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The Transformation of the European Mind
An excerpt from a book review by Karen Armstrong of The Reformation by Diarmaid MacCulloch "Despite its many achievements, the Reformation was rooted in fear and distress. There were violent repudiations of the past, bitter condemnations and a terror of theological deviation. This last has left a difficult religious legacy. During the Reformation, doctrinal orthodoxy became more important than ever before. People were beginning to apply the rational and logical standards of the new scientific revolution to their religion and to lose the ability to think mythically. In the pre-modern world, for example, a religious symbol was experienced mystically as one with the divine reality to which it pointed. By the 16th century, however, some claimed that the Eucharist was only a symbol, and that the body of Christ was not actually present in the ceremony. Hitherto, in common with Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus, Christians had relished highly allegorical interpretations of Scripture, but now they were beginning to read their Bible literally, for factual information, in a way that was alien to the text. People were learning to think differently. Old ideas now seemed untenable, and fresh conceptions of religious truth were urgently required. This was exhilarating, but also frightening. The struggle to assimilate new habits of mind pushed theology to the fore. Increasingly, Western Christians would come to equate faith with belief in official doctrine. Even though Luther did not see faith in this way, an obsession with intellectual conformity would become one of the legacies of the Reformation and is peculiar to reformed Christianity. In traditions such as Judaism, Islam or Buddhism, religion is not about believing obligatory propositions but about behaving differently."
Copyright © 2005 St. Augustine by-the-Sea
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