After Rome collapsed, it took a few centuries for the Roman Catholic Church to spread throughout most of Europe. Technologically, this was The Iron Age. Iron Age technologies stayed pretty much the same from before the birth of Christ until the 1900s.
The Roman Catholic Church was involved in many secular activities. Scriptoriums in her monasteries produced most of the books, Her hospitals took care of nearly all the sick, and Her schools educated nearly all the literate. In many areas, monasteries offered the only rooms and food available for travelers. Each of these endeavors required land and labor, much of which was provided by monasteries and convents.
It was the strangest thing that had ever happened. Governments helped The Church because it helped keep people off the streets by encouraging holy men and women to take vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. Even stranger, those who took the necessary vows were encouraged, and paid, to pray; often for the souls of the very kings, nobles, and other government officials who’d facilitated the building of those monasteries and convents.
By praying for others, Catholics got their own souls into Heaven. When their prayers landed in the Golden Bowls held by the Twenty Four Elders who sit around the Throne of God, many went onto the Altar of God, and were answered, thus perpetuating the system that encouraged them.
Modern governments don’t like any part of that idea. Many of them would rather that their own souls suffer endlessly in Hell than do anything to help other souls get into Heaven. Still, we can look back, and wonder if there weren’t some advantages to a system that encouraged people to love their neighbors, tell the truth, pray to God, and only have to pay ten percent of their income in taxes.
