Description: As late as 1518, plans were laid by Pope Leo X and the monarchs of Europe to set aside their internal quarrels and once more embark on a holy crusade to wrest the Middle East from the Ottoman Turks. Finding accord and even enthusiasm for the enterprise, all was on course for a multiyear military campaign to push east from North Africa through Egypt and south through the Balkans to squeeze the Turks in a pincer movement and finally oust the Muslims from the Holy Land. The great plan, however, died when Europe was once again plunged into internal strife with the death of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, who had been a leader for the crusade.

Description:An award-winning, widely recognized expert on premodern history, Professor Thomas F. Madden launches the first of a two-part series on the medieval world. This all-encompassing investigation of a highly influential time period includes the major events of the era and informative discussion of empire, papacy, the Crusades, and the fall of Constantinople.During the course of these lectures, Professor Madden also addresses the rise of Islam, reform movements, and schisms in the church. In so doing, Professor Madden underscores the significance and grand scale of an age that continues to hold an undeniable fascination for people today.

Description: In this compelling series of lectures, widely esteemed author and professor Thomas F. Madden illustrates how the papacy, the world's oldest institution, gave birth to the West.Since Jesus Christ instructed the foremost of his Apostles, Peter, that he would be the rock upon which Christ would build his church, the papacy has survived the rise and fall of empires while continuing to assert an undeniable influence on world events. The men who have served as pope are a fascinating collection of larger-than-life personages who have touched millions of lives, changed the course of history, and even launched crusades that have altered the balance of global politics.With a learned approach and incisive analysis, Professor Madden not only provides a history of the papacy, but sheds light on the personalities of the popes and the flavor of their pontificates. At the same time, Madden demonstrates how the papacy has survived the tumultuous cauldron of history and offers a studied commentary on the future of this resilient institution.

Description: As the world entered the modern age, the Catholic Church faced new challenges to its authority, both from without and within. As one of the planet's oldest institutions, the Church had already survived 16 centuries, but as winds of change altered the global landscape, the Church's very existence would be called into question.Professor Thomas F. Madden leads these compelling lectures, focusing on a Church both adapting to a world in flux and striving to exert its influence and power. Throughout modernity, the Church responded to - and weathered - a host of major world events: the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, colonization of the New World, and of course the World Wars that in large part defined the 20th century.As the face of the Church, the popes affected Catholicism in ways that can only be truly understood from a careful examination of the past. And so the lives of the popes, along with major Church proceedings, wars, and other significant world events, are brought to bear in a comprehensive look at the Church in the modern age.

Description: Entrusting the apostles to continue the work he had started by instructing them to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit . . .,” Jesus kindled the fires of a new religion in a world largely dominated by polytheism, cult leader worship, and mysticism. In the first century of its existence, Christianity was both welcomed and vilified throughout the Roman Empire. Many of Christianity’s original adherents were martyred —murdered by those who believed it a danger to their authority or, at the very least, the cause of unrest among an otherwise docile populace.

Description: For many, the Inquisition conjures Gothic images of cloaked figures and barbarous torture chambers. So enmeshed is this view of the Inquisition in popular culture that such scenes play out even in comedies such as Mel Brooks' History of the World and Monty Python's Flying Circus. But is this a fair portrayal? And how was the Inquisition perceived in its own time? Professor Thomas F. Madden of Saint Louis University delivers a stimulating series of lectures exploring all facets of the Inquisition, including the religious and political climate of its time and the Inquisition's relationship to heresy and reformation. With a scholarly eye and infectious enthusiasm, widely published author and noted expert on pre-modern European history Thomas Madden imparts an understanding of the Spanish and Roman Inquisitions while dispelling popular myths associated with the subject.