Erasmus’s Vision of Reform

Well before Luther posted the 95 Theses in Wittenberg and long after the end of the Council of Trent, Christian Humanists puzzled over what true Reform should look like for Christendom. Erasmus of Rotterdam was both the heir to Late Medieval scholastic visions of reform in terms of priestly and ecclesiastical renovation and renewal and the progenitor of a particularly spiritually personal and moralistic vision of Christian reform. As the Protestant Reformation took shape and the Catholic Reformation worked to define what it meant to be Catholic, Erasmus focused on the reform of the Christian herself. In this way, while other Reformers’ visions of reform primarily focused on the hierarchy, doctrine, and liturgy of the Church, Erasmus saw reform as emanating from the spiritual renewal of the individual Christian. For Erasmus, this moral and spiritual renewal would flow from scriptural study, solid education, and the tempering of monastic and priestly excess and would engender the gradual and peaceful Reform of the Church.