What if the Protestant reformation never happened?

[Tangible]

1. I hate to say it, but the Protestant Reformation was a deliberate rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry. One guy hinted on it here, I'm just filling the gaps.

Tinfoilhattery.

 

[Erose]

I did not say that the Protestant Reformation was inevitable
I just said that over the last 500 years, so much has changed because of it, we can not assume what it would be like if it never happened

Sorry, about that. I wasn't very clear was I. I agreed with what you said, and then I added some additional thoughts, but those thought I added, I didn't clarify that they were mine and not yours. Thinking faster than I can type.

 

[mark kennedy]

1. I hate to say it, but the Protestant Reformation was a deliberate rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry. One guy hinted on it here, I'm just filling the gaps.

Martin Luther was German, I wonder if that had something to do with his rebellion against Rome and the Spanish Emperor who judged him at the The Diet of Worms 152.

2. The Catholic Monarchs were getting bored of the Sacraments and Liturgy. They wanted Humanism. To glorify themselves. No more of this God stuff.

Classical humanism isn't opposed to God, it's simply the idea that humanity is perfectible. I would agree in principle except that it's impossible by human effort.

3. Catholic scholars spent hundreds of years researching various fields to help build a very powerful form of Government Democracy based on Constitution based on the Bible, partially.

The medieval Catholics were not big on democracy, they had a kind of constitutional republic. It's modeled after Plato's Republic and it did what Plato said it would do, it lasted a thousand years.

4. The ancient romans and greeks loved their ideas of liberty which were naturally very condusive to a Christian foreground.

Christianity makes converts everywhere it spreads, the message is to whosoever will. One of the reasons Rome adapted Christian theism is that they made converts of the barbarians, especially the followers of Alaric the Great who sacked Rome in 410. Had Rome not Christianized it would have fallen.

5. The Romans did not like the Germanic Tribe style of government or the ancient muslim for that matter but were able to create peace by imploying the democratic separation of powers philosphy and unity of diversity.

That's why Constantine move his capital to Byzantium, Turkey was the key to international commerce at the time.

6. Calling a democratic nation constitutionarily run or a constitutional government democratically run is a logical inconclusion. It does not make sense. Those are both two different forms of government, entirely.

You lost me there.

7. For America it is the Dems and Repubs, Russia the Commies, middle east dictators, europe is fashism, china socialism... Different names, but not that different in application. Either the system shares its power among parties or not and emphasises the roman ideologies or the chinese/ruissian/dictator form. Not so hard to understand.

If your talking about Protestant and Catholic political ideologies you could look at the Civil War in England and the Thirty Years War. Did you know John Locke was a Protestant Whig? Do you know why that is important to the founding of the US Constitutional Republic.

8. The greatest book ever written on the dark ages would have to be foxes book of martyrs in my opinion. The two babylons. I say this purely from a scholary point of view.

I think the Dark Ages should be famous for the books they preserved and I don't just mean the Christian canon of Scripture.

9. The better 90s sources would have to be the prophecy club.

I remember them.

10. I am unaware of any new modern authors or speakers as i believe since america has basically been turned over to a shadow Government the world now awaits the show down.

If you mean the rise of public authorities I would agree they are a shadow government but their not really in control of much.

11. People who run on emotion like to over emphasise a point on the spectrum to strain a nat and eat a camel as the good saying goes.

The ancient Greeks are famous for their being driven by emotion, the point seems moot.

12. I believe, as someone else stated the reformation was inevitable. Inquisition was unpopular, too messy, unintelligent you could say and just - old. Everyone is dead. No one left to kill the good saying says those who live by the sword will perish by it. Thats what happened the inquisitors and all those cronies started turning on one another - certain royalties and nobiities started getting involved it was just too messy. Revelations says that they will answer to God themselves so no worries there diggin up old mens dead bones.

Fifty years before the Inquisition started you could not seize the property of heretics so it didn't happen much. When it stopped it was because Rome had decided to take away the seizure laws. The Salem Witch Hunts of 1692 were over political intrigue and everyone accused of witch craft was subject to seizure. There's a simple explanation here if you look clearly at it.

13. Democracy presented an oppertunity for global government fusion. Whether thats going to end with them shooting up some more sheep unlike ever before or ever will be, the skies being rolled up like a scroll, God establishing new jerusalem, sealing the tribes and saints, judging the nations and casting satan, the anti christ and false prophet and their children into the lake of fire forever or... (fill in here) not for me to decide but for others to decide. I will say this. God is not mocked. And the devil is not the only one laughing..
. He who laughs last...

I never really understood what all the fuss is about Jerusalem in the first place, it's not much of a city. God likes it for some reason which has a lot to do with it's history.

15. My opinion is purely this to answer the op. The reformation was God calling the catholic church to repentence. Imho had there been no reformation the chinese germanic tribes or muslim antients would have completely whiped out the catholic church from off the earth along with temselves and i say this conservatively and carefully the reformation embodied those principals off the gentiles that the first century church loved. Thank God for preserving some of our ancestors and even sparring those who were guilty for our sakes

You lost me again but overall, an interesting take on the topic.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[hagios24]

Tinfoilhattery.

Im listening.

 

[food4thought]

Another question worth asking might be what if Rome had accepted reform and guided it rather than fighting it and attempting to stamp it out?

Now THAT is an interesting thought... I'm not sure how far they would have been willing to go.

 

[mark kennedy]

Tinfoilhattery.

That's always helpful when you make up new words.

Protestant theology wasn't a reform of Catholic theology even though to this day they share a core epistemology. Protestant Reform was a reformation of Christian theism and a new way of looking at things. It was a new unified theory, the Aristotelian Scholasticism was breaking down and Protestants were a movement of those who no longer had to submit to Rome.

Now the political influence of Rome is limited to Vatican City, at the time, they unified Europe and dominated politics. One has to ask the question, what happened that made Protestant democracy what it is today?

Without the Protestant Reformation there would have been no Scientific Revolution, a fact from history that is lost on modern scholars. John Locke and Isaac Newton were Protestant Whigs and best friends so there was much more going on there then people crafting tin foil hats.

 

[Tangible]

That's always helpful when you make up new words.

Protestant theology wasn't a reform of Catholic theology even though to this day they share a core epistemology. Protestant Reform was a reformation of Christian theism and a new way of looking at things. It was a new unified theory, the Aristotelian Scholasticism was breaking down and Protestants were a movement of those who no longer had to submit to Rome.

Now the political influence of Rome is limited to Vatican City, at the time, they unified Europe and dominated politics. One has to ask the question, what happened to made Protestant democracy what it is today?

Without the Protestant Reformation there would have been no Scientific Revolution, a fact from history that is lost on modern scholars. John Locke and Isaac Newton were Protestant Whigs and best friends so there was much more going on there then people crafting tin foil hats.

My one-word response was meant to signify that the idea that "the Protestant Reformation was a deliberate rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry [sic]" is pseudohistorical theorizing at best, and IMO, ridiculous to the same degree as those conspiracy theorists who go about in tinfoil hats.

(And FWIW I didn't make up the word 'tinfoilhattery'.)

 

[mark kennedy]

My one-word response was meant to signify that the idea that "the Protestant Reformation was a deliberate rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry [sic]" is pseudohistorical theorizing at best, and IMO, ridiculous to the same degree as those conspiracy theorists who go about in tinfoil hats.

(And FWIW I didn't make up the word 'tinfoilhattery'.)

Sounds made up to me:

Mocking term for debunked conspiracy theories. Often used in reference to 9/11 theories and people that treat the DaVinci Code as non-fiction (tinfoilhatters, if you must)​

Tinfoilhattery

The Protestant Reformation was the catalyst for the rise of democracy in Europe, no two ways about that and I need no tin foil hat to prove it. The Scientific Revolution and the form of government that became US Constitutional republic was a product of the Protestant Reformation. Do you really think your characterization of Protestantism is a substantive description of Protestantism:

rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry

That sounds like mockery, like the pejorative term 'tinfoilhattery'. Protestantism did reform governance and it did so after escaping the political clutches of the Roman Catholic Empire. Had that not happened there would be no such thing as democracy in America.

 

[Tangible]

My contention is that the idea, as stated, that the Protestant Reformation was a conscious scheme of the Roman Catholic monarchy to create democracy is laughable. I stand by my assertion.

The development of democratic forms of government certainly were a product of the Reformation, but this was in no way the plan or intent of the Roman Catholic monarchy.

 

[GratiaCorpusChristi]

Ugh. This thread is depressing. It's such an interesting question and so quickly became Catholics screaming "better!" and Protestants screaming "worse!"

I agree at the very least with those that say something had to happen in the sixteenth century. Considering that Luther and Zwingli began their reformations in Saxony and Zurich at about the same time completely independent of each other, you'd either have to assume a conspiracy from some future Catholic fundamentalist going back in time and murdering all the early reformers (which would be a fun novel), or only be able to take out one of the reformations, not all of them.

In any case, the reformers of the Catholic Church- Erasmus, More, Staupitz, Cajetan, Contarini, Pole, etc.- would probably have had more influence and been less marginalized as crypto-Protestants. On the other hand, the Protestant crisis had at least one very positive effect upon the Catholic Church: it pushed the Renaissance-era papacy to stop behaving like petty Italian princes (there was a string of about a half dozen absolutely terrible popes in the half century before the Reformation) and start behaving like Christian prelates. Would that have happened where it not for a pesky monk in Wittenberg, a loud nobleman in Zurich, and a turncoat king in England? I don't see that happening, no. So in at least one sense, the Catholic Church would be mired in corruption for longer, because the Counter-Reformation did accomplish some good and important things within the papal body.

The Scientific Revolution would probably also have proceeded apace and perhaps quicker, since the Roman Inquisition may not have been set up and may not have prosecuted Galileo.

One area, however, in which things could have been far worse is in the long term settlement of North America and the development of early modern political thought. Without the independence of the United Kingdom from papal censure, England (like France) would have been severely stunted in its pursuit of North American colonies. The Treaty of Tordesillas would have remained in force. Moreover, without the Reformed wing of the Protestants, Puritan political theory would have never undermined absolute monarchy as it did. No English Civil War, no beheading of Charles I, no John Locke. No Mayflower Compact. No English Bill of Rights. No American Declaration of Independence and Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Well, maybe. But I don't know why I should bother if this is going to be an exercise in ecclesiastical flag waving rather than an interesting discussion on alternate history. Sorry, Catholics, I just hold you all to a higher standard.

 

[Tangible]

Like I said, a Scandinavian North American East Coast, a Chinese West Coast, and a moose-mounted, sword wielding Native American empire in the Upper Midwest makes for much more interesting daydreams.

 

[GratiaCorpusChristi]

1. I hate to say it, but the Protestant Reformation was a deliberate rebellion by the Catholic Monarchy to create Demoacry. One guy hinted on it here, I'm just filling the gaps.

2. The Catholic Monarchs were getting bored of the Sacraments and Liturgy. They wanted Humanism. To glorify themselves. No more of this God stuff.

3. Catholic scholars spent hundreds of years researching various fields to help build a very powerful form of Government Democracy based on Constitution based on the Bible, partially.

4. The ancient romans and greeks loved their ideas of liberty which were naturally very condusive to a Christian foreground.

5. The Romans did not like the Germanic Tribe style of government or the ancient muslim for that matter but were able to create peace by imploying the democratic separation of powers philosphy and unity of diversity.

6. Calling a democratic nation constitutionarily run or a constitutional government democratically run is a logical inconclusion. It does not make sense. Those are both two different forms of government, entirely.

7. For America it is the Dems and Repubs, Russia the Commies, middle east dictators, europe is fashism, china socialism... Different names, but not that different in application. Either the system shares its power among parties or not and emphasises the roman ideologies or the chinese/ruissian/dictator form. Not so hard to understand.

8. The greatest book ever written on the dark ages would have to be foxes book of martyrs in my opinion. The two babylons. I say this purely from a scholary point of view.

9. The better 90s sources would have to be the prophecy club.

10. I am unaware of any new modern authors or speakers as i believe since america has basically been turned over to a shadow Government the world now awaits the show down.

11. People who run on emotion like to over emphasise a point on the spectrum to strain a nat and eat a camel as the good saying goes.

12. I believe, as someone else stated the reformation was inevitable. Inquisition was unpopular, too messy, unintelligent you could say and just - old. Everyone is dead. No one left to kill the good saying says those who live by the sword will perish by it. Thats what happened the inquisitors and all those cronies started turning on one another - certain royalties and nobiities started getting involved it was just too messy. Revelations says that they will answer to God themselves so no worries there diggin up old mens dead bones.

13. Democracy presented an oppertunity for global government fusion. Whether thats going to end with them shooting up some more sheep unlike ever before or ever will be, the skies being rolled up like a scroll, God establishing new jerusalem, sealing the tribes and saints, judging the nations and casting satan, the anti christ and false prophet and their children into the lake of fire forever or... (fill in here) not for me to decide but for others to decide. I will say this. God is not mocked. And the devil is not the only one laughing..
. He who laughs last...

15. My opinion is purely this to answer the op. The reformation was God calling the catholic church to repentence. Imho had there been no reformation the chinese germanic tribes or muslim antients would have completely whiped out the catholic church from off the earth along with temselves and i say this conservatively and carefully the reformation embodied those principals off the gentiles that the first century church loved. Thank God for preserving some of our ancestors and even sparring those who were guilty for our sakes

This is extraordinary gibberish. Really, just pure non-representational poetry. It's like a Jackson Pollack painting in words.

 

[Rhamiel]

Moreover, without the Reformed wing of the Protestants, Puritan political theory would have never undermined absolute monarchy as it did.

but Absolute Monarchy did not really come up until AFTER the Protestant Reformation

medieval nations were more of a balance between the Monarch, the Church, the Landed Gentry, Trade Guilds and other social institutions
it could be argued that the Protestant Reformation helped to bring about the Absolute Monarchies of the Early Modern period by weakening the power of the Church

 

[ForChristJesus]

What would society be like today?

The whole world would be Necromancing into spritism and the emergence of the new age spiritists is indicative of what would have become of the whole world.

 

[sonshine234]

What would society be like today?

Much better and less divisive

 

[yogosans14]

Much better and less divisive

But your not even Catholic

 

[sonshine234]

nor am I Protestant and if the travesty never happened I would be Catholic or Orthodox

 

[Hentenza]

What would society be like today?

Much poorer. Them indulgences are expensive.

 

[Rhamiel]

well, the Reformation Era Catholic Church was also kind of a reaction to the Protestant Reformation

so there would be good and bad things that would be different in the Catholic Church
one thing I learned just today was that there were many Catholics who were thinking about changing the Mass from Latin into the vernacular of the common people
but after the Reformation, Protestants were SO against the use of Latin for the Liturgy, that the Catholic Church kind of doubled down on Latin, used it as a way to distinguish herself from Protestant denominations

so if the Reformation never happened, the Catholic Church might have gone to the vernacular in the 1700's instead of the 1960's
who knows?

I think there would have been a lot more diversity in the Catholic Church
like if Calvinism never broke off and became such a popular movement, there might be more of an emphasis on Predestination in the Catholic Church (there are schools of thought that are closer to Calvinism, I think the Dominicans are a bit more focused on Predestination, I am not sure)

 

[Rhamiel]

Much poorer. Them indulgences are expensive.

reading the Bible for a half hour is expensive?