WHI- Chap20-Obj5
Discuss the role of Christian religion in the lives of the people during the High Middle Ages. Christianity was very influential during the high middle ages. Roman Catholic Christianity guided European ideas on religious, moral, and ethical matters. Birth, marriage, and death rituals were taken from and administered by the Roman Catholic church. Art, literature, and music also were heavily influenced by Christian themes, such as doctrines and stories. There were churches and cathedals all over Europe. Bishops and archbishops in France and Italy began to organize schools in the early eleventh century, such as the schools in cathedrals of Paris, Chartres, and Bologna. So Christianity had a great role with the starting of schools in Europe. Rituals were appealing to the common people of Europe, and sacraments were very important. The catholic church recognized baptism, matrimony, penance, and Eucharist as sacraments. Popular religion also included devotion to saints, the most popular of whom was the Virgin Mary. Many Christians also underwent pilgrimages, to places like Rome, and Compostela, in Spain, and some even to Jerusalem. Reform movements such as the Franciscans and the Dominicans and the non-catholic Cathars came about to change Roman Christianity, or in some cases, abolish it. And then, of course, Christianity is the reason for the Crusades, and Christian expansion, which rocked Europe.
