By: Phillip Ableidinger, Jin Johnson, and Matthew Kellen
“Discuss the relationship between politics and religion by examining the wars of religion. Choose three specific examples from the following: the Dutch Revolt, the French wars of religion, the English Civil war, and the Thirty Years’ war.”
Politics and religion have for long been two sides of the same coin. Although it’s easy to dismiss their relationship as desultory or ineffectual, it has jointly wielded considerable power on the geopolitical stage; perhaps even single handedly changing the course of modern European history. The partnership between church and state cannot be understated, having been the main cause of power-struggles, societal collapse and power shifts throughout the 16th and 17th centuries.
Religious control over governments, whether for economic or political reasons, is apparent in many post-Renaissance countries such as France, Spain, and the Holy Roman Empire.
Conflict over …show more content…
The changes were caused by the Wars of Religion and the new ideas of Protestantism and other political ideas that came up during the 16th and 17th century.
The English civil war caused many societal changes like the increased hate of Catholics and the increase of the parliament's power. The increased hate of Catholics was sparked by the Gunpowder Plot, which was a plan to blow up the parliament by Catholics who opposed the parliament at the time. This increased the number of Puritans who want to purify the anglican church of all traces of Catholicism because they say Catholics as extremists.
The French Wars of Religion caused some political freedoms to protestants, but France still remained very largely Catholic. There was a very uneasy treaty between the Calvinists or Huguenots in france and the Church, but that was a still improvement for the