Was the late medieval Catholic Church unable or unwilling to reform itself?

‘Reformation’ or reformatio was a key phrase of the later medieval period (defined here as
roughly 1300-1500), from the beginning of the second Council of Lyons in 1274 and the
Council of Vienna (1311-1312). The term originally meant the redrafting of laws or statutes,
in the context of civic law codes, university curricula or canon law. It also had a second
definition, used by philosophers: the ‘form’ of something meant the essential, unchanging
quality common to all the various ways in which something could exist. Therefore, to ‘re-
form’ something was to restore it to its original essence.1 Both of these definitions are very
apt to describe the long-planned reformation of the Catholic Church, which encompassed
both the clergy and the laity: reformation was essential to redraft the Church’s laws and bring
clarity to disputed issues.2 It was also essential to restore the Church to conformity with
heaven—usually, this meant restoring the Church to an earlier, uncorrupted form (writers
during the Schism called it the ‘Apostolic Age’). In this sense, ‘reform’ could be both
conservative and idealistic, hence, potentially entirely unachievable.3 This meant that while
the Church was willing to reform itself in some way, it was unable to because reform, as
envisaged by idealists, was impossible. A variety of factors contributed to making this
idealised reform impossible, chief of which was self-interest. Other factors also contributed
such as the practical limitations of Church policies and the presence (or lack thereof) of a
significant rival to the Papacy.

Chiefly, but not exclusively, a wholesale, idealistic reform of the Church was virtually
impossible because of powerful and competing interests within the Curia. For instance, true
reform demanded the severe reduction of papal authority and episcopal appointments to
reduce the various vices that often came with it: pluralism (accumulation of several benefices
in the hands of one man) and non-residence (not residing in a parish when one has the care of
souls).4 The development of conciliar theory during the Schism (a period of instability when
several Popes contended for power and no single one ruled), spearheaded by French
theologians Pierre d’Ailly (1350-1420) and Jean Gerson (1363-1429), marked the first major
attempt to fulfil these demands. Conciliarism stated that a general council of the Church had
greater authority than the Pope and could if necessary depose him. This was following a new
theory on reform by ‘head and limbs’, with the biological analogy meaning that the role of
‘head’ passed to the council fathers. Indeed, Gerson in the De materia concilii generalis
argued that the Catholic Church’s supreme authority must rest with a general council and not
with the Pope. This was developed by d’Ailly who maintained that bishops and priests
received their authority and jurisdiction directly from Christ and not through the Pope.5 This
greatly contributed to diluting a chief obstacle in the way of reform and led to several further
developments. The Council of Constance (convened in 1414) succeeded in restricting papal
control by issuing the decree Sacrosancta which declared Church councils to be superior to
popes. On this basis, it forced the contending popes of the schism and elected a new pope in
their stead. Significantly, this granted the councils superior authority to the Pope and enabled
the fathers of Constance to promulgate the decree Frequens which laid the foundation for
1
Euan Cameron, The European Reformation, Second Edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), p. 44.
2
Bernard M. G. Reardon, Religious Thought in the Reformation, Second edition (London: Routledge, 2013), p.
281.
3
Euan Cameron, The European Reformation, Second Edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), p. 44.
4
Francis Oakley, The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church, 1300-1870 (Oxford ; New
York: Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 25.
5
Bernard M. G. Reardon, Religious Thought in the Reformation, Second edition (London: Routledge, 2013), p.
9.
ensuring administrative and moral reforms by mandating regular councils. This was short-
lived as the Papacy under Pius II seized back papal control through the decree Execrabilis in
1460, which asserted pre-conciliar arguments for Peter’s primacy within the Church, thereby
justifying the plenitude of Papal power. The decree Execrabilis was therefore highly
significant as it marked an end to the conciliar theory of governance, which then faded into
an obscure theoretical concept until the Council of Pisa.6 This meant that successive Popes
could stall and evade demands for a council, preventing their power from being undercut in
the resulting reforms. This also exposes the inherent fragility of the conciliar theory: it only
emerged in the chaos of the Schism and rapidly faded with growing Papal strength.
Therefore, reform failed in the late medieval period because the Pope, on whom reformation
was dependent, was reluctant to oversee it.

Where the Popes did sluggishly conduct some reforms, further symptoms of self-interest are
seen limiting them, beyond the Pope’s concerns. This is seen in the reform programmes
carried out in the years following 1449. These proposals were piecemeal approaches limited
in scale and effectiveness by various competing self-interests within the Church. For instance,
Pope Alexander VI appointed a reform commission in 1497 during which corrupt offices
were renounced by high-ranking cardinals such as Carafa and Piccolomini. Julius II created a
commission to discuss reforming the Curia. These attempts all reveal a somewhat belated, but
genuine, will in the Church for reform. Yet, they were all tarnished by self-interest:
Alexander VI’s proposals were ignored after being diluted in committees, while Julius II
appointed members of the threatened positions to the commissions intended to reform them.
These two instances reveal the pattern of Papal reform in the absence of a strong general
council, such as the Council of Constance: an abuse is identified and a solution proposed, but
quickly watered down and eventually forgotten as the Pope appeases the opposition. This
suggests that self-interest was a systematic structural weakness that the general councils had
mitigated: after the decree Execrabilis, the Church became unable to launch a strong reform
program to a degree of success.7

Another structural weakness, also related to self-interest, was the system of ‘benefices’,
which both prevented and caused further reform as an issue in itself. Its flaw is seen in its
etymology involving a conflation of government authority and proprietary rights. As
benefices related to ecclesiastical offices, this suggests that the distinction between the office
itself and the ownership of property became blurred. This undermined reform by contributing
to unsavoury practices such as absenteeism: cardinals who were becoming increasingly
Italian by the end of the 15th century for instance saw little point in living in the location of
their benefices when they could simply stay in Rome and accumulate wealth from those
benefices located both within and outside Italy. Since government authority was equated to
property, the cardinals ran little risk of losing the office and regarded their office as a source
of income rather than an area of duty.8 Indeed, as late as 1560, 70 Italian bishops resided in
Rome rather than in their appointed see.9 Not only was this absenteeism, but self-interest
meant that these cardinals defended their practices, actively undermining the Church’s ability
to reform itself. The issue of benefices would only be addressed at the Council of Trent

6
Steven E. Ozment, The Age of Reform, 1250 - 1550: An Intellectual and Religious History of Late Medieval and
Reformation Europe, 12. [pr.] (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1980), pp. 398–99.
7
Euan Cameron, The European Reformation, Second Edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), p. 46.
8
Francis Oakley, The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church, 1300-1870 (Oxford ; New
York: Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 24.
9
Steven E. Ozment, The Age of Reform, 1250 - 1550: An Intellectual and Religious History of Late Medieval and
Reformation Europe, 12. [pr.] (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1980), pp. 399–400.
(1545-1563) and even then it would be tolerated indicating that the problem was exacerbated
by the Pope’s corruption and obsession with maintaining his Papal powers.10

Outside of the Curia, self-interest still posed problems to the Catholic Reformation as
individual interests collided, often according to population divisions, hindering the reform
movement. This can be seen in late medieval Strasbourg, which made several attempts at
Catholic reform to restrict the property of the Church. In 1471, the city fathers decreed that
nuns (often rich heiresses) could only have a life interest in their inheritances, most of which
reverted to the city when they died. However, some secular priests bought from the city the
right to leave property by will to prevent it from lapsing into the bishop’s control and used
the right to leave property to monasteries. In this instance, self-interest prompted a refusal to
accept the reforms on Church property. Another instance of self-interest is found in the
attitude of lay rulers towards the Church. Lay rulers felt that the Church was their church and
they needed to protect their investments in it. This meant that, while small reforms were
accepted, anything radical was staunchly opposed by most secular rulers. This suggests that
the Church was simply too valuable for most investors to risk experimenting with. Both of
these indicate an unwillingness and inability to reform the Church due to conflicting and
powerful interests.11

Impracticalities and unforeseen consequences could hinder the Catholic Reform movement.
Two examples show this. Firstly, the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 stipulated diocesan
synods and episcopal visitations at fixed intervals as part of reforms. These intervals, in
practice, were too close together for a large see and demanded too much from the bishop of a
small and poor see. This reveals another fundamental problem with medieval reform efforts:
Church governance was too large and too centralised, so even when the reforming will was
present, Rome was unable to apply this to produce an individual settlement for every see.12
Secondly, in the 15th century, reformed Catholic ‘congregations of strict observance’ were
formed, consisting of reformed houses grouped to oversee each other.13 While seemingly a
benefit for Catholic reformation, the constant expansion of these congregations as they took
over derelict or ill-disciplined monasteries created large problems such as the diversion and
misappropriation of monastic endowments; the hierarchy created; and the issues of such a
large number of members such as purity being undermined by ill-disciplined members. Both
of these examples demonstrate the risk involved with the Catholic Reformation: a lack of
information in Rome could cause unforeseen and problematic consequences for the Church,
undermining the ability to adequately reform.

There was an absence of pressure on the Church since no powerful and persuasive rival had
appeared during the 15th century: reformed alternatives such as Anglicanism, Calvinism and
Lutheranism only began to gain strength in the early 16th century. Only then did the Catholic
Church defend itself through the intensification of the Catholic Reformation. This is evident
from the fresh movements that emerged in the 16th century, such as a common emphasis on
large-scale teaching of basic Christian doctrine via catechising—simple instructions based on
the patient repetition of lessons which were often phrased in question-and-answer form.
evangelicals from Luther onwards had already understood the importance of catechetical

10
Steven E. Ozment, The Age of Reform, 1250 - 1550: An Intellectual and Religious History of Late Medieval
and Reformation Europe, 12. [pr.] (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1980), p. 408.
11
Euan Cameron, The European Reformation, Second Edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), pp. 64–
65.
12
Ibid., P. 50.
13
Ibid., P. 47.
instruction by the 1530s—the Catholic Church had a strong impetus to follow through to
combat evangelical subversion. Societies were also formed to aid the Church in bringing
converts back to the faith. For instance, the Society of Jesus (later known as the Jesuits) was
founded in 1540 and gained 3,000 members working in three continents 25 years after its
formation—combatting perceptions of anti-clericalism. It quickly grew to be highly
influential, especially within the Council of Trent.14 The sudden growth in innovation
suggests that the Church never felt a strong desire to reform until its existence became
threatened. Yet, this does not mean that when the Church was under pressure it predictably
enacted reforms: in Switzerland, great efforts were made to effect Catholic reforms by the
bishops Christoph von Utenheim of Basle, Hugo von Hohenlandenberg of Constance, and
Aimon von Montfalon and his nephew Sebastian in Lausanne. These reforms were directed at
revising liturgical books and a series of synods to eliminate the flaws of the Church such as
pluralism.15 These efforts failed, suggesting that while the Church may have increased its
attempts at reformation in response to the growth of evangelical resistance, this did not mean
that the Church was more successful in these attempts than in previous years. Hence, it is
difficult to say whether pressure on the Church aided its ability to enact reforms, but it did
increase its willingness to do so.

Overall, the consequences of these hindrances meant that, for most clergy, reform remained a
paper objective until the 16th century. It was confined to empty slogans such as that
championed by conciliar theorists, reform by ‘head and limbs’, and numerous programs that
accomplished very little such as those inaugurated by the Popes after 1460. Certainly, with
the crucial exception of the Pope, there was a strong and persistent will within the Catholic
Church to reform itself, but this task was so vague and complex that it was near impossible to
do, largely due to the complex web of powerful interests within the Church that prevented
such reforms—most significant of which was the Pope’s interests, chief of which was
maintaining power. Because the Pope’s goal was essentially the antithesis of that of reform, it
is no surprise that so little reform occurred in the 15th century.

Bibliography:

-Cameron, Euan, The European Reformation, Second Edition (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2012)

-MacCulloch, Diarmaid, Reformation: Europe’s House Divided, 1490-1700 (London:

Penguin, 2004)

-Oakley, Francis, The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church,

1300-1870 (Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2003)

-Ozment, Steven E., The Age of Reform, 1250 - 1550: An Intellectual and Religious History
of Late Medieval and Reformation Europe, 12. [pr.] (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1980)

-Pettegree, Andrew, The Early Reformation in Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 1992)

14
Diarmaid MacCulloch, Reformation: Europe’s House Divided, 1490-1700 (London: Penguin, 2004), pp. 133–
37.
15
Bruce Gordon , ‘Switzerland’ in The Early Reformation in Europe, ed. by Andrew Pettegree (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 73.
-Reardon, Bernard M. G., Religious Thought in the Reformation, Second edition (London:
Routledge, 2013)