ABSTRACT
This chapter surveys the Atlantic dimensions of early modern Catholic Christianity in light of recent developments on a number of largely separate scholarly fronts and explores a few of the most promising lines along which investigations might proceed. It highlights connections that develop from one central dimension of the Catholic Reformation, that is, the program of renewing the Christian faith and correcting the behavior of the lay population of Europe. In many areas of Latin America and North America evangelized by Catholic missionaries, the "reduccion" was a favored instrument of conversion. The discourse surrounding this important ideal and institution is also revealing on the concept of Catholic imperium. (Jesuit Missions spread all over the globe), showing each continent led by a Jesuit. Catholicism looms large in the historiography of the early modern Americas, though traditionally the subject has been treated in ways that minimize the opportunities for fruitful dialogue with scholarship on the European Catholic Reformation.
