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The End of the Schism: Catholics, Protestants, and the Remaking of Christian Life in Europe, 1880s–1970s
368 pages, Hardcover
Published April 22, 2025
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April 17, 2026
Awesome book. Details the Catholic-Protestant relations between the 1880s and 1970s. Coming into the book, there isn’t really any signs ecumenism is coming. Tensions between the religions is still relatively high and kinda escalating (which is like really funny reading Catholics do polemics about Protestants and vice versa). Even in places where you think there’d be places of convergence like Anti-socialism or anti-feminism, they’re kinda using the same arguments but aren’t united in the fight against these forces of materialism and sin. However, a problem emerges in Germany. Germany is much more of a mix of Catholics and Protestants and they need a way to create the base for fascism. So they invent the concept of Christianity and ecumenism and whiteness. And lemme tell ya the Catholics and Protestants overwhelmingly love fascism and the concept of ecumenism and the white race. And from there we’re really off to the races. After the Nazis are defeated, everyone pretends they were one of the few anti-fascist Christians and the ecumenism continues in the name of defeating socialism (the one constant amongst the Christians is their hate of socialism and communism). And then there’s really no going back from there. Ecumenism is just fully normalized.
There is an interesting dual track in this book where at each juncture we check in on the missionaries. Due to material conditions likebeing thousands of miles from Europe and having to contend with the native populations of the colonies, the missionaries are typically having a somewhat different conversation than back in mainland Europe.
We end on the New Left’s influence on Christianity and the fringe European version of liberation theology that brings about that’s ultimately snuffed out by the church.
There’s something to be said in this book about Gary Gerstle’s “The Protean Character of American Liberalism” in parts of this book. At various points in the book, there are efforts by Christians to absorb some mild version of their critics critique into their ideology. From setting up Christian labor unions as an alternative to socialism, to being pro-limited social safety nets, to eventual fringes becoming woke and third world liberationists there is like some attempt to co-opt whatever is popular into some limited way into their ideology.
However, the real secret sauce of Christianity is as it’s pointed out by the new left Christians in the end of the book is the ability of the churches to suck up to and ingratiate themselves with power. There’s a lot of selective emphasis on things that are very convenient to the ruling class, and huge endorsements of fascism which is really how it’s survived as a religion for so long.
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P116
P125
P147
There is an interesting dual track in this book where at each juncture we check in on the missionaries. Due to material conditions likebeing thousands of miles from Europe and having to contend with the native populations of the colonies, the missionaries are typically having a somewhat different conversation than back in mainland Europe.
We end on the New Left’s influence on Christianity and the fringe European version of liberation theology that brings about that’s ultimately snuffed out by the church.
There’s something to be said in this book about Gary Gerstle’s “The Protean Character of American Liberalism” in parts of this book. At various points in the book, there are efforts by Christians to absorb some mild version of their critics critique into their ideology. From setting up Christian labor unions as an alternative to socialism, to being pro-limited social safety nets, to eventual fringes becoming woke and third world liberationists there is like some attempt to co-opt whatever is popular into some limited way into their ideology.
However, the real secret sauce of Christianity is as it’s pointed out by the new left Christians in the end of the book is the ability of the churches to suck up to and ingratiate themselves with power. There’s a lot of selective emphasis on things that are very convenient to the ruling class, and huge endorsements of fascism which is really how it’s survived as a religion for so long.
P115
P116
P125
P147
Displaying 1 of 1 review