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Christian Unity (the book) - The Maranatha Community

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In Central Europe ano<strong>the</strong>r 30 years of religious conflict between 1618 and 1648devastated <strong>the</strong> region. Nationalistic and political aspirations played a greatpart in <strong>the</strong> conflicts as Bohemians (Czechs) resisted <strong>the</strong> authority of a decayingCatholic Empire. <strong>The</strong> Czechs had set up a rival King to replace <strong>the</strong> CatholicEmperor Ferdinand II, and this Protestant rebellion was crushed at <strong>the</strong> Battleof Bila Hora near Prague in 1620. <strong>The</strong> Swedes and Danes and even <strong>the</strong> Englishwere drawn into <strong>the</strong> conflict, and Catholic France supported <strong>the</strong> Swedishintervention in order to counter <strong>the</strong> power of <strong>the</strong> German empire. Twoseparate treaties ended <strong>the</strong> wars and re-established <strong>the</strong> cuius regio-eius religioprinciple of <strong>the</strong> Augsburg formula.<strong>The</strong> whole dreadful period damaged <strong>the</strong> cause of <strong>Christian</strong> <strong>Unity</strong>, but itcreated a longing for <strong>the</strong> peaceful co-existence of <strong>the</strong> warring sides and <strong>the</strong>beginning of <strong>the</strong> concept of ecumenism (<strong>the</strong>n called ‘syncretism‘).In <strong>the</strong> conclusion of her <strong>book</strong> Problems of Authority in <strong>the</strong> ReformationDebates, G R Evans makes <strong>the</strong> valid point that both sides, Catholic andProtestant, could only see as polarisations <strong>the</strong> issues <strong>the</strong>y faced: ‘Scripture andtradition, faith and works, and so on.’ She writes:‘We need to recognise that a large proportion of <strong>the</strong> difficulties which arevoiced today about going forward to unity are <strong>the</strong> legacy of attitudes andassumptions of <strong>the</strong> sixteenth century.’ 54<strong>The</strong> time had not yet come to consider <strong>the</strong> possibility that, for example,justification by faith and justification by works are not contradictory terms butcomplementary. Komensky, in <strong>the</strong> next century, was to point to this truth, buteven his time had not yet come.Throughout <strong>the</strong> next four centuries <strong>the</strong> two sides in Western Christendomstayed apart, sometimes bitterly divided. Voices for <strong>Christian</strong> <strong>Unity</strong> in <strong>the</strong> 17 thand 18 th Century were rare but not unknown.54Evans, G R, Problems of Authority in <strong>the</strong> Reformation Debates, Cambridge, UniversityPress, 1992, p 288.Page 75

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