[PaulW]

The simple answer to your question is Yes they were. They were the Pope's defenders and supposedly the defenders of the faith. Unfortunately wealth, laziness and a taste for the good life got the better of them so many lost their zeal and probably had long forgotten what they were doing there in the first place. Many became drunken slobs who did nothing but rape, pillage and grow fat. That is not to say they all turned out like that, some had spiritual ideals which they kept to fervently. If you want to see a good film about this you could watch "The Kingdom of Heaven", where the crusaders were fighting against the Moslems and trying to capture and defend Jerusalem, the holy city. Eventually they surrended to Sulliman, a renowned leader of the Moslems who agreed not to annhilate them all if they would surrender Jerusalem, he would give them all safe passage to a Christian area where they were no threat to him. At one stage Sulliman had over two hundred thousand warriors and the Knights defending Jerusalem were but a few thousand. The Knights knew, although they put up a good fight, that they would eventually all be killed along with all of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so to save the innocent citizens they agreed to give the city up. There are three major controlling influences in Jerusalem to this day; Muslims, Jews and Christians who all hold so called Holy sites there. The Muslims built a Mosque above the site where the Jews consider was the Temple Mount, an extremely important religious site for them. I do believe they built a tunnel underneath to reach the original site. The Christians on the other hand, because of the significance of Jesus, have also claimed various sites in Jerusalem and also defend their right to be there.Although purely ceremonially these days, the Knights Templar still exist. I believe there are a group of them who are called Knights of St. John of Jerusalem.