May 1999
This was a term paper due towards the end of my Freshman Year at FU. It garnered a B, but I think it should have received higher. I read every page of the books that I cited. I think it was my best academic piece of writing my freshman year. It's about the investiture controversy (Pope Gregory VII v. Henry IV). When it was uploading, some of the punctuation marks were replaced with wingdings characters. I think I got them all and replaced them with the correct punctuation, I'm not sure though.
Please keep in mind that I do not post these on the Internet for you to copy and paste your life through college. However, if you do, don't blame me when you're kicked out for a breach in academic integrity. Enjoy!
Holy Satan
Pope Gregory VII was a staunch supporter of Cluniac reform which demanded the elimination of simony, alienation of property, and lay investiture. Society at this time, however, did not realize the separation between church and state because wealthy lords forced the church into the feudal system. Church and state were intertwined due to the lord vassal relationship erasing the lines of jurisdiction between lord and bishop - and even king and pope. Gregory admonished those participating in the infesting of the church, lard laymen abusing their unjustly attained spiritual position. Henry IV, emperor of Germany instigated conflict with Gregory by appointing three bishops to sees in Italy, an act which was solely the responsibility of the Pope. A moral battle between Gregory VII and Henry ensued. Finally, Gregory and Henry compromised with the Church obtaining the stronger side of the compromise. Gregory solidified the political as well as spiritual power of the papacy, not by pronouncing his reign, but by defeating the only person who was a roadblock, Henry. Given society's views at the time, Gregory was effective because he beat a political leader.
Most of the monasteries, by the tenth century, had been integrated into the feudal system. Although the monasteries were financially supported, the monks were obligated to provide military protection for their lords, who owned the monks' land. This also required monasteries to employ serfs, who helped farm the land, as well as provide their serfs with necessities. The weaving of political and spiritual power, led to "the gradual decline of the spiritual focus of the monastery" (Cory et al., 181). Simony, alienation of property, and lay investiture became common practice and control was soon out of the church's hands.
"The spiritual decline of monasticism began to change when William the Pious founded a new Benedictine monastery at Cluny in 910 A.D." (Cory et al., 181). The Cluniac reform movement sought to reinvigorate the spiritual focus of the Church. By abolishing laymen in spiritual positions of power. This opinion brought the issue of church and state to light.
The abbots spoke out against secular leaders who attempted to wield control over bishops and other clergy. They taught that the pope in Rome was the only one who ought to have authority over the clergy. They spoke out against concubinage. . . arguing that the clergy ought to be celibate so that the church might be their spouse.
(Cory, 181)
The realization of the Cluniac reform movement was the goal of Pope Gregory VII.
Gregory VII, whom a friend once described as a "holy Satan," was elected as a "reform pope" in 1073. He especially spoke out against simony, alienation of property, and lay investiture, as William had. This politically incorrect position - in terms of lords who have participated in simony (the buying and selling of ecclesiastical offices and/or spiritual goods), alienation of property (deeding church goods as the private inheritance of bishops, or priests, children), and lay investiture (secular powers controlling the appointment of church officials) - brought opposition from the wealthy and powerful lords.
Gregory's reforms meant a sharp decline in power for the lords. Laymen had become church officials, such as abbots, priests, and bishops. Simony was a common and accepted source of income for lords. Lay investiture was accepted as well, not only hurting the church morally, but spiritually as well. If a peasants lord was a bishop who had been appointed through lay investiture, spiritual guidance was not an option. A layman in the position of a bishop who was a bishop merely because of money and power, could not provide ample spiritual guidance. Lay investiture allowed lords to hold spiritual power. Alienation of property stemmed from lay investiture. By deeding church goods as the private inheritance of bishops' or priests' children, who were born from concubines, lay lords, in essence, steal the church's good as well as assure their heirs with future living conditions and power. This hurts the influence of a church over its people. A church cannot preach if a layman is in office. Given these gains for the lords, Gregory's reforms were feared. However, the separation between church and state had not been set.
King Henry IV of Germany appointed three bishops to sees. Regardless of the positive impact Henry's father had on the Catholic church, Gregory admonished him. He claimed to be loyal to the church. In a letter to Henry regarding the three bishops he had appointed, Gregory writes:
We marvel exceedingly that you have sent us so many devoted letters and displayed such humility by the spoken words of your legates, calling yourself a son of our Holy Mother Church. . . yet in action showing yourself most bitterly hostile to the canons and apostolic decrees in those duties especially required by loyalty to the church. . . And now, heaping wounds upon wounds, you have handed over the sees of Fermo and Spoleto ? if indeed a church may be given over by any human power to persons entirely unknown to us, whereas it is not lawful to consecrate anyone except after probation and with due knowledge.
(Geary, 581)
This letter, written "Dec. 8, 1075 [or Jan. 8, 1076]" (Geary, 581), is followed by Henry's excommunication.
. . . In the name of Almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, through thy power and authority, I deprive King Henry, son of the emperor Henry, who has rebelled against thy Church with unheard-of-audacity, of the government over the whole kingdom of Germany and Italy, and I release all Christian men from the allegiance which they have sworn or may swear to him, and I forbid anyone to serve him as king.
(Geary, 583)
Henry, pressured by the church, makes amends at Canossa 28 January 1077:
Before the date the Lord Pope Gregory is to set, I, King Henry, shall bring about justice according to his judgment or harmony according to his counsel with regard to the complaint and objection now being made against me by archbishops, bishops, dukes, counts, the other princes in the realm of the Germans, and those who follow them by reason of the same objection. . . Moreover, no other difficulty prejudicial to his honor will occur with my assent; and should any person create one for him, I shall help him [Gregory] in good faith, according to my ability.
(Geary, 601)
However, Henry was to be excommunicated again. After a battle with the Saxons, Henry receives the aforementioned excommunicated persons into his counsels. Gregory wrote:
When, therefore, we saw that we had reached the limit: namely, first, that he refused to give up his relations with those who had been excommunicated for sacrilege and the heresy of Simony; second, because he was not willing, I will not say to perform, but even to promise repentance for his crimes, for the penance which he had sworn to in the hands of our legates was a fraudulent one; finally, because he had dared to divide the body of Christ, that is, the unity of the Church, for all these crimes, I say, we excommunicated him through the decision of a council. Since we could not bring him back to the way of salvation by gentle means, we tried, with God's help, to do so by severity, and if, which God forbid! He should not be afraid even of the severest penalty, our soul should at least be free from the charge of negligence or timidity.
(Geary, 585)
The breach was clearly permanent.
More letters were written, Gregory excommunicated Henry again, and "Gregory recognized Rudolf of Suabia, the leader of the German political opposition as anti-king, and Henry appointed the distinguished Archbishop Wilbert of Ravenna as Clement III" (McManners, 212). Given the arguing between them, the main issue remained - as it had been from the start - lay investiture. Kings and popes argued over which of them is fit to appoint bishops. The issue of church and state finally surfaced at the Concordat of Worms.
At The Concordat of Worms, held in 1122, "the emperor renounced his claim to appoint bishops but he retained control of many other imperial rights over the church in Germany" (Cory et al., 183). The pontiff's Dictatus Papae, "proclaimed that the pope, as supreme judge under God alone, held supreme power over all Christian souls; all bishops and abbots were subject to him and he alone held absolute powers of absolution and excommunication"
(Cory et al., 183).
Gregory's ideal was a world ordered by intellectual logic, by law and jurisdiction, by a center at Rome. In order to change Christianity he had to designate the line between church and state. However, given the society at the time, this task would demand more than a doctrinal letter.
By about 1050 A.D. "most people were baptized in childhood and knew no alternative pattern of worship" (McManners, 205). Catholics did not know what it meant to be Catholic, only that they were Catholic by birth. They had lost their sense of being a Catholic - which is why Henry appointed Clement, a reference to the pope after Peter, so as to recall the pure time of Catholicism - because they "valued above all the power of the church to win the blessing of God by its prayers" (McManners, 205). Why would laymen pray if their fate rested on the shoulders of monks and priests? "It was the task of monks and priests to pray, and of laymen to sustain them by their alms" (McManners, 205). Since priests and monks prayed and laymen gave alms, not much interaction, in the way of spiritual direction or education, occurred between the two groups meaning "the real impact of the gospel upon such vital institution as marriage and warfare was limited" (McManners, 206). The Church was deteriorating morally because of the lack of education and the number of laymen as spiritual officers giving room for the rise of secular power.
The deterioration of Christian education coupled with the church's assimilation into the feudal system allowed for secular political power to infiltrate the church. "Lay lords commonly received the tithe, the charge of ten percent of produce which in principle provided the basic revenue of the clergy, and they treated the local churches as personal possessions, selling and leasing them, and charging for their services" (McManners, 206). As the church became assimilated into the feudal system, the question of who controlled the church presented itself.
The characteristic feature of church order in the first half of the eleventh century was what German historians have called Eigenkirchentum, a word which can best be rendered as the - privatization - of churches. The old discipline had been superseded by a system of private rights. . . all perceived as the personal possession of their holders.
(McManners, 205)
The reason why Gregory's efforts were instrumental in solidifying the political as well as spiritual power of the papacy, given the social construct of the time, is because he disputed with a political leader. By doing so, he appealed, not only to the Catholics who were not involved in simony or lay investiture, but to all people. By not wavering from his belief before the potential wrath of Henry IV, Gregory proved himself, and the validity of the church. The church was strong enough to combat political figures. Unlike people in the East, whose "emperor had authority over the patriarchs even to the point of calling councils and prescribing solutions to doctrinal issues in the church" (Cory et al., 181), Gregory viewed the Pope as supreme ruler over all followers, regardless of boundaries, and made it so. Given the society and the state of his church, a doctrinal letter would have had no effect. It is when Gregory proved that the church does not need the state that he solidified the political and spiritual power of the church.
Through time, church and state have learned to compromise. In the United States, a country that has no official religion, some believers in states break laws because of their beliefs. For example, polygamy is still practiced in desolate places in Utah. Polygamy is illegal in the United States. The general compromise is that when one - due to ones beliefs - begins to hurt others in any way, the law of the state will take control.
However, some issues fall within the gray area of judgment. Abortion, for example, made legal by the Supreme Court, is against the Catholic faith. Although the United States' laws are, for the most part, Christian, the state has declared abortion legal and, by association, moral - for what are laws if not representative of morals. The state acknowledges the abortion as ending a pregnancy, but not as ending a life. According to the Roe v. Wade decision, if the zygote has not passed the fetal stage of birth, the baby is not a person, but a collection of chromosomes which has the potential of becoming, given time, a person. The Catholic Church recognizes the humanity of a baby from the time of conception. If the Supreme Court is convinced that abortion is killing a person, abortion would be illegal, the gray area being obvious. Even today, the church v. state issue is affecting our lives.
Work Cited
Cory, Catherine A. et al. Ed. The Christian Theological Tradition. MA: Simon, 1996:
181, 183.
Geary, Patrick J. Ed. Readings in Medieval History. Ontario: Broadview, 1998: 581+.
McManners, John ed. The Oxford History of Christianity. Oxford: Oxford, 1993: 205+.
If you have any questions or comments, please e-mail me.
(C) 1998 RIGHTINGS