Lutheran Ping!
Wishing a Blessed Reformation Day!
Posted on 10/26/2008 12:25:45 PM PDT by Alex Murphy
This week (Oct. 31) in 1517, Martin Luther crossed the religious Rubicon when he posted his 95 theses on the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany. His action led to a schism in the Catholic Church and the subsequent formation of the Protestant sect, and — no small thing — it paved the way for the Reformation.
In a nutshell, Luther’s 95 theses proclaimed that the Roman Catholic Church was corrupt, that the pope was abusing his powers and that the church’s practice of selling indulgences (for a price the church would lower a sinner’s punishment in the afterlife) violated Catholic teachings.
He had a point. By 1517 a series of “Renaissance Popes,” as they were called, were so obsessed with money and power that they had abandoned all pretense of piety, spending huge sums on grand architectural and artistic monuments (granted, the Sistine Chapel is one of them), wild parties, ostentatious jewelry and clothing, and other luxuries. Most had gone into such debt they not only sold indulgences for past sins, but also for sins yet to be committed!
Luther also differed with the church’s contention that “good works” — that is, the good things people do to make up for their sins — was what led to salvation. Luther contended that only faith in God led to salvation, which was best achieved by reading the Bible and following one’s conscience.
The pope was not amused at Martin Luther’s acts of defiance, quickly branding him a heretic, demanding that he recant and eventually excommunicating him. Luther responded by leaving the church and stepping up his denunciations of its practices, including calling for a revolt against the papacy.
His protest started a fire, one that had been smoldering for some time, and his movement grew quickly. Indeed, his mass following, which included many powerful German princes (who resented the authority that an Italian pope had in their land), probably prevented him from being burned at the stake.
Emboldened, Luther decided to further his cause by translating the Bible into German, which — for the first time ever — allowed citizens to read it, and interpret it for themselves. Perhaps even more than his 95 theses, this action loosened the church’s hold on the people, and soon questioning Church dogma became common. The subsequent flowering of independent religious thought soon led to other kinds of independent thinking, leading in turn to a blossoming of creativity in all fields — science, the arts, medicine and so on. The Reformation was on.
Luther was far from perfect. He was tyrannical, paranoid and anti-Semitic. But he had an effect on history that will last as long as we are free to think independently about religion, politics and a host of other issues.
Lutheran ping material.
My daughter is studying this in school.
We are grateful that he had the courage to expose the lies and hypocrisy of these teachings.
That's putting it mildly, especially with reference to his antisemitism.
And where do you think he learned to be an antisemite?
I think my favorite Luther story is where he smuggled a bunch of nuns ( including one that became his wife ) out of a convent in used herring barrels.
Thanks for posting. Interesting/educational.
LOL
Luther hated Jews and you blame the Catholic Church for it?
By Grace Through Faith...this is most certainly true.
thank goodness ‘xposing the lies’ resulted in thousands of competing PROTESTANT denominations who argue ALL SORTS OF OPPOSING VIEWPOINTS ON THE SAME SUBJECTS pertaining to eternal salvation..
yes, thank goodness for the ‘sola scriptura’..
Always interesting to see the lengths they will go to bastardize scripture and create straw men arguments.
Take note of Thesis Number 90: “These questions are serious matters of conscience to the laity. To suppress them by force alone, and not to refute them by giving reasons, is to expose the church and the pope to the ridicule of their enemies, and to make Christian people unhappy.”
A lot of present-day people can identify with this. Barbara West is only the most recent example, as is Robert Schulz, or Irwin Schiff, or Larken Rose, or Sherry Peale Jackson, or Joseph Bannister.
Wishing a Blessed Reformation Day!
Well, to begin with, the author got that wrong. Salvation comes from faith in God, seeking forgiveness and the Holy Spirit working in you. Simply reading the Bible and following "one's conscience" has nothing to do with it. It's "one's conscience" that get's one in trouble...
Oh, and need I add, our good works are manifestations of our faith; they have nothing to do with salvation.
Islam needs a Martin Luther.
This is the day Martin Luther began the restoration of the truth of the gospel message to mankind. The sole sufficiency of Christ's death on the cross for the forgiveness of sins. The return of focus on Christ and his death and resurrection. The overthrow of man made traditions and doctrine and a return to the only authority for doctrine - the Scriptures.
Sola fide. Sola scriptura. Sola gratia. Sola Christus. Soli Deo gloria.
Amen!
Luther was against all false religions. He never lifted a finger against Jews.
Luther's condemnation and hatred of the Jews simply shows that he was a product of the church and of his age. Anti semitism was quite rampant in Europe through the Middle Ages, and they were Catholic Christians.
It's a straw man, and has nothing to do with Luther's 95 theses, or the tenets of the Reformation.
♫Seems to me I've heard this song before...
Where did he learn to support BIGAMY?
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