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The Path to European Secularization
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Denunciation of the Peace of Westphalia
Pope Innocent X (featured on the left in a painting, Retrata de Papa by Diego Velasquez 1650 ) published a pamphlet in November, 1648 after the signing of the Peace of Westphalia that demonstrated his severe disapproval of the agreement. To the Pope, a treaty which removes religion as a cassus belli removes a lot of potential political power from the hands of the Church. The Vatican had no position of power at the Treaty. His denunciation called the Treaty, "null and void". -
The Death of Jean Calas
Voltaire (1694-1778) was a leading figure in the Enlightenment movement. He and his contemporaries advocated for rational and independent conclusions free from the weight of Church doctrine and ideology. He wrote A Short Account of the Death of Jean Calas in protest of the death of a man, falsely tortured and executed for murdering his son allegedly because his son wished to become Catholic. He mocks extreme religion, the reverence for martyrs and saints, and the power of the Church in France. -
Rome's Capitulation
Richard Newton drew this political cartoon of the Pope and Napoleon along with William Pitt in 1797. In this particular cartoon Newton places the Pope in a position of humiliation and submission to Napoleon, who at that time was clearly the dominant force in Italy as part of the French military. On February 19, 1797 Pius VI was forced to sue for peace after facing multiple militray defeats. This cartoon shows the international reaction to this capitulation in Rome. -
Origin of Species
A Venerable Orang-Utang: A Contribution to Unnatural History was featured in The Hornet’s 1871 edition. This comes twelve years after Darwin’s 1859 publication of On the Origin of Species, which theorizes upon the elimination of species based on natural selection.The illustrator for this piece is unknown. Darwin’s theory was met with both support and high levels of skepticism, especially from religious leaders. His theories challenged many of the core tenants of Catholicism. -
Polish Uprising
Pope Pius IX is featured in this cartoon banishing the Russian delegation to the Vatican from Rome in 1864. During the 1863 Polish Uprising, when Poland seeks indpendence from Russia, the pope supports the Polish revolt against the Orthodox Czar. German and Papal involvement set the stage for future religious tensions during the Kulturkampf. Jędrzej Brydak. Expulsion of the Russian envoy to the Holy See Felix von Meyendorff by Pope Pius IX in 1864 for insulting catholic faith, 1876. Pen -
Separation of Church and State
France
This image is the cover to the 1902 edition of La Lanterne. The editor of the Magazine, Victor Flachon, was an adamant member of the right party, and very much opposed the Church. The title of the page “Voila, L’Enemi” refers the power of the Church in France. During this period in France there was intense debate about the role that the Catholic Church should play in France. Opponents to Church influence called for the end of the 1801 Concordat and the severing of Church state relations.
