Hill Spring International School
Integrated Social Studies
2023-24
Name: Grade:
Date: Team Project Activity Reflection
Task: Fill in the reflection according to the activity you were involved in.
The Renaissance aimed to restore church practice closer to the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. These
changes in thinking led to the Reformation – a challenge to the established Christian church in western Europe.
The Reformation is also known as the Protestant Reformation movement.
Background of the Protestant Reformation
The Renaissance led to a renewed interest in the works of writers from the days of ancient Greece and the
Roman Empire. Their works inspired a new philosophy known as humanism – the beliefs that humans were in
control of their own destinies. Humanism arose during a time when there was growing discontent in the western
Christian church over the way the church was run.
In 1517 Martin Luther, a monk protested publicly by nailing 95 theses against the sales of indulgences (pardons
for sins) on a church door in Wittenberg, Germany. He was protesting against what he saw as the church’s
theological corruption and called for reform. This is where the Reformation is said to have truly begun.
How did the Reformation Movement spread?
The new technology of printing further helped spread the ideas of the Reformation. The Bible, which had
previously been available only in Latin, the language of scholars, was translated into local languages for all to
read. Some rulers used the ensuing discontent to further their own agenda. For example, Henry VIII of England
wanted his marriage to Catherine of Aragon dissolved. He asked the Pope for a divorce. But Catherine was the
daughter of King Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella I of Castille, the rulers of Spain
Not wanting to antagonise the powerful Spanish throne by any means, the Pope refused to dissolve the marriage
between Catherine and Henry VIII. Henry VIII decided to break with the church in Rome as a means to grant
himself the divorce and formed the Church of England centred around Protestant beliefs although he was no
supporter of it. Other rulers of European kingdoms such as Sweden and the Netherlands also embraced
Protestant ideals in order to minimise the influence of the Catholic Church in their respective countries.
The Counter-Reformation
From 1545, the Catholic Church fought back with a movement of its own – the Counter-Reformation, sending
out Jesuit priests to campaign against the spread of Protestantism and convert the populations of the Spanish
Empire in the Americas. The split between Christians in western Europe led to wars as countries struggled with
new religious alliances.
One of these was the Thirty Year’s War beginning in 1618. The conflict was fought between an alliance of
Catholic Countries such as Spain and the Holy Roman Empire against an alliance of Protestant countries such
as the Netherlands, Sweden. France, although being a catholic power, joined with the Protestant alliances as it
felt that the Spanish empire was getting too powerful on the European continent and sought to curb it. The war
ended with the signing of the treaty of Westphalia in 1648, which resulted in territorial gains for the Protestant
alliance.
The year 1648 is considered to be the end of the Reformation period as now the focus of European monarchies
(and future wars) returned to dynastic politics instead of religious ones.
Catholics and Protestants persecuted one another in their own way. As religious disputes in Europe continued in
the 1600s, some people left Europe and sought religious freedom in the new world of America.
During the Counter-Reformation era, the Catholic Church grew more literate, spiritual and educated. New
religious orders combined rigorous spiritual with a globally-minded intellectualism
Legacy of the Reformation
Along with the religious consequences of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation came deep and lasting
political changes. Northern Europe’s new religious and political freedoms came at a great cost, with decades of
rebellions, wars and bloody persecutions.
But the Reformation’s positive repercussions can be seen in the intellectual and cultural flourishing it inspired
on all sides of the schism—in the strengthened universities of Europe.
