The Beginning Of The Modern World

The modern world as we know it, had a beginning in religion rather than in science or technology. The Reformation of the Sixteenth Century really changed our way of thinking and made the modern world possible. The Reformation was about purifying Christianity by going back to the Bible itself instead of the dictates of the pope and the extensive man-made traditions of the Catholic Church. The name most immediately associated with the Reformation is Martin Luther.

A "Protestant" was "one who protested" against the hierarchical and hide-bound institution of the church and believed that anyone could read the Bible for himself. Protestant churches were thus much more loosely organized than the Catholic Church.

It is the individualistic, continuous self-improvement, think-for-yourself Protestant mentality that led to settlement of nations like the U.S. and Canada. The biblical idea of the world as a depraved and sinful place opened the mind's door to ways to improve that world and led to the Industrial Revolution. Prior to the Reformation, people had too much respect for the way things had always been for any large-scale improvements like that.

The stripping of the pope of his authority in favor of the Bible itself provided the mindset to do the same to kings in favor of democracy. The turning to the Bible instead of the dictates of the pope opened the way for rule of law in civil society instead of the dictates of an autocracy.