Marking the end of several centuries of degradation of the power of the Catholic church as well as the turning point of internal attempts to reform the church was the Protestant Reformation and the Catholic church’s response in the Counter-Reformation. Protestantism stressed a personal relationship between each individual and God without the need for intercession by the institutional church. In the Renaissance, artists and writers including Machiavelli, Galileo, and Michelangelo took up a view of life that emphasized the humans’ ability to change and control the world. Therefore, the rise of Protestantism and the Counter-Reformation, along with the Renaissance, helped to support individualism and creating a feeling of encouragement of
