Me (in my head): Is this guy serious? I mean, really? Where did he expect this Church chock full of moral authority to come from? A vacuum? Sure, the source is Jesus Christ, ultimately and always, but you don't see Christ coming down and personally and physically piloting the ship now, do you? Christ works through Man. And Man works in the world.
Okay, so let's play with kid gloves and be charitable enough to assume that all he meant was "political Christendom". Now, if the Church had not attempted to assert some temporal authority in conjunction with the spiritual authority that was already rightfully within Her realm, what would happen? In other words, if the Church had not gone through political Christendom, would it still be that moral force this guy so lauds Her to be today?
First, let's look at a Christianity that never attempted to compete with the kings for temporal power. This was Eastern Christianity, centered around Byzantium.
What happened?
Caesaropapism. Yep, if the Church had not asserted any temporal authority, it would have been relegated to just another organ for some empire or kingdom. The current Church is a moral authority in the world today due in no small part to its independence from any single nation state. How would the Catholic Church be the moral force this professor claims it to be if it ended up as just another arm of France or Italy? (In fact, the Church did end up overtly attached to whatever secular ruler happened to let her be the main Church in his lands, but this was precisely because political Christendom had collapsed.)
The foundation of papal independence was built during the height of political Christendom (for a guy who teaches a class called "Foundations", you'd think he'd know this...), where She vyed with Kings for authority. If not for political Christendom, there would be no intellectual and experiential basis to divorce the power of the Church from that of whatever local lord or government She happened to find Herself under. The Eastern Church never developed one, so to this day you have Eastern Churches attached to every single Near-Eastern nationality.
And if he thinks the Church could have gone on its merry way without nary a thought given to political power, that would have been impossible. The only source of learning in the so-called Dark Ages would be a critical organ for any ruler worth his salt wanting to establish some sort of Imperium. The Church would find every single lord in Western Europe vying to control Her and the learning She commands, if only because rule and civilization would be impossible without it. So, the only solution other than political Christendom would be to eschew whatever made the Church attractive to barbarian lords. I do not think this intrepid professor would go so far as to suggest that, in order to avoid Christendom, the Church should just forget about manuscripts, literacy and book-keeping and all those stinking liberal arts, just so She would have no need to exert Herself temporally. What sort of liberal arts professor would think that...
Second, another reason why the Church has the moral authority She has today is because She had at one time commanded the faith and loyalty of all Europe, and by extension, those other countries influenced by those loyal to Her. If there had been no political Christendom, there would have been no mass conversions of the European peoples. (If you can't convert the ruler, you can't convert the people en masse) With no mass conversions, there would be no Renaissance, no Enlightenment, and consequently, no modern world (or modern Church) as we know it. Those years spent contemplating Aristotle and building cathedrals would have been spent still trying to convert the Europeans piecemeal. Let's be generous and assume that the Church, because She stayed out of politics, would not be tarnished by the involvement. That means that She would still, to this day, be trying to convert the pagan tribes of Northern Europe. That is, if the Muslim overlords let Her.
Add to that the spectre of there being no scientific advance and none of the technological advantages that helped elevate both Western European (and consequently, Catholic) prestige and power in the world. How would the Church reach the Americas? Heck, how would She reach the Philippines? And yes, the Catholic Church and influence She held during the height of Political Christendom allowed Her to found universities and generally philosophically jumpstart what would become science as we know it today. No other civilization came close to matching this achievement. Centuries after first observing the stars, inventing the abacus and discovering gunpowder well before Europe, the Chinese had to wait for Christian Europe to introduce accurate star charts, the clock and the rifle. Don't get me started on so-called Islamic "science"....
Sure, political Christendom led to a slew of corrupt and lackadaisical clergy. Yes, there were abuses, which would lead to the Reformation and all the nuttiness that followed that. You cannot expect every scenario to play out with everybody coming in clean as driven snow. This is man we're talking about here. Man would still be sinful, even without political Christendom. I daresay that if we assume a continued spell of general clerical good behavior and a lack of abuse in both scenarios, one with and one without political Christendom, it would still require political Christendom for the Church to acquire the moral authority (which extends even beyond Catholics...just watch Obama try to court the Pope when The One visits the Vatican) that She enjoys today....
*long contemplation is interrupted*
Professor: I will see you next week....
Me: Class is over?
****
One breezed-over misconception, and I already have an entire semester's course outline's worth of material.
Yes, I am easily distract...
Oh!
What was I thinking again?Bottom line, I personally just do not understand the hype surrounding this Professor. He's good... but to cavalierly dismiss such a crucial period of Western history as bad when it was crucial to the development of the Church the institution he heads actively seeks to defend... I dunno. I guess its just another case of Busted Halo for me.
Oh well. It's still a fun class though.
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