Text of the Reformation Lecture

History M01B – Krister Swanson – Moorpark College

Overview of Reformation

• many phases (Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, RC Counter Reformation, English)
• Political - alliances formed on religion, opportunity to seize local power
• Economic - RC church was a huge economic entity
• Religious - major changes in Christian theology/doctrine

RC Church Corruption

• Benefices ($$$ from church position)
• indulgences (selling salvation)
• graft (embezzlement)
• legal exemptions (tax, criminal)
• political popes & bishops
• scholastic interpretations provide support for these practices

Reaction to Corruption:

• resentment toward church
• contempt amongst clergy for lack of discipline
• Humanism (Erasmus vs. superstition, corruption, etc.) print New Testament in vernacular to all

Martin Luther

• German, RC priest who feels unworthy of salvation, unhappy w/ corruption
• decides salvation comes through faith, not works
• Jubilee indulgence is the last straw ($$ can’t be key to salvation)
• 1517- Posts 95 Theses in Wittenberg, Germany

Lay it Down, Brother Martin:

• FAITH!!!
• direct access to God thru prayer
• rails against papal usurpation (Pope has assumed God’s role)
• direct authority of Bible
• clergy can marry
• princes are heads of local churches

Swiss Reformation (1522)

• Led by Zwingli who believes practices that lack literal scriptural support should be banned
• abstract Christ Ô Splits with Luther Ô German & Swiss Reformations don’t unite
• Reformation will continue to splinter as a result

Zwingli’s main grievances with RC:

• The RCs conflate Doctrine with Gospel
• clerical celibacy
• RC Focus on purgatory
• Idea that works lead to salvation
• Excommunication by one person
• using saints as mediators to God
• penance “Christ has borne our pain”
• church officials lacking spiritual focus

Counter Reformation

• The movement to eliminate abuses & respond to Protestants
• Pope Clement VII (Medici) fears conciliar power & is slow to act
• Fear of Protestantism finally allows reformers to take hold of papacy
• Pope Paul III provides leadership, starts line of moral popes

Council of Trent (1545-1563)

• changes discipline, not doctrine
• Christ is present in Communion, faith & works for salvation
• tradition & scripture are equal
• use of Latin & Vulgate
• images, relics, saints & pilgrimages are good
• Provides opportunity for women (St. Teresa) & Ursulines
• attacks clerical concubines, simony, & nepotism, clarifies use of indulgences
• Establishes new seminaries for priests (one per diocese)

Other Positives of the CR

• Clergy more accountable
• New Orders: Oratorians, Ursulines, &
• Jesuits:(Loyola’s “Cath. Crusaders”)
• focus on church
• excellent educ.
• Political confessors to kings
• missionary work, underground in Prot. areas
• Missionaries in new territories (Americas)
• Missionary fervor highest in Spain
• Baroque art in Catholic Cities

The Down Side of the CR

• Office of Inquisition (church courts) to suppress heresy (prots. had own version)
• Use forced testimony & torture to get confessions
• Confiscation of property, prison, eventually death for “convicted” heretics
• Index of Forbidden Books bans “heretical” books (porn, sorcery, science, and Protestant works)
• Index is necessitated by printing
• Outbreak of rel. wars (not all fault of RCs)
• Counter Ref. is slowed by Enlightenment, but brings back Prots upset about discipline, not doc