ABSTRACT
The Church was a principal sufferer from the evils which afflicted Europe in the ninth and tenth centuries. By the middle of the eleventh century a great deal of progress towards recovery had been made. First of all, Christianity was no longer on the defensive; it had taken the aggressive against paganism. Secondly, it was proceeding with its own internal regeneration, beginning with a great and widespread movement of monastic reform, which was followed by a movement for the reform of the secular clergy. The death of Almanzor in 1002, and the internal dissensions of the Moslems culminating in the end of the Caliphate in 1031 gave the Christians their opportunity. The zeal for the expansion of Christianity and the missionary endeavour could not have been possible if the Church had remained stagnant and unregenerate. Decrees against simony and clerical marriage were multiplied at synods, but little advance was made against practices that were of long standing and well-nigh universal.
