This installment traces the development of the church through the High Middle Ages through Luther's excommunication in 1521. We examine the technological reforms of the 12th and 13th centuries, the growing economic power of Europe and a re-discovery of the classical past. We see how the same impulses that drove art and culture in the Renaissance brought a new autonomy to individuals within the church, a freedom which would eventually challenge the status quo a a Roman church more and more rooted in the politics of its day.