catholic church [Gr.,=universal], the body of Christians, living and dead, considered as an organization. The word catholic was first used c.110 to describe the Church by St. Ignatius of Antioch. In speaking of the time before the Reformation in Western Europe, Catholic is technically used to mean orthodox (i.e., those who accept the tradition as mediated by the Roman Church). Today in English it usually means the Roman Catholic Church. Protestants use the word catholic in its original sense to designate the Christian Church taken as a whole.

Roman Catholic Church, Christian church headed by the pope, the bishop of Rome (see papacy and Peter, Saint). Its commonest title in official use is Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. "Roman Catholic" is a 19th-century British coinage and merely serves to distinguish that church from other churches that are "Catholic" (see catholic church). The term "Roman Church," when used officially, means only the archdiocese of Rome. Roman Catholics may be simply defined as Christians in communion with the pope.

Organization of the Church

There are within the church a number of rites, i.e., ancient, independent traditions of discipline and worship, differentiated through isolation (see also liturgy). Besides the Roman rite, to which the vast majority belong, there are among Catholics five Eastern rites, used by a number of communities (Eastern Catholics or Uniates; see patriarch). They are: the Byzantine (the rite also of the Orthodox Eastern Church, which is not in communion with Rome), to which belong many groups, including Melchites, Ruthenians, Romanians, and the Italo-Albanians of S Italy; the Antiochene (also the rite of the autonomous Jacobite Church), to which belong the Maronites, the Syrian Catholics, and the Malankarese of Malabar; the Alexandrian, to which belong the Catholic Copts and Ethiopians (see Copts); the Chaldaean (also the rite of the autonomous Nestorian Church), to which belong Chaldaean Catholics and Syro-Malabarese; and the Armenian (also the rite of the autonomous Armenian Church). These rites and communities have their own organizations under the pope and are protected from attempts to "Latinize" them. Best known, perhaps, of the non-Roman Western rites are the Ambrosian, the Dominican, and the Mozarabic.

Apart from the rites and foreign missions, the organization of the church is by diocese, the territory of a bishop. Important sees have archbishops, who often supervise neighboring, suffragan bishops. With certain restrictions, the pope names the bishops. Dioceses are made up of parishes, each of which has a church and a priest (the pastor). The pope controls bishops mainly by general legislation. His government, which is run by the cardinals living at Rome, is concerned with matters of wide significance, such as missions and relations with states (see also cardinal; papal election; Vatican City).

Cutting across territorial lines are the religious orders of men and women; their field is monastic life, nonparish activities, and schools; they frequently run missions, hospitals, and colleges (see monasticism). Their members generally receive subsistence only. The parish clergy support themselves, often with salaries fixed by the bishop. Most of the clergy are priests (see orders, holy); they are trained (usually from four to six years) in seminaries maintained by the bishops, the orders, or the Vatican. Members of the clergy do not marry, unless they are parish priests of Eastern rites.

There is no churchwide census, and there are various criteria for determining membership. However, the Roman Catholics in the world are estimated to be about half the total number of Christians and make the church one of the largest religions in the world, with more than 1 billion adherents. Roughly half of all Catholics live in Latin America and the Caribbean. In 2003, there were 63.4 million Roman Catholics in the United States.

Beliefs, Doctrines, and Practices

To belong to the church one must accept as factually true the gospel of Jesus as handed down in tradition and as interpreted by the bishops in union with the pope. Fundamental in this divine tradition is the Bible, its text determined and disseminated by the church. Adherents must also accept the church as possessing the fullness of revelation, and the church, according to the Roman Catholic catechism, is the only Christian body that is "one, holy, catholic [universal], and apostolic."

The doctrine of apostolic succession is one of the keystones of the Catholic faith; it holds that the pope (the vicar of Christ) and the bishops have in varying degrees the spiritual authority Jesus assigned to his apostles. The voice of the pope, either alone or in conjunction with his bishops in council, is regarded as infallible when speaking on matters of faith and morals taught in common with the bishops (see infallibility). Many features of the traditional teaching (dogma) have been analyzed and restated, by the councils and by great theologians (see council, ecumenical; creed; Thomas Aquinas, Saint; Trent, Council of; Vatican Council, First; Vatican Council, Second).

The chief teachings of the Catholic church are: God's objective existence; God's interest in individual human beings, who can enter into relations with God (through prayer); the Trinity; the divinity of Jesus; the immortality of the soul of each human being, each one being accountable at death for his or her actions in life, with the award of heaven or hell; the resurrection of the dead; the historicity of the Gospels; and the divine commission of the church. In addition the Roman Catholic Church stresses that since the members, living and dead, share in each other's merits, the Virgin Mary and other saints and the dead in purgatory are never forgotten (see church; saint).

The church is seen as having from God a system of conveying God's grace direct to humanity (see sacrament). The ordinary Catholic frequents the sacraments of penance (required at least once a year) and the Eucharist (required once every Easter time; see also sin). The Eucharist is the center of public worship, often embellished with solemn ceremony (see Mass).

Private prayer is also regarded as essential; contemplation is the ideal (see mysticism), and all believers are expected to devote some time to prayer that is more than requesting favors. Different methods of prayer are recommended (see rosary; Saint Ignatius of Loyola; Thomas à Kempis). Self-renunciation is a necessary part of prayer (see fasting; Lent).

The church teaches that the main motive for ethical behavior is the love of God. Nothing that God has created is evil in itself, but evil use may be made of it. The doctrine concerning persons not Catholic is that since God affords each human being light sufficient to attain salvation, all will be saved who persevere in what they believe to be good, regardless of ignorance. Only those will be damned who persist in what they know to be wrong; among these are persons who resist the church when they know it to be the one, true church.

History

For the first centuries of the church's history, see Christianity.

The Church in the Middle Ages

From the 9th cent. to 1520 the church was simply Western Europe taken in its religious aspect, and no clear line divided spiritual from temporal life. In the West (unlike the East) the religious organization was free for centuries from grave interference from civil rulers. Charlemagne was an exception, but his influence was benign. In the chaotic 9th and 10th cent. every part of the church organization, including the papacy, became the prey of the powerful.

The restoration of order began in monasteries; from Cluny a movement spread to reform Christian life (see Cluniac order). This pattern of decline of religion followed by reform is characteristic of the history of the Roman Catholic Church; the reform goals have varied, but they have included the revival of spiritual life in society and the monasteries, and the elimination of politics from the bishops' sphere and venality from the papal court. The next reform (11th cent.) was conducted by popes, notably St. Gregory VII and Urban II. Part of this movement was to exclude civil rulers from making church appointments—the first, bold chapter in a 900-year battle between the church and the "Catholic princes" (see church and state; investiture).

The 12th cent. was a time of great intellectual beginnings. St. Bernard of Clairvaux and the Cistercians revived practical mystical prayer. Gratian founded the systematic study of the canon law, and medieval civil law began its development. This double study was to provide weapons to both sides in the duel between the extreme papal claims of Innocent III and Innocent IV, and the antipapal theories of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. Also in the 12th cent., Peter Abelard and other thinkers pioneered in rationalist theology.

From early rationalist theology and from the teachings of Aristotle developed the philosophies and theologies of St. Bonaventure and St. Thomas Aquinas (see also scholasticism). This was the work of the new 13th-century universities; to them, and to the friars—the Dominicans and Franciscans—who animated them, passed the intellectual leadership held by the monasteries. St. Dominic's order was formed to preach against the Albigenses (a campaign that also produced the Inquisition). The vast popular movement of St. Francis was a spontaneous reform contemporary with the papal reform of the Fourth Lateran Council. The 13th cent. saw also the flowering of Gothic architecture.

The contest between church and state continued, ruining the Hohenstaufen dynasty and, in the contest between Boniface VIII and Philip IV of France, bringing the papacy to near ruin. Then came the Avignon residence—the so-called Babylonian captivity of the papacy (1309-78), a time of good church administration, but of excessive French influence over papal policy. Except for isolated voices, such as that of St. Catherine of Siena, the church seemed to lose energy, and a long period devoid of reform began. A long-enduring schism and a series of ambitious councils (see Schism, Great) involved most churchmen in a welter of politics and worldliness.

There were popular religious movements, characterized by revivalism and a tendency to minimize the sacraments (along with church authority); they encouraged private piety, and one group produced the inspirational Imitation ascribed to Thomas à Kempis. The popular tendencies were extreme in John Wyclif, who developed an antisacramental, predestinarian theology emphasizing Bible study—a "protestant" movement 150 years before Protestantism.

The Reformation and Counter Reformation

The 15th-century councils did little for reform, and the popes, shorn of power, were reduced to being Renaissance princes. Such men could not cope with the Protestant revolt of Martin Luther and John Calvin (see also Reformation). The Protestants aimed to restore primitive Christianity (as described in the Bible), and they succeeded in weakening the hold of the church in all of N Europe, in Great Britain, and in parts of Central Europe and Switzerland. Politics and religion were completely intertwined (as in England, Scotland, and France); hence the admixture of religious issues in the Thirty Years War.

Within the church there triumphed the most extensive of all the church's reform movements (see Counter Reformation; Jesus, Society of). From it sprang a general revival of religion and much missionary activity in the new empires of Spain and Portugal and in East Asia. In France, Catholicism found new life, beginning with St. Francis de Sales and St. Vincent de Paul. There, too, began the cult of the Sacred Heart (i.e., God's love for men), which would affect Catholic prayer everywhere. A contrary influence was Jansenism (see under Jansen, Cornelis), an antisacramental middle-class movement.

The Seventeenth through Nineteenth Centuries

The 17th cent. saw an increase of state control over the church (see Gallicanism) in all the Catholic countries, and in the 18th cent. the Bourbons began a course openly aimed at eliminating the papacy. The suppression of the Jesuits was part of the campaign, which reached a climax in the legislation of Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II. The revolutionary movement eventually destroyed the Catholic princes, and the church had to live with secular states, some anti-Catholic, some tolerant. The facts of the change were not clear at once, and for much of the 19th cent. the popes (and other Catholics) would look back to an idealized 18th-century golden age before "liberalistic" atheism and materialism. The last of these popes was Pius IX, who was forced to give up the Papal States. In enouncing the dogma of papal infallibility Pius did much to cement church unity.

In Pius's successor, Leo XIII, the church found new leadership; he and his successors worked and preached to urge Catholics to take part in modern life as Catholics, abandoning reactionary dreams and seeking some social reform. In some countries Catholic political parties were formed. Meanwhile oppressive conditions and the development of a mass socialist movement combined to detach much of the working class from the church. Otto von Bismarck (in Germany; see Kulturkampf) and "liberal" governments (in Italy, France, and Portugal) passed hostile measures, especially against religious orders.

The Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries

In the 20th cent. the tensions between the church and national governments sometimes led to outright suppression of the church, as in the former Soviet Union and Communist Eastern Europe, Mexico, Spain, and China. Mussolini and Hitler also ruined as much of the church as they could. The century has been marked more noticeably, however, by new trends in the practice and outlook of the church. The encyclical of Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum (1891), was followed by the Quadrigesimo Anno (1931) of Pius XII, and the Mater et Magistra (1961) of John XXIII, the Progressio Populorum (1967) of Paul VI, and the Laborem Exercens (1981), Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (1987), and Centessimus Annus (1991) of John Paul II. The purpose of these was fundamental readjustment to the moral and social problems of modern life and a greater stress upon the role of the laity in the church. Linked with this was a movement for church "renewal" both by laity and the clergy. This was particularly strong in France, Germany, Great Britain, and the United States.

Some of the issues stressed were the need for liturgical reform, the recognition of the various regional contributions to the living existence of the church, and the recognition of the nonpolitical internationalism of the church (although declarations of implacable opposition to atheistic Communism persisted and were particularly strong under Pius XII, who urged the church to oppose all antireligious totalitarianism). Another growing revival involved the tightening of relations between the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and various Protestant churches.

All of these "progressive" currents came together at the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), which, under John XXIII and Paul VI, initiated broad reforms in the areas of public worship, government, and ecumenism (see ecumenical movement). The long-reigning John Paul II made the church more international and continued his predecessors ecumenical trends, but he affirmed (as the popes preceding him did) the church's traditional stands on marriage, abortion, homosexuality, and other doctrinal matters, opposed relaxing the rule of celibacy, and reemphasized the primacy of the Vatican in church government.

The church in the United States began the 21st cent. confronting a major crisis concerning sexual abuse of minors by Roman Catholic priests and how it is and was handled by the U.S. hierarchy. Multiple revelations in 2002 that some bishops had allowed priests accused of sexual abuse to remain in the priesthood and to continue to perform their duties in situations where abuse could and sometimes did recur sparked outrage in the United States; such cases were also not reported to civil authorities. Various dioceses faced civil lawsuits and criminal investigations, several bishops resigned after their involvement in sexual relationships was revealed, and Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston resigned because of criticism over his handling of sex abuse charges. The issue led to a meeting between American cardinals and the pope in Rome, and, after a meeting of American bishops and discussions with the Vatican, to the establishment of new policies that included barring a priest who has sexually abused a minor from any ministerial role and that committed the hierarchy to alert legal authorities to instances of abuse.

Reformation, Catholic: see Counter Reformation.

In the following list, the date of election, rather than of consecration, is given. Before St. Victor I (189), dates may err by one year. Antipopes—i.e., those men whose elections have been declared uncanonical—are indicated.

St. Peter, d. 64? or 67?

St. Linus, 67?-76?

St. Cletus, or Anacletus, 76?-88?

St. Clement I, 88?-97?

St. Evaristus, 97?-105?

St. Alexander I, 105?-115?

St. Sixtus I, 115?-125?

St. Telesphorus, 125?-136?

St. Hyginus, 136?-140?

St. Pius I, 140?-155?

St. Anicetus, 155?-166?

St. Soter, 166?-175?

St. Eleutherius, 175?-189?

St. Victor I, 189-99

St. Zephyrinus, 199-217

St. Calixtus I, 217-22

antipope: St. Hippolytus, 217-35

St. Urban I, 222-30

St. Pontian, 230-35

St. Anterus, 235-36

St. Fabian, 236-50

St. Cornelius, 251-53

antipope: Novatian, 251

St. Lucius I, 253-54

St. Stephen I, 254-57

St. Sixtus II, 257-58

St. Dionysius, 259-68

St. Felix I, 269-74

St. Eutychian, 275-83

St. Caius, 283-96

St. Marcellinus, 296-304

St. Marcellus I, c.308-309

St. Eusebius, 309-c.310

St. Miltiades, or Melchiades, 311-14

St. Sylvester I, 314-35

St. Marcus, 336

St. Julius I, 337-52

Liberius, 352-66

antipope: Felix, 355-65

St. Damasus I, 366-84

antipope: Ursinus, 366-67

St. Siricius, 384-99

St. Anastasius I, 399-401

St. Innocent I, 401-17

St. Zosimus, 417-18

St. Boniface I, 418-22

antipope: Eulalius, 418-19

St. Celestine I, 422-32

St. Sixtus III, 432-40

St. Leo I, 440-61

St. Hilary, 461-68

St. Simplicius, 468-83

St. Felix III (or II), 483-92

St. Gelasius I, 492-96

Anastasius II, 496-98

St. Symmachus, 498-514

antipope: Lawrence, 498-505

St. Hormisdas, 514-23

St. John I, 523-26

St. Felix IV (or III) 526-30

Boniface II, 530-32

pope or antipope: Dioscurus, 530

John II, 533-35

St. Agapetus I, 535-36

St. Silverius, 536-37

Vigilius, 537-55

Pelagius I, 556-61

John III, 561-74

Benedict I, 575-79

Pelagius II, 579-90

St. Gregory I, 590-604

Sabinian, 604-6

Boniface III, 607

St. Boniface IV, 608-15

St. Deusdedit, or Adeodatus I, 615-18

Boniface V, 619-25

Honorius I, 625-38

Severinus, 640

John IV, 640-42

Theodore I, 642-49

St. Martin I, 649-55

St. Eugene I, 654-57

St. Vitalian, 657-72

Adeodatus II, 672-76

Donus, 676-78

St. Agatho, 678-81

St. Leo II, 682-83

St. Benedict II, 684-85

John V, 685-86

Conon, 686-87

antipope: Theodore, 687

antipope: Paschal, 687

St. Sergius I, 687-701

John VI, 701-5

John VII, 705-7

Sisinnius, 708

Constantine, 708-15

St. Gregory II, 715-31

St. Gregory III, 731-41

St. Zacharias, 741-52

Stephen II, 752 (never consecrated)

Stephen II (or III), 752-57

St. Paul I, 757-67

antipope: Constantine, 767-69

antipope: Philip, 768

Stephen III (or IV), 768-72

Adrian I, 772-95

St. Leo III, 795-816

Stephen IV (or V), 816-17

St. Paschal I, 817-24

Eugene II, 824-27

Valentine, 827

Gregory IV, 827-44

antipope: John, 844

Sergius II, 844-47

St. Leo IV, 847-55

Benedict III, 855-58

antipope: Anastasius, 855

St. Nicholas I, 858-67

Adrian II, 867-72

John VIII, 872-82

Marinus I, 882-84

St. Adrian III, 884-85

Stephen V (or VI), 885-91

Formosus, 891-96

Boniface VI, 896

Stephen VI (or VII), 896-97

Romanus, 897

Theodore II, 897

John IX, 898-900

Benedict IV, 900-903

Leo V, 903

antipope: Christopher, 903-4

Sergius III, 904-11

Anastasius III, 911-13

Lando, 913-14

John X, 914-28

Leo VI, 928

Stephen VII (or VIII), 928-31

John XI, 931-35

Leo VII, 936-39

Stephen VIII (or IX), 939-42

Marinus II, 942-46

Agapetus II, 946-55

John XII, 955-64

Leo VII, 963-65, or Benedict V, 964-66 (one of these was an antipope)

John XIII, 965-72

Benedict VI, 973-74

antipope: Boniface VII, 974, 984-85

Benedict VII, 974-83

John XIV, 983-84

John XV, 985-96

Gregory V, 996-99

antipope: John XVI, 997-98

Sylvester II, 999-1003

John XVII, 1003

John XVIII, 1004-9

Sergius IV, 1009-12

Benedict VIII, 1012-24

antipope: Gregory, 1012

John XIX, 1024-32

Benedict IX, 1032-44

Sylvester III, 1045

Benedict IX, 1045

Gregory VI, 1045-46

Clement II, 1046-47

Benedict IX, 1047-48

Damasus II, 1048

St. Leo IX, 1049-54

Victor II, 1055-57

Stephen IX (or X), 1057-58

antipope: Benedict X, 1058-59

Nicholas II, 1058-61

Alexander II, 1061-73

antipope: Honorius II, 1061-72

St. Gregory VII, 1073-85

antipope: Clement III, 1080-1100 (see Guibert of Ravenna)

Victor III, 1086-87

Urban II, 1088-99

Paschal II, 1099-1118

antipope: Theodoric, 1100

antipope: Albert, 1102

antipope: Sylvester IV, 1105-11

Gelasius II, 1118-19

antipope: Gregory VIII, 1118-21

Calixtus II, 1119-24

Honorius II, 1124-30

antipope: Celestine II, 1124

Innocent II, 1130-43

antipope: Anacletus II, 1130-38

antipope: Victor IV, 1138

Celestine II, 1143-44

Lucius II, 1144-45

Eugene III, 1145-53

Anastasius IV, 1153-54

Adrian IV, 1154-59

Alexander III, 1159-81

antipope: Victor IV, 1159-64

antipope: Paschal III, 1164-68

antipope: Calixtus III, 1168-78

antipope: Innocent III, 1179-80

Lucius III, 1181-85

Urban III, 1185-87

Gregory VIII, 1187

Clement III, 1187-91

Celestine III, 1191-98

Innocent III, 1198-1216

Honorius III, 1216-27

Gregory IX, 1227-41

Celestine IV, 1241

Innocent IV, 1243-54

Alexander IV, 1254-61

Urban IV,1261-64

Clement IV, 1265-68

Gregory X, 1271-76

Innocent V, 1276

Adrian V, 1276

John XXI, 1276-77

Nicholas III, 1277-80

Martin IV, 1281-85

Honorius IV, 1285-87

Nicholas IV, 1288-92

St. Celestine V, 1294

Boniface VIII, 1294-1303

Benedict XI, 1303-4

Clement V, 1305-14

John XXII, 1316-34

antipope: Nicholas V, 1328-30 (see Rainalducci, Pietro)

Benedict XII, 1334-42

Clement VI, 1342-52

Innocent VI, 1352-62

Urban V, 1362-70

Gregory XI, 1370-78

The Great Schism, 1378-1417

Roman Line

Urban VI, 1378-89

Boniface IX, 1389-1404

Innocent VII, 1404-6

Gregory XII, 1406-15

Avignon Line

antipope: Clement VII, 1378-94 (see Robert of Geneva)

antipope: Benedict XIII, 1394-1423 (see Luna, Pedro de)

antipope: Clement VII, 1423-29

antipope: Benedict XIV, 1425-30

Pisan Line

antipope: Alexander V, 1409-10

antipope: John XXIII, 1410-15 (see Cossa, Baldassare)

Martin V, 1417-31

Eugene IV, 1431-47

antipope: Felix V, 1439-49 (see Amadeus VIII)

Nicholas V, 1447-55

Calixtus III, 1455-58

Pius II, 1458-64

Paul II, 1464-71

Sixtus IV, 1471-84

Innocent VIII, 1484-92

Alexander VI, 1492-1503

Pius III, 1503

Julius II, 1503-13

Leo X, 1513-21

Adrian VI, 1522-23

Clement VII, 1523-34

Paul III, 1534-49

Julius III, 1550-55

Marcellus II, 1555

Paul IV, 1555-59

Pius IV, 1559-65

St. Pius V, 1566-72

Gregory XIII, 1572-85

Sixtus V, 1585-90

Urban VII, 1590

Gregory XIV, 1590-91

Innocent IX, 1591

Clement VIII, 1592-1605

Leo XI, 1605

Paul V, 1605-21

Gregory XV, 1621-23

Urban VIII, 1623-44

Innocent X, 1644-55

Alexander VII, 1655-67

Clement IX, 1667-69

Clement X, 1670-76

Innocent XI, 1676-89

Alexander VIII, 1689-91

Innocent XII, 1691-1700

Clement XI, 1700-1721

Innocent XIII, 1721-24

Benedict XIII, 1724-30

Clement XII, 1730-40

Benedict XIV, 1740-58

Clement XIII, 1758-69

Clement XIV, 1769-74

Pius VI, 1775-99

Pius VII, 1800-1823

Leo XII, 1823-29

Pius VIII, 1829-30

Gregory XVI, 1831-46

Pius IX, 1846-78

Leo XIII, 1878-1903

St. Pius X, 1903-14

Benedict XV, 1914-22

Pius XI, 1922-39

Pius XII, 1939-58

John XXIII, 1958-63

Paul VI, 1963-78

John Paul I, 1978

John Paul II, 1978-2005

Benedict XVI, 2005-

Ferdinand the Catholic: see Ferdinand II, king of Aragón.

Christian Catholic Church, religious denomination founded (1896) in Chicago by John Alexander Dowie. Its members are sometimes known as Zionites. The church has its center in Zion, Ill., which Dowie founded (1901) as a religious community. In addition to religious and educational activities in Zion, the founder started various industries on a cooperative basis, an undertaking that was built up by Wilber Glenn Voliva, who became general overseer upon the deposition of Dowie in 1905. Zion is no longer exclusively a religious community. The church extensively supports foreign missions. There are about 3,000 members in the United States and Canada.

Catholic University of America, at Washington, D.C.; the national university of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States; coeducational; founded 1887 and opened 1889. It includes a college of arts and sciences as well as schools of engineering and architecture, law, library and information sciences, music, nursing, philosophy, religious studies, and social service. The university has access to the facilities of the national laboratories at Oak Ridge, Tenn., and participates in a cooperative program with the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute at Bethesda, Md.

Catholic League, in French history: see Holy League.

Catholic Emancipation, term applied to the process by which Roman Catholics in the British Isles were relieved in the late 18th and early 19th cent. of civil disabilities. They had been under oppressive regulations placed by various statutes dating as far back as the time of Henry VIII (see Penal Laws). This process of removing the disabilities culminated in the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 (and some subsequent provisions), but it had begun a number of years before. Priest hunting, in general, ended by the mid-18th cent.

In 1778, English Catholics were relieved of the restrictions on land inheritance and purchase. A savage reaction to these concessions produced the Gordon Riots (see Gordon, Lord George) of 1780, and the whole history of Catholic Emancipation is one of struggle against great resistance. In 1791 the Roman Catholic Relief Act repealed most of the disabilities in Great Britain, provided Catholics took an oath of loyalty, and in 1793 the army, the navy, the universities, and the judiciary were opened to Catholics, although seats in Parliament and some offices were still denied. These reforms were sponsored by William Pitt the Younger, who hoped thereby to split the alliance of Irish Catholics and Protestants. But Pitt's attempt to secure a general repeal of the Penal Laws was thwarted by George III. Pope Pius VII consented to a royal veto on episcopal nominations if the Penal Laws were repealed, but the move failed. In Ireland the repeal (1782) of Poynings' Law (see under Poynings, Sir Edward) was followed by an act (1792) of the Irish Parliament relaxing the marriage and education laws and an act (1793) allowing Catholics to vote and hold most offices.

By the Act of Union (1800) the Irish Parliament ceased to exist, and Ireland was given representation in the British Parliament. Then, since the Irish were a minority group in the British legislature, many English ministers began to advocate Catholic Emancipation, influenced also by the decline of the papacy as a factor in secular politics. Irish agitation, headed by Daniel O'Connell and his Catholic Association, was successful in securing the admission of Catholics to Parliament. In 1828 the Test Act was repealed, and O'Connell, although still ineligible to sit, secured his election to Parliament from Co. Clare. Alarmed by the growing tension in Ireland, the duke of Wellington, the prime minister, allowed the Catholic Emancipation Bill, sponsored by Sir Robert Peel, to pass (1829). Catholics were now on the same footing as Protestants except for a few restrictions, most of which were later removed. The Act of Settlement is still in force, however, and Catholics are excluded from the throne.

Catholic Apostolic Church, religious community originating in England c.1831 and extending later to Germany and the United States (1848). It was founded under the influence of Edward Irving; its members are sometimes called Irvingites. Because of their prophetic gifts, 12 apostles (including Henry Drummond) were in 1835 set aside as officers. They were expected to survive until the Second Coming of Jesus, but the last of them died in 1901. When the apostles began to die, a schism took place in Germany over the appointing of successors. This led to the formation (1863) of the New Apostolic Church, the formal name of the present-day organization. An angel, or bishop, presides over each congregation; he is assisted by pastors, teachers, and others. Symbolism and mystery of worship characterize the elaborate liturgy, which has borrowed much from the Roman Catholic Church, including devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Much emphasis is given to the Second Coming of Jesus. The membership is about 8 million worldwide (1994).

Anglo-Catholic movement: see Oxford movement.

known as Ferdinand the Catholic Spanish Fernando el Católico

(born March 10, 1452, Sos, Aragon—died Jan. 23, 1516) King of Aragon from 1479, king of Castile (as Ferdinand V) from 1474 (joint sovereign with Queen Isabella I until 1504), king of Sicily (as Ferdinand II, 1468–1516), and king of Naples (as Ferdinand III, 1503–16). The son of John II of Aragon (1398–1479), Ferdinand married Isabella of Castile in 1469 and fought to impose his authority over the nobles in the two kingdoms. As part of an effort to modernize Castile, they banned all religions other than Roman Catholicism, leading to the Spanish Inquisition (1478) and the expulsion of the Jews (1492). Conquest of Granada in 1492 made it possible to support Christopher Columbus's voyages to the New World. Ferdinand furthered his expansionary policies in the Mediterranean and in Africa. After the conquest of Naples in 1503, during the Italian Wars, Spain rivaled France as the most powerful state in Europe. By uniting the Spanish kingdoms into the nation of Spain, Ferdinand began Spain's entry into the modern period of imperial expansion.

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(1609–35) Military alliance of the Catholic powers of Germany, led by Maximilian I, duke of Bavaria, and designed to stem the growth of Protestantism in Germany. Plans for a league had long been discussed, but the formation of the Protestant Union in 1608 finally caused the Catholics to unite. In alliance with the Habsburg emperors, the League's forces, led by Graf von Tilly, played a key role in the Thirty Years' War. The league was abolished by the Peace of Prague (1635).

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Freedom from discrimination and civil disabilities granted to the Roman Catholics of Britain and Ireland in the late 18th and early 19th century. After the Reformation, Roman Catholics in Britain could not purchase land, hold offices or seats in Parliament, inherit property, or practice their religion without incurring civil penalties. Irish Catholics faced similar limitations. By the late 18th century, Catholicism no longer seemed so great a social and political danger, and a series of laws, culminating in the Emancipation Act of 1829, eased the restrictions. A major figure in the struggle for full emancipation was Daniel O'Connell.

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