(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Religion 102: The Protestant Reformation [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-04-02 The Catholic Church gained its great wealth in many ways. One of these involved the sale of indulgences. According to Church doctrine, when a person died their soul would go first to Purgatory where it would spend some time being purified so that it could become worthy for Heaven. When a dead person’s living friends and relatives purchased indulgences from the Church, it was believed that person’s soul would spend less time in Purgatory. A number of clergymen, including Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Jan Hus, began advocating for change. One of the first of these advocates was Jan Hus (1372-1415), a Czech priest who was Master at Charles University in Prague. Hus spoke out against some Church practices and was excommunicated. Hus was burned at the stake for heresy in 1415. When he was dying, he predicted that others would take up his calls for reform. Hus had been influenced by the writings of John Wycliffe (1320-1384), a seminary professor at Oxford who advocated the translation of the Bible into vernacular languages which would make it available to more people. His followers, known as Lollards, advocated predestination and opposed the veneration of the saints, transubstantiation, monasticism, and the Papacy. The spark that ignited what would become the Reformation came in the spring of 1517 when Johann Tetzel, a Dominican, made an appeal for indulgences in Jüterborg, Germany. In his book A Little History of Religion, Richard Holloway writes: “Tetzel had been a member of the Inquisition. It was his success as a persuader that had prompted the Archbishop of Mainz to make him his chief sales director for indulgences.” On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther (1483-1546) posted his 95 Theses on the door of the town church in Wittenburg. This was a public protest against the sale of indulgences and marks the beginning of the movement to transform the Roman Catholic Church, which resulted in the emergence of the Protestant churches. With the power of the printing press, Luther’s 95 Theses were printed and distributed widely. In addition, Luther produced a great many other works which were also printed and read throughout Europe. In his book World History, Philip Parker reports: “Luther went on to attack other precepts of the Church, including the core Catholic dogma of transubstantiation (the belief that the bread and wine at communion transform into the body and blood of Christ) and, crucially, papal supremacy.” In their book The Library: A Fragile History, Andrew Pettegree and Arthur der Weduwen write: “The Reformation shattered the unity of western Christendom. Those loyal to Rome denounced Luther and his followers as heretics; Luther, meanwhile, gradually broadened his attack to encompass the whole institutional structure of the Catholic Church.” Martin Luther was a priest who had become a professor of theology at Wittenberg University. In 1517, Luther had a vision, and he would later write: “Here I felt I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates. A totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me.” With regard to Martin Luther, Karen Armstrong, in her book A History of God: The 4,000-year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, writes: “Luther, however, was a rabid anti-Semite, a misogynist, was convulsed with a loathing and horror of sexuality and believed that all rebellious peasants should be killed.” John Calvin (1509-1564) viewed humans as inherently sinful. He felt that the Bible was the true word of God and thus articulated the ultimate moral standard. Philip Parker writes: “Calvin stressed predestination (God’s control over all human actions) and a direct relationship with God, devoid of priestly or papal interference.” Scott Atran, in his book In Gods We Trust, reports: “For Calvin, conformity and submission to orthodoxy guaranteed the social stability necessary for reformist thought and practice to spread, steadily and uniformly, to an expanding mass.” Predestination was one of the beliefs promoted by Calvin. In his book Religions of the World Made Simple, John Lewis writes: “Only the elect are saved and they are saved simply because God has chosen them, not because their faith has earned salvation. Men are therefore not born equal, for some are preordained to eternal life, some to eternal damnation.” Calvin disagreed with Luther on many issues: for example, Calvin advocated the separation of church and state. In 1536. Calvin published Institutes of the Christian Religion which became the most read book of the Reformation. Calvin’s version of the Protestant message spread across the Swiss cantons, France, the Netherlands, and Scotland. The movement started by these reformers became known as the Reformation. The reformers did not feel that a priestly hierarchy was needed for salvation. The Bible, they stressed, was the true word of God and was, therefore, more important than priests and membership in the Catholic Church for salvation. They felt that people should be able to read the Bible in their own language and should not necessarily rely on a priest’s interpretation of it. The Protestants rejected the concept of Purgatory as having no Biblical foundation. They placed an emphasis on belief, on faith, rather than ritual. In his book Ritual: A Very Short Introduction, Barry Stephenson writes: “In the wake of the Reformation, there began a process of de-ritualization across Western Europe, a curtailing of ritual that continued through the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution.” For the Protestants, there was a shift in emphasis from religious ritual to doctrinal belief and the concept of faith. Karen Armstrong, in her book Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence, writes: “The Reformation, however, had introduced an entirely new emphasis on ‘belief.’ Hitherto the Middle English beleven (like the Greek pistis and the Latin credo) had been a practically expressed ‘commitment’ or ‘loyalty’; now it would increasingly come to mean an intellectual acceptance of doctrinal opinions.” Among Protestants, lists of obligatory beliefs emerged, such as the Thirty-Nine Articles, the Lambeth Articles, and the Westminster Confession. In his book Architecture, Jonathan Glancy summarizes the Protestant Reformation this way: “Their reforms included a return to simple ceremonies, less emphasis on priestly intervention, and services in local languages rather than in Latin. Protestantism’s growth was aided by printing.” One of the important books for the Protestants was the Bible. Richard Holloway writes: “Once you liberate a book from the control of a single authority it becomes subject to many interpretations, especially if it is believed to have been inspired by God.” Richard Holloway also writes: “Some of the new Protestant Churches found themselves more inspired by the Old Testament than by the New.” The Roman Catholic Church responded to the Protestant Reformation by instituting a number of changes known collectively as the Counter-Reformation. These changes included reforming old religious orders and the creation of new orders, such as the Jesuits (founded by Ignatius Loyola) which sent out missionaries to regions outside of Europe. Following the Reformation, a number of different Protestant Christian churches were formed in Europe. These included the following: Lutheran Inspired by Martin Luther, Lutheran Protestants see the Bible as their only guide to doctrine. Philip Wilkinson writes: “They believe that salvation is the gift of God, and that people come to God through faith in Jesus Christ alone, not through the performance of good works—Lutheran theologians insist on the fallen, sinful state of humanity, and believe that it is impossible for a person to please God by doing good deeds in the world.” Presbyterian The Presbyterian churches take their name from their form of church government which is based on an interpretation of how the New Testament describes the structure of churches. The churches are governed by presbyters (ministers or elders who occupy a priestly role). Philip Wilkinson reports: “This form of governance particularly attracted religious leaders in Scotland, who were looking for a way to run their churches that involved the whole community and left the way open for subsequent reforms.” Anabaptists The Anabaptist movement started in 1525 when Conrad Grebel, George Blaurock, and Relix Mantz gathered in Zurich to discuss matters of faith. They found no support in scripture for child baptism. In his book Extraordinary Groups: The Sociology of Unconventional Life-Styles, William Kephart reports: “Although they considered themselves a Christian sect, the Anabaptists were dissatisfied with the Protestant Reformation.” They believed in the separation of church and state and the supremacy of the human conscience. Baptists emerged from the Anabaptists and stressed adult baptism. Anglican In the 1530s, King Henry VIII of England broke with the Roman Catholic Church and made the English sovereign the head of the Church of England. The Church of England kept many of the features of the Roman Catholic Church, including priests and bishops, but rejected the authority of the Pope. Methodist The English Anglican priest John Wesley wanted to inspire a renewal of Christianity within the Church of England in the 1730s. This religious movement, which envisioned Christians living according to rules or “method” laid down in the Bible, became a separate denomination. 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