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Explore the impact of Martin Luther's revolutionary movement on Europe, challenging the Catholic Church and sparking a religious upheaval. Witness the spread of Lutheranism, the rise of Protestantism, and the conflicts between religion and politics.
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Luther’s Revolution Lutheranism and Protestant Reformation
Catholic Church in the 16th Century • Spreading universities • Printing press to publish bibles • Popes possessing significant authority • People becoming more religious • Highways packed with Pilgrims • Vatican amongst the worlds most beautiful sites
Cries of outrage grow louder • Wealth of church • Simony • Pluralism • Clergy immortality
Religious sentiments of Europeans • Pilgrimages common • Shrines believed to cure illnesses • Yet people wanted more… • Humanists condemned many practice of the church • As suffering rose so did outcry against the church • Conflicts between Religion and Politics • Erosion of confession and the rise of indulgence
Indulgences • Substitute for confession and penance. • Part of the Catholic doctrine of good works • “so as soon as the coin in coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs” • Came to be viewed as “pardons” • Sale had become big business
Tetzel Controversy • Needed an agent to sell them to build the St. Peter’s Basilica. • Gave the ability to grant your ancestors freedom from their sins and removal from purgatory.
Martin Luther • Relatively obscure German professor. • Rose due to his intellectual achievements. • Preached and taught. • Successful and content on the outside, but internally tormented.
Luther's Internal Struggle • “I was one who terribly feared the last judgment and who nevertheless wished with all my heart to be saved.” • He couldn’t erase his belief in his own sins • How could he liberate his own soul? • “I pondered night and day until I understood the connection between righteousness of God and the sentence “The just shall live by faith”, then I grasped that the justice of God is his righteousness by which through grace and pure mercy, God justifies us through Faith”
Luther's 3 principles • Sola Fide: Justification by faith alone • Sola Scriptura: all that was needed to understand the mercy of God was contained in the Bible • All who believed in Gods righteousness were equal in God’s eyes.
The 95 Theses • Luther’s scholarly response to Indulgences. • Nature of the act? • Content? • Placed him in direct conflict with the Roman Catholic Church.
Luther summoned by Charles V to Worms • Ordered to recant • “I cannot and I will not retract anything, since is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. I cannot do otherwise.” • Asked Charles V and the Pope to use the Bible to contradict his words…
Spread of Lutheranism • Encouraged local princes to allow their subjects to practice it. • Diminished power of the papacy. • Published over 30 works that were huge best sellers. • German princes long angry with politics in Europe were the quickest to embrace it
Spread of Protestantism • John Calvin • Unwilling reformer • Geneva was largely under Catholic and prince control. • The region had been exposed to Protestantism by the reformer Huldrych Zwingli
Calvinism • Luther/Calvin comparison • Calvin and Paris under Francis I (at right) • An avid defender of French Huegenots (Protestants) • Predestination • “Many are called but few are chosen” “The Elect” • Puritans (congregational elect government) • “infants themselves bring their own damnation from the mothers womb” • Discounts the good works doctrine
The Anabaptists Dutch persecution of Anabaptists (Mennonites)