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Source & Credit: Google Knol
By Zia H. Shah, MD | Upstate, NY
This is a smart move!
Recent violation of Minarets in Switzerland is a clear violation of this golden principle and also of religious freedoms.
I have developed another knol that covers some of these issues: [read here]
Those
who are not convinced of the wisdom of this separation may do well to
read the history of the First Crusade. It was initiated by Pope Urban
II, to consolidate his internal reign rather than any higher noble
cause. Needless to say that he caused great number of casualties on
both sides. I will gradually illustrate this here beyond doubt. For
now let me just quote Encyclopedia Britannica to give you a glimpse of
this:
"Urban II head of the Roman Catholic church (1088–99) who developed ecclesiastical reforms begun by Pope Gregory VII, launched the Crusade movement, and strengthened the papacy as a political entity.
...
Urban’s pontificate not only led to a further centralization of the Roman Catholic church but also to the expansion of papal administration; it contributed to the development of the Roman Curia, the administrative body of the papacy, and to the gradual formation of the College of Cardinals. The term Curia Romana first appeared in a bull written by Urban in 1089."[1]
Pope
Urban II (1088-1099) was responsible for assisting Emperor Alexus I
(1081-1118) of Constantinople in launching the first crusade. He made
one of the most influential speeches in the Middle Ages, calling on
Christian princes in Europe to go on a crusade to rescue the Holy Land
from the Turks. In the speech given at the Council of Clermont in
France, on November 27, 1095, he combined the ideas of making a
pilgrimage to the Holy Land with that of waging a holy war against
infidels.[2]
August Charles Krey describes the first crusade in these words:
"Some of our men (and this was more merciful) cut off the heads of their enemies; others shot them with arrows, so that they fell from the towers; others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames. Piles of heads, hands, and feet were to be seen in the streets of the city. It was necessary to pick one's way over the bodies of men and horses. But these were small matters compared to what happened at the Temple of Solomon, a place where religious services are ordinarily chanted. What happened there? If I tell the truth, it will exceed your powers of belief. So let it suffice to say this much, at least, that in the Temple and porch of Solomon, men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins."[3]
The purpose and true cause of the crusade in the words of the Encyclopedia Britannica:
"The essential reason of Urban II.'s action, and consequently the true cause of the crusade, was the ambition of the pope to unite with Rome and the Roman Church the Churches of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria and even Constantinople, which the Greek schism had rendered independent. This thought had already crossed the minds of Leo IX. and Gregory VII., but circumstances had never allowed them to put it into execution. Armed by the reformation with a moral authority which made it possible to concentrate the forces of the West under the supreme direction of the Church and its leaders, Urban II. addressed himself with his customary decision to the execution of this enormous enterprise. With him, as with all his successors, the idea of a collective expedition of Europe for the recovery of the Holy Places was always associated with the sanguine hope of extinguishing the schism at Constantinople, its very centre, by the substitution of a Latin for a Byzantine domination. Of these two objects, he was only to realize the former; but the crusade may well be said to have been his own work. He created it and preached it; he organized it, dominated it, and constantly supervised it. He was ever ready to act, either personally or through his delegates, and never ceased to be the effective leader of all the feudal soldiers he enrolled under the banner of the Holy See. He corresponded regularly with his legates and with the military leaders, who kept him accurately informed of the position of the troops and the progress of the operations. He acted as intermediary between the soldiers of Christ and their brothers who remained in Europe, announcing successes, organizing fresh expeditions, and spurring the laggards to take the road to Jerusalem."[4]
Wikipedia states under the term Concordat of Worms:
"Gregory VII appeared to have succeeded when the emperor Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor was humiliated at Canossa in 1077. There, Henry begged in the snow to be let back into the good graces of the Church, having been excommunicated the year before by Gregory. The penitent and humbled emperor did not remain in that state. Soon Henry IV took his revenge. He named his own pope Antipope Clement III in the old manner of the Holy Roman Emperors. Pope Urban II, more prudent than Gregory sidestepped the issue using a Crusade to gather Christian Europe together under his authority."
Here Wikipedia is referring to the book, A History of Medieval Europe: From Constantine to Saint Louis by R. H. C. Davis.
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References
- "Urban II." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 06 Jan. 2010
ca.com/EBchecked/top ic/619378/Urban-II>. - A History of the Christian Church, 4th ed., edited by Williston Walker, Richard A. Norris, David W. Lotz, and Robert T. Handy (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1985), p. 284.
- August Charles Krey. The first crusade: the accounts of eye-witnesses and participants. LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1921. Page 261.
- The Encyclopedia Britannica: a dictionary of arts, sciences, 1911. Under the heading Papacy, Edited by Hugh Chisholm. Page 692.
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Read here: Separation of Church and State
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