Paste your essay in here…During the Middle Ages, Christianity was the only recognised religion. The Catholic Church dominated Europe and played a vital role in society. “The Church became dominant in Europe following the fall of the Roman Empire.” Kings, Queens and many other leaders gained their position with the help of the Church as they were in alliance with them. Two important events in the history of Christianity and Catholicism were the Conversion of Constantine and the Crusades. These two events need to be analysed and discussed in order to gain a clear understanding of their importance in the history of the Church.
A major turning point in the history of the Catholic Church was when Constantine, the Roman Emperor, converted to Christianity in the year 312 CE. Constantine’s conversion occurred during a war against his brother-in-law and co-emperor Maxentius. Constantine was convinced that he needed divine assistance, when he was praying for this assistance he received a vision from God. It was of a cross of light at midday, showing “in hoc signo vinces” which translates to “in this song you will be victorious” in English. “For better or for worse” the conversion of Constantine had a major impact on the spread of Christianity. After just one year of becoming a Christian, Constantine and Licinius, both Roman Emperors, released the ‘Edict of Milan’ in 313. This was a proclamation which permanently allowed for the tolerance of all religions within the Roman Empire. This granted all people to follow whatever religion they would like, allowed Christians to have legal rights including being able to organize churches and the giving back of stolen property. As well as the reclamation of property, reimbursement of losses and legal rights in disputes, the Edict of Milan also stopped the Great Persecution and Gladiator Games. This was when all Christians who expressed their religion were persecuted in the Roman Empire. This was the biggest impact Constantine had on Christianity as Christians were now able to express their faith freely without fearing their life. After that, Constantine declared a new set of legislations that supported the Christian clergy therefore the church lands progressed towards becoming tax-free. Constantine also allowed the clergy to receive an allowance to stop them from worrying about money and focus all of their time on serving God. Constantine’s strategy was to unify his empire and in order to do this he gave permission to Christians to receive help from government officials to build new churches and then began to embark on a building frenzy of churches. Constantine “significantly impacted on the development of Christianity” however it wasn’t just positively. Caesaropapism was one of the biggest problems that was brought about when Constantine took control of the church. Constantine had monarchical control over the church, he used the church to control the state. Constantine was seen by people to take his authority too far, he gave many people roles within the state because they were Catholic. According to Micah Andrew Hasty who is a blogger about religions, states “He began to give every soldier that would convert to Christianity 20 silver coins. Think about going out on a street corner and announcing that anyone who would accept Jesus Christ as their savior would be given a $50 bill on the spot. This would indeed be a stimulus package!”. At the start of his reign, Constantine tolerated paganism for the sake of harmony, however, later in his reign he had to weaken the hold of paganism in order to pave way for Christianity. Constantine took precious metals from pagan temples to fill his own treasury for all of his building projects and even went on further to destroy temples on the pretext of exorcising demonic influences. The conversion of Constantine “significantly impacted upon the development of Christianity” ‘for better or for worse.”
The Crusades were a major turning point in the history of the Catholic Church,“for better or for worse” these campaigns “significantly impacted upon the development of Christianity.” The Crusades were a series of military campaigns of Medieval England against the Muslims of the Middle East. These movements were sanctioned by the Latin (Western) Church that occurred from 1095 to 1291. Jerusalem was one of the most notable places for Christians as Jesus had spent most of his life there and when it was captured by the Muslims, the Christians were not happy. In order for the Christians to recapture it and claim it their own they needed to fight back to get the Holy Land, however, the Muslims were giving it to them easily because it was a sacred site for them as Muhammed, their founder, had been there. With Muslims not willing to give it to the Christians easily, it caused a series of religious wars which lasted for over 200 years. “For better”, the Crusades positively impacted on the spread of Christianity as it allowed for many new ideas to be brought about. Knowledge was brought about in architecture, astronomy, mathematics, science and medicines, new spies, skills, the compass and even spaghetti was new within Christian culture. They also discovered many volumes of Greek philosophy which was taken from Islamic scholars who studied and preserved them. The finding of the volumes of philosophy also would bring about extensive changes that eventually lead to the Renaissance. As well as philosophy being discovered, new military techniques were also brought about. Although the crusades allowed for many new ideas to be discovered within the Christian Church, they also allowed for many faults. “Or worse” the Crusades significantly impacted on the spread of Christianity. The crusades were a time brutality, death and violent conflicts which resulted in the deaths of 10’s of 1000’s of people including women and children. The main objective of the crusades was to reclaim the Holy Land from the Muslims however the Christians didn’t. Instead they split the Church between the Christians of the West and the East because of the destruction of Constantinople. The crusades also brought about anti-semitism and further misunderstanding and intolerance among Muslims, Christians and Jews. “For better or for worse” the Crusades “significantly impacted upon the development of Christianity”.
Both the conversion of Constantine to Christianity and the Crusades “significantly impacted upon the development of Christianity” “for better or for worse”. The conversion of Constantine impacted on the spread of Christianity as it was a religion that was able to be expressed freely without the fear of death. Christians were now favoured by the Emperor which gave them many positive benefits. Nonetheless the Crusades had a negative impact on the development of Christianity as the Catholic Church started all of the religious wars which lasted for over 200 years and killed tens of thousands including women and children. This had a negative impact as many people did not want to be associated with a religion that resorts to violence and death when they want something. Overall, the conversion of Constantine and the crusades were two of the most crucial times in the history of the Catholic Church which “significantly impacted upon the development of Christianity”.