Ecclesiastical courts in France

>>3273774
I believe that their power began to wane in the reign of Philip IV. He brought the papacy to Avignon and the kings of France basically picked and controlled their own ope for over a hundred years.

If I remember correctly it was a slow process, starting with the pope being controlled by the king. Then the king eventually gained the right to hear and decide final appeals. By the time the papacy moved back to Rome permanently/the little schism ended, reformation sentiment was rising and in a couple of decades Martin Luther published his theses and shit really hit the fan.

The 16th and 17th centuries were very bad for the church in northern Europe, including France. The French Wars of Religion went on for years, again increasing Catholics' faith but decreasing the Church's power.

By the 18th century, just before the revolution, the Church still had almost complete legal authority over their own serfs. This is no small thing, since the Church owned about a third of all the land in France. But, concerning crimes committed by non-Church serfs, on Church property or not, the judgement wouldn't devolve onto the Church.

The death blow to the Church's power in France, really, was the revolution. It destroyed all governmental and social conventions, and this definitely included the power of the Church.

If I remember rightly.

>>3273774
>Middle Ages
>State
The State as the holder of the monopoly of voilence has not existed until Absolutism.