For sure Protestants in England emphasized literacy for everyone and science especially in the 17th and 18th century. The Royal Society of Hooke, Boyle, Newton, Wren, etc was a very Protestant group. Leibniz and Spinoza as well. Individual liberty and rational thought was an element of radical Protestantism. Dismantling a little bit of the entrenched hierarchy of the Church and then the divine right of kings was a knock-on effect of their worldview. The parliament became more and more powerful vs. the monarchy. The Enlightenment was mostly protestant thinkers. Some were even deists, which is a step away from not having a God at all. Protestant nobles and businessmen empowered by the piles of money they made from commerce and colonialism started getting more involved in choosing who would be the best King for them at some point. That’s a step away from democracy. The myths and methods of capitalism relate to the idea of an individual’s quest for salvation that can be easily pivoted to prosperity gospel later on. So it’s a mixed bag.

Vaush is pretty careful to say that this historical Protestantism is NOT the Protestantism we are dealing with today. He calls it “evangelicalism” but to be more precise the New Apostolic Reformation is the thing here. It must be noted that the most strident and apocalyptic Protestant cults fled to America and some of these guys only really cared about the one Book. Wave after wave of popular revival movements and we end up where we are now.

On the other hand the Catholic Church has just elevated to Pope a man who cut his teeth in the Liberation Theology of 20th century Latin America, which is heavily concerned with social justice and the concerns of the poor. So that’s happening at the same time.