Conciliarism

In the history of Christianity, the Conciliar movement or "Conciliarism" was a reform movement in the 14th and 15th century Catholic Church that held that final authority in spiritual matters resided with a general church council, not with the pope. The movement emerged in response to the Avignon papacy— the popes removed from Rome and subject to pressures from the kings of France— and the ensuing Great Schism that inspired the summoning of the Council of Constance (1414-1418). The eventual victor in the conflict was the institution of the Papacy, though the final gesture, the doctrine of Papal Infallibility was not promulgated until 1870.

Within a century the Christian church split over irreconcilable differences, such as the relative stress placed on Scripture and Authority where they appear to conflict and other divisive issues raised by the Conciliar movement, which is condemned in retrospect by traditionalist Roman Catholics, who support the Papacy in issues of authority.

The word "Conciliarism" is used when subtexts of heterodoxy or heresy are to be subtly emphasized, and aspects of structural reform within the Roman church are to be downplayed. Secular historians tend to use the more neutral expression "Conciliar movement," which offers no such inherent connotations of being ideologically driven.