AHC WI:Protestant Italy
- Thread starter Pericles
- Start date
You can't do this with the Pope in Rome. Maybe the Popes could be kept in Avignon, making the Italians resentful.
Sorry. i don't want to seem rude. But why choosing such an obviously impossible alternate history ?
There are a hundred times as much possibility to have the USA or the UK or north and east Germany become or remain catholic as :
- to have Italy or Spain become protestant,
- or to have Saudi Arabia or Iran becoming protestant, jewish or catholic with a POD in 1979.
There are a hundred times as much possibility to have the USA or the UK or north and east Germany become or remain catholic as :
- to have Italy or Spain become protestant,
- or to have Saudi Arabia or Iran becoming protestant, jewish or catholic with a POD in 1979.
Will Kürlich Kerl
Banned
Another Western Schism, and then the Reformation happens. A divided papacy isn't as strong as a unified papacy.
Will Kürlich Kerl
Banned
This is not ASB. Especially since the only restraint is BEFORE 1600, so you can have many PODs that change Italy into a Reformation-loving region.
That's the problem though. Even with the Popes flagrantly breaking their clerical vows, which happened all the time, pre-1600 Italy is fanatically loyal to the Holy See, because the history of the Church begins in Rome.
I suppose you could fracture the Apostles. I seem to recall a disagreement between Peter and Paul over whether or not to preach to the Gentiles.
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Exactly this. Unless the POD in in like the 1st century AD, which would butterfly the Protestant Reformation, among other things, I can't see who this is possible. Four countries that would NEVER be majority protestant are Italy, France, Spain and Portugal. And thats a fact.
Yeah, breaking the cohesion of the Apostles would completely alter the history of the Church.
Maybe a few small breakaway Protestant-minded mini-countries and city states eventually get tolerated under the condition that they don't proselitize and that their rulers are kept on a tight leash ?
There are OTL examples of domestic Italian Catholic heresies/splinter movements and even actual Italian Protestant churches/movements, though they had to face persecution/ostracization until relatively recently.
There are OTL examples of domestic Italian Catholic heresies/splinter movements and even actual Italian Protestant churches/movements, though they had to face persecution/ostracization until relatively recently.
That's why I suggested keeping the papacy in Avignon, to make the church become un-Italian. Italy would still be a stretch, but if the Avignonese Church is in total collapse, it could possibly lose everything but France.
Actually France did have a large Protestant minority IOTL, and with the right circumstances it's very possible to make France majority Protestant.
No it didn't. 15-20% of the population was Protestant yes, but the majority of those were Nobles, not commoners. The commoners would NEVER accept a Protestant King, nor would the Catholic Nobles. There's a reason that Henri IV had to convert.
How exactly is 20% not a large minority?
And their were many Protestant commoners (a country Frances size can NOT have a population where over 5% of the population are part of the Nobility), indeed large areas of Southern France had local majorities.
It's more likely that their would end-up simply being multiple Popes with a Tuscan backed one ending up the Italian Pope.
True 20% is a large part of the populace, I already conceded that. However, I remember learning in school that there was a much higher percentage of Nobles who were Protestant then commoners who were Protestant. Also I noticed that you didn't depute me when I pointed out Henri IV's conversion was necessary.