Version: 8 (current) | Updated: 11/24/2025, 3:50:42 PM
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@file_pinax -> documents -> @modern_indulgence_essay:document {title: "Modern Indulgence: A Historical and Contemporary Analysis", creator: @bilbo_baggins:person {full_name: "Bilbo Baggins"}, created: @date_2023, language: "en", subjects: ["Medieval history","Christianity","Indulgences","Social inequality","Economic history","Philanthropy","Corruption","Reformation","Modern society","Critique of institutions"], description: "An essay exploring the historical context and modern parallels of the indulgence system in the medieval Catholic Church, critiquing contemporary institutions and their role in perpetuating inequality and corruption."}
@file_133047701_modern_indulgence -> contains -> @modern_indulgence_essay:document
@bilbo_baggins:person {full_name: "Bilbo Baggins"}
@indulgence_system:concept {origin: @crusades:event, purpose: "remission of penitential debt", financed_by: [@wealthy_nobles:concept, @church:organization], criticized_by: @martin_luther:person, modern_analogue: @modern_indulgence:concept}
@crusades:event {start: @date_1060, end: @date_1270, description: "Military campaigns sanctioned by the papacy to reclaim the Holy Land; first indulgences granted to crusaders."}
@wealthy_nobles:concept {role: "buyers of indulgences to avoid penance"}
@church:organization {type: "institution", wealth: @church_wealth:concept, practices: [@indulgence_system, @penance_system:concept, @excommunication:concept, @interdict:concept]}
@church_wealth:concept {extent: "by 900 AD owned ~⅓ cultivated land in western Europe; by 16th c owned half of Germany"}
@penance_system:concept {description: "system of assigned spiritual tasks for sin absolution", status: "became unsustainable by 13th c"}
@excommunication:concept {definition: "formal exclusion from sacraments"}
@interdict:concept {definition: "ecclesiastical censure prohibiting sacraments in a region"}
@martin_luther:person {full_name: "Martin Luther", role: "Reformer", authored: @ninety_five_theses:document}
@ninety_five_theses:document {year: @date_1517, critique: @indulgence_system, call: "personal connection to God"}
@reformation:movement {start: @date_1517, cause: @indulgence_system, key_figure: @martin_luther, outcome: "formation of Protestantism"}
@protestantism:movement {origin: @reformation, principles: ["sola scriptura","sola fide"]}
@dante_alighieri:person {full_name: "Dante Alighieri", role: "poet", work: @purgatorio:document}
@purgatorio:document {title: "Purgatorio", author: @dante_alighieri, excerpt: "Sheep metaphor for unquestioning obedience"}
@ambrose:person {full_name: "Ambrose of Milan", role: "bishop", contribution: "promoted death‑bed donations as path to heaven"}
@john_chrysostom:person {full_name: "John Chrysostom", role: "bishop", quote: "Robbery is not imparting our good things to others"}
@thomas_aquinas:person {full_name: "Thomas Aquinas", role: "theologian", idea: "church possesses an almost infinite spiritual treasury"}
@bonaventure:person {full_name: "Bonaventure", role: "theologian", view: "church should defend faith and support education"}
@pope_alexander_ii:person {full_name: "Pope Alexander II", role: "pope", action: "first granted indulgences in 1060s"}
@geoffrey_chaucer:person {full_name: "Geoffrey Chaucer", role: "author", created: @pardoner:person}
@pardoner:person {role: "seller of indulgences", source: @canterbury_tales:document, admitted_hypocrisy: true, quote: "Radix malorum est cupiditas"}
@canterbury_tales:document {author: @geoffrey_chaucer, contains: @pardoner}
@peruzzi_family:organization {type: "merchant family", city: @florence:place, role: "early oligopolistic financiers"}
@florence:place {country: @italy, region: "Tuscany"}
@italy:place {continent: @europe}
@brussels:place {country: @belgium, region: "Flanders"}
@paris:place {country: @france, region: "Île‑de‑France"}
@amiens_cathedral:place {country: @france, description: "Gothic cathedral funded largely by indulgence sales"}
@st_peters_basilica:place {city: @rome:place, funded_by: @indulgence_system, completed: @date_1626, significance: "symbol of indulgence‑driven corruption"}
@rome:place {country: @italy, continent: @europe}
@modern_indulgence:concept {definition: "contemporary mechanisms (charitable donations, ESG funds, carbon offsets) that function as moral absolution purchases", parallels: @indulgence_system, criticized_by: @charitable_industrial_complex:concept}
@charitable_industrial_complex:concept {author: @buffett:person, claim: "non‑profits become profit‑driven enterprises that launder wealth", source: @buffett_article:document}
@buffett:person {full_name: "Peter Buffett", role: "author"}
@buffett_article:document {title: "The Charitable Industrial Complex", outlet: "New York Times", author: @buffett}
@ESG_fund:concept {type: "investment vehicle", marketed_as: "ethical", used_for: "wealth laundering"}
@oil_money:concept {description: "profits from fossil‑fuel industries channeled through charitable fronts"}
@sh*tcoin_profits:concept {description: "speculative crypto gains funneled via philanthropy"}
@wealth_inequality:concept {historical_root: @medieval_inequality:concept, modern_manifestation: @modern_wealth_gap:concept}
@medieval_inequality:concept {drivers: [@high_land_rents:concept, @low_wages:concept, @food_price_profits:concept]}
@high_land_rents:concept {impact: "peasant exploitation"}
@low_wages:concept {impact: "labor stagnation"}
@food_price_profits:concept {impact: "peasant impoverishment"}
@modern_wealth_gap:concept {drivers: [@investment_banks:organization, @consulting_agencies:organization, @non_profits:organization]}
@investment_banks:organization {role: "wealth accumulation"}
@consulting_agencies:organization {role: "service‑based capitalism"}
@non_profits:organization {role: "charitable industrial complex"}
@guilt_induced_education:concept {description: "academic curricula that instill moral guilt for historical injustices"}
@moral_cleansing:concept {practice: "donations used to absolve personal guilt"}
@systemic_change:concept {desired_outcome: "structural reforms beyond charitable gestures"}
@new_beliefs:concept {proposal: "create transparent, accountable systems using digital verification"}
@digital_verification:concept {technology: "blockchain"}
@blockchain:technology {applications: [@carbon_indulgences:concept]}
@carbon_indulgences:concept {source: @nerlich_koteyko:publication, description: "carbon‑offset schemes framed as moral purchases"}
@nerlich_koteyko:publication {title: "Compounds, Creativity and Complexity in Climate Change Communication: The Case of ‘Carbon Indulgences’", authors: ["Brigitte Nerlich","Nelya Koteyko"]}
@charity_laundering:concept {definition: "using charitable channels to cleanse illicit or unethical wealth"}
@hypocrisy:concept {manifestations: [@indulgence_system, @charitable_industrial_complex]}
@corruption:concept {historical_examples: [@indulgence_system, @church_wealth], modern_examples: [@charitable_industrial_complex]}
@exploitation:concept {targets: [@peasants:concept, @modern_vulnerable_populations:concept]}
@peasants:concept {status: "subject of medieval exploitation"}
@modern_vulnerable_populations:concept {examples: ["low‑income communities","environmentally impacted groups"]}
--- Relationships (selected controversial focus) ---
@indulgence_system -> financed -> @church_wealth:concept {by: [@wealthy_nobles, @merchant_class:concept]}
@indulgence_system -> criticized_by -> @martin_luther:person {work: @ninety_five_theses:document}
@indulgence_system -> linked_to -> @corruption:concept {evidence: "sale of spiritual remission for money"}
@indulgence_system -> linked_to -> @hypocrisy:concept {evidence: "pardoner’s deceitful sales"}
@church -> employed -> @pardoner:person {role: "indulgence seller"}
@church -> built -> @st_peters_basilica:place {funded_by: @indulgence_system}
@modern_indulgence -> parallels -> @indulgence_system:concept {critique: "modern charity as moral absolution"}
@charitable_industrial_complex -> enables -> @wealth_inequality:concept {mechanism: "wealth laundering through philanthropy"}
@ESG_fund -> used_for -> @wealth_inequality:concept {by: @rich_donors:concept}
@rich_donors:concept {behavior: "donate to appear virtuous while preserving wealth"}
@guilt_induced_education -> produces -> @moral_cleansing:concept {through: "charitable donations"}
@digital_verification -> proposed_solution -> @systemic_change:concept {via: "transparent blockchain ledgers"}
@blockchain -> supports -> @carbon_indulgences:concept {as: "verified carbon offset purchases"}
--- End of Knowledge Graph ---<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png" width="1024" height="1002" data-attrs="{"src":"https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png","srcNoWatermark":null,"fullscreen":null,"imageSize":null,"height":1002,"width":1024,"resizeWidth":null,"bytes":2219328,"alt":null,"title":null,"type":"image/png","href":null,"belowTheFold":false,"topImage":true,"internalRedirect":null,"isProcessing":false,"align":null,"offset":false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Vbho!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F62f6da06-4b15-4392-a97e-ad69d3efcb7b_1024x1002.png 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container restack-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-refresh-cw"><path d="M3 12a9 9 0 0 1 9-9 9.75 9.75 0 0 1 6.74 2.74L21 8"></path><path d="M21 3v5h-5"></path><path d="M21 12a9 9 0 0 1-9 9 9.75 9.75 0 0 1-6.74-2.74L3 16"></path><path d="M8 16H3v5"></path></svg></div><div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></div></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div><hr></div><p><strong>1/3 - Not Knowing Why</strong></p><p><em>“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish”<br></em>- <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+10:27-30&version=NIV">John 10:27-30</a></p><p></p><p>The 13th century had been a golden age for Europe. Major advancements in agriculture (the three-field system, the invention of the heavy plow and horse harness) had led to large food surpluses and a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-growth-of-world-population-after-industrial-revolution-Source-United-Nations-World_fig1_353821660">population boom</a>. Nobles took advantage of all this human capital by charging <a href="https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUUR0000SEHA">high land rents</a>, <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/">paying low wages</a>, and <a href="https://time.com/6269366/food-company-profits-make-groceries-expensive/">profiting from high food prices</a>, creating a wealth pump that enriched landowners at the expense of peasants.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-1" href="#footnote-1" target="_self">1</a></p><p>These trends were especially magnified in <a href="https://jon.mirror.xyz/Kf1tgUOcav-33CZNheL5_griDe5URu3KnQDD6qf52v0">emerging market towns and cities</a> (like Florence, Bruges, and Paris) where <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/01/09/trends-in-income-and-wealth-inequality/">inequality accelerated rapidly</a> as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urbanization#/media/File:Urbanization_over_the_past_500_years_(Historical_sources_and_UN_(1500_to_2016)),_OWID.svg">rural immigrants flooded into cities</a> in hope of opportunity. Typically, <a href="https://nonprofitquarterly.org/unpacking-the-us-aristocracy-inside-americas-wealthiest-50-families/">a few wealthy families</a> were able to establish dynastic, mono/<a href="https://www.visualcapitalist.com/the-banking-oligopoly-in-one-chart/">oligopolistic control</a> over the recently developed finance/banking or trade industries (e.g. the Peruzzi Family in Florence).<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-2" href="#footnote-2" target="_self">2</a></p><p>Such rapid wealth accumulation allowed many wealthy noble families to forgo the traditional practice of primogeniture (100% inheritance by the first-born son) and to <a href="https://www.wikihow.com/Split-Your-Estate-Fairly-Between-Your-Beneficiaries">instead split their estates among several sons</a>. Families that weren’t wealthy enough to do so could also send their later-born sons on a Crusade (which could end with some <a href="https://uca.edu/politicalscience/home/research-projects/dadm-project/asiapacific-region/united-statesphilippines-1898-1946/">new territory</a>/<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Expedition">trade routes</a>/<a href="https://www.newsweek.com/war-iraq-oil-trump-saddam-hussein-kurds-kurdish-erbil-isis-islamic-state-791771">plunder</a>, or <a href="https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/military/killed#:~:text=The%20number%20of%20United%20States,also%20borne%20high%20human%20costs.">death</a>) or <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/11/millennials-want-to-work-in-these-emerging-markets">send them to a burgeoning market city</a> to broaden the family empire or start their own. These practices resulted in the noble elite class expanding significantly, with especially large cohorts of <a href="https://youtu.be/C762HWSz67w?t=2805">middle-ranking nobles</a> emerging in the late 13th century.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-3" href="#footnote-3" target="_self">3</a></p><p>The <a href="https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/1676262417817378818?s=20">peasants</a>, meanwhile, weren’t fairing too well. They had either stayed on the estate of <a href="https://foodprint.org/issues/labor-workers-in-the-food-system/">some exploitative lord</a> or moved to an <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1875/10/13/79254436.html?pageNumber=6">overcrowded</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/deliveries-blocked-french-refinery-sites-fourth-day-2023-03-10/">unhygienic</a> market town. The hardship, though, is secondary to the fact that the whole process had been extremely <a href="https://youtu.be/5Q1Nb2Upe4c?t=15">unfair</a>: peasants had seen <a href="https://quotefancy.com/quote/847451/Karl-Marx-Capitalist-production-therefore-develops-technology-and-the-combining-together">very little of the fruits of their labor</a> as wealth concentrated in the <a href="https://youtu.be/CHC9UKvrP2M?t=29">top 1% of the nobility</a>. As <a href="https://educationdata.org/college-enrollment-statistics">competition for power and resources</a> among the recently expanded noble elites increased, all this exploitation and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_United_States">inequality ramped up</a>, the <a href="https://youtu.be/F7SNEdjftno?t=62">working conditions worsened</a>, and the <em><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ressentiment">ressentiment</a> and </em><a href="https://youtu.be/FFA_MA3vqJw?t=46">immiseration of the peasantry festered</a>.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-4" href="#footnote-4" target="_self">4</a></p><p>Despite this escalating inequality and the wealth pump funneling resources to the land-owning aristocracy, there was a powerful stabilizing force, one that promised that <a href="https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/peace-justice/">in the end all would be made equal and just</a>: Christianity. There was a shared belief among peasants and nobles alike that what truly mattered was not earthly status or economic class (in fact, your average medieval person would have little to no conception of these modern ideas), but whether your moral character would satisfy the <a href="https://youtu.be/PVkWokLqPOg?t=558">Final Judgment</a> of God. </p><p>Such a belief system was comforting to many. It not only promised <a href="https://youtu.be/ISTPRoBW2sc?t=106">an eternal and immutable sense of justice</a>, but also that, if you confessed all your sins and did what the priest told you, salvation and heavenly bliss were just around the corner. Practically, these beliefs <a href="https://youtu.be/wQpzUdu150I?t=35">encouraged people to be dutiful, peaceful, contributing members of society, to be unthinking and unquestioning</a> — <a href="https://youtu.be/f84J81C0Pdw?t=7">a flock</a> of God. This was the <a href="https://youtu.be/R6bHs8Vm3EQ?t=246">ideal society</a> that the spiritual elites of the time, like Dante, aimed to create: </p><blockquote><div class="preformatted-block" data-component-name="PreformattedTextBlockToDOM"><label class="hide-text" contenteditable="false">Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published</label><pre class="text"><em>Even as sheep that move, first one, then two,
then three, out of the fold — the others also
stand, eyes and muzzles lowered, timidly;
and what the first sheep does, the others do,
and if it halts, they huddle close behind,
simple and quiet and not knowing why:</em>
- Dante Alighieri, <em><a href="https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/purgatorio/purgatorio-3/">Purgatorio </a></em><a href="https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/purgatorio/purgatorio-3/">III</a>, Mandelbaum Trans. </pre></div></blockquote><p>In contrast to this introspective aspect of the faith, there was a another more external belief that provided comfort to the less fortunate: that the rich, who had likely <a href="https://youtu.be/9B-RkNRGH9s?t=21">exploited</a> others to amass their wealth, would face divine retribution at the Final Judgement. </p><p>Christianity <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_revolution">in its early stages</a> was big on this subversive aspect, championing notions of equal justice in the afterlife and a radical reordering of social hierarchies. To give you some idea of how anti-rich early Christians were, here’s a quote from the Book of James:</p><blockquote><p><em>Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the innocent one, who was not opposing you.</em></p><p>- <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=James+5:1-6&version=NIV">James 5:1-6</a></p></blockquote><p>The idea, per Matthew, was that it was essentially impossible for a rich man to get into heaven:</p><blockquote><p><em>Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.</em></p><p>- <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+19:24&version=KJV">Matthew 19:24</a></p></blockquote><p>Now, as we in our <a href="https://www.salon.com/2023/06/13/welcome-to-the-end-times-peter-turchin-saw-this-coming--and-says-we-can-still-prevent-collapse/">plutocratic society</a> know well, wholly excluding the rich and powerful from your new organization is not the best plan in the long term. Still, the opposite, accepting the rich with open arms or marketing specifically towards them, is a good way to become the target of popular revolt. Christianity, as it became more institutionalized through its 300 years of nascency, found a classic middle ground: hypocrisy.</p><p>In the 4th century, theologians, such as (soon-to-be Saint) Ambrose, hatched a new idea: <a href="https://youtu.be/DkFw4vfgjHk?t=58">lambast the rich</a> <em>but </em>offer them a path to heaven via a <a href="https://givingpledge.org/about">deathbed donation to the poor</a> (via <a href="https://www.forbes.com/lists/top-charities/?sh=4bb7f5355f50">the Church</a>, of course). We can see some of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Xmi2Ry_BNk">marketing</a> for the campaign from St. Chrysostom:</p><blockquote><p><em>This also is robbery — not to impart our good things to others. Very likely it may seem to you a strange saying; but wonder not at it, for I will, from the Divine Scriptures, bring testimony showing that not only robbery of other men's goods, but also the not imparting our own good things to others, — that this also is robbery, and covetousness, and fraud.</em></p><p>- St. John Chrysostom, <em><a href="https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/chrysostom_four_discourses_02_discourse2.htm">Discourse on the parable of the Rich man and Lazarus</a></em></p></blockquote><p>Thus if you were a wealthy aristocrat you either: 1) Feared God and Hell, and therefore would give anything to end up in Heaven. So, when the priest came to your bedside and you confessed a lifetime of sin to him, he might suggest you dedicate a good portion of the estate in your will to the Church in order to be granted safe passage up to heave;<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-5" href="#footnote-5" target="_self">5</a> or 2) you, being more practical, wanted to establish yourself and your family as upstanding and virtuous. You observed <a href="https://fortune.com/2016/06/01/giving-pledge-new-members-2016/">other wealthy families, especially the most inordinately wealthy among them, giving away vast fortunes</a>, and you, thinking yourself of comparable stature, do the same. </p><p>By taking advantage of the delusions and the vanities of the rich (both of which they, throughout time, have been quite well known for), the Church was able to accrue a great deal of wealth. By 900 AD the Church owned about <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/joewalsh/2021/07/24/vatican-owns-over-5000-properties-worldwide-it-reveals-in-first-disclosures-on-its-real-estate-holdings/">a third of the cultivated land in western Europe</a>, and by the Protestant Reformation (16th century) it owned half of Germany.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-6" href="#footnote-6" target="_self">6</a> </p><p>Early on, much of the wealth the church acquired through its landholdings was redistributed to the poor through <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare">almsgiving</a> and the various initiatives led by local monks. Early monastic orders were actually some of the most influential economic agents in the Early Middle Ages, promoting the payment of rents with money (as opposed to food) and the development of markets.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-7" href="#footnote-7" target="_self">7</a> </p><p>As the Catholic Church's wealth and power swelled with the influx of noble bequests, its influence broadened and deepened. For nobility, aligning favorably with the Church brought <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Monetary_Fund">an array of financial advantages</a>: land grants, a share of the collected tithes, or tax exemptions. It also gave your children access to <a href="https://www.careereducation.columbia.edu/career-counseling">enticing career paths</a> in lucrative Church positions. But most importantly, the Church's favor gave you legitimacy — endorsing your noble status or, <a href="https://infogalactic.com/info/List_of_authoritarian_regimes_supported_by_the_United_States">if you were a monarch, bolstering your claim to the throne</a>. If you were a really good king, maybe you’d even be <a href="https://www.amazon.com/che-guevara-t-shirts/s?k=che+guevara+t-shirts">canonized</a>. </p><p>Those were the carrots, the stick was political ostracism through <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/world/middleeast/30hussein.html">excommunication</a> (the act of officially excluding an individual from participation in the sacraments and services of the Christian Church) or <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/russia-us-ukraine-sanctions.html">interdict</a> (an ecclesiastical censure that prohibited certain sacraments and religious services from being performed in a particular area or for a certain group of people). Through these various levers of legitimization, the Church was able to establish a powerful, continent-spanning network of influence that, at the <a href="https://youtu.be/qKfuMPN23dE?t=304">turn of the millennium</a>, was about to realize its full potential. </p><div><hr></div><p><strong>2/3 - A Little Indulgence</strong></p><p><em>“Honor to the government and obedience, and also to the crooked government! So wills the good sleep. What can I do if power likes to walk on crooked legs?”<br>- </em>Friedrich Nietzsche, <em><a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/7205/7205-h/7205-h.htm#chap11">Thus Spoke Zarathustra</a></em>, From the Chairs of Virtue</p><p></p><p>By the 12/13th centuries the Church was dealing with a few issues:</p><p>#1 - All the wealth brought about by reopening (semi) global trade route with the East via the Crusades and the Church’s (re)establishment of markets and use of coinage in most of Europe resulted in the emergence of an increasingly wealthy new merchant class, also known as the bourgeoisie. While this new class had acquired through trade and lending significant financial resources, its members were simultaneously looked down upon by the landed nobility and resented by the peasantry. This group needed legitimacy, and the methods they were prepared to use for acquiring it had the potential to significantly disrupt the existing social hierarchy.</p><p>#2 - The Church’s old pseudo-judicial system, called the penance system, was a bit stale.</p><p>Here's how it worked: Let's say you committed a sin, such as lying to your parents or stealing a piece of bread. You, feeling quite guilty about it, would go to your priest and confess your sin. Then, he would assign you some kind of spiritual task — a penance — such as <a href="https://youtu.be/VY9o-cpcq8I?t=116">saying your Hail Marys</a> ten times a night for a week, <a href="https://youtu.be/emHWmTO3eA0?t=2">fasting on Fridays</a> for a month, or even <a href="https://youtu.be/9ztDurfg3Wk">a pilgrimage to a holy site</a> in Rome or Jerusalem. </p><p>Once you completed your task, you would be absolved of your sin by the priest, and <a href="https://youtu.be/rzUkLB9vJnU?t=180">you’d feel quite good and morally clean</a> (before inevitably committing another minor sin and the process starting over). This system, served, at a group level, as a very effective means of social regulation and, for the individual, provided a satisfying means of <a href="https://www.betterhelp.com/">continuous moral improvement</a>.</p><p>However, as society scaled up in the late 1000s to 1300s, with increased urbanization, population growth, and economic development, this penance system became unwieldy. It became logistically unsustainable for a local priest to keep track of everyone's sins and their penance completion status. Additionally, many parishioners had built up so much penitential debt that there was no conceivable way they could complete their penance in full, especially if they were ordinary peasants busy on the farm or the market (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/05/sunday-review/the-families-that-cant-afford-summer.html?_r=1">who’s got the time to hike out to Jerusalem?!</a>). The worst part about having a lot of penance is that if you died without having been properly absolved of your sins, you were headed to Hell, and that is something Medieval Christians truly feared.</p><p>#3 - The Church was certainly on strong financial footing at the time, but its wealth was mostly in relatively illiquid land assets. With the development of market dynamics and coinage it would have been useful at the time for the Church to develop an additional source of liquid income.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-8" href="#footnote-8" target="_self">8</a></p><p>The indulgence system (at least temporarily) addressed all three of these issues: the social-climb-y aspirations of the new bourgeoise, the penitential binds of the average parishioner, and the cutting-edge financing needs of the Church. </p><p>An indulgence allowed for a individual to purchase spiritual cleanliness and expunge their own spiritual debts or that of their ancestors in purgatory. Purchasing an indulgence granted you either <a href="https://youtu.be/xbhCPt6PZIU?t=59">direct passage to heaven</a> or, at least, got you a Disney Fast Pass through most of purgatory. </p><p>This monetary version of the indulgence (the most common version you may have heard of and the one that Martin Luther notably critiqued) was not the original version of the indulgence. Its origins lie in the crusades, with Pope Alexander II granting the first indulgences in the 1060s to “defenders” of the faith going off to fight the Moors in Spain.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-9" href="#footnote-9" target="_self">9</a> The concern was that these crusaders, who may have had some outstanding penitential debt, might die in battle without having served their penance, which would have meant eternal damnation. To prevent this, indulgences were issued, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.I._Bill">cancelling their debt</a> and ensuring their passage to heaven.</p><p>As the crusades wore on, <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/military-spending-defense-budget">the logistical expenses of conducting foreign wars</a>, purchasing <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_military_company">mercenaries</a>, and building <a href="https://www.todaysmilitary.com/ways-to-serve/bases-around-world">fortifications</a> became quite a burden on the Papacy’s purse strings. There were also those with the funds to support the war (yes, our old buddies, the rich!) who were were unable or unwilling to make the dangerous trek out to the Levant. <a href="https://youtu.be/ZWijx_AgPiA?t=91">To these wealthy hawks the Papacy offered an out</a>: you can get the same indulgence of penance-removal as the real crusaders, all you have to do is pay.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-10" href="#footnote-10" target="_self">10</a></p><p>This innocent act of first turning spiritual debt into hard, war-making financing, built on itself and eventually got out of control. By the 13th century Thomas Aquinas was postulating that the church had a nearly infinite spiritual treasury due to the all the powerful acts of saints, and that the Church could draw on this spiritual treasury to grant indulgences to those who had committed minor sins. Bonaventure stated that the Church’s responsibilities included not only the (literal) “defense of the Holy Land” but also the “defense of the faith [against heretics], and the promotion of studies and similar endeavors.”<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-11" href="#footnote-11" target="_self">11</a> Therefore, indulgences could be granted to <a href="https://paw.princeton.edu/article/annual-contributions-hit-record-818-million">university benefactors</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism">financial-backers of the inquisition</a>.</p><p>One of my favorite indulgence justifications from this era comes from an anonymous 13th century theologian of Metz arguing for indulgences for the construction of roads and bridges:</p><blockquote><p><em>Travelers on broken paths and dangerous and difficult roads are hindered. They hack through the woods and are put upon, and their carts are turned over, and wine spills all over, and they thrash their horse and get angry. These travelers grumble, and they curse all those who ought to have repaired the road, and they sin mortally by swearing shamefully against God and the saints.</em><a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-12" href="#footnote-12" target="_self">12</a></p></blockquote><p>When logic like <em>good roads → prevent cursing → morally good ∴ take money</em> is sufficient for the granting of an indulgence, then you can assume that indulgences were being granted for just about anything.</p><p>One of the major uses of indulgence financing was the construction of <a href="https://www.visualcapitalist.com/rush-build-new-skyscrapers/">the many grand cathedrals</a> that appeared across Europe during this period (such as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiens_Cathedral">this one in Amiens</a>). Those who could not afford an indulgence were offered the graceful option of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/business/economy/immigration-labor-economy.html">working construction</a> for one of the new cathedrals.</p><p>As time went on, the scale of the indulgence scheme got so large that the Church had to start outsourcing indulgence-granting to <a href="https://www.pogo.org/analysis/2017/10/contractors-and-true-size-of-government">private contractors</a>. These contractors, such as Chaucer's character, the Pardoner, in <em>the Canterbury Tales</em>, would travel around Europe with saintly relics (which were probably fake) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offsets_and_credits">collecting funds in exchange for a slip of paper that represented an indulgence</a>. Here’s the pardoner admitting to the hypocrisy of it all himself:</p><div class="preformatted-block" data-component-name="PreformattedTextBlockToDOM"><label class="hide-text" contenteditable="false">Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published</label><pre class="text"><em>Thus spit I out my venom, under hue
Of holiness, to seem holy and true.
But, shortly mine intent I will devise,
I preach of nothing but of covetise.
Therefore my theme is yet, and ever was,
</em>Radix malorum est cupiditas. [the root of evil is greed]
<em>Thus can I preach against the same vice
Which that I use, and that is avarice</em>
- Geoffrey Chaucer, <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2383/pg2383-images.html#chap18">Canterbury Tales</a>, "The Pardoner’s Tale"</pre></div><p>These pardoners, by the way, often made a good living, taking some pretty hefty commission fees.<a class="footnote-anchor" data-component-name="FootnoteAnchorToDOM" id="footnote-anchor-13" href="#footnote-13" target="_self">13</a></p><p>This indulgence system built on itself with increasingly ridiculous levels of grandeur and wasteful spending which achieved its pinnacle in the construction of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Peter%27s_Basilica#Financing_with_indulgences">St. Peter's Basilica</a>, which was funded from indulgences collected from across Europe. By its completion in 1626, the indulgence had begun to take on its modern meaning of the almost sinful enjoyment of luxury or pleasure, not in the individual sense as we think of it, but in representing a whole system of corruption and decadence. </p><div><hr></div><p><strong>3/3 - Whats Good</strong></p><p>“<em>When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, ‘Repent’ (Mt 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance</em>"<br>- Martin Luther, <a href="https://www.luther.de/en/95thesen.html">95 Theses</a>, #1</p><p></p><p>If you've been following the links and references scattered throughout this piece, you might have started to draw a parallel between our current societal context and that of the medieval Catholic Church. Today’s non-profits and charitable organizations, its socially responsible corporations and benevolent governments, are the corrupted Catholic Church of tomorrow. These institutions claim to do good, and at one time many of them did do tangible good (see the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_Era">Progressive era</a>), but systems, if not checked and continuously updated, become corrupt, and today, these institutions manipulate each of our desires to be a morally good person so that they and their officials can profit.</p><p>When you donate to some wildlife charity, or buy sustainable products, or invest in an ESG fund you probably do so because you think it will do some good in the world even if you can’t quite see that good for yourself. You believe. You trust. But it is that very lack of verifiability in the good act that makes it both unsatisfying to you (if you can’t see the person or people you’re helping, it doesn’t feel so good to help) and permits those who organize this hall of mirrors of goodness to remain unaccountable, paying themselves a generous salary in the process. The wealthy use such donations to absolve themselves of moral or societal sin, laundering their <a href="https://eletric-vehicles.com/tesla/elon-musk-says-sp-500-esg-index-for-excluding-tesla-while-keeping-exxon/">oil money</a> or <a href="https://twitter.com/ftxfuturefund/status/1498350483206860801">pumped up shitcoin profits</a> through charities and 501c3’s, to create the illusion of benevolence while continuing business as usual. </p><p>Instead of focusing on tangible, inter-personal actions — helping someone on the street, being a welcoming host, showing love to those around you — we're told to put our heads down, work, and then donate to one of these "good" organizations. </p><p>I see this mindset take hold of nearly all my college peers. Their “education” infects them with this guilt — a guilt for all the atrocities and injustices of history — and they are told to feel bad about their privilege or station, and yet their energy to morally cleanse themselves is not channeled towards enacting any sort of true systematic change or even helping their fellow man homeless in the street outside their lecture hall but instead back into the very system that created the injustice in the first place. </p><p>I see this mindset take hold of nearly all my college peers. Their "education" implants them with this guilt - a guilt for all historical atrocities and injustices the world over - and instructs them to lament over their privilege or station. However, instead of directing their moral cleansing energy towards initiating genuine systematic change or even helping his fellow man, sitting outside the lecture hall, homeless, their energy gets redirected back into the very system that first brought about the injustice: they get a job at an investment bank or a consulting agency or a non profit (those modern ecclesiastical offices) and are told to sell their souls to the big bad corporations for just a while. Then, once they have some money, they can do some real good. This gold-paved path to moral salvation (which lulls so many into sedated complacency) is a lie: the doing good never comes because no matter how much you make, you are always more indebted to the system and can always be excommunicated from it.</p><p>The historical precedent shows us that this system of institutionally-imposed guilt and fake goodness inevitably leads to corruption, preventing the genuine good that people are fighting for from being realized. The Church's corrupt system, though at the time it likely seemed permanent, did come to an end. Criticism mounted and heretical groups emerged, claiming the Church had strayed too far from its roots. Initially, these dissenters were denounced, their ideas discarded and their writings banned. While the Church was able to manage these schismatics and even made some reforms in response to their contrary opinions, by the time of Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation the situation had reached a boiling point.</p><p>Luther famously critiqued the indulgence system, asserting that one's connection to God should not be brokered by a sprawling bureaucracy of ecclesiastical officials, that it could not simply be bought. Instead, he advocated for a personal connection to God and for modest, local churches and priests to foster this connection. This thinking underpins Protestantism and drove the Reformation.</p><p>The depth of Protestantism deserves more space than I should offer here, but I bring it up to highlight a historical trajectory. Perhaps in the grand ark of history we are a long way from a true modern Reformation, perhaps there is is more corruption and indulgence yet to come. But, today, I believe, we stand at a local maximum on the precipice of a period of disintegration, where trust in institutions once thought to be infallible is evaporating, where there are new technologies which allow people to verify, create, and isolate. There is (or soon will be) an opportunity to establish new systems that create accountability, transparency, and allow for goodness (however it may be defined) to be not just an unkept political promise but an enforceable reality. </p><p>We — not as one popular monolith but in our local internet enclaves — should create new beliefs, new goods and new evils, and then tangibly act on those beliefs. By doing so we would fulfill something inherently human — to imagine, to believe, to create. Then, we would be more than just the thoughtless flock of these institutions frolicking in a false Kingdom of Heaven, we would be on the path towards doing something truly divine. </p><p><END></p><div><hr></div><p><strong>Further Reading:</strong></p><p>Buffett, Peter. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/27/opinion/the-charitable-industrial-complex.html">"The Charitable Industrial Complex."</a> New York Times Opinion.</p><p>Luckmann, Thomas. <em>The Invisible Religion: The Problem of Religion in Modern Society</em>. Edited by Tom Kaden and Bernt Schnettler. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2023. DOI: 10.4324/9781003257875.</p><p>Nerlich, Brigitte, and Nelya Koteyko. "Compounds, Creativity and Complexity in Climate Change Communication: The Case of ‘Carbon Indulgences’." Global Environmental Change 19, no. 3 (2009): 345-353. <strong><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.03.001">https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.03.001</a></strong>.</p><p>Sahay, Apoorva, et al. <a href="https://rmi.org/what-can-blockchain-do-for-carbon-markets/">"Beyond the Buzz: What Can Blockchain Do for Carbon Markets?"</a> RMI.</p><p>Swanson, Robert. Brill's Companions to the Christian Tradition, v. 5. Leiden: Brill, 2006. (Accession No: 232466).</p><p>Swanson, Robert N. "The Challenges of Indulgences in the Pre-Reformation Church." In Schriftenreihe Bibliothek des Deutschen Historischen Instituts in Rom Band 132 (2017): 3-17. DOI: 10.1515/9783110503258-002. <a href="https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/51702/1/9783110503258.pdf">Download</a></p><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-1" href="#footnote-anchor-1" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">1</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Peter Turchin, <em>End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration</em>, pg. 32</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-2" href="#footnote-anchor-2" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">2</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Daniel DeMatos, <em>The Tontine Coffee House</em>, “<a href="https://tontinecoffeehouse.com/2020/08/17/the-financiers-of-medieval-florence/">THE FINANCIERS OF MEDIEVAL FLORENCE</a>”</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-3" href="#footnote-anchor-3" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">3</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Turchin, <em>End Times</em>, pg. 33</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-4" href="#footnote-anchor-4" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">4</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Ibid.</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-5" href="#footnote-anchor-5" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">5</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>The Church had also previously propagated the practice of individual ownership and testamentary inheritance in conjunction with what Joseph Henrich calls its Marriage and Family Program (MFP) [the breaking down of kinship based networks from nuclearization of the family and the championing of individual rights], which all came in handy at this moment. </p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-6" href="#footnote-anchor-6" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">6</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Joseph Henrich, <em>The WEIRDest People in the World</em>, pg. 185</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-7" href="#footnote-anchor-7" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">7</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Gasper, Giles E. M., and Svein H. Gullbekk, eds. <em>Money and the Church in Medieval Europe, 1000–1200: Practice, Morality and Thought</em>. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2016, 20-21.</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-8" href="#footnote-anchor-8" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">8</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Other liquid income streams would have included: tithes (~= income/produce tax), sacrament/service fees, land rents, gifts, and in some cases of corruption simony (the selling of church offices). </p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-9" href="#footnote-anchor-9" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">9</a><div class="footnote-content"><p> If you’re interested here is the actual proclamation (in translation): </p><p>“In paternal charity, we encourage those who resolve to make the journey to Spain, so that what they thought divinely inspired to embark upon, they may care for with the greatest solicitude; let him confess to his bishop or to his spiritual advisor according to the seriousness of his sins, and the rigour of penance shall be imposed by the confessors, lest the devil be able to level the charge of impenitence. We, therefore, attending with prayer, by the authority of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul, grant them remission of sins and release from penance.” </p><p>Original Latin (if you’re a real nerd): </p><p>“Eos, qui in Ispaniam profisci destinarunt, paterna karitate hortamur, ut, que divinitus admoniti cogitaverunt ad effectum perducere, summa cum sollicitudine procurent; qui iuxta qualitatem peccaminum suorum unusquique suo episcopo vel spirituali patri confiteatur, eisque, ne diabolus accusare de inpenitentia possit, modus penitentiae imponatur. Nos vero auctoritate sanctorum apostolorum Petri et Pauli et penitentiam eis levamus et remissionem peccatorum facimus, oratione prosequentes.”</p><p>Shaffern, Robert W. "The Medieval Theology of Indulgences." In <em>Promissory Notes on the Treasury of Merits: Indulgences in Late Medieval Europe</em>, edited by R. N. Swanson, pg. 12-13. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2006.</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-10" href="#footnote-anchor-10" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">10</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>You can imagine that if you were one of those mid-level medieval nobles (a mid) whose family couldn’t afford a crusade indulgence, and you had to go fight in some foreign land and see your buddies die, while the big landowners got to just sit on their asses and pay of the papacy, you’d be a little resentful. To understand how that resentment came to a head, see <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Years'_War">The Hundred Years’ War</a>.</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-11" href="#footnote-anchor-11" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">11</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Shaffern, Robert W., pg. 17</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-12" href="#footnote-anchor-12" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">12</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Ibid. pg. 18</p></div></div><div class="footnote" data-component-name="FootnoteToDOM"><a id="footnote-13" href="#footnote-anchor-13" class="footnote-number" contenteditable="false" target="_self">13</a><div class="footnote-content"><p>Some argue that these pardoners represented some of the first elements of service-based capitalism, which, if you buy it, is not a very flattering origin story for today’s consultants, investment bankers, and lawyers. </p></div></div>No children (leaf entity)