EMERGING EUROPE – THE AGE OF FAITH
In the mythology of the European Union, the ‘European project’ began with Charlemagne (Karl der Grosse in German; Charles the Great in English). Although there was no concept of ‘continents’ then, and so of Europe as a continent, the idea is convincing enough. However, Christian people in his time thought of themselves as simply part of the worldwide Christian community – just as Muslims today see themselves as part of the trans-national Islamic community, the Umma (or Ummah). Charlemagne’s Christendom had much in common with the Umma, where no divide was recognised between the sacred and the secular.
His vision of what he wanted to achieve was greatly influenced by his understanding of Augustine’s concept ‘the City of God’. Unfortunately, what Augustine’s meant by this bore little resemblance to what Charlemagne thought he’d meant. What he – or those who advised him – had imported into the term was Augustine’s earlier, triumphalist Christendom thought, not the new and defining idea to be found in the actual book, City of God. Inevitably, then, what Charlemagne set about constructing was a renewed Christendom.
When set against truly Christian principles, the Holy Roman Empire – Christendom renewed – can only be reckoned thoroughly unsatisfactory. Its context, however, must be understood. This is how R.H.C. Davis describes it:
The first period of the Middle Ages, from the fourth century to the ninth, was a time of despair – the ‘Dark Ages’ – which witnessed the disintegration of the Mediterranean world and the collapse of its political, cultural and economic unity. But even more important than the actual destruction was the fact that people realised that they were living in an age of decline. It was what made St Augustine and Gregory the Great think that the end of the world was at hand. It was what gave the sense of urgency to the work of Cassiodorus and Alcuin, striving to salvage the culture of the ancient world before it was too late. It was the great motive-force behind the great political developments of the period.