Streams of the Reformation Movement and Their Political Environments – Test Case Studies on France, England/Scotland, and “Slovenia”

Abstract

The three movements, which are primarily taken into account in this article, stem from the English-Scottish, French and Slovenian national background. The English were very consistent when dealing with the ideas of the Reformation. One might observe that with the initial effort they were eager to maintain the ecclesiastical standards according to the old regime. Consequently, the concept of being a Protestant remained in the background for quite a while. When taking this into account, we may comprehend the unique way of thought called Evangelicalism, that is ‘being centred on the gospel’, which would only be fully implemented in the 19th century. This delay was mainly due to the problems of developing the idea of the free church in a free country, which was experienced by both, the Catholics and the Protestants. In the meantime, there was enough temporal space and enough civil and governmental wisdom, so that the new unique ecclesiastical entity called Anglicanism could arise. The French decisively cut into the field of the relationship between secular and ecclesiastical. InSlovenia, the seemingly unimportant ecclesiastical movement took its own direction. For the Slovenes, it was the official naming of the nation in their own language that brought the initial momentum, which resulted in political independence in the 20th century. By drawing a line under this period, we realise that the Reformation movement brought a lot of diversity into the European milieu.