The Priestcraft Theory: Text and Context

Abstract

The imposition by Church and state of a revolutionary history of Christian culture on much of early modern Europe was itself a factor in the matrix of tension that led to long-term political destabilization and military conflict in Europe. In the French Wars of Religion, as in other conflicts of the period, supposed religious precedent often served to reinforce and justify the economic and political goals of kings and princes. After all — and it is worth stressing this often undervalued point — the stakes were high. Protestant secession meant control of the Church, which usually meant at least a short-term injection of funds for hard-pressed sovereigns and better prospects for taxing the wealth of the Church. More importantly, control of the Church and its power over the hearts and minds of the masses was still a principal factor in a sovereign’s ability to maintain adequate control of his/her realm in a politically and militarily unstable continent. That Rome supported most of the bellicosity of Catholic powers was understandable: faith coincided with the protection of the secular wealth of the Church from Protestant hands. In this sense, a Catholic battle for the defence of empire lay behind and at times coincided with the material goals of Catholic powers. The carnage and turmoil of the various so-called Wars of Religion in the sixteenth century gave way to that of the Thirty Years War (1618–48), in which huge areas of Europe were devastated and peoples displaced amid the slaughter. The monarchies of Europe did not emerge from this maelstrom and regain political and religious balance until the wave of Europe-wide wars and revolutions of the mid-seventeenth century had subsided.