In The City of God Augustine defines what it means to be Christian and the consequences of opposing Christianity. Similarly, Pope Urban uses these views to encourage Christians to fight in the Holy War. The promises of peace, eternal life, and the consequences that can lead someone to hell are all themes that Urban uses to bring Christians together to fight against Muslim forces.
At the council of Clermont, Urban addresses a large crowd in hopes to unite Christendom and gain support to attack the Muslim forces. In order to gain support for the Holy War, Urban must make sure that everyone is on the same page. “Hoped to find you as faithful and as zealous in the service of God as I had supposed you to be. “But if there is in you any deformity
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The robbing, seizing of highly-ranked officials including merchants and outside forces intervening in church affairs must stop he pleads. “Therefore, it is necessary to reenact the truce, as it is commonly called, which was proclaimed a long time ago by our holy fathers. I exhort and demand that you, each, try hard to have the truce kept in your diocese”. Urban demands the people that they must call truce amongst themselves. The fighting between them must be rechanneled against the common enemy. To protect Christ, they must unify together in the Holy War to liberate the Holy Land that has been invaded by the Turks.
To persuade the people even more to join the crusades Urban announces that “They have killed and captured many, and have destroyed the churches and devastated the empire. If you permit them to continue thus for awhile with impurity, the faithful of God will be much more widely attacked by them”. Hearing how the Turks have burned down their churches, killed and captured their own people and have caused devastation to the empire was the striking call that pushed people to fight in the Holy War. Not only was their empire at stake but also the threat of their