Title: 1320: Section 15: The Crusades and Medieval Christianity
Headings: SECTION 15
The Crusades and Medieval Christianity


Content: They built and touched upon almost every aspect of life in the day, a fact that is especially clear when one looks at their outcome. First and foremost, if the popes who promoted the Crusades gained the authority to muster an army and send it on a mission—it should be noted that they never acquired the actual power of a field commander to oversee a battle or call for specific maneuvers, at least not during the Crusades—in the end, their excursion into the armed forces did more damage than good to the prestige of the papacy. By the last Crusade, many in Europe had come to see the Pope as just another war-mongering king, not the guardian of souls who stand before heaven's gate. But in other respects, these Church-sanctioned wars brought some benefit to Medieval Europe. For instance, crusading allowed westerners to take advantage of the much richer East for the first time since the days of ancient Rome. More important, it served as an outlet for Europe's youth and aggression as population exploded during the High Middle Ages (1050-1300 CE). That is, sending young men off to fight in a holy cause stifled, if only briefly, the internal wars which had racked the West since the collapse of Roman government and forestalled the self-destruction that would again characterize European history in the centuries to come. Moreover, the mere fact that a few of these Crusades produced victories of some kind helped Europeans regain a sense of self-confidence—after centuries of losing on nearly every front imaginable, they finally turned the tables on their military and cultural superiors to the east—the resulting surge of optimism that followed the minority of Crusades which eked out some measure of success contributed in no small way to the glorious twelfth-century renaissance in art and literature which swept Europe during the High Middle Ages. But when these meager triumphs are tallied up against the casualties and mayhem resulting from the Crusades, it's hard to say they were worth it, especially in the long run. For instance, crusading brought no significant new territories or allies into the European cultural sphere—at best, it can be said it opened the door slightly for western traders to do business abroad, but even that proved harmful by making the Church seem commercial and greedy—and worse yet, the enormous drain of energy and manpower won the West little more than increased antagonism with its neighbors in the East, a situation which still resonates in modern international relations.