Church Reform and the Crusades (600 CE – 1100 CE)
Explore the popes who guided the Church through the rise of Christendom. This era witnessed the crowning of Charlemagne, the Cluniac reforms, the Investiture Controversy, and the call to the First Crusade.
Reform, Empire andthe Call to Crusade
The five centuries from Gregory the Great to Urban II transformed the papacy from a Mediterranean institution into the spiritual heart of Western Christendom. Popes crowned emperors, launched reform movements, and ultimately called Christian Europe to arms in defence of the Holy Land.
St Leo III crowned Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor on Christmas Day 800, creating a partnership between pope and emperor that would shape European politics for centuries. Yet this alliance also brought conflict: Gregory VII and Henry IV clashed dramatically over investiture, with the emperor standing barefoot in the snow at Canossa seeking absolution.
The Cluniac reform movement reinvigorated monasticism and raised expectations for clerical holiness. Reform-minded popes like St Leo IX combated simony and clerical marriage, while the tragic schism of 1054 divided East and West. The era culminated with Urban II preaching the First Crusade at Clermont in 1095.
At a Glance
“I have loved justice and hated iniquity; therefore I die in exile.”
Pope St Gregory VII
Final words, Salerno, 1085
Libertas Ecclesiae
The reform popes fought for the freedom of the Church from secular control. Their vision of a purified, independent Church continues to inspire the struggle for religious liberty today.