THE REFORMATION
CHAPTER 12; SECTIONS 3-4
I.
The Protestant Reformation
A. Erasmus and Christian Humanism
1. The Protestant Reformation is the name given to the religious reform movement
that divided the Western Church into Catholic and Protestant groups.
2. The new classical learning that was part of the Italian Renaissance humanism
spread to northern Europe.
3. Christian humanists believed in the ability of human beings to reason and
improve themselves. They thought that if people read the basic works of
Christianity, they would become more pious. This inner piety would bring
about reform of the Church and society.
4. Erasmus believed that Christianity should show people how to live good
lives on a daily basis rather than provide a system of beliefs that people
have to practice to be saved. Wrote In Praise of Folly.
5. These beliefs opened the way to the Protestant Reformation.
B. Religion on the Eve of the Reformation
1. The so-called Renaissance popes (1450-1520) were more concerned with Italian
politics involved with running the Papal States than with spiritual matters.
2. Many church officials used their Church offices to advance their careers and
their wealth.
3. Many ordinary parish priests were unable to offer people advice and
instruction in salvation.
4. People sought indulgences the collection of relics.
C. Martin Luther
1. Martin Luther was a monk and a professor at the University of Wittenberg, in
Germany, where he lectured on the Bible.
2. Through his study of the Bible, Luther came to believe that humans were not
saved through their good works but through their faith in God. This belief
became the chief teaching of the Protestant Reformation.
3. The Ninety-Five Theses
a. Luther was particularly offended at Johann Tetzel’s selling of indulgences.
b. Luther sent the 95 Theses to his Church superiors. They were printed
and spread to all parts of Germany. Pope Leo X did not take this issue
seriously.
4. A Break with the Church
a. Luther called for the German princes to overthrow the papacy in Germany
and establish a reformed German church.
b. The Church excommunicated Luther in January 1521.
c. The newly elected Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, declared Luther
an outlaw. His works were to be burned and Luther captured and
delivered to the Emperor.
d. Luther’s ruler, Elector Frederick of Saxony, sent Luther into hiding
and protected him.
D. Politics in the German Reformation
1. Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, wanted to keep his empire united under his
dynasty, the Hapsburgs, and to keep the Catholic Church the one church in that
empire.
2. Charles was fighting with France over disputed territories on his western frontier.
3. The Ottoman Turks were advancing on the eastern part of his empire.
4. Pope Clement VII sided with the French king for political reasons.
5. The several hundred German states owed loyalty to the emperor. Germany’s
II.
development in the Middle Ages had enabled these state to free themselves
from the emperor’s authority. Many individual rulers of the German states
supported Luther as a way to assert their own local authority over the authority
of the empire and Charles V.
6. An end to religious warfare in Germany came in 1555 with the Peace of
Augsburg. This agreement gave German states freedom to choose between
Catholicism and Lutheranism.
The Spread of Protestantism and the Catholic Response
A. Zwinglian Reformation
1. Zurich, Switzerland
2. lost war with Catholic states in Switzerland
B. Calvin and Calvinism
1. had to flee Catholic France to Switzerland when he converted to Protestantism
2. faith alone to achieve salvation
3. predestination
4. Geneva, Switzerland; then France, Netherlands, and Scotland
C. The Reformation in England
1. roots in politics, not in religion
2. When the pope refused to annul King Henry VIII’s marriage to his first wife
because she had not given him a male heir, he got the Archbishop of
Canterbury to annul the marriage.
3. Henry married Anne Boleyn who gave birth to a girl who would be come
Queen Elizabeth I.
4. The Act of Supremacy declared that the King was head of the new Church of
England. This position gave the king control over religious doctrine, clerical
appointments, and discipline. Sir Thomas More, a Christian humanist and
a devout Catholic, opposed the king’s action and was beheaded.
5. Henry used his new powers to dissolve the monasteries and sell their land and
possessions to wealthy landowners and merchants. The king received a great
boost to his treasury and a group of supporters who now had a stake in the
new order.
6. Edward VI, son of Jane Seymour, Henry’s third wife
7. Mary, daughter of Catherine of Aragon, Henry’s first wife, Bloody Mary
8. Elizabeth, daughter of Anne Boleyn, Henry’s second wife, Elizabethan Age
D. The Anabaptists
1. The true Christian church was voluntary community of adult believers who had
undergone spiritual rebirth and had then been baptized.
2. Each Anabaptist church chose its own minister, or spiritual leader.
3. Anabaptists believed in the complete separation of church and state to the
point where they would not hold political office or bear arms.
E. Effects of the role of Women
1. Protestants abolished both monasticism and the requirement of celibacy for the
clergy.
2. Family life was the only destiny for most Protestant women—nothing had changed.
F. The Catholic Reformation
1. Jesuit missionaries were very successful in restoring Catholicism to parts of
Germany and eastern Europe and spreading it to other parts of the world. The
Jesuits used education to spread their message.
2. Pope Paul III appointed a Reform Commission in 1537. The commission
blamed the Church’s problems on the corrupt policies of the popes.
3. The Council of Trent reaffirmed traditional Catholic teaching in opposition to
Protestant beliefs.