Historian's Irony

Cardinal Newman said, ‘To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.’ That might be the case for systematic Protestantism along the lines of the Reformation, with a strict observance of the solas. It applies less obviously to a Protestantism that understands itself as a form of developing Christian faith that happens not to include a strong allegiance to the bishop of Rome.

Diarmaid MacCulloch is deep in history, and he has ceased to be anything in particular. Nonetheless he looks with understanding and sympathy on the spiritual and religious quests that have occurred in history and will no doubt continue to occur.

I am rereading MacCulloch’s book Reformation: Europe’s House Divided (1490-1700), which I first read 10 years ago while I was in the process of becoming Catholic, and which I am now reading in preparation for a historical trip to Germany in the footsteps of Martin Luther.

It is striking how religion and politics interplay, how allegiances and rivalries help to build consensus, and how people navigate a world with the consciousness of a last judgment, with a network of relations that has shifting perspectives on the wheat and the tares, and with the human needs that are basic to us all.

When King Henri IV of France (formerly King of Navarre) ultimately decided to convert to the Catholic Church, allegedly on the grounds that ‘Paris was worth a Mass’, this was the reaction of a prominent Reformer:

Theodore Beza, who all through his long years in Geneva had corresponded with Navarre, regularly received cash from him and was devoted to him as a new King David in Israel, was devastated at Henri’s betrayal of the godly cause. Beza nevertheless remained loyal, and sadly consoled himself with a different Old Testament image: God’s champion in Israel, Samson, sacrificed his life to slay his enemies, and now perhaps King Henri was making an even greater sacrifice of his soul in God’s cause. He also continued to regard himself as on King Henri’s payroll.