Download Council of Trent The Council of Trent, which began on December 13

Council of Trent
The Council of Trent, which began on December 13, 1545, and met several times until 1563, sought to
tackle thorny issues of reform that had divided European Christians even before the protests of men like
Martin Luther. While certainly a response to the criticisms of Protestant reformers, the Council of Trent
was one in a long line of attempts to correct abuses, part of a cycle of reform that stretched back to the early
days of the Roman Catholic Church. The Council of Trent addressed key problems within the Christian
community and further galvanized the Catholic Church to combat Protestantism in the CounterReformation. Its influence was a long-lasting one; the Council confirmed and reiterated Catholic positions
on the priesthood, sacraments, and place of tradition down to the late 20th century.
Conflicts in Christianity
The abuses that brought the Church into controversy in the early 16th century had their roots in the
religious conflicts of late medieval Europe. The ravages of plague, war, and papal politics had done much
to make the laity suspicious and mistrustful of the Church. For example, from 1309 to 1377, the papacy
resided in Avignon, France, in what became known as the Avignon papacy. During that time, many
Europeans felt that the pope was inappropriately influenced by the French king, making him less impartial
and less concerned with the spiritual welfare of the flock outside of France. Likewise, the Great Schism,
which began in 1378 after the papacy moved back to Rome, eventually supplied Europe with multiple
popes, each of whom excommunicated the other and his followers. In the face of such crises, many
Christians looked less to the institutional Church and more to such alternative expressions of faith as
mysticism.
Even on the local level, the breakdown of authority helped contribute to problems, chief among them
corruption. Some priests were poorly educated and sometimes lacked enough literacy in Latin to celebrate a
mass correctly, and some communities did not have a priest at all. One of Luther's major complaints was
abuse in the sale of indulgences (purchased documents that reduced a person's time in purgatory). While an
old Christian practice and theologically acceptable to some Christians, others found the practice distasteful
and viewed it as a simplified way to salvation.
Martin Luther and the Reformation
In 1517, Luther's famous Ninety-Five Theses against the abuse of indulgences sparked a religious
controversy throughout Germany. After Pope Leo X excommunicated him, Luther found a new home and
enthusiastic patron with Frederick III, the elector of Saxony, and continued to refine his positions. Two key
points for Luther were the ideas of sola fides (Latin for "by faith alone") and sola scriptura (Latin for
"scripture alone"). The first, sola fides, meant that one needed only faith to attain salvation, a stance that did
not agree with the traditional, Catholic notion that one needed faith and good works. The second idea, sola
scriptura, held that the Bible, as the inspired word of the Christian God, was the ultimate authority in
determining any issue of faith. While Catholic theologians likewise valued the Bible for its authority, they
also emphasized a tradition of scholarship that had developed within the Church in the forms of the
writings of the Christian apologists, the pronouncements of several councils, and the decrees of the popes.
All of those sources of authority, according to Catholic tradition, had been been inspired by the Holy
Ghost.
Other Protestant reformers, like John Calvin and Ulrich Zwingli, also called into question Catholic
teachings and traditions. Many of those reformers were powerful preachers; they were often more than a
match for their Catholic opponents. The Catholic response was slow and disorganized initially, in many
ways because the Church saw nothing in the latest protests that differed radically from previous
movements, most of which it had either incorporated, like the followers of Saint Francis of Assisi, or
successfully destroyed, as it had with so many heresies. Furthermore, some princes, like Frederick,
welcomed the Protestant sects into their territories, embracing them for political reasons as much as for
spiritual ones. Once relations with Rome had been sundered, those princes could confiscate Church lands
and gain taxes that normally went to the Vatican.
There had been previous attempts to deal with the Protestant movement, but few of those had made much
headway. In 1512, for example, the Fifth Lateran Council met under Pope Julius II, but it was more
concerned with a renewed threat from conciliarists than it was with the contentions of Luther and other
Protestants. Conciliarism held that general Church councils should be the final authority for questions of
doctrine. Traditionally, Conciliarism met with stiff opposition from the papacy, which asserted that the
pope was the ultimate authority on earth.
Both Catholic and Protestant factions had called for a council to resolve their differences, but various
factors stalled such a meeting. Pope Clement VII was fearful that such a council would strengthen
conciliarists. The next pope, Paul III, succeeded in calling a council, though the location was not set for
some time thanks to fears on both sides that political geography might help one side over the other. A
compromise was Trent, an imperial city in northern Italy, but nonetheless constituting more neutral ground.
The first attempt to meet in 1542 failed because of strong opposition from Protestants, but the council
insisted on a second attempt. The council eventually met during three separate periods—1545–1547, 1551–
1552, and 1562–1563—under the leadership of three different popes.
First Conference (1545–1547)
The opening meeting, led by Pope Paul, aimed to reconcile Protestantism with Catholicism as well as
reform the Church. For example, Luther's idea of sola scriptura, that the Bible alone is the doctrinal
authority, was rejected. The council reasserted the customary position that maintained that scripture was to
be understood in light of tradition. Additionally, the council defined their doctrinal positions, not only for
those areas that Protestants attacked, but also to clarify their own beliefs. Everything from the sacraments
to the responsibilities of parish priests was discussed. In this session, the Church outlined its position on the
sacraments, rejecting Protestant views that Jesus initiated only the two sacraments of baptism and Holy
Communion. The sacraments were clearly defined and firmly established as seven: baptism, confirmation,
marriage, communion (the Eucharist), penance, ordination of priests, and extreme unction (a rite in which a
priest anoints a sick, injured, or dying person). The council also set formal decrees reaffirming the canon of
the Old Testament and New Testament, the notion of original sin, and Latin as the official language of the
Bible and mass.
Second Conference (1551–1552)
Pope Paul died on November 10, 1549, and the second meeting was held by his successor, Pope Julius III.
In this meeting, the council narrowed the definition of the sacrament of the Eucharist, the ceremony
involving the partaking of bread and wine as the representation of Jesus's body and blood. While such
Protestant reformers as Calvin and Zwingli had defined the Eucharist as a symbolic representation of
Christ, the council established the sacrament in terms of transubstantiation, the notion that the bread and
wine become the literal elements of Christ. The council also discussed the sacraments of penance and
extreme unction and issued decrees on such reforms as clerical discipline. By the last sessions of the second
meeting at Trent, several Protestant ambassadors had joined the discussions, but because of growing
threats, animosity, and war, the council was suspended for nearly a decade.
Third Conference (1562–1563)
The third meeting managed to reconvene under the leadership of Pope Pius IV. In this convocation, the
council members tackled, among other subjects, the veneration and invocation of saints, clerical education,
and the troubling issue of absentee priests and bishops. Both sides, Catholic and Protestant, reached a great
measure of agreement, in part due to a skillful papal legate named Giovanni Morone. While content that the
papacy backed the Protestant position on priestly discipline, the Protestant representatives were less
satisfied that no clear statement had been made about the direct role of the pope. Luther, for example,
believed in a "priesthood of all believers," the idea that any committed Christians, and not just anointed
priests, were special, and that one did not need a priest to hold the Eucharist. Such a view contradicted the
traditional view that clerics, and by extension the organized Church, were holier than the laity, and the only
ones capable of administering the sacraments. While not every issue discussed in this meeting was resolved
by compromise, the council managed to further cement Catholic beliefs.
A New Statement of Catholicism
The summation of Catholic doctrine formulated by the Council of Trent was published by Pope Pius as The
Catechism of the Council of Trent. The impact of the council and its definitions was profound. Many points
of contention with Protestant views had been addressed, but more than that, the council inspired the Church
with new energy for winning back the hearts and souls of European Christians. Among the agents
instrumental in that campaign, often called the Catholic or Counter-Reformation, were the Jesuits, a
number of whom had played key roles in the various sessions of the council. The division between Catholic
and Protestant Christians, however, remained. In revitalizing Catholic zeal for reform, the Council of Trent
provided a solid, universal statement of belief, one that not only helped Catholic reformers debate Church
doctrine with Protestant thinkers, but also clarified and reformed Catholic doctrine until the momentous
changes that occurred in the late 20th century with Vatican II.
Further Reading
Chemnitz, Martin. Examination of the Council of Trent. 4 vols. Trans. Fred Kramer. St. Louis, MO:
Concordia Pub. House, 2007; Fenlon, Dermot. Heresy and Obedience in Tridentine Italy: Cardinal Pole
and the Counter Reformation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972; Jedin, Hubert. A History of
the Council of Trent. Trans. Ernest Graf. St. Louis: Herder Book Co., 1957; MacCulloch, Diarmaid. The
Reformation. New York: Viking, 2004; Mullett, Michael A. The Catholic Reformation. New York:
Routledge, 1999.
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"Council of Trent." World History: The Modern Era. ABC-CLIO, 2011. Web. 14 Oct. 2011.
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