Replies

What should the Church have done, start fomenting revolutions? One of the things that makes our own Revolution so remarkable was it's outstanding success -- most don't go nearly as well. Many republican revolutions go hand-in-hand with foul humanist ideologies that result in equally bad conditions as would be found under a monarchy. At the time, little blame could be lain upon those who viewed republicanism with skepticism -- it was an experiment, one which didn't always go well. One of the reasons our Revolution worked out so well was because we did NOT do away with the existing societal structure, a structure most would consider gentrified to say the least.

Back-tracking in history, in the face of Huns at the gates of Rome, moslems at the gates of Tours, Norse in Britain and to the gates of Paris and beyond, Mongols in Russia, and then protracted moslim aggression for literally centuries and right up to the gates of Vienna and the shores of the Mediterranean, I don't think experimenting with forms of government was of great concern to anyone in Europe. Survival was more in mode.

As time progressed the papacy had good relations with the Swiss Confederation, and sided with William of Orange over Kng James of England, to mention but two examples. The American congress severed ties with the Vatican over Pope Pius IX's recognition of the Confederate States. The Church has by no means supported absolutists without thought.

To present Europe as an evil empire humming along under the jewel-encrusted thumb of the pope is as gross a misrepresentation of history as possible, one which takes very little historical context into account.