What is the case against seeing the Medieval Catholic Church as oppressive? I have a professor who keeps mentioning a false claim regarding the Catholic Church during the Medieval Times that I know is historically untrue but I do not know how to give a concise counter-argument regarding these views.

My professor basically is stating the following thing that I need help answering and correcting:


  The Catholic Church in the Medieval Times was oppressive and monopolized knowledge because she wanted to suppress the common man from knowing what was going on. 


Basically he states that the Church in the Medieval Ages prior to the printing press and the development of concepts such as Democracy wanted to keep people ignorant.

How can I show him that this is not true as evidenced by the various creations of universities during the Middle Ages and the monasteries which helped preserve education and manuscripts?
I think, as is often the case, that in some times and places, the Church was co-opted by the Aristocracy. While the Church certainly had a vested interest in promoting learning, the Aristocracy did not. After all, Scripture is a revolutionary thing, and if the working classes (peasantry) became to well versed in exactly what the Bible teaches, they might be harder to control, and indeed even revolt. And given that the hierarchy of the medieval Church was often drawn from the Aristocracy, the notion that at least some elements in the Catholic church were oppressive, and attempted to keep some of the people from being educated, is at least a question worth pursuing. This is not to suggest, by the way, that all members of the Hierarchy of the church felt this way, but unquestionably some did. 

On the other hand, the church did not always side with the aristocracy. In the New World, for example, the aristocracy as a whole sought from Rome a decree that the native peoples that they found here were not rational beings, as this would allow the locals to be put into slavery. However, the church refused, to the consternation of some of the Aristocracy in the new world.

I think this is yet another instance where the answer does not lie at either extreme, but somewhere in the middle. I would say, that in the long term, yes the Church did promote learning, and preserve the body of knowledge. However, in some times and in some places, it was less noble in this regard than in others.