The crusades were initially used as a reference to the military campaigns that were sanctioned by the Roman Catholic Church of the Latin. The crusades were sanctioned during the high middle ages and the late middle ages. 1095 was the first year that the pope, Urban II sanctioned the first crusade. The purpose of the first crusade was to increase the access of Christians to the holy lands of Jerusalem and its surroundings. There are many other military campaigns that were sanctioned by the Roman Catholic Church or the pope for various reasons that range from economic to political; when looking at the crusades, the essay is going to discuss the timeline of the military sanctions and the effects of the crusades in Europe (The Crusades, 2014).
THE ROMAN CATHOLIC.
The Roman Catholic Church played a very significant role in the crusades movement that cannot go unmentioned. There was a period where the aggressive and hostile papacy came into conflict with empires and monarchs that led to the East-West Schism of 1054. The papacy made strides to gain its independence from secular rulers. This was helped by the fact that the church was marshaling for the use of armed forces by Christians. The result of this was very intense and led to the increase in Christian piety and the interest of taking the Palestine from Muslims using the notion of "Just War". The core of this school of thought was that non-Christians needed not to be forced to accept the religion or should they be physically humiliated for having a different faith apart from Christianity. This was opposed to another opinion which was less common that vengeance was a response to the injuries coming from the denial of the Christian faith, the Christian government or the opportunity of a justified forced conversion to Christianity. Taking part in such a war by the crusaders was seen as a form of penance that could remit one's sins which is not a representative of a Christian worldview.