Last month we had a lengthy discussion regarding the observation of October 31st.  A lot of things entered into the posts, halloween, all hallows eve, harvest festivals etc--all the things you normally think of at this time of year.

But the whole point of the original post was that there was another reason for celebvrating the date besides Halloween.  This was also the date when Martin Luther posted his 95 theses to the church door.

Many Christians today have no idea of the importance  this event has on our religious scene.  We are often asked what religion we are; the classifications go something like  Hindu, Islamic, Jewish, Catholic,  Protestant....  Each of these religions has a specific over all set of tenets, canons or catechisms.   Except Protestantism.  Protestants generally acknowledge God and Christ and that Salvation lies in Christ, but there the similarities largely end.  The term protestant covers a large number of religions.  So saying one is "Protestant"  is a little like saying one is "white" in describing natinality.

There seemed to be enough lack of information on this... and Damaris ws saying how they had just done a series of messages on the protestant revolution in her congregation... that I decided we could investigate it on a new thread.  So here goes.

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The Catholic Church maintains that it traces its roots to Christ Himself and that Peter was the first Pope.  This historians reiterate many of the New Testament events  as part of their actual history.

I couldn't find the specific date that the church was formally organized. We know that at some point this happened because the structure of the Catholic church is nothing like the gathering of believers describe in the bible.

We do know a few things:  The earliest center of Christianity was Jerusalem but, in 70 A.D. a Jewish revolt failed. The Romans sacked Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple. These events were a major turning for both Judaism and Christianity.

After 70, Christians became dispersed, moving out more and more beyond Israel. Christianity increasingly became Hellenized. Greek, not Aramaic, became the primary language of Christians. Instead of Jerusalem, three cities: Antioc in Syria,  Alexandria in Egypt, and Rome in Italy.  This was a result of the disciples 'going to all  parts of the earth"  and the by product of the curch at Jerusalem being scattered by the revolt there.  

 Af some point a formal action on someone's part took placed that delineated what we call the Roman Catholic Church.

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Hi! Donna M made a great introduction on Martin Luther. Here, I have a little bit more info on him:

He was born on November 10th, 1483, in Eisleben, Germany.
In 1501, at the age of seventeen, he entered the University of Erfurt. He received his masters degree in 1505.

Luther sought assurances about life and was drawn to theology and philosophy. He was deeply influenced by two tutors, Bartholomaus Arnoldi von Usingen and Jodocus Trutfetter, who taught him to be suspicious of even the greatest thinkers and to test everything himself by experience.

Luther decided to leave his law studies and become a monk. He sold his law books and entered a closed Augustinian friary in Erfurt on July 7 1505. His father was furious over what he saw as a waste of Luther's education.

Luther dedicated himself to monastic life, devouting himself to fasting, long hours in prayer, pilgrimage and frecuent confession. He described this period of his life as one of deep spiritual dispair. He said: "I lost touch with Christ the Saviour and Comforter, and made of Him the jailor and hangman of my poor soul."

Johann von Staupitz, his superior, concluded that Luther needed more work to distract him from excessive introspection and ordered him to persue an academic career. In 507 he was ordained to the priesthood, and in 1508 began teaching theology at the University of Wittenberg. He received a Bachelor's degree in Biblical studies on March 9th, 1508, and another Bachelor's degree in the Sentences by Peter Lombard in 1509. On October 19th, 1512, he was awarded his Doctor of Theology and, on October 21st, 1512, was received into the senate of the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg, having been called to the position of Doctor in Bible.

I considered that we had to know his background first to understand that he was not a crazy illiterate who woke up one morning saying that God "talked" to Him.
He was an educated man, a Doctor in Bible!
He didn't initiate the turmoil he initiated out of a "feeling".
He had spent the latest years of his life studying and examining the Word of God thoroughly.
All what he did after, has a lot of sense when we know his background and level of education.

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Now we don’t need a bunch of pro-catholic emails. Bashing Catholics isn’t the point.  We are just trying to look at the historical climate that existed at the time of Martin Luther…  There was a reason for his actions and we will look at that background. This is just hitting the very hightes points of history to give us an over veiw.

Okay. As the men of God took the message to the world it was pretty much an individual proposition.  The organization of individual church groups was connected loosely through the relationships of the evangelists.  When Jerusalem was sacked by the Romans the centralized source of ‘information was destroyed, it was only natural that other nexuses should develop.  That is what happened in Antioch, Alexandria and Rome.  Each of these congregations had its own devout and respected teachers who perpetuated the Word of God.

The catholic church, of course, sprang from the group in Rome.  It was convenient for their purposes to over look the other groups of men and women who were faithfully serving God.  Those groups could also trace their roots back to the original apostles and Christ.

At this point in approximately 76 AD the office of ‘ope’ was instituted and the Catholic church swung into religious prominence as a political religious organization.  I’m not looking into the politics.  It requires more digging than I want to do right now.  Only let me say that the sources of information have been so tightly controlled by the organization that lines to the truth are buried deeply.  Just remember God has always had a people.  He has protected it and kept His word Safe and intact, in spite of, rather than because of, the Catholic Church.

As time progressed because of its political connections the catholic church established tight control over the continuation of the Written Word.  They were not the only institution perpetuating the copying but they were by far the most prominent because of their connections to the political machine.  The Catholic church grew because the rulers of the time established it as the church of state and mandated its use throughout the area where the Romance languages (Those languages based on the Latin language, ie Italian, French, Spanish, and more loosely. English. ) were dominant and extending also into the Germanic language areas.  Anyway.

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As the Roman Empire spread its influence, after his rise to power Constantine was Roman emperor from 306, and the sole holder of that office from 324 until his death in 337. Best known for being the first Christian Roman emperor, Constantine reversed the persecutions Diocletian, his predecessor, and issued the Edict of Milan in 313, which proclaimed religious toleration throughout the empire.

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Although Constantine was not directly a ‘catholic’ but more associated with the Greek Orthodox brand of Christianity, he established a precedent for the position of the emperor in the Christian Church. Constantine himself disliked the risks that religious disputes and controversies brought with them, preferring where possible to establish orthodoxy.  The emperor saw it as his duty to ensure that God was properly worshipped in his empire, and what proper worship consisted of was for the Church to determine.

As with the early church fathers the catholic church was prompt to claim a connection with this powerful figure and. in the eighth century, most likely during the pontificate of Stephen II (752–7), a document called the Donation of Constantine first appeared, in which the freshly converted Constantine hands the temporal rule over "the city of Rome and all the provinces, districts, and cities of Italy  and the Western regions" to Sylvester and his successors.  In the High Middle Ages, this document was used and accepted as the basis for the Pope's temporal power.

So that brings us roughly to Martin Luther's time.

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Donna, 

I meant to ask you to post the name of the guy who 'started" the catholic movment.  I know that in spite of tradition and 'catholic' history, the group as a 'church' cannot actually BE traced to Peter.

Peter did not sit down and organize the massive machine that is the Catholic Church. 

If you know the name or know where to find it, will you please post it.

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Okay.  We have brought the religious scene up to the situation tht existed at Martin Luther’s time.  At this time the religious understanding of the major part of the ‘civilized world” as some have referred to the western Asia and Europe world, was controlled by the Catholic Church.  If one was to have any chance of salvation or the hope of eternal life it had to come through the Catholic Church.

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As Luther studied, he became aware of many inconsistencies that existed between the teachings of the church and the Word of God.  As Donna noted above he published these findings and they became the basis of the Lutheran church.  I’m not entirely sure that Luther intended to establish another church.  I believe he wanted to initiate changes in the existing system.  His action was in great part a response to the selling of indulgences by a Dominican priest and directly challenged the position of the clergy in regard to individual salvation.  At any rate the Catholic church did not take kindly to his theses. 

Martin Luther went through several years of hardship with reprimands and disciplinary measures but eventually ended up being expelled from the church.   He continued to minister to a congregation teaching the new doctrines he had come to comprehend.  This group of congregations did eventually come to be called the Lutheran church.

Martin Luther became one of the first men to see the need for the Word of God to be translated into the common tongues although John Wycliffe, John Hus, Thomas Linacre, John Colet and others had already put their life’s work and even their lives on the line for same cause of truth.  Luther was the first person to translate and publish the Bible in the commonly-spoken dialect of the German people. The Luther German New Testament translation was first published in September of 1522. The translation of the Old Testament followed, yielding an entire German language Bible in 1534.

The men mentioned above as well a Luther were instrumental in opening the Word to ordinary men rather than the theological community.  I’m not going to try to discuss each ‘movement’ in sequential order but only to highlight the understanding of God’s Word as it was opened up by men of God.

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Protestantism contains many denominations with differing practices and doctrines. It principally originated in the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation, begun with Martin Luther’s Ninety Five theses in 1517.  Following that time any number of other religious movements sprang up based on doctrines contrary to those taught by the Catholic Church.   The term Protestantism is often used loosely to denote all non-Roman Catholic varieties of Western Christianity, rather than to denote specific Churches.  Many denominations do not trace their roots to the Catholic Church but rather through independent teachings to the early disciples.  Regardless of this, the congregational movements were not prominent until after the event of the Ninety-five theses.

Perhaps the easiest way to view the progression of the Protestant Movement is to look at it as a series of waves. As each wave washed against the beach it exposed another layer of Truth from the Word.   This was necessary since for most people the full teachings of the Bible had been obscured by the hundreds of years when it was controlled by the Catholic Church and meted out  in measured bits that suited their policies

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As we discusssed above, the word Protestant, came from the "protest" that was launched against the catholic church.  Many of us do not consider ourselves Protestant, since we were never a part of the Catholic Church.  For instance, I was born into the Church of God when I gave my heart to the Lord.  Before that I was a sinner, pure and simple. 

Others however were tangled up in religion and have walked away from false practices.  We don't want to hurt anyone here but we will point out what the Bible says and not accept any other doctrine from any other denomination.  If we look closely we will find that just like the Catholic Church, the other denominations have their big share of non-Biblical (false) doctrines. 

If we mention a doctrine that your particular denomination doesn't support, please don't gripe at us.  We are not trying to slam your church in particular but if it isn't biblical, it isn't Truth, no matter what church teaches it or how long it has been taught or who it traces its roots to.  We will only support Bible teachings.  That was the basis of the Protestant movement.

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Many times members of the board have tried to cite doctor so and so or this teacher or that or this scholar or that to support certain doctrines.  We don't accept educated theories as support for false doctrines.  And the word of God needs no scholarly support at all.

Also please don't if you want to enter the discussion attempt to copy and paraphrase teachings from a catechism.  For one thing, it is usuallly obvious and for another thing these teachings must be all incorporated into the full picture presented from the Bible.  The discussion usually breaks down from there  because the poster cannot take it any further than just the bald statement.

Gotta go,  Cat fight!!! 

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