The Reformation and Religious Change

Causes of the Reformation

By 1500, growing discontent with Church wealth and clerical misconduct created widespread demand for religious reform.

• Simony was the corrupt buying or selling of sacred Church positions and offices.
• Nepotism meant appointing family relatives to powerful Church roles regardless of merit.
• Pluralism meant holding more than one Church parish or diocese at the same time.
• Absenteeism meant a bishop or priest lived away from his parish or diocese but still collected its income.
• Selling indulgences offered certificates claiming to reduce punishment for sins in purgatory.
• Ordinary people resented paying the tithe, a compulsory tax of one-tenth of their yearly income.
• Renaissance learning encouraged scholars to read original biblical texts and question Church teachings.
• The printing press meant reform ideas could be printed cheaply and spread quickly across Europe.

Martin Luther: Religious Beliefs

Martin Luther was a German Augustinian monk and theology professor at Wittenberg who rejected traditional Church doctrine.

Martin Luther: Actions and the Break with Rome

Luther also took public actions that challenged the Pope's authority and spread his ideas.

• In 1517, in Wittenberg, Luther wrote his 95 Theses attacking the sale of indulgences by Johann Tetzel.
• In 1520 Pope Leo X sent Luther a papal bull (an official papal order) threatening excommunication, and Luther burned it in public.
• Leo X excommunicated Luther in early 1521, cutting him off from the Catholic Church.
• At the Diet of Worms in 1521, Emperor Charles V declared Luther an imperial outlaw after Luther refused to recant.
• Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, hid Luther at Wartburg Castle to protect him from arrest.
• At Wartburg, Luther translated the New Testament into German so ordinary people could read Scripture.

The Counter-Reformation and Long-Term Results

The Catholic Church responded with the Counter-Reformation to reform internal abuses and stop Protestantism spreading.

• The Council of Trent (1545–1563) outlawed simony, pluralism, absenteeism, and the sale of indulgences.
• The Council established seminaries to train parish priests properly and reaffirmed traditional Catholic doctrines.
• Ignatius Loyola founded the Jesuits, approved by the Pope in 1540, to run disciplined schools and missions worldwide.
• The Inquisition tried people for heresy (holding beliefs the Church rejected), and the Index of Prohibited Books listed books Catholics were forbidden to read.
• Europe divided into a largely Protestant north and a Catholic south, leading to religious wars.
• Catholics saw Luther as a heretic who split the Church; Protestants saw him as a reformer who corrected abuses.
• Religious division from the Reformation still shapes modern Europe, including sectarian division in Northern Ireland.

Key terms

Reformation

A sixteenth-century European religious movement that split the Catholic Church and led to the rise of Protestantism.

Protestant

A Christian who broke away from the Catholic Church during the Reformation and followed the teachings of reformers such as Luther.

Simony

The corrupt practice of buying or selling positions and offices within the Church.

Indulgence

A certificate from the Catholic Church that cut the punishment a person would face in purgatory (a place of punishment before heaven) for sins already forgiven.

Justification by Faith Alone

Martin Luther's core doctrine that salvation is granted purely through faith in God, not by good works.

Council of Trent

A series of Catholic meetings (1545–1563) that eliminated clerical abuses, established seminaries, and defined Catholic teachings.

Counter-Reformation

The Catholic Church's campaign to reform internal abuses, clarify its doctrines, and halt the spread of Protestantism.

Vernacular

The everyday local language spoken by ordinary people in a specific region, such as German or English.