WI: no protestant reformation, reform through secularization

So i know this could bring up some heated debate but i find this is a really interesting topic. i have already looked for other threads on it but found nothing. this was very much inspired by the son of Aragon timeline with the reformed Catholics of England and Denmark though with a twist for this.
the main question is what if the protestant reformation never really kicked off rather remaining a debate about reform of some of the church practices never really see such radicalization that both the Catholics and protestants saw.
POD:
i am thinking of two possibly three pods one is much less likely than the other so i will start with that first.
pod 1:
A theologian or priest in a similar manner of Luther or the like minded such as Calvin sees a need for change so proposes such a plan one that dictates the separation of church from governance. this ties into the view that kings are the appointed temporal rulers not the church however, this would be a two way street and the opposite applies to rulers to a certain degree as they would be expected to defend the church in their respective nation.
Pod 2:
we know that there have been times where the college has taken time to decide on a new pope in some cases years. so what if good old Julius holds on for a few more years so when he kicks it is right around the time Luther posts his arguments so with the pope dying just before the ball starts rolling the talk of reform stifles the elections leading to an inability to choose a successor so without a central authority there isn't really the protestants to demonize nor is there any central authority too act as an opposing force.
possible pod:
what if in a similar manner mentioned in the son of Aragon? the temporal princes begin trying too reform the church removing possibly "corrupt" monasteries?

i would assume that if a secularist option was proposed the princes would take it as it would allow them to cut a lot of the influence the pope has in their realm. removing a lot of their grievances they had and without a central authority to argue it much wouldn't stop it.
i believe that these early changes and reforms would break the back of a lot of arguments that the protestants made leading too few actual doctrinal changes and would ensure that neither side of the debate could radicalize. such as the counter reformation and the stifling of scientific funding the church regularly supported before the reformation.

if anybody got good ideas or disagree would love to hear and debate
 
Reform through secularization is highly unlikely because secularization was an entirely unintended product of reformation that came about because various Christian confessions including the Catholic Tridentine church couldn't agree on a religious interpretation of society.
Luther would have been appalled at secularization because it was the opposite of what he was trying to achieve:
He wanted a pure and reformed Christian church and he viewed the secular princes / rulers as a means of removing the Pope and forcibly reforming the church.
He definitely didn't advocate for a permanent secularization of society. In fact the modern(present day) world would be unfathomable and frightening to a medieval mind.
Protestant Were also against unrestricted democracy, but Luther's sola scriptura principle eventually made it necessary!
Absolute, undeniable cataclysm of Thirty Years War made both sides aware that a new modus vivendi was necessary hence toleration and eventually secularization!

In fact I'm currently writing a theses on the Reformation as the turning point between Medieval Period and Early Modern Period, which deals amongst other things with the process of secularization!
Can I get back to you in about two months?
In the mean time here is some literature:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0674088050/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_5
https://www.amazon.co.uk/European-C...d=1540812969&sr=1-3&keywords=Heinz++Schilling
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1107643570/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_2
 
Reform through secularization is highly unlikely because secularization was an entirely unintended product of reformation that came about because various Christian confessions including the Catholic Tridentine church couldn't agree on a religious interpretation of society.
Luther would have been appalled at secularization because it was the opposite of what he was trying to achieve:
He wanted a pure and reformed Christian church and he viewed the secular princes / rulers as a means of removing the Pope and forcibly reforming the church.
He definitely didn't advocate for a permanent secularization of society. In fact the modern(present day) world would be unfathomable and frightening to a medieval mind.
Protestant Were also against unrestricted democracy, but Luther's sola scriptura principle eventually made it necessary!
Absolute, undeniable cataclysm of Thirty Years War made both sides aware that a new modus vivendi was necessary hence toleration and eventually secularization!

In fact I'm currently writing a theses on the Reformation as the turning point between Medieval Period and Early Modern Period, which deals amongst other things with the process of secularization!
Can I get back to you in about two months?
In the mean time here is some literature:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0674088050/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_5
https://www.amazon.co.uk/European-C...d=1540812969&sr=1-3&keywords=Heinz++Schilling
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1107643570/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_2
nice well thanks for the info.
though my mentioning of Luther wasn't in the sense of him actually saying that just a theologian that could propose such ideas at the time of reform while the church was in a weakened state. sorry should of clarified that, my English can be faulty at times
though from how you describe it would not really help as it being viewed in such a negative manner. I also wasn't thinking any form of democracy being in affect that didn't really cross my thoughts, my main point was if the churches ability to really screw with the princes was removed therefore less of a want too back the core reformists that want the more extreme views. though i do have a bit of bias being slightly monarchist so sorry if that came across.

though this leaves me with another question what would the princes view on a church more removed from temporal affairs not so much theirs from spiritual ones?
anyways thanks for the cool info. food for thought
 

Skallagrim

Banned
I think that a POD that late presents certain problems. Once the ball gets rolling, it's difficult to stop. A better POD would be that some internal crisis causes a faction within the Church to advocate for reform and gain (relative) clout. If you then contrive a circumstance where some leading figures among those opposed get killed off, you've paved the way for the reformers to gain the upper hand. At the next conclave, their man gets elected Pope. (The obvious way to get rid of the reactionaries is to have them hold a gathering and have a local epidemic break out and kill a lot of them-- that's not exactly unrealistic, considering what the bubonic plague wrought in Naples shortly before.) If you go with that POD, the "Reformation" was we know it never even becomes an idea to be considered. Instead, would-be reformers would split off from the Church in OTL would flock to the banner of the internal reformist faction.

At that point, we do get to a somewhat tricky matter. Namely: what would those reformers actually be advocating? Well... it wouldn't be OTL Protestantism. There would be some shared points of concern, but this would be about terminating the corruption ("the rot") within the Church. It would very definitely not be about overhauling core doctrines. In a general sense, the Church already had two strains within it that later combined and evolved to form the nexus of Protestantism.

One of those strains was a pietism that rejected materialism and worldly corruption. An early proponent was Joachim of Fiore. A proponent closer to the reformation was Girolama Savonarola. The Church opposed Savonarola's radicalism, however, and not without reason. This leads me to think that in the case of internal reform, you would see the reformers stressing the Church's spiritual role and advocating a withdrawal from worldly politics, but you would not see any ardently anti-materialist (quasi-Gnostic) "bonfire of the vanities".

The other strain was also concerned about the Church's role in temporal politics, but approached it from the angle of the two kingdoms doctrine of Saint Augustine. This had also been brought up in the context of the investiture controversy, and was often argued by those who sided with the Emperor against the Pope (when it came to worldly supremacy). Again, one should not expect a radical about-face where the reforms lead the Pope to recognise the worldly Emperor as his political superior. Rather, the aforementionec spiritual re-orientation of the Church would handily fit together with a Church that is less involved in politics. This could lead to a new "agreement" between Pope and Emperor, where the Pope agrees not to be too involved, and the Emperor agrees to pay lip service to the Pope('s higher standing). An obvious proponent of exactly that was Dante Alighieri, especially in De Monarchia.

In OTL, the Reformation combined both those strains of thought, strengthened them and took them out of their historical context, leading to a situation where kings began instituting state churches over which they presided, while the notion of pietism and anti-materialism grew more radical and anti-hierarchical than it had ever been (in some cases grotesquely so). This would not happen in the ATL we are looking it. It would be a far more moderate affair, where the established hierarchies stay in place, but certain priorities shift... and gradually, certain powers shift as well. At the same time, the real issue (rampant corruption) would be handled as well.

All this would make it far less likely for worldly monarchs to attack the Church. Their major grievances would be addressed at least in part, and they would be far more keenly aware of the advantages of the existing order. After all... they do derive their divine right to rule from the Church. Focusing their hotility on the monasteries is particularly unlikely, since the reformist faction in the Church would almost inveriable be rather monastic. In a Catholic context, they'd be contrastic the learned and spiritual monastic life with the corruption of (too much) involvement in worldly politics. The post-reform Church would be more monastic than ever. And that would be a good thing for science, since a lot of the Church's contributions to science came out of the monasteries.

Interestingly, that brings us to a more realistic path by which we can arrive at secularisation. Just as you say, the absence of radicalisation would preserve the intellectual mindset of the pre-Reformation Catholic Church: one that was quite open-minded and tolerant (moreso, in any case, than virtually all secular authorities). Over time, this would simply lead to discoveries that would lead to ever more questions... and, quite possibly, a growing attitude of reserved skepticism about a great many issues. I'm not saying the Church would become agnostic, but without the radicalisation we saw in OTL, it might just drift a bit in that direction. In fact, that might happen just in time to co-incide with OTL's Enlightenment. It would just be a slow, gradual dawning, rather than all the flash and fury of OTL.
 
I think that a POD that late presents certain problems. Once the ball gets rolling, it's difficult to stop. A better POD would be that some internal crisis causes a faction within the Church to advocate for reform and gain (relative) clout. If you then contrive a circumstance where some leading figures among those opposed get killed off, you've paved the way for the reformers to gain the upper hand. At the next conclave, their man gets elected Pope. (The obvious way to get rid of the reactionaries is to have them hold a gathering and have a local epidemic break out and kill a lot of them-- that's not exactly unrealistic, considering what the bubonic plague wrought in Naples shortly before.) If you go with that POD, the "Reformation" was we know it never even becomes an idea to be considered. Instead, would-be reformers would split off from the Church in OTL would flock to the banner of the internal reformist faction.

At that point, we do get to a somewhat tricky matter. Namely: what would those reformers actually be advocating? Well... it wouldn't be OTL Protestantism. There would be some shared points of concern, but this would be about terminating the corruption ("the rot") within the Church. It would very definitely not be about overhauling core doctrines. In a general sense, the Church already had two strains within it that later combined and evolved to form the nexus of Protestantism.

One of those strains was a pietism that rejected materialism and worldly corruption. An early proponent was Joachim of Fiore. A proponent closer to the reformation was Girolama Savonarola. The Church opposed Savonarola's radicalism, however, and not without reason. This leads me to think that in the case of internal reform, you would see the reformers stressing the Church's spiritual role and advocating a withdrawal from worldly politics, but you would not see any ardently anti-materialist (quasi-Gnostic) "bonfire of the vanities".

The other strain was also concerned about the Church's role in temporal politics, but approached it from the angle of the two kingdoms doctrine of Saint Augustine. This had also been brought up in the context of the investiture controversy, and was often argued by those who sided with the Emperor against the Pope (when it came to worldly supremacy). Again, one should not expect a radical about-face where the reforms lead the Pope to recognise the worldly Emperor as his political superior. Rather, the aforementionec spiritual re-orientation of the Church would handily fit together with a Church that is less involved in politics. This could lead to a new "agreement" between Pope and Emperor, where the Pope agrees not to be too involved, and the Emperor agrees to pay lip service to the Pope('s higher standing). An obvious proponent of exactly that was Dante Alighieri, especially in De Monarchia.

In OTL, the Reformation combined both those strains of thought, strengthened them and took them out of their historical context, leading to a situation where kings began instituting state churches over which they presided, while the notion of pietism and anti-materialism grew more radical and anti-hierarchical than it had ever been (in some cases grotesquely so). This would not happen in the ATL we are looking it. It would be a far more moderate affair, where the established hierarchies stay in place, but certain priorities shift... and gradually, certain powers shift as well. At the same time, the real issue (rampant corruption) would be handled as well.

All this would make it far less likely for worldly monarchs to attack the Church. Their major grievances would be addressed at least in part, and they would be far more keenly aware of the advantages of the existing order. After all... they do derive their divine right to rule from the Church. Focusing their hotility on the monasteries is particularly unlikely, since the reformist faction in the Church would almost inveriable be rather monastic. In a Catholic context, they'd be contrastic the learned and spiritual monastic life with the corruption of (too much) involvement in worldly politics. The post-reform Church would be more monastic than ever. And that would be a good thing for science, since a lot of the Church's contributions to science came out of the monasteries.

Interestingly, that brings us to a more realistic path by which we can arrive at secularisation. Just as you say, the absence of radicalisation would preserve the intellectual mindset of the pre-Reformation Catholic Church: one that was quite open-minded and tolerant (moreso, in any case, than virtually all secular authorities). Over time, this would simply lead to discoveries that would lead to ever more questions... and, quite possibly, a growing attitude of reserved skepticism about a great many issues. I'm not saying the Church would become agnostic, but without the radicalisation we saw in OTL, it might just drift a bit in that direction. In fact, that might happen just in time to co-incide with OTL's Enlightenment. It would just be a slow, gradual dawning, rather than all the flash and fury of OTL.
i do agree with your statement and think that would be a far better pod.
what do you think the effects of such a change on the modern world have? could it be more monarchist and pro science?
also i do have a question about the approach the world views take as would it not be possible that science in the ATL be more integrated into theology and a much less atheistic world. while the church itself my be more agnostic would if also be much more of a religious world without the stigma of radicalisation. What effect would a world without that religious divide in Europe and would there be any more reformist agendas like allowing priests too marry such as in east orthodoxy?
 
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