Gregory was particularly notable as the inheritor of the Roman State. He lived during the darkest age of Rome when memories and traditions of greatness still existed in an environment of death, grief and isolation. It was under those conditions that he fathered medieval Christianity and the civilization that arose in Western Europe during the Middle Ages. He did so as the "Missionary Pope" who championed the dignity of Rome against the worldly power of the Byzantine Empire not by military force or political intrigue but by simple moral authority. It was he who made religion, rather than politics or economics, the foundation of Christianity, and after him, the Western world looked to Rome for guidance.

Unfortunately, Gregory was a bit too otherworldly for those who came after him. His whole schema was dominated by a supernatural concern for a superworldly Roman order. Not only was he remarkably ignorant in many ways (especially for a rather successful world leader), but he could not imagine that the moral authority he gave the Church would be abused for worldly purposes because he expected the world to end before such corruption could occur. In fact, his reign marked the moral apex of Catholicism—the point from which the Church gradually descended into corrupting worldly affairs and took on the schizoid nature of an organization whose leaders became debased by reality while its ideology became ever more unworldly.

Regrettably, Gregory's ignorance was due partially to his morality, which was opposed to the intellect. He believed prayer to be magical, welcomed superstition and frowned on curiosity. Faith alone was good enough for God, and it must be an unquestioning faith. If doctrine was incomprehensible, that really did not matter, as reasonable proof was unnecessary. What did matter was that the faith should be rooted in fear, since anxiety was the best motivation for escaping Hell.

This was Gregory's theological legacy and his contribution to the Dark Ages. The faith he bequeathed was one of dark fear and hatred of the natural world. If Gregory personified the moral purity of institutional Christianity, it was a purity in eternal conflict with worldly knowledge and behavior necessary for survival. However moral his God was, He was not a God of law and light who welcomed the pursuit of truth, beauty and practicality. Faith in that kind of God would later be based upon a faith in humanity, but if there was one thing people in the Middle Ages did not believe in, it was themselves.

With the passing of Gregory, the history of the Church became that of a structured organization gradually emerging with a codified, quasi-functional

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