In the year 1095 AD, Pope Urban II called for all the European Christianity to unite in a Crusade to conquer the Holy Land from the hands of the Islamic Caliphate. It was the beginning of the Crusades that lasted for two hundred years until the year 1291 when the last Crusader city of the Holy Land was recovered by the Muslims. During this period, European merchants got in contact with Chinese silk and eastern spices that came to the Middle East from the Silk Road. It sparked European interest in the far East.
After the Christian European experience in the Middle East with non-Christian people and non-Christian empires, Catholic kings and the Church wanted to spread Christianity abroad. It was one of the main reasons why so many missionaries went to the New World after it was discovered by Christopher Columbus.
