Reformation and the Counter Reformation
The Reformation and the Counter Reformation Traditional historiography has encouraged us to think of the religious history of the 16th century in terms of a revolt by reformers against an inert Church establishment, and of a consequent confrontation between two opposing religious traditions: Roman Catholicism representing the heritage of the medieval Church, and therefore, orthodox and traditional; and Protestantism, representing the rejection of the medieval Church in favour of a purer scripturally-based religion, and in that sense heterodox and radical. Today, however, we are encouraged to think of the Reformation and the counter-Reformation as two sides of the same coin or, to be more precise, as parallel rather than conflicting movements, developing in symbiosis, conditioned and moulded by the same set of historical circumstances and displaying similar ideological enthusiasms and concerns. This process of revision owes its origin to the time of the Reformation itself, in the realm of theology. ... The distinguished intellectual historian, Heiko Obermann wants us to regard the Reformation in its theological content - which is what it was about - as the culmination of medieval scholasticism, not as an aberration or repudiation. ... On the other hand, recent historiography of the Counter Reformation is moving towards a restoration of the modernising and Protestant dimensions of the same. ... It is now generally conceded that the traditional image of the Counter Reformation as the apotheosis of reactionary conservatism is a travesty. There are, indeed, striking affinities between the Counter Reformation ideology of mission and the Reformation ideology of evangelisation. In addition, one can also say that the inspiration of Renaissance humanism “acted as a wet-nurse” to both movements (Brendan Bradshaw, “The Reformation and the counter-Reformation” History Today Vol. ... One is the mystique of order: the exaltation of moral discipline, of religious conformity and social obedience, and of authority (see, for example, John Bossy “The Counter Reformation and the People of Catholic Europe” in Past and Present, 1970 below). ... Wright (The Counter Reformation, 1982) avoids the question of priority of origin i. ... whether the Counter Reformation originated as a reaction to Lutheranism or whether it was a continuation of an earlier Catholic Reformation upon which Luther’s movement is to be regarded as an aberration. ... The “Tridentine spirit” was a reaffirmation rather than a reformation. ... Trent and the Counter Reformation revival made religion more meaningful to millions. ... The Catholic Reformation was in large measure a movement directed by bishops, implemented by parish priests and aimed at the laity. ... Catholic Reformation moralists denounced the excesses of marital and paternal power with a view to attaching men more firmly to their families. ... Catholic Reformation confessors began to take seriously the needs of the female penitents, their anxiety about frequent pregnancies. ... The Council of Trent made no innovation concerning dogma, rather the validity of traditional beliefs, whether those attacked by the Reformation or others, were reaffirmed.