The Christian Church in the Middle Ages

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The Christian Church in the Middle Ages

The Christian Church in the Middle Ages played a significant role in society. Unfortunately though, the church is often regarded as the capital of corruption, evil, and worldliness. Today, so many people depict the medieval church as being led by materialistic popes, devouring tithes from poverty-stricken peasants, having various illegitimate children, and granting indulgences for money from wayward believers. Yes, circumstances like this may have been the case, and is often hard to disapprove, considering the fact that this notion is often advocated in movies. But we must open our mind, and look at the situations first before jumping to conclusions.

As many things define the distinct characteristics of history, the Christian church has made a remarkable milestone especially during the Middle Ages. Christianity’s emergence as an official religion influenced not only the church, it enabled people to look beyond the obsession of power and worldly pleasures, but to a final and ultimate reward for a life well spent. Everybody put their faith in the hope and love of the Christian God. It gave the people goals and led them to the right path, yet why is it looked down upon so harshly? Maybe it was because of the wealth it exemplified, or the deterioration of morality in the popes. One can heedlessly conclude that the Medieval church was corrupt and unholy, but that would not justify its existence. Accordingly, the church was just trying to adjust itself to an age of chaos and uncertainty.

The idea that the medieval church was immoral can be rooted on a few methodological errors. The arbitrary use of historical evidence and the ignorance of the circumstances are a couple to name. Mayb...

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...question once again arises. How immoral or corrupt was the church? Sure, there were various imperfections about the church, but considering the spirit and diversity that the church distinguished, there is no justice to go as far as to say that the church was corrupt in the Middle Ages. It is simple to call the imperfections that happened in the Middle Ages characteristic of the medieval church, but depicting its reforms as surpassing in its own time would only contradict that statement. The church in the Middle ages does not mean that what happened then does not happen now, if anything, today we still can witness pastors, clergymen, televangelists, all abusing their power of religion just to get money as Julius II and Leo X did centuries ago. As a conclusion, the medieval church was not uniquely corrupt and immoral; it was just adjusting itself to an age of chaos.

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