The Reaction of the Failed Church

Through the World Civilizations II course that I am taking this semester I realize how much of the Church’s failures have fueled and created a rise in atheism, as well as the secularization of the world. Specifically what we’re discussing is the Plague, and how prior to the epidemic destroying Europe, the Catholic Church was the most powerful organization in Europe. They were in charge of hospitals, education, land ownership, as well as being the main employer of most of Europe. So when the Church practically went bankrupt due to the Plague, they could no longer fulfill their responsibility to the people. From this deficiency the people looked for alternatives apart from the church for survival. Out of their loss of power, the Church attempted to regain power by becoming harsher with their moral restrictions. When “modern” medicine was becoming archaic, doctors looked for new ways of practice which included human dissection. The Church’s response was to condemn it. When traditional Catholic schools did not update their curriculums, educated people wrote new ones outside of the church, and started schools with funding from private non-Catholic contributors. Simply put, when the Church was unable to provide, people looked to other means. When the Church is in charge of so much, any group would fail in at least some areas. And when the Church then tries to gain control over something they shouldn’t have power over, they overcompensate by become stricter, only pushing societies to secularism and people to atheism.