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Did the Church Destroy Civilization?
The Western academic bias against the Christian faith in general and the Catholic Church specifically has been ongoing since the Enlightenment. Although today there are some areas of scholarship where the bias has been beaten back or even dismantled, in most institutions of higher learning it is still alive and well.
Why the Crusaders Went
This post is the third in a series about the most prevalent modern myths about the Crusades and how to refute them.
Anna Comnena was the thirteen-year-old daughter of Emperor Alexius I when the initial group of Crusaders marched into Constantinople during the First Crusade in the late eleventh century. Later, as a woman in her forties, she wrote the Alexiad, an account of the events of her father’s reign. In describing the arrival of these warriors from the West, Anna expressed the skeptical belief that the Crusaders (or at least the knights) had come simply to “get richer” and with the “ulterior purpose… to seize the capital [Constantinople] itself.”[1]
Were the Crusades Just Wars?
This post is the second in a series about the most prevalent modern myths about the Crusades and how to refute them.
Some people find distasteful the idea that the pope exhorted and spiritually incentivized Catholic warriors to fight in the Crusades. They say the Crusades highlight the hypocrisy of Christians, who, on the one hand, profess to follow Jesus, who willingly accepted his Passion and death, and on the other, participated in and supported an armed expedition to the Holy Land. This criticism gained popular favor through the writings of the 20th-century historian Steven Runciman.
Why the Crusades Were “Glorious”
This post is the first in a series about the most prevalent modern myths about the Crusades and how to refute them.
The Crusades are one of the most misunderstood topics in Church history. Movies and TV present as established fact an outdated anti-Catholic narrative about them that stays alive by sheer repetition. Not only do secular critics of the Church use this narrative to attack Catholicism (and religion in general), but many Catholics uwittingly accept it as true.
The Saintly Crusader King
Today is the feast of St. Louis IX, king of France. Louis’s insistence on taking the cross [in December 1244] and journeying to the Holy Land was an outgrowth of his deep faith and love for Christ. He yearned to see Jerusalem under Christian control once more. His desire was so great that he was prepared to risk his personal and royal fortunes on the expedition. He was sovereign of the wealthiest region in all Christendom and the king of the most populous Christian country. There was much to lose by going on Crusade, but King St. Louis IX knew that the eternal reward greatly outweighed the temporal risk.
This an an excerpt from my book: The Glory of the Crusades
The Antipope Who Became a Saint
Today the Church celebrates the memorial of Sts. Hippolytus (170-235) and Pontian (r. 230-235)—a most interesting pair of early Christian men who were at first enemies but now share eternal glory.
In its first several centuries, the Church dealt with crises both external and internal. Externally, the Church suffered for nearly 250 years under the violent persecutions of Roman emperors, begun under mad Nero in A.D. 64 and finally stopped under Constantine in 313. Internally, the Church wrestled with heresies, schism, and matters of discipline.
Conquest, Desecration, and Phony History
Worldwide attention is focused on the crisis in Iraq as Sunni Muslim militant forces from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) sweep through the region killing and rampaging unimpeded.
A recent Washington Post article highlighted ISIS’s destruction of the purported tomb of the Old Testament prophet Jonah. The author did a good job describing ISIS’s motives (basically, if it’s not Sunni Muslim it’s bad) and correctly noted that militants destroying sacred places in the name of religion is not a new historical phenomenon. The article noted the Roman army’s destruction of the Jerusalem temple, the Nazi rampage against “degenerate art,” and the Taliban’s attack on the Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001.