How much power can the Pope gain?

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In the Middle Ages the Papacy actually wielded significant temporal power but faced w backladh from secular power and its power stopped growing.

Could the power of the Papacy keep growing to such an extent that the Catholic clergy becomes THE dominant political force in Europe and either makes secular kings purely ceremoniał or just establishes a singular Kingdom of God in Europe?
 
"How much power can the Papacy gain"?
I'm not sure tbh. Maybe a more successful Empire of Charlemagne or Holy Roman Empire could help out with uniting Europe into one Kingdom?
The power of the Papacy could also be helped by more unsuccessful Emperors in the Popes vs Emperors time period.
 
Kick
Yes It was intentional.

I waited for someone to notice that

I imagine Europe to look like China with the Pope as equal to the Emperor and the ruling class of clergymen officials appointed by the Pope with national States being like the HRE or Indian States, weak and constanty changing.
 
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In the Middle Ages the Papacy actually wielded significant temporal power but faced w backladh from secular power and its power stopped growing.

Could the power of the Papacy keep growing to such an extent that the Catholic clergy becomes THE dominant political force in Europe and either makes secular kings purely ceremoniał or just establishes a singular Kingdom of God in Europe?
The problem is the existence and precedence of the office of Emperor. The Emperor, in theory at least, was the ultimate source of temporal authority within the Roman Empire.
So you need to make the Pope Emperor without other kings having the precedent of being granted it before or in absence of the Pope.
What you probably need is the fall of both East and West Romes, then a later Pope resurrects the title for the papacy alone in a way that all subsequently popes automatically bear the title. That way the odd king could be made co-emperor where needed and not have de jure power leave the papacy if the Pope dies while a co-emperor still lives.
 
It does not have to be an actual Papal Empire. IOTL Europe had monarchs, nobles, townsfolk and clergy all competing for power and not able to truły defeat each other. The challenge is to make Catholic clergy THE dominant power in Europe, something in between Brahmins and Confucian scholars in China.
 
It does not have to be an actual Papal Empire. IOTL Europe had monarchs, nobles, townsfolk and clergy all competing for power and not able to truły defeat each other. The challenge is to make Catholic clergy THE dominant power in Europe, something in between Brahmins and Confucian scholars in China.

Well, IRL you had many papal vassals taking power in some places. The Norman rulers of Southern Italy held their lands as fiefs of the Papacy. Likewise, Godfrey de Bouillon was 'Advocate of the Holy Sepulchre', while Bohemond and his nephew Tancred held their titles as Prince of Antioch and Prince of Galilee as fiefs of the Pope.

Perhaps expand this. Have more lands being taken over by people who then pledge fealty to the Pope, and establish a wider number of lands as within the Pope's gift to grant as fiefs?
 
Yes It was intentional.

I waited for someone to notice that

I imagine Europe to look like China with the Pope as equal to the Emperor and the ruling class of clergymen officials appointed by the Pope with national States being like the HRE or Indian States, weak and constanty changing.

Well in that case...never mind, then.
 
The problem is the existence and precedence of the office of Emperor. The Emperor, in theory at least, was the ultimate source of temporal authority within the Roman Empire.
So you need to make the Pope Emperor without other kings having the precedent of being granted it before or in absence of the Pope.
Agreed. I think what you'd want is something more like a Caliph.
You'd need to have PoDs dating back to the establishment of the pentarchy atleast, with the Emperor remaining recognised as Christ's vice recent on earth, maybe subsuming the title of Patriarch of the Church as the one of the appanages of the imperial office.
This way you'd technically have a Pope that's an emperor. Of course actual secular power of the emperor could ebb and flow, but his status as a singular, inviolable religious entity would be cemented(much like the Chinese emperor).
 
Yes It was intentional.

I waited for someone to notice that
Y'know, if your intention was for people to have a meaningful interaction with your thread with intelligent discussion about how an alt!Papacy could gain and wield more temporal power than it did in OTL, maybe don't insult the Pope in your thread title? Speaking as someone who's debated converting to Catholicism for a while now, it not only comes across as really fucking insulting to Catholics but also just makes you look utterly fucking juvenile. Regardless of someone's personal views on the Church and the Papacy, it's still a religion that's followed by millions of people worldwide and to make a shitty (pun intended) joke about their religious head is honestly really tactless.
 
Catholic too, I agree it's an uncool move, but perhaps OP just wanted the thread to be more noticeable. You're right about how it flushed the possibility of meaningful discussion down the toilet (haha) though.
 
Yep. Admittedly clickbaity title; in hindsight it was a crappy idea to call the title that. (Heh.)
In terms of meaningful discussion, I wonder if you could have more successful Islamic invasions causing the Christian polities of that time in Western Europe to rally around the Pope? Could that work?
 
Yep. Admittedly clickbaity title; in hindsight it was a crappy idea to call the title that. (Heh.)
In terms of meaningful discussion, I wonder if you could have more successful Islamic invasions causing the Christian polities of that time in Western Europe to rally around the Pope? Could that work?

Not the right time; the Papacy hadn't yet reached the apex of its own power during the first Umayyad and Abbasid strikes against Western Europe, and by the time of the Turkish invasions, the secular kingdoms were too well-established.

The sweet spot, I think, for turning the Papacy into a Christian version of the Tibetan Empire would be during the Mongol invasion--if the Holy Roman Empire and France are so catastrophically devastated that monasteries and prince-bishoprics founded after the invasion are the only games in town as far as higher civilization goes.
 
Uh, isn't this what is called dry dung fuel? So...you're asking if what, dry dung fuel is more burnable than IRL? As in we can smelt metals with them?

Move over oil and coal! Shit is the new king of fuels!
 
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