Modern Times
By 1500, the Catholic Church had reached an apparently dominant position as the established religious authority in western and central Europe dominating a faith-landscape in which Judaism, Waldensianism, Hussitism, Lollardry and the finally conquered Muslims al-Andalus (the Muslim-dominated Spain) hardly figured in terms of numbers or influence. When the institutions of the Church felt themselves threatened by what they perceived as the heresy, and then schism of the Protestant Reformation, they reacted. Paul III (Pope from 1534 to 1549) established a system of tribunals, administered by the "Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Universal Inquisition", and staffed by cardinals and other Church officials. This system would later become known as the Roman Inquisition. In 1908 Pope Saint Pius X renamed the organisation: it became the "Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office". This in its turn became the "Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith" in 1965, which name continues to this day.
Read more about this topic: Inquisition
Famous quotes containing the words modern and/or times:
“A more problematic example is the parallel between the increasingly abstract and insubstantial picture of the physical universe which modern physics has given us and the popularity of abstract and non-representational forms of art and poetry. In each case the representation of reality is increasingly removed from the picture which is immediately presented to us by our senses.”
—Harvey Brooks (b. 1915)
“Times go by turns, and chances change by course,
From foul to fair, from better hap to worse.
The sea of Fortune doth not ever flow,
She draws her favours to the lowest ebb;
Her tides have equal times to come and go,
Her loom doth weave the fine and Coarsest web;”
—Robert Southwell (1561?–1595)