Asses the contribution of the Jesuits to the Catholic revival in the Sixteenth Century

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History 1

The Catholic Reformation

“Asses the contribution of the Jesuits to the Catholic revival in the Sixteenth Century”

There is no dispute that the Jesuits played very important roles in the revival of the Catholic faith and the Counter Reformation alongside the Council of Trent.  It was particularly the Jesuits who played the most vital role in taking the ideas agreed at Trent and putting them into practise throughout Europe. Although the Jesuits were a just small group of people, they were the activists that helped spread, clarify, solidify and improve the operations of the Church, thus leading to its long term revival. The revival of the Catholic Church was mainly reliant on the correction of 4 Key factors; the ecclesiastical or reconfiguration of the church, the Religious orders, The spiritual spread or movements, and the political dimensions of the church which were all covered by the Jesuits although the Council of Trent.

Among all the conditions that needed to be corrected there was the growing divide between the clerics and the laity as well as many members of the clergy in the rural parishes. Reasons for this were because of the lack of education which was what the Jesuits contributed to improve clerical standards of the church. The orthodox view is that it was in Germany that the Jesuits achieved most effects during the sixteenth century. For example, Since there was a fear that Protestantism was realistically going to take over the whole of Germany Peter Canisuis, who was the first German Jesuit (1543), founded the first German Jesuit College in Sicily and continued to uphold the claims and teachings of the Catholic Church which eventually stunning the protestant spread, most specifically in the south of Germany. Looking back to the early 1400’s the clerical leaders of the Catholic Church were all alluded with corruption and nepotism. However due to the Increased significance of Jesuit sodalities (from c. 1563) networks of former Jesuit schools and university students, helped replace old confraternities thus improving the training quality clergy men as well as allowing Jesuits teachings to spread and grow in many parts of Europe. When Ignio Layola died in 1556, there were over 30 colleges across Europe and the new world. This increased in 1600 by 236 colleges offering instruction and guidance free of charge. However, since the Jesuits were under the jurisdiction of Pope Paul IV, it was mainly spread throughout Italy, Poland and Spain. They also particularly concerned to educate the sons of the ruling elites as well as brining lay people into their churches and exposing them to the influence of outstanding preaching as well as teaching rural folks simple prayers and hymns. Unlike many of the medieval religious orders, the Jesuits placed little importance on their souls by instead placing great stress on saving the souls of others by direct and positive action. Using these acts as evidence, this would fully shed some light on the effects of having better clerical standards through education by the influenced by the Jesuits thus the revival of the Catholic faith. However, missionaries found it difficult to break down local folk’s beliefs and superstitions and, in the countryside especially, the understanding of basic Christian doctrine was poor as well as life threatening. For example, the execution of Father’s Campion and Parsons in England in 1580 demonstrates how perilous missions could be. Arguably looking at this in a different perspective, being a Jesuit missionary would have been as a noble task to be part of. In addition, were better educated in Jesuits studies leaving better futures for improvement and expansion of Catholic revival.

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In relation to this, the Jesuits at the same time gave a catholic doctrine that was more clarified and understanding. An example of this was in 1599 the creation of a dedicated curriculum (Ration Studorum) was made, which gave clear instructions on how that doctrines could be understood. In addition, Jesuits increasingly the key writers of the period to gave clearer descriptions of theology, therefore making it easier to push through Catholic teachings. For Instance Robert Bellermine wrote what collectively become called “The Disputationes” which set out to reinforce Catholic doctrine and undermine Protestant theology which published between 1581 ...

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