Heresy, Culture, and Religion in Early Modern Italy

In this book, renowned historians discuss religious reform in Italy after the Reformation. John Jeffries Martin recounts the artist Lorenzo Lotto, and his paintings of Christian themes, under the patronage of both the borgoise and the church. Michelle Fontaine writes about the Protestants, and other persons who questioned the church, who resided in the city of Modena. She gives several reasons for why the church had to tolerate it, ranging from the lack of a central Bishop, to other matters that diverted the Pope’s attention. When a Bishop was appointed to oversee the city’s religious life, he knew that he couldn’t fight “heresy” with edicts or opinions; that would just generate more arguments for him. His solution was to make the church a bigger draw than the scholar, and to do that, he made his speeches more entertaining. Huge crowds attended, and something tells me that America’s theatrical preachers probably learned of this and copied his ideas.

I suspect that the church in Italy failed to stamp out dissent for reasons both political and economic. Firstly, the Italian states were all separate of each other, and in smaller city-states, the authorities didn’t have enough police to back up the church. If the Inquisition showed up in Modena, and the people refused to recognize its authority, who would enforce the Pope’s will? As for the economic factors, many of the “heretics” were probably from the merchant classes, and what kind of governor would risk angering his biggest taxpayer? The Inquisition was rampant in Spain, but keep in mind that Spain was a unified nation, with a powerful central government, and a powerful military culture. There was no shortage of men to use terror and force.

What I find most interesting about this book is that while the Protestant religion never took hold in Italy, the country was still a hotbed of radical ideas. Though not mentioned explicitly in this book, Italy was where the Greek scholars fled after Constantinople fell, and they brought with them their knowledge of ancient works. This was the beginning of the Renaissance, or the rebirth of interest in art and literature, and no doubt it influenced the country’s thinkers. Those that could read went searching for old books, and their learning put them at odds with the church. Ironically, it was monastery libraries that preserved those books after the fall of Rome.

Today, despite the stereotype, the church is not as powerful in Italy as it once was. I doubt that Milan’s wealthy classes bother to go to mass, and the non-Christian population is increasing. Even in the 1500’s, the church’s power in Italy would have been ebbing away, thanks to money. You had increasingly powerful merchant families in the north, like the Medicis, and the city governors needed their money. If it was a choice between listening to the church and listening to the merchant class, the government would’ve sided with those who could pay.