 The Catholic Church was for centuries at the center of the development of the values, ideas, science, laws and institutions which constitute Western civilization.Empiricism later gave rise to the scientific method, the scientific revolution, and the Age of Enlightenment.Western culture continued to develop with the Christianisation of European society during the Middle Ages, the reforms triggered by the Renaissance of the 12th century and 13th century under the influence of the Islamic world via Al-Andalus and Sicily (including the transfer of technology from the East, and Latin translations of Arabic texts on science and philosophy), and the Italian Renaissance as Greek scholars fleeing the fall of the Byzantine Empire after the Muslim conquest of Constantinople brought classical traditions and philosophy.