THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION
• Religious Reform movement that divided the
western Church into Catholic and Protestant
groups
• No longer is western Europe united under one
faith
Problems With The Church
• Corruption in the Catholic Church
– Many of the popes were more concerned with the
political interests of the Papal States
– Many Church officials used their offices to advance
their careers, wealth, and families
• Simony = the buying and selling of Church offices
• Pluralism = having more than one office
• Many local priests seemed ignorant of their spiritual
duties, especially on instructing people on how to
achieve salvation
– Salvation = acceptance into Heaven
• The Church preached gaining indulgences by venerating
saints, obtaining holy relics, or buying an indulgence
certificate
– Indulgence = release from all or part of the
punishment for sin
– In the 1500s Pope Leo X approved a new campaign of
indulgences
– In the German area, the archbishop Albert of Mainz
started selling indulgences to pay off the large loan
he took out to buy the archbishopric
• Most people found the Church unconcerned with their
spiritual needs
Early Reformers
• John Wycliffe
– English reformer in the 1300s, his followers are called
Lollards
– He believed that the Church should give up its earthly
possessions
– He also encouraged his followers to read the Bible
• Jan Hus
– Reformer in Bohemia late 1300s, early 1400s
– Preached against the immorality and worldliness of
the Church
– Meeting with Church officials and was promised safe
passage – instead he was tried for heresy, and burned
at the stake
Erasmus and Christian Humanism
• Christian humanists believed that humans had the
ability to reason and improve themselves
– Major goal was to reform the Catholic Church
– People could become more pious by reading classics
and studying works of Christianity
• Best known Christian humanist was Erasmus
– The “philosophy of Christ” – inward piety, not
external observances of rituals
– Wanted to educate people about Christianity and
criticized the monks
– Did not want to break away from the Church
• “Erasmus laid the egg that Luther hatched”
Martin Luther and the 95 Theses
• Martin Luther was a monk and a professor at the
University of Wittenberg
• He was upset by the widespread selling of indulgences
– In 1517 Luther posted his 95 Theses on the door of
the Church in Wittenberg
– It attacked abuses in the Church, specifically the
selling of indulgences
• Luther rejected the Catholic teaching that both faith
and good works were necessary for salvation
– He believed that salvation was through faith alone
– The idea of justification (being made right before
God) by faith alone is the Protestant Reformation’s
chief teaching
• Luther also declared that the only head of the Christian
Church was Jesus and not the pope, and that individual
Christians should be their own interpreters of scripture
– For all Protestants, the Bible, not the Church, became
the primary source of religious truth
– Luther even translated the Bible into German
• 1520 Luther called for the German princes to overthrow
the papacy and establish a reformed German Church
– Wanted to keep only two sacraments – baptism and
Communion – and allow the clergy to marry
• In response Pope Leo X excommunicated Luther
• Luther was also summoned to appear before the
imperial diet (legislative assembly) of the Holy Roman
Empire at the city of Worms
– At the Diet of Worms Luther was asked by the Holy
Roman Emperor Charles V and the pope’s
ambassador to recant (take back) his teachings and
opinions
– Luther refused, saying he would only admit he was
wrong if they could prove he was wrong using the
Bible
– The Edict of Worms made Luther an outlaw, but he
was protected by his prince, Frederick of Saxony
Rise of Lutheranism
• Martin Luther’s doctrines became known as
Lutheranism, the first Protestant faith
– Over the next few years, Luther’s religious movement
became a revolution
– By 1530 Lutheranism was a formally recognized
branch of Christianity
• In 1529 Emperor Charles V moved to suppress
Lutherans in Germany
– Lutheran princes issued a protest, which is how the
term Protestant came into being
• Lutheranism gained the support from many German
rulers, who took control of Catholic Churches and
formed state churches, supervised by the gov’t
• Luther’s movement was tied to politics and he believed
the state was called by God to maintain peace and order
necessary to spread the gospel
• Martin Luther was a social conservative
– Peasants thought that Luther called for equality and
they rebelled in the German Peasants Revolt
– Luther, however, was horrified by the revolt and told
nobles and princes to put down the revolt
Politics in Germany
• Germany at this time was a land of several hundred
territorial states ruled by “princes”
– All owed loyalty to the emperor, however most were
able to free themselves from the emperor’s authority
– The most powerful princes were the seven electors
• Holy Roman Emperor Charles V ruled an empire
consisting of Spain, the Austrian lands, Bohemia,
Hungary, the Low Countries, Milan, Naples, and new
territories in the Americas
– Charles wanted to keep all this Catholic and under
the control of his family, the Hapsburg dynasty
– Charles V’s chief rival was King Francis I of France
• Many individual rulers of the German states supported
Luther and became Lutheran
– They rebelled against the emperor, wanting the right
to be able to worship
– Charles was forced to make peace with the Lutheran
princes in 1555 with the Peace of Augsburg
• Terms of the Peace of Augsburg
– It accepted the division of Christianity within
Germany
– German states could choose between Catholicism or
Lutheranism
– No religious tolerance for individuals – princes chose
their subjects’ religion
Spread and Division of Protestantism
• The ideal of Christian unity was lost forever with the
Peace of Augsburg and Lutheranism was the first of
many Protestant religions
• Zwinglian Reformation was started by Ulrich Zwingli, a
priest in Switzerland
– He banned relics and images
– The church he established was based on a theocracy
• Theocracy = gov’t in which church and state are
joined and officials are considered divinely
inspired
– Zwingli was killed in a war between Catholics and
Protestants in Switzerland
• Calvinism was started by John Calvin after he fled to
Switzerland from Catholic France
– He placed a new emphasis on the all-powerful nature
of God
– Predestination = God has determined in advance who
will be saved (the elect) and who would be damned
(the reprobate)
• God knows who the elect are before they are born
• No amount of good works could change this
– Began to reform the city of Geneva and the city
became a theocracy under Calvin’s leadership
• Calvinists viewed humans as sinful by nature and
enacted strict laws to regulate people’s behavior
• John Knox became the spokesman for the Reformation in
Scotland
– Knox’s Reformed Church replaced the Roman Catholic
Church in Scotland after years of religious turmoil
– Eventually becomes the Presbyterian denomination
• The Anabaptists believed in the complete separation of
church and state
– They also believed in adult baptism since the true
Christian church was a voluntary community of adult
believers
– Anabaptists were branded as dangerous radicals since
rebaptizing adults was crime punishable by death
– Later evolved into several religious factions, such as
the Mennonites and the Amish Mennonites
The English Reformation
• Reformation in England was due to politics and
romance, not religion
• King Henry VIII became king at age 17 in 1509
– He was a devout Catholic who defended the Catholic
Church against Luther and Erasmus
– Earned the title “Defender of the Faith”
– Was married to Catherine of Aragon, a Spanish
princess, who had been married to his older brother
first before he died
– The problem was that after years of marriage, the
couple only had the princess Mary and Henry wanted
a son – felt a female monarch would weaken England
• Henry then met and fell in love with Anne Boleyn and
decided he wanted to have his first marriage annulled
(declared invalid)
– The pope refused, since he wouldn’t go against
Catherine’s nephew, the Emperor Charles V
– The king wanting to end his marriage was known as
“the king’s great matter”
• Henry summoned a Reformation Parliament, which
declared that England no longer under the authority of
the pope
– Henry became the head of the Church of England
• Kept the new church closely tied to Catholicism
– Henry also closed Catholic monasteries and took
away Church lands
– England’s church courts granted Henry a divorce and
he married Anne, who then gave birth to Elizabeth
• In 1534 the Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy,
which stated that the king was the supreme head of the
new Church of England
– Subjects had to take an oath declaring Henry the
supreme head
– His friend Thomas More opposed this and was
beheaded
• Henry was still Catholic and followed the Catholic
teachings, but at his death in 1547, his nine-year old son
Edward VI moved the Church of England in a more
Protestant direction
• In 1553, young Edward died and Mary, the daughter
ofCatherine of Aragon, became Queen
– She returned England to the authority of the pope
and had Protestants burned at the stake
– So many people were killed she earned the nickname
“Bloody Mary”
• When Mary died, Elizabeth became Queen
– Tired of all the religious turmoil, Elizabeth broke with
Rome and established a moderate Protestant Church
of England
– She did not persecute people for their religious
beliefs
– Some Catholics plotted to kill Elizabeth and replace
her with Mary, Queen of the Scots
The Catholic Reformation
• The Catholic Church responded to the spread of
Protestantism by beginning a series of reforms, also
known as the Counter-Reformation
• Formed new religious orders whose members worked
to reform the Church
– The most influential was formed by a Spanish
nobleman named Ignatius of Loyola
• Ignatius of Loyola founded the Society of Jesus, better
known as the Jesuits
– Took a vow of obedience to the church and pope
– Concentrated on education to spread their message
– The Jesuits established missions, schools, and
universities and were successful in restoring
Catholicism to parts of Germany and Eastern Europe
• The Council of Trent convened by Pope Paul III
– Met on and off from 1545 to 1563
– One goal was to examine criticisms made by
Protestants and look at Protestant theology
• In the end, they rejected all Protestant ideas and
upheld Catholic theology
–Both faith and good works were needed for
salvation, the clergy could not marry, belief in
purgatory, and the seven sacraments were
upheld
• There would be no compromise between
Catholicism and Protestantism
– Another goal was to address reform within the
Church
• Addressed the corruption of the clergy, the
training of priests became regulated, and the sale
of indulgences was abolished
– The council was a great boost to Catholicism and
many Catholics had renewed confidence in the
Church
• Two other things the Catholic Church did to combat the
spread of Protestantism was establish the Roman
Inquisition and the Index of Prohibited books (list of
books that Catholics were forbidden to read, such as
Erasmus, Luther, and Galileo)