Counter Reformation

The Counter Reformation was an effort by the Roman Catholic Church to deal with the issues of corruption and complaints that had plagued the Church and led to the breakaway of the new Protestant Churches. By strengthening Catholic theology and reigning in objectionable practices, it hoped to either reabsorb or neutralize the Protestant movement while renewing the faith of the Catholic Church. The effort to combat Protestantism sometimes led to harsh reprisals against Protestant thought.

The Counter Reformation is generally considered to have started in 1560 and end in 1648 with the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War between Catholic and Protestants. Some defining moments were the creation of the Jesuits and the convening of the Council of Trent. In the end the Protestant break was permanent and positions adopted or reaffirmed by the Catholic Church had a tendency to define the differences, but did little to mend them.

External Links

• summary

Further reading

• Dickens, A. G. The Counter Reformation (1969)
• O'Connell, Marvin R. Counter-reformation, 1550-1610 (1974)
• Wernham, R. B. ed. The New Cambridge Modern History, Vol. 3: Counter-Reformation and Price Revolution, 1559-1610 (1968), essays by scholars

Primary sources

• Luebke, David, ed. The Counter-Reformation: The Essential Readings (1999) excerpt and text search