The Renaissance was a revival of pagan Roman culture, including art and architecture.
It wasn't really a revival of pagan roman culture. The Renaissance is a period where Europe rediscovered a lot of forgotten antique text sure, but the way these texts were read and interpreted was very much in-line with the time-period they were rediscovered. So while there was a growing interest for greco-roman mythology for example, most of the people who studied it didn't believe in the myths and were more interested in the way they were told, sometimes even reinterpreting or rewriting them to better fit christian eyes and virtues.
Same with art and architecture. Buildings were build with a style that tried to mimic antiquity, but they still had little in common with the ones built during antiquity. As for art, while it certainly saw a growing use of greco-roman motifs, it still had nothing in common with antique art and still had adapted along the lines brought by the previous periods of time.
However the Catholic church prematurely cut the Renaissance short, not allowing the neopagan culture to truly bloom.
How exactly can you say the Catholic Church prematurely cut the Renaissance short?
Many ecclesiastical princes were as much interested by the revival of the classics and the growing interest of antiquity as the other parts of Europe. Which isn't a surprise since many of the most powerful ecclesiastical princes came from princely families, so naturally shared the growing interests of those.
Even the Papacy wasn't immune to the move. Rome was the seat of the Pope and he did everything to embellish it according to the fashion of its time. St. Peter's cathedrals is very much a product of the Renaissance for example: it obviously lack greco-roman motifs but it's definitely a Renaissance buildling. It's also forgetting the amount of work done on the Sistine chapel during the time-period which was done by the top artists of their time...
In fact, the fact the Church became such a proeminent promoter of the Renaissance and thus showed and used its wealth so much for it probably played a part in the rise of the Reformation. Denouncing clerical wealth and criticizing the catholic clergy's mores were all the rage during the Reformation after all.
Finally, the interest in antiquity certainly didn't stop with the Renaissance. You basically had to wait the XIXth Century for the interest in antiquity to die down, precisely at the same time authors started to dive more serisously into the middle ages and rediscover it. And even then, antiquity still interested many.
I am thinking, instead of having a Protestant Reformation as an expression of built up discontent against the Catholic church, how can we have a NeoPagan Revival. As an extension of the Renaissance, with not only the aesthetic parts (art and architecture), but also the old pagan religious beliefs making a comeback. I would like to see a return of ancient Green and Roman paganism, and also Slavic, Celtic, and Nordic paganism.
It seems basically impossible and very much like a stretch. By the late 15th century (the time during which the Renaissance begins), Europe was pretty much completely converted to Christiannity. Paganism was pretty much dead and if there were pagans left, they were probably way too small in number to have an influence.
The church was also very much in control of culture, and theology at the time was among the highest and most respected disciplines of the time. So most of Europe's life revolved around the christian religion.
You have more chance to see Europe turning to Islam, and that's mostly because of the Turkic expansion in the Balkans.
The only place were a pagan revival might be possible could be Lithuania as it converted very late to Christiannity. And even then I think Lithuanian paganism died out pretty quickly once Lithuania converted... Not to mention that at the time of the Renaissance, Lithuania was in personnal union with Poland. And even taking that into account, Lithuania was more of a backwater compared to England, France, the HRE or the italian states.
The end result would be the defeat of the Catholic church in Europe, and no Protestants either.
Even admitting that a neo-pagan revival would be plausible, a "defeat" of the Catholic church seems very unlikely. Even at the height of the Reformation, the time when a good deal of prince and states turned away from Catholicism for one of the protestant denominations, the Church still enjoyed a considerable amount of support. It also underwent a Counter-Reform movement that allowed it to face the Reform: the end result was that Europe was mostly divided along the lines of a Protestant North and a Catholic South. That's not really what I call a defeat: a certain loss of influence sure, but at the same time the countries that stayed Catholic were even more aligned with the Church than they used to (even if there were still the usual oppositions between Temporal and Spiritual power).
A neo-pagan revival would most likely face the same issues the reformation did. You'd have princes who'd convert to the neo-pagan ways and other who'd stay adamantly true to Chritsian doctrines, and the Church would also undergo a movement to better fight the neo-pagans.
This would also not necessarilly prevent the advent of Protestantism. It could disminish its rise and influence, but at the same time a neo-pagan revival would also most likely increase the grievances against the catholic clergy, with the rise of neo-pagans cited as proof of their weakness and corruption.
The Renaissance continues for much longer, also inspiring Scandinavia and Russia to have their own Renaissances based on their own pagan culture.
What makes you think Scandinavia and Russia didn't undergo a Renaissance of their own?
I admit I know the history of those two regions rather poorly. However, Scandinavia had strong ties to Northern Europe, especially England, Germany and the Netherlands, countries which all were affected by the Renaissance. So it's likely the Renaissance came into Scandinavia through those contacts. Not to mention that at the time of the Reformation, Denmark and Sweden were major Protestant powers and played a huge part in the events. And if you look at Danish and Swedish art of the time, you certainly see the traces and impact of the Renaissance.
Russia was more distant and kind of a different world, but saying the Renaissance played no part in Russia seems strange for me.
What PODs would be needed for that?
As far as I can tell, the scenario seems so unlikely we border ASB territory. You need the Renaissance to not just be a growing interest in antiquity but to also have a religious impact, a questionning of chrsitiannity's dominance in Europe and inspire a revival of pagan religions. With the cars we're dealt with... I don't see a POD that makes this works outside of a Fantasy scenario. Or going back long before the Renaissance, which kinda defeats the purpose.
