The Counter Reformation: Reference Materials

Isolates the special and positive characteristics of the Counter-Reformation and accounts for them in relation to the environment in which they developed. The author sees in the spirit of the Counter-Reformation an attempt not to check but to extend and come to terms with the more individualistic and modern environment in which the Catholic Church found itself. The Jesuits are treated as agents of this change.

In "Poor, Sinning Folk," W. David Myers investigates the sixteenth-century fate of the medieval Christian sacrament of penance, the process of confessing to a priest in secret one's sins against God and other humans. In Pre-Reformation Germany, numerous layers of public ritual, expectation, and display surrounded the central secret act of confessing and conditioned its meaning. Less frequent and less private than the ritual familiar to modern Catholics, medieval penance was for most German-speaking Christians a seasonal event with social as well as spiritual ramifications for participants. Protestantism swept confession away from many German lands. Even where Catholicism survived and flourished, as in the lands comprising modern Bavaria, the sacrament of penance changed profoundly. The modern confessional booth was introduced, making the sacrament more prominent, more secure from scandal, and ultimately more private. This reform coincided with the efforts of secular rulers to fashion a more disciplined, obedient population. New religious orders, most notably the Society of Jesus in Bavaria, saw the frequent confession of lay people as a means to piety and spiritual discipline amid the temptations of worldly affairs. By the middle of the seventeenth century, political and religious forces combined to forge the sacrament of penance into an effective instrument of spiritual discipline which would fashion the modern Catholic conscience and endure essentially unchanged into the late twentieth century.

"Religion and Politics in the Age of the Counterreformation" confirms what historians have long suspected - that the influence of a court confessor or chaplain could be crucial to the formation of policy in an early modern state. -Jacket.

Deals with the general councils of the Catholic Reformation in the late medieval and early modern periods. This collection contains overviews of the various editions of and scholarship on these general councils.

Modern research so transformed our understanding of the Catholic world between 1400 and 1700 that the term 'Counter Reformation' cannot now be used without major qualification. Through a wide varity of primary sources, the author considers reform initiatives before, during and after the Council of Trent and focuses on particular issues. How did Catholicism survive the Reformation onslaught, regenerate itself and even recover lost ground? Why were different methods of combating Protestantism adopted in Spain and Germany? In the long term, how successful were the campaigns to reform the church and counter Protestantism - and why was he latter less important than the former? -Jacket.

"This book comprises nine key articles on the Counter-Reformation, introduced and contextualized for the student reader. They show that these reforms were more than a mere reaction against the Protestant challenge to Catholic doctrine and institutions; rather, they also constituted an internal renewal that transformed sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Catholic religious life in many complex ways."--Jacket.

The reform of the Catholic Church in the sixteenth century was historically as important as the contemporary Protestant Reformation. Though never committed solely to fighting Protestantism, it inevitably also became a Counter Reformation, since it soon faced the threat created by Luther and his successors. The century between the career of Ignatius Loyola and that of Vincent de Paul became a classic age of Catholicism. The lives of its saints, popes and secular champions could hardly be made more fascinating by any novelist. While paying due attention to the great characters, the author also considers the broader political, social and cultural features of the Counter Reformation. A.G. Dickens is Emeritus Professor of History at the University of London.

In 1559 there still existed in Europe a hope that the religious unity which had underpinned the ideal of a single western Christendom might be restored. By 1610 that hope had perished forever. This volume recounts how the Catholic Church's only partially successful efforts during this period.

"Guy Bedouelle's Reform of Catholicism, 1480-1620, introduces nuances to earlier books on this subject by demonstrating how reform within the Roman Church owed much to a ferment and coordination of action emanating from its traditional geographic and jurisdictional centre, Rome. But, after showing how the Council of Trent legislated reform in the Church and empowered structures to carry it out, Bedouelle also highlights the actions of dedicated men and women that brought about a renewed spirit in the Church and in society - a "Catholicism" which, at least in some aspects, paralleled the way other Christians constituted a "Lutheranism," a "Calvinism," or an "Anglicanism.""--Jacket.

The early sixteenth century, a time of great religious ferment and upheaval, is marked historically by the Protestant Reformation. Professor Olin focuses here on a parallel movement of renewal and reform that remained within the Catholic Church - a movement of fundamental importance, but one not often given due emphasis or analysis .A lengthy study traces the course of Catholic reform from Ximenes initiatives to the close of the Council of Trent. Several key documents, translated from the Latin, and a study of Ignatius Loyola, arguably the most important contributor to Catholic reform, show through contemporary sources and activities the character of the Catholic reform movement. -Jacket.