1. History of the Church I: Week 14

2. Charlemagne and Christendom  Christmas Day, 800 Charles the Great or Charlemagne becomes the protector of Rome and Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire

3. What does the is mean for the Church?  Since the fall of Rome, the West has looked for a return of a unified Roman Empire  Clovis, leader of the Germanic Franks, organized them and unified the kingdom  When Clovis died, the kingdom fell into disarray because of fighting between the heirs  Charles Martel, taking the position of mayor of the palace, defeated the Muslims at Tours

4. What does this mean for the Church?  When Pepin the Short took over the Frankish kingdom from his family, he wanted the mayor of the palace to be the true ruler of the kingdom. How could he get his wish?  Ask the Pope for his blessing which he received in 751  The Pope did this because he needed a protector against the Lombard's  Ravenna was taken by Pepin and given to the Pope

5. What does this mean for the Church?  The Pope now was the ruler of Papal States in central Italy as well as the spiritual head of Europe  When Charlemagne was crowned, he had three goals: increase his kingdom, gain Christian favor and improve the intellectual power of both minds and souls  The effect was all of Europe would remain Christian, even if in name only, for the next 1000 years

6. How did God use Charlemagne?  One, he drove the Muslims back into Spain and made sure Europe would not become Islamic  He conquered the Saxons to the North who were notoriously pagan  He drove back the descendants of the Huns, the Slavs, and created the future empire of Austria

7. How did God use Charlemagne?  In all of his conquests, he set up stable governmental structures which would eventually became the nation states of modern Europe  He set up a universal language  He set up Christianity as the religion  He built schools and universities and encouraged learning

8. What happened after Charlemagne?  The territory was to vast for it to remain under one political rule  As the Vikings invaded from the North, the people turned to local lords to provide protection  This is how Feudalism started in Europe  The church looked to feudal lords and German kings for protection  The Church attempted to influence behavior through codes of conduct

9. Church Reforms  In 910, the monks sought to reform what they saw as spiritual decline in the church especially the popes  This Cluny Reform sought to enforce clerical celibacy and stop the sale of church office called simony  From the 8 th to the 11 th centuries, Popes were picked more for their political allegiance rather than their spiritual qualifications  Thus in 1059, the college of the Cardinals was formed to pick the pope

10. Gregory VII  One of the first new popes after these reforms was Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085)  Instead of saying the church and state were equal in power, he claimed the spiritual was more important than the secular  In other words, popes could rule over kings (Henry IV)

11. Impact on the Church  Although Gregory took his power too far, he did lay down two principles for Christianity:  In loyalties of men, spiritual rules over secular  Men can only find true unity in Christ and obedience to the laws of God