Influence of the Christian Church in Middle Ages

Influence of the Christian Church in Middle Ages

Influence Of The Christian Church

The Christian Church played a very important role in allowing the Middle Ages to flourish as they did. Two major areas in which they succeeded in influencing the people were political and spiritual. With all their land, the church held a great amount of power, and was able to capture the political grasp of people around them. And of course, the Church led prayer services, performed rituals and gave guidance to its congregants and influenced the Middle Ages spiritually. In these years, the Church reached the climax of its power, and religion played an important role in the development and meaning of all life.

Cities were growing all around Western Europe, and the balance of power was shifting towards the Christian church. Between fights across countries in the Middle East, Viking raids and various crusades, the Christians eventually were invited to stay in Muslim Holy Lands as pilgrims, whose company was welcome. The Church decided to stay and eventually their culture, mixed with Muslim culture, spread into most of Western Europe.

With the growth of territory, and the balance of power shifting, the Christian church found itself with much land in their hands. Popes began to hold lots of political, as well as spiritual power. Starting with Feudalism, this new form of government was similar to a social ladder. On the top were kings, who gave land to their lords. In return, lords became the king's vassals and gave food and loyalty to their successors. The pope and the church ultimately controlled all of this. Feudal justice was another main part of political changes. In the case of a trial, it would be handled in 1 of 3 ways: trail by battle, compurgation or trial by ordeal.

As we look into the history of the Christian church, we can find that the Middle Ages influenced many of our modern day political practices. The church's Magna Carta has appealed to many of our founding fathers and jump-started their...

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