Conversion in the Early Church: Central Europe

Christianity spread from Rome across Europe quite rapidly. By the ninth century CE, Christianity was the common faith of Western Europe. How was this conversion acheived, and what made the efforts of the Church so successful? Different tactics were used in different regions, and this subject will be covered in several different articles over the following weeks.

The Church relied on a variety of tactics in the conversion of Europe. By modern standards, some of the missionaries of the church were remarkably effective salesmen. Bloodier methods of conversion were left to political, rather than religious figures.

The conversion of Central Europe was somewhat bloodier, and more challenging than the conversion of the British Isles. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Central Europe was plunged into an age of minimal learning and literacy.There was minimal political unity, and the Church in Rome had only a very limited influence.

The conversion efforts in Central Europe began with Pope Gregory the Great in the sixth century. He sent missionaries out throughout Europe, although particularly to the British isles. He protected the Lombard tribes, and because of this they began the process of conversion from Arianism to Roman Christianity.

By the end of the seventh century, Pope Gregory's missions to Britain had proved successful, and missionaries were being sent out from the convents of Britain to convert the pagans of Germany. The best known of these, St. Boniface, took Gregory's advice to adapt pagan sanctuaries and pagan rites to Christianity by cutting down a sacred tree and using it to build a church. Quiet, peaceful conversions were the realm of monks and missionaries. They particularly sought out converts among women who then converted their spouses and raised their children as Christian.

All that said, paganism was still rampant among the tribes of Germany in 800 when Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emporer. Charlemagne's method of converting the remaining pagans in his land was significantly less gentle, but has remained a time tested means of getting the desired result. Charlemagne simply instituted a "convert or die" policy, and rather quickly, the vast majority of remaining pagans converted.

This isn't to say that the old faith of the tribes was truly gone, but at the least, on the surface it had been replaced by Christianity, in a form roughly approximating that of the Roman Church.

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