If you wanted to interpret the Late Middle Ages as a period of decline, what arguments and evidence would you emphasize? If you wanted to interpret this period primarily as on of transition what arguments and evidence would you emphasize. .
It first declares that this same council, legitimately assembled in the Holy Ghost, forming a general council and representing the Catholic Church militant, has it's power immediately from Christ, and everyone, whatever his state or position, even if it be the Papal dignity itself, is bound to obey it in all those things which pertain to the faith and the healing of the said schism, and to the general reformation of the Church of God, in head and members. .
Attack on the Papacy: The Conciliar Movement - Sherman Page 142.
The Church, split in two is a great indicator of the decline in the Late Middle Ages. Two separate Popes claiming the position of Christ's vicar promotes instability that radiates throughout Europe. .
Therefore by a perpetual edict, we sanction, decree, establish and ordain that general councils shall be celebrated in the following manner, so that the next one shall follow the close of this present council at the end of five years. The second shall follow the close of that, at the end of seven years .
Attack on the Papacy: The Conciliar Movement - Sherman Page 142.
To heal and reform The Church's great divide and to ensure that it doesn't happen again a general church council was implemented to monitor and correct the state of The Church from the Pope down. .
The Misled believers and sacrilegious masters of this sect hold and teach that they are in no way subject to the lord Pope or Roman Pontiff, or to the other prelates of the Roman Church, and that the latter persecute and condemn them unjustly and improperly. Moreover they declare that they cannot be excommunicated by this Roman Pontiff and these prelates .
Manual of the Inquisitor - Bernard Gui.
