests didn't know
Latin and lacked opportunities for proper theological training (addressing the education of priests had been a fundamental focus of the
humanist reformers in the past). Parish priests were to be better educated in matters of theology and apologetics, while Papal authorities sought to educate the faithful about the meaning, nature and value of art and liturgy, particularly in monastic churches (Protestants had criticised them as distracting). Notebooks and handbooks became more common, describing how to be good priests and confessors.
Thus, the Council of Trent was dedicated to improving the discipline and administration of the Church. The worldly excesses of the secular
Renaissance church, epitomized by the era of
Alexander VI (1492-1503), exploded in the Reformation under
Pope Leo X (1513-1522), whose campaign to raise funds in the German states to rebuild
St. Peter's Basilica by supporting use of indulgences was a key impetus for
Martin Luther's
95 Theses. But the Catholic Church would respond to these problems by a vigorous campaign of reform, inspired by earlier Catholic reform movements that predated the
Council of Constance (1414-1417): humanism, devotionalism, legalist and the observantine tradition.
The Council, by virtue of its actions, repudiated the pluralism of the Secular Renaissance Church: the organization of religious institutions was tightened, discipline was improved, and the parish was emphasized. The appointment of Bishops for political reasons was no longer tolerated. In the past, the large landholdings forced many bishops to be "absent bishops" who at times were property managers trained in administration. Thus, the Council of Trent combated "absenteeism," which was the practice of bishops living in Rome or on landed estates rather than in their dioceses. The Council of Trent also gave bishops greater power to supervise all aspects of religious life. Zealous prelates such as
Milan's Archbishop
Carlo Borromeo (1538-1584), later canonized as a saint, set an example by visiting the remotest parishes and instilling high standards. At the parish level, the seminary-trained clergy who took over in most places during the course of the seventeenth century were overwhelmingly faithful to the church's rule of
celibacy.
The orders
New religious orders were a fundamental part of this trend. Orders such as the
Capuchins,
Ursulines,
Theatines, the
Barnabites, and especially the
Jesuits strengthened rural parishes, improved popular piety, helped to curb corruption within the church, and set examples that would be a strong impetus for Catholic renewal. The Theatines were an order of devoted priests who undertook to check the spread of heresy and contribute to a regeneration of the clergy. The Capuchins, an offshoot of the
Franciscan order notable for their preaching and for their care for the poor and the sick, grew rapidly in both size and popularity. The Capuchin fathers were an order based on the imitation of Jesus' life as described by the
Gospels. Capuchin-founded confraternities thus took special interest in the poor and lived austere lifestyles. These differing approaches were often complementary, as with the missions to rural areas poorly served by the existing parish structure. Members of orders active in overseas missionary expansionism expressed the view that the rural parishes, whose poor state of affairs contributed to the growth of Protestantism, often needed Christianizing as much as heathens of Asia and the Americas. The Ursulines focused on the special task of educating girls. Their devotion to the traditional works of mercy exemplifies the Catholic Reformations reaffirmation of salvation through faith and works, and firmly repudiated the
sola scriptura of the Protestants emphasized by
Lutherans and other Protestant sects. Not only did they make the Church more effective, they reaffirmed fundamental premises of the Medieval Church.
However, the Jesuits, founded by the Spanish nobleman and ex-soldier
Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), were the most effective of the new Catholic orders. His
Societas de Jesus was founded in 1534 and received papal authorization in 1540 under Paul III. An heir to the devotional, observantine, and legalist traditions, the Jesuits organized their order along military lines, they strongly reflected the autocratic zeal of the period. Characterized by careful selection, rigorous training, and iron discipline, the worldliness of the Renaissance Church had no part in the new order. Loyola's masterwork
Spiritual Exercises reflected the emphasis of handbooks characteristic of the earlier generation of Catholic reformers before the
Reformation. The great psychological penetration that it conveyed was strongly reminiscent of devotionalism. However, the Jesuits are really the heirs to the observantine reform tradition, taking strong monastic vows of chastity, obedience, and poverty and setting an example that improved the effectiveness of the entire Church. They became preachers, confessors to monarchs and princes, and educators reminiscent of the humanist reformers, and their efforts are largely credited with stemming Protestantism in
Poland,
Bohemia,
Hungary, southern
Germany,
France, and the Spanish
Netherlands. They also strongly participated in the expansion of the Church in the Americas and Asia, conducting efforts in missionary activity that far outpaced even the aggressive Protestantism of the Calvinists. Even Loyola's biography contributed to the new emphasis on popular piety that had been waning under the eras of politically oriented popes such as
Alexander VI and
Leo X. After recovering from a severe battle wound, he took a vow to "serve only God and the Roman pontiff, His vicar on earth." Once again, the emphasis on the Pope is a key reaffirmation of the Medieval Church as the
Council of Trent firmly defeated all attempts of
Conciliarism, the belief that general councils of the church collectively were God's representative on earth, rather than the Pope. Firmly legitimizing the new role of the Pope as an absolute ruler strongly characteristic of the new age of absolutism ushered in by the sixteenth century, the Jesuits strongly contributed to the reinvigoration of the Counter-Reformation Church.
Spiritual movements
curia, called
Spirituali, actively tried to reform the Church through reform of the individual. This movement was strong and significant era in the Church.
Church and its music
The demand by the Council of Trent for simplicity in music in order that the words might be heard clearly placed a serious stumbling block in the path of the development of
polyphony in the mid-16th century.
The Council, in their
Canon on Music to be used for the Mass, stated:
All things should indeed be so ordered that the masses, whether they be celebrated with or without singing, may reach tranquilly into the ears and hearts of those who hear them, when everything is executed clearly and at the correct speed. In the case of those masses which are celebrated with singing and with organ, let nothing profane be intermingled, but only hymns and divine praises. The whole plan of singing should be constituted not to give empty pleasure to the ear, but in such a way that the words be clearly understood by all. And thus the hearts of listeners be drawn to desire of heavenly harmonies in the contemplation of the joys of the Blessed. They shall also banish from church all music that contains whether in the singing or in the organ playing things that are lascivious or impure.
While this was worded fairly vaguely, the intent was clear. Complex
polyphony was no longer deemed acceptable by the Council.
Palestrina's musical mastery and his skill at word setting greatly affected the outcome of this difficult situation. By composing a six-part polyphonic mass, called the
Missa Papae Marcelli (Pope Marcellus Mass), of 1555, Palestrina demonstrated that polyphony was compatible with the mandates of the Counter-Reformation. Using an economy of notes, the mass setting conveys its words with surprising clarity. This represented a marked shift from the composer's earlier compositions, which often paired a single syllable with long strings of notes, called
melismas, which obscured the text. The new, tighter style (which did occasionally resort to homophony) was both shorter and more comprehensible to the worshipper. The Pope Marcellus Mass was believed since the late 16th century to have been instrumental in preventing the abolition of polyphony. Recent scholarship, however, shows that this mass was composed before the cardinals convened to discuss the ban (possibly as much as ten years before). The mass was not, therefore, solely responsible for "saving" Catholic church music, as is sometimes claimed. Still, Palestrina's music would become the model for future generations of Catholic composers, and it continues to be held as an exemplar for polyphonic clarity.
Like Palestrina, the Flemish composer
Jacobus de Kerle (1531/32-1591) also demonstrated to Council delegates that polyphony was capable of projecting the words in a coherent manner. It is quite possible that Kerle, not Palestrina, should be credited as the first "savior" of polyphony. Another composer,
Vincenzo Ruffo (c. 1508-1587), also complied with the reforms of the Council of Trent. Ruffo devoted himself entirely to sacred music in the spirit of the Counter-Reformation. Ruffo, however, took a different approach by dispensing with polyphony in favor of composing chordal, or homophonic, mass settings. Later in life, he apparently grew dissatisfied with homophony and returned to polyphony.
After all of the debate during the third meeting of the Council of Trent, the council's solutions gave composers very little room for artistic expression. Composers such as Palestrina and Lasso would find other ways of expressing their sacred themes during the Counter-Reformation.
The Council of Trent brought about other changes in music: most notably developing the Missa Brevis, Lauda and "Spiritual Madrigal" (Madrigali Spirituali).
The inadvertent start of the scientific revolution
Some historians such as
James Burke have noted some of the directives initiated in the Counter-Reformation had consequences that would ironically create even more formidable challenges to the Catholic Church's authority and very world-view. Specifically, efforts to reform the Julian calendar may have led to the Church's confrontation with Galileo and with the scientific world in general.
This came about with the initiative to make the Catholic Church more attractive to the common person. In addition to better training for the clergy, there was also the idea of making the Church's facilities and activities more attractive to the laypeople. Part of this included extensive decorations that would eventually spawn the elaborate
baroque art style and more celebrations of holidays and similar events.
The need to have these events followed closely throughout the dioceses raised the problem with the accuracy of the
calendar. By the sixteenth century the
Julian calendar was almost ten days out of step with the seasons and the heavenly bodies. Among the astronomers who were asked to work on the problem of how the calendar could be reformed was
Nicolaus Copernicus, a canon at
Frombork (Frauenburg). In the dedication to
De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (1543), Copernicus mentioned the reform of the calendar proposed by the
Fifth Council of the Lateran (1512-1517). As he explains, a proper measurement of the length of the year was a necessary foundation to calendar reform. By implication, his work replacing the
Ptolemaic system with a
heliocentric model was prompted in part by the need for calendar reform. An actual new calendar had to wait until the
Gregorian calendar in 1582.
At the time of its publication,
De revolutionibus passed with relatively little comment in the Catholic Church itself, which treated the conception as little more than a mathematical convenience. However, the fact that the Earth's motion directly contradicted literal readings of the Bible and
Aristotle's philosophy eventually became an unavoidable issue. This occurred when scholars like
Galileo Galilei believed he could amass physical evidence supporting heliocentrism (although he himself failed to), or at least undermining
Ptolemy.
Major figures
References
Philipp M. Soergel: Wondrous in His Saints: Counter Reformation Propaganda in Bavaria. Berkeley CA: University of California Press, 1993
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