95 thesis christianity

Martin Luther

(1483-1546)

Who Was Martin Luther?

Luther called into question some of the basic tenets of Roman Catholicism, and his followers soon split from the Roman Catholic Church to begin the Protestant tradition. His actions set in motion tremendous reform within the Church.

A prominent theologian, Luther’s desire for people to feel closer to God led him to translate the Bible into the language of the people, radically changing the relationship between church leaders and their followers.

Luther was born on November 10, 1483, in Eisleben, Saxony, located in modern-day Germany.

His parents, Hans and Margarette Luther, were of peasant lineage. However, Hans had some success as a miner and ore smelter, and in 1484 the family moved from Eisleben to nearby Mansfeld, where Hans held ore deposits.

Hans Luther knew that mining was a tough business and wanted his promising son to have a better career as a lawyer. At age seven, Luther entered school in Mansfeld.

At 14, Luther went north to Magdeburg, where he continued his studies. In 1498, he returned to Eisleben and enrolled in a school, studying grammar, rhetoric and logic. He later compared this experience to purgatory and hell.

In 1501, Luther entered the University of Erfurt , where he received a degree in grammar, logic, rhetoric and metaphysics. At this time, it seemed he was on his way to becoming a lawyer.

Becoming a Monk

In July 1505, Luther had a life-changing experience that set him on a new course to becoming a monk.

Caught in a horrific thunderstorm where he feared for his life, Luther cried out to St. Anne, the patron saint of miners, “Save me, St. Anne, and I’ll become a monk!” The storm subsided and he was saved.

Most historians believe this was not a spontaneous act, but an idea already formulated in Luther’s mind. The decision to become a monk was difficult and greatly disappointed his father, but he felt he must keep a promise.

Luther was also driven by fears of hell and God’s wrath, and felt that life in a monastery would help him find salvation.

The first few years of monastic life were difficult for Luther, as he did not find the religious enlightenment he was seeking. A mentor told him to focus his life exclusively on Jesus Christ and this would later provide him with the guidance he sought.

Disillusionment with Rome

At age 27, Luther was given the opportunity to be a delegate to a Catholic church conference in Rome. He came away more disillusioned, and very discouraged by the immorality and corruption he witnessed there among the Catholic priests.

Upon his return to Germany, he enrolled in the University of Wittenberg in an attempt to suppress his spiritual turmoil. He excelled in his studies and received a doctorate, becoming a professor of theology at the university (known today as Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg ).

Through his studies of scripture, Luther finally gained religious enlightenment. Beginning in 1513, while preparing lectures, Luther read the first line of Psalm 22, which Christ wailed in his cry for mercy on the cross, a cry similar to Luther’s own disillusionment with God and religion.

Two years later, while preparing a lecture on Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, he read, “The just will live by faith.” He dwelled on this statement for some time.

Finally, he realized the key to spiritual salvation was not to fear God or be enslaved by religious dogma but to believe that faith alone would bring salvation. This period marked a major change in his life and set in motion the Reformation.

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'95 Theses'

On October 31, 1517, Luther, angry with Pope Leo X’s new round of indulgences to help build St. Peter’s Basilica , nailed a sheet of paper with his 95 Theses on the University of Wittenberg’s chapel door.

Though Luther intended these to be discussion points, the 95 Theses laid out a devastating critique of the indulgences - good works, which often involved monetary donations, that popes could grant to the people to cancel out penance for sins - as corrupting people’s faith.

Luther also sent a copy to Archbishop Albert Albrecht of Mainz, calling on him to end the sale of indulgences. Aided by the printing press , copies of the 95 Theses spread throughout Germany within two weeks and throughout Europe within two months.

The Church eventually moved to stop the act of defiance. In October 1518, at a meeting with Cardinal Thomas Cajetan in Augsburg, Luther was ordered to recant his 95 Theses by the authority of the pope.

Luther said he would not recant unless scripture proved him wrong. He went further, stating he didn’t consider that the papacy had the authority to interpret scripture. The meeting ended in a shouting match and initiated his ultimate excommunication from the Church.

Excommunication

Following the publication of his 95 Theses , Luther continued to lecture and write in Wittenberg. In June and July of 1519 Luther publicly declared that the Bible did not give the pope the exclusive right to interpret scripture, which was a direct attack on the authority of the papacy.

Finally, in 1520, the pope had had enough and on June 15 issued an ultimatum threatening Luther with excommunication.

On December 10, 1520, Luther publicly burned the letter. In January 1521, Luther was officially excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church.

Diet of Worms

In March 1521, Luther was summoned before the Diet of Worms , a general assembly of secular authorities. Again, Luther refused to recant his statements, demanding he be shown any scripture that would refute his position. There was none.

On May 8, 1521, the council released the Edict of Worms, banning Luther’s writings and declaring him a “convicted heretic.” This made him a condemned and wanted man. Friends helped him hide out at the Wartburg Castle.

While in seclusion, he translated the New Testament into the German language, to give ordinary people the opportunity to read God’s word.

Lutheran Church

Though still under threat of arrest, Luther returned to Wittenberg Castle Church, in Eisenach, in May 1522 to organize a new church, Lutheranism.

He gained many followers, and the Lutheran Church also received considerable support from German princes.

When a peasant revolt began in 1524, Luther denounced the peasants and sided with the rulers, whom he depended on to keep his church growing. Thousands of peasants were killed, but the Lutheran Church grew over the years.

Katharina von Bora

In 1525, Luther married Katharina von Bora, a former nun who had abandoned the convent and taken refuge in Wittenberg.

Born into a noble family that had fallen on hard times, at the age of five Katharina was sent to a convent. She and several other reform-minded nuns decided to escape the rigors of the cloistered life, and after smuggling out a letter pleading for help from the Lutherans, Luther organized a daring plot.

With the help of a fishmonger, Luther had the rebellious nuns hide in herring barrels that were secreted out of the convent after dark - an offense punishable by death. Luther ensured that all the women found employment or marriage prospects, except for the strong-willed Katharina, who refused all suitors except Luther himself.

The scandalous marriage of a disgraced monk to a disgraced nun may have somewhat tarnished the reform movement, but over the next several years, the couple prospered and had six children.

Katharina proved herself a more than a capable wife and ally, as she greatly increased their family's wealth by shrewdly investing in farms, orchards and a brewery. She also converted a former monastery into a dormitory and meeting center for Reformation activists.

Luther later said of his marriage, "I have made the angels laugh and the devils weep." Unusual for its time, Luther in his will entrusted Katharina as his sole inheritor and guardian of their children.

Anti-Semitism

From 1533 to his death in 1546, Luther served as the dean of theology at University of Wittenberg. During this time he suffered from many illnesses, including arthritis, heart problems and digestive disorders.

The physical pain and emotional strain of being a fugitive might have been reflected in his writings.

Some works contained strident and offensive language against several segments of society, particularly Jews and, to a lesser degree, Muslims. Luther's anti-Semitism is on full display in his treatise, The Jews and Their Lies .

Luther died following a stroke on February 18, 1546, at the age of 62 during a trip to his hometown of Eisleben. He was buried in All Saints' Church in Wittenberg, the city he had helped turn into an intellectual center.

Luther's teachings and translations radically changed Christian theology. Thanks in large part to the Gutenberg press, his influence continued to grow after his death, as his message spread across Europe and around the world.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: Luther Martin
• Birth Year: 1483
• Birth date: November 10, 1483
• Birth City: Eisleben
• Birth Country: Germany
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: Martin Luther was a German monk who forever changed Christianity when he nailed his '95 Theses' to a church door in 1517, sparking the Protestant Reformation.
• Christianity
• Astrological Sign: Scorpio
• Nacionalities
• Interesting Facts
• Martin Luther studied to be a lawyer before deciding to become a monk.
• Luther refused to recant his '95 Theses' and was excommunicated from the Catholic Church.
• Luther married a former nun and they went on to have six children.
• Death Year: 1546
• Death date: February 18, 1546
• Death City: Eisleben
• Death Country: Germany

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CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Martin Luther Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
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• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: September 20, 2019
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
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Martin Luther's 95 Theses

This translation of Martin Luther's 95 theses was published in the Works of Martin Luther  by Adolf Spaeth et al [ means "and others" ]. Published 1915.

Our books consistently maintain 4-star and better ratings despite the occasional 1- and 2-star ratings from people angry because we have no respect for sacred cows.

It's important to notice that all  of the 95 theses have to do with indulgences .

Since Luther's most famous doctrine is Sola Fide , it's often assumed that this was the topic of the ninety-five theses or that they covered many of the doctrinal issues he had with Roman Catholicism.

They did not. They all concern indulgences.

I posted Martin Luther's 95 theses  on this site long ago, but not everyone understands either the context or the meaning of the theses. So, to the actual text of Martin Luther's challenge, I will add just a couple paragraphs of historical context and an explanation of each thesis.

Historical Context

It is often thought that Martin Luther was protesting the Roman Catholic Church in the 95 theses, or that much of his Reformation theology is espoused in them. That is not true.

Martin Luther was a good Catholic when he posted his debate challenge, and the topic was purely the subject of " indulgences ," and more specifically the abuse and sale of indulgences. (A brief definition of indulgences would be a release from the penalty of sin based on the merits of Jesus and the saints.) The specific issue was that Johann Tetzel , sent by the pope to earn money for the building of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, was preying on the ignorance of poverty-stricken and superstitious Germans, collecting money from them to buy the release of their relatives from the fires of Purgatory .

Martin Luther's Heading to the 95 Theses

Out of love for the truth and the desire to bring it to light, the following propositions will be discussed at Wittenberg, under the presidency of the Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts and of Sacred Theology, and Lecturer in Ordinary on the same at that place. Wherefore he requests that those who are unable to be present and debate orally with us, may do so by letter.

In the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Martin Luther was not merely protesting. He was issuing a general challenge to a public discussion with the 95 theses as the topic of discussion. The reason that it was possible to invite the public to a discussion of ninety-five  topics is because Luther had really only covered one topic. He had 95 arguments, or almost 95 arguments, against indulgences, but indulgences were his one topic.

The 95 Theses Explained

1. Our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, when He said  Poenitentiam agite  ["Repent"], willed that the whole life of believers should be repentance.

Poenitentiam agite  is a quote from Matthew 3:2 and 4:17 in Jerome's Latin Vulgate. Modern English translations have "repent," though  poenitentiam agite  literally means "do penance." Martin Luther begins his arguments against indulgences by saying that we should be living lives of repentance.

2. This word cannot be understood to mean sacramental penance, i.e., confession and satisfaction, which is administered by the priests.

Luther argues that Jesus' command to "do penance" cannot be interpreted to mean the penance prescribed by priests after confession. (Today, this would usually be something like "say five Hail Mary's, three Our Father's, and one Act of Contrition." At least, that's what I experienced growing up Roman Catholic. It may have been very much different in Luther's time.)

The attempt here is to divorce the penalty of sin from any penance prescribed by a priest. In the arguments that follow, he will tie the penalty of sin to repentance and hatred of self rather than to a penance that the Church can prescribe are take away.

In what would become the Protestant motto, Luther does exalt the command of Jesus over the tradition of the Roman Catholic Church, though it becomes clear as we progress through his theses that he expects the pope to agree with him on these things. He is trying to oppose  Johann Tetzel  and to stop his extortion of the German people, not to oppose the pope or the Church.

3. Yet it means not inward repentance only; nay, there is no inward repentance which does not outwardly work divers mortifications of the flesh.

Luther argues that all inward repentance will, by its very nature, produce "divers mortifications of the flesh." In other words, true repentance will put the flesh to death in some outward way.

4. The penalty [of sin], therefore, continues so long as hatred of self continues; for this is the true inward repentance, and continues until our entrance into the kingdom of heaven.

Luther reference "the penalty" because that is what an indulgence is supposed to remit. He ties the penalty of sin to hatred of self that should never end rather than a temporary penance issued by the Church. 

5. The pope does not intend to remit, and cannot remit any penalties other than those which he has imposed either by his own authority or by that of the Canons.

Here Luther begins to make use of what he has asserted in the first four theses. The repentance that matters, he has said, is what Jesus has commanded. That repentance never goes away, and it is not a penance prescribed by a priest. So here he follows those assertions up by stating that the only penalties that the pope can remit are those that he has imposed himself by his own authority or on the basis of established ecclesiastical rules (canons).

6. The pope cannot remit any guilt, except by declaring that it has been remitted by God and by assenting to God's remission; though, to be sure, he may grant remission in cases reserved to his judgment. If his right to grant remission in such cases were despised, the guilt would remain entirely unforgiven.

The pope can only remit guilt if God has remitted it. There are areas reserved to his judgment that only he can remit.

7. God remits guilt to no one whom He does not, at the same time, humble in all things and bring into subjection to His vicar, the priest.

When God remits guilt, he also humbles the repentant person, and he requires of penitent that he be subject to God's representative, the priest. The point here is that this type of remission cannot be gained by putting money into Johann Tetzel's money box because that does not produce humility nor bring about subjection to the priest.

Note that Martin Luther is still a good Catholic and priest at this point. He has much to say, even in his later Protestant writings, about submission to the pastor. Here, he is promoting a better route to remission. In confession, penance is assigned to humble the penitent person and this penance is done in submission to the priest as God's representative.

8. The penitential canons are imposed only on the living, and, according to them, nothing should be imposed on the dying.

Penitential canons  were rules about the prescribing of penance after confession. The penance included things like prolonged fasts or banishment from the communion table for periods that could last for over a decade.

Martin Luther points out that the canons that the church is allowed to prescribe all have to do with things that concern the living. They do not include purgatory. This is an obvious foundation for the argument that the Church cannot limit the length of purgatory, but can only remove penalties that it has imposed.

9. Therefore the Holy Spirit in the pope is kind to us, because in his decrees he always makes exception of the article of death and of necessity.

Through the Church and through the pope, the Holy Spirit is kind to us because the penitential canons, the penalties the church is allowed to impose, do not include death. I am not sure what Martin Luther means by "necessity." (If any reader can help with this, please email me using the "contact me" button on the Navbar.)

10. Ignorant and wicked are the doings of those priests who, in the case of the dying, reserve canonical penances for purgatory.

If a priest receives a confession from a dying person, then issues him a penance that will be performed in purgatory, then that priest is ignorant and wicked. He is ignorant because the penitential canons allow no such thing, and he is wicked because even a dying person should be granted full cleansing of the soul before departing this life.

11. This changing of the canonical penalty to the penalty of purgatory is quite evidently one of the tares that were sown while the bishops slept.

This habit of prescribing penalties to be paid in purgatory is compared to the sowing of tares by an enemy in Jesus' parable in Matthew 23:34-40. The references to the bishops sleeping might be a harmless reference to the parable, but it is more likely a jab, an early display of Martin Luther's acerbic wit.

12. In former times the canonical penalties were imposed not after, but before absolution, as tests of true contrition.

The prescribing of penalties by a priest was for the purpose of testing true sorrow, true repentance. Once those penalties were performed, only then was the penitent absolved of his sin.

13. The dying are freed by death from all penalties; they are already dead to canonical rules, and have a right to be released from them.

Since the penitential canons apply to this life only, and priests are only to administer penalties that can be performed in this life, then the death of a Christian frees him from all such penalties. They cannot be performed by those who have passed on, and so they are released.

14. The imperfect health [of soul], that is to say, the imperfect love, of the dying brings with it, of necessity, great fear; and the smaller the love, the greater is the fear.

Luther now leaves the discussion of penalties in this life versus penalties in purgatory. His new subject concerns the fear and despair of the dying. The less love that the dying person has shown in his or her life, the greater is their fear as they face death.

15. This fear and horror is sufficient of itself alone (to say nothing of other things) to constitute the penalty of purgatory, since it is very near to the horror of despair.

This fear of death, especially in those that have not loved much, serves as the penalty of purgatory because it is so full of despair. (This could be interpreted to mean that Martin Luther finds purgatory unnecessary, but he shows us in the next few theses this is not true.)

16. Hell, purgatory, and heaven seem to differ as do despair, almost-despair, and the assurance of safety.

I don't think this needs explanation in light of the explanation of theses 14 and 15.

17. With souls in purgatory it seems necessary that horror should grow less and love increase.

Purgatory is supposed to "purge" the sinner whose sins are not so great that he should go to hell. Hence the name "Purgatory." As the sinner finds his conscience purged in purgatory, his fear and despair should grow less, and his love should increase.

18. It seems unproved, either by reason or Scripture, that they are outside the state of merit, that is to say, of increasing love.

This, like so many other theses in Martin Luther's treatise, is just a buildup for the following theses. Here he says that no one has proven that those in purgatory cannot receive merit in the way of increasing love.

19. Again, it seems unproved that they, or at least that all of them, are certain or assured of their own blessedness, though we may be quite certain of it.

Still setting a foundation for following theses, Luther points out that no one has proven that all of the people in purgatory are certain that they will leave purgatory for heaven. Nonetheless, for some reason I do not understand, he says we may be quite certain it is true that all those in purgatory have an assurance that they will arrive at blessedness.

20. Therefore by "full remission of all penalties" the pope means not actually "of all," but only of those imposed by himself.

Since some penalties are remitted in purgatory to the benefit, in growing love and lessening fear, of the resident there, the pope cannot offer to remit all penalties, but only those that he himself has imposed.

We should emphasize here that indulgences are meant to remit the  penalty  of sin, not sin itself. The sin itself needs to be forgiven through repentance and confession, but even a forgiven sin sometimes involves lamenting, mourning, and weeping (James 4:9,10). The Roman Catholic Church has taken this so far that some sins obtain a penalty of purgatory before real deliverance from sin occurs.

Here, once again, Luther concludes that the only penalties for sin that the pope can remove are the ones that he himself has prescribed.

21. Therefore those preachers of indulgences are in error, who say that by the pope's indulgences a man is freed from every penalty, and saved;

This would have been a claim of Johann Tetzel, and probably others. Luther denies it based on his previous points.

22. Whereas he remits to souls in purgatory no penalty which, according to the canons, they would have had to pay in this life.

Luther is explaining his conclusion of thesis 21, so he repeats some of his earlier points. Here he says that when the preachers of indulgences promise to remit penalties in purgatory, they are outside their bounds because any penalty being paid in purgatory does not belong to this life. Luther has shown earlier that the pope can only remit penalties that can be carried out in this life because those are the only ones he is allowed to impose by the canons.

23. If it is at all possible to grant to any one the remission of all penalties whatsoever, it is certain that this remission can be granted only to the most perfect, that is, to the very fewest.

Even if it were possible to grant someone the remission of all penalties for the sins they have committed, this would surely be true to very few people, those who have lived the most perfect lives.

24. It must needs be, therefore, that the greater part of the people are deceived by that indiscriminate and highsounding promise of release from penalty.

Therefore, since, at best, only a rare few could have all their penalties remitted by an indulgence, then the majority of people are being deceived by the claims of the indulgence preachers.

25. The power which the pope has, in a general way, over purgatory, is just like the power which any bishop or curate has, in a special way, within his own diocese or parish.

The pope's power over purgatory can be compared to a bishop's authority over his own diocese and parish.

Statements like these are confusing as you read through the 95 theses unless you realize that they are foundations for later arguments. Reading a statement like this is like reading the start of a sentence. Read on and Martin Luther will tell you where he is going.

26. The pope does well when he grants remission to souls [in purgatory], not by the power of the keys (which he does not possess), but by way of intercession.

The parentheses belong to Martin Luther. However, at this point in his life, Martin Luther would not have denied to the pope the power of the keys of the kingdom (Matt. 16:18-19). Therefore this is mistranslated. Another translation reads: "(which he cannot exercise for them)."

Such a translation fits in with everything Luther has been saying. The pope cannot use the keys of the kingdom, which he does possess, to help people in purgatory. He can only help those who have penalties that belong to this life, penalties which the pope, either personally or through the local priest, has imposed himself.

Therefore, it is a good thing, Luther argues, if the pope prays for people in purgatory to have their penalties remitted, but he cannot remove penalties to souls in purgatory by the power of his office.

27. They preach man who say that so soon as the penny jingles into the money-box, the soul flies out [of purgatory].

Johann Tetzel had a famous jingle as a sales pitch. In German it rhymed:

So wie das Geld im Kasten klingt Die Seele aus dem Fegfeuer springt

In English, this is "As soon as the money jingles in the box, the soul leaps out of Purgatory."

Luther says that those who say this are preaching the doctrines of men.

28. It is certain that when the penny jingles into the money-box, gain and avarice can be increased, but the result of the intercession of the Church is in the power of God alone.

Luther turns their jingle around and says that it is gain and avarice that can be increased by pennies jingling in money-boxes. The intercession of the Church produces the power of God, not money.

29. Who knows whether all the souls in purgatory wish to be bought out of it, as in the legend of Sts. Severinus and Paschal.

Luther moves on in a surprising direction. What if there are souls that do not wish to have their time in Purgatory shortened? He references Saint Severinus of Noricum, a fifth-century Christian, and Pope Paschal I, who are supposed to have offered to go to Purgatory and bear its pains on behalf of other faithful believers.

It is very hard to track down this legend! So far all I have been able to find is rumor. I will keep looking to see where it came from. There is a Vita Severinus , a life of Severinus , written by Eugippius. I'll see what I can find in it.

Pope Paschal I was pope from 817 to 824, and Severinus belongs to the mid-fourth century. He was the mentor of the famous desert hermit Anthony.

30. No one is sure that his own contrition is sincere; much less that he has attained full remission.

I am sure that this would have been considered an undeniable truth in Luther's time. It would not be a popular teaching in our own. You can be sure, however, that if Luther presents this statement without evidence, then he was confident it would be accepted as true without argument.

31. Rare as is the man that is truly penitent, so rare is also the man who truly buys indulgences, i.e., such men are most rare.

Martin Luther does not oppose indulgences in general. He opposes the improper use of them, and these 95 Theses are an explanation of what Luther sees as improper usage. The proposed public discussion probably never occurred in the format Luther was expecting. Instead, the discussion occurred without his supervision all over Germany after these theses were printed and reprinted by others.

32. They will be condemned eternally, together with their teachers, who believe themselves sure of their salvation because they have letters of pardon.

Luther asserts that those who assure themselves of their salvation because of a letter of pardon, which is what an indulgence is, will be eternally condemned.

33. Men must be on their guard against those who say that the pope's pardons are that inestimable gift of God by which man is reconciled to Him;

In other words, beware of those preachers of indulgences who tell you that they will reconcile a man to God. The purpose of an indulgence is to remove some earthly penalty imposed by the church, such as temporary banishment from communion or a period of self-affliction. Reconciliation to God is not the purpose of an indulgence, and we should beware of those who say they are.

34. For these "graces of pardon" concern only the penalties of sacramental satisfaction, and these are appointed by man.

Luther gives us a new phrase here: "sacramental satisfaction." That is what we have been describing. Indulgences can free you from penalties that are prescribed by priests, but not from penalties bestowed by God after this life.

35. They preach no Christian doctrine who teach that contrition is not necessary in those who intend to buy souls out of purgatory or to buy confessionalia.

Be assured that every Roman Catholic with any theological training and sincerity in their faith, even in the sixteenth century, would have agreed with Martin Luther on this ones. However, the hawkers of indulgences had stooped so low that they were promising instant release from purgatory as soon as a coin fell in the money box. There was no contrition necessary from the one who paid the money for they were not paying for penalties that were their own, and there was no way to know if contrition existed in a soul that is in purgatory. So the indulgence preachers said it was not necessary. This was not Roman Catholic theology, it was greed and evil sales methods by salesmen with corrupt souls.

36. Every truly repentant Christian has a right to full remission of penalty and guilt, even without letters of pardon.

37. Every true Christian, whether living or dead, has part in all the blessings of Christ and the Church; and this is granted him by God, even without letters of pardon.

38. Nevertheless, the remission and participation [in the blessings of the Church] which are granted by the pope are in no way to be despised, for they are, as I have said, the declaration of divine remission.

39. It is most difficult, even for the very keenest theologians, at one and the same time to commend to the people the abundance of pardons and [the need of] true contrition.

40. True contrition seeks and loves penalties, but liberal pardons only  relax penalties and cause them to be hated, or at least, furnish an occasion [for hating them].

41. Apostolic pardons are to be preached with caution, lest the people may falsely think them preferable to other good works of love.

42. Christians are to be taught that the pope does not intend the buying of pardons to be compared in any way to works of mercy.

43. Christians are to be taught that he who gives to the poor or lends to the needy does a better work than buying pardons;

44. Because love grows by works of love, and man becomes better; but by pardons man does not grow better, only more free from penalty.

45. Christians are to be taught that he who sees a man in need, and passes him by, and gives [his money] for pardons, purchases not the indulgences of the pope, but the indignation of God.

46. Christians are to be taught that unless they have more than they need, they are bound to keep back what is necessary for their own families, and by no means to squander it on pardons.

47. Christians are to be taught that the buying of pardons is a matter of free will, and not of commandment.

48. Christians are to be taught that the pope, in granting pardons, needs, and therefore desires, their devout prayer for him more than the money they bring.

49. Christians are to be taught that the pope's pardons are useful, if they do not put their trust in them; but altogether harmful, if through them they lose their fear of God.

50. Christians are to be taught that if the pope knew the exactions of the pardon-preachers, he would rather that St.  Peter's church should go to ashes, than that it should be built up with the skin, flesh and bones of his sheep.

51. Christians are to be taught that it would be the pope's wish, as it is his duty, to give of his own money to very many of those from whom certain hawkers of pardons cajole money, even though the church of St. Peter might have to be sold.

52. The assurance of salvation by letters of pardon is vain, even though the commissary, nay, even though the pope himself, were to stake his soul upon it.

53. They are enemies of Christ and of the pope, who bid the Word of God be altogether silent in some Churches, in order that pardons may be preached in others.

54. Injury is done the Word of God when, in the same sermon, an equal or a longer time is spent on pardons than on this Word.

55. It must be the intention of the pope that if pardons, which are a very small thing, are celebrated with one bell, with single processions and ceremonies, then the Gospel, which is the very greatest thing, should be preached with a hundred bells, a hundred processions, a hundred ceremonies.

56. The "treasures of the Church," out of which the pope grants indulgences, are not sufficiently named or known among the people of Christ.

57. That they are not temporal treasures is certainly evident, for many of the vendors do not pour out such treasures so easily, but only gather them.

58. Nor are they the merits of Christ and the Saints, for even without the pope, these always work grace for the inner man, and the cross, death, and hell for the outward man.

59. St. Lawrence said that the treasures of the Church were the Church's poor, but he spoke according to the usage of the word in his own time.

60. Without rashness we say that the keys of the Church, given by Christ's merit, are that treasure;

61. For it is clear that for the remission of penalties and of reserved cases, the power of the pope is of itself sufficient.

62. The true treasure of the Church is the Most Holy Gospel of the glory and the grace of God.

63. But this treasure is naturally most odious, for it makes the first to be last.

64. On the other hand, the treasure of indulgences is naturally most acceptable, for it makes the last to be first.

65. Therefore the treasures of the Gospel are nets with which they formerly were wont to fish for men of riches.

66. The treasures of the indulgences are nets with which they now fish for the riches of men.

67. The indulgences which the preachers cry as the "greatest graces" are known to be truly such, in so far as they promote gain.

68. Yet they are in truth the very smallest graces compared with the grace of God and the piety of the Cross.

69. Bishops and curates are bound to admit the commissaries of apostolic pardons, with all reverence.

70. But still more are they bound to strain all their eyes and attend with all their ears, lest these men preach their own dreams instead of the commission of the pope.

71. He who speaks against the truth of apostolic pardons, let him be anathema and accursed!

72. But he who guards against the lust and license of the pardon-preachers, let him be blessed!

73. The pope justly thunders against those who, by any art, contrive the injury of the traffic in pardons.

74. But much more does he intend to thunder against those who use the pretext of pardons to contrive the injury of holy love and truth.

75. To think the papal pardons so great that they could absolve a man even if he had committed an impossible sin and violated the Mother of God--this is madness.

76. We say, on the contrary, that the papal pardons are not able to remove the very least of venial sins, so far as its guilt is concerned.

77. It is said that even St. Peter, if he were now Pope, could not bestow greater graces; this is blasphemy against St. Peter and against the pope.

78. We say, on the contrary, that even the present pope, and any pope at all, has greater graces at his disposal; to wit, the Gospel, powers, gifts of healing, etc., as it is written in I. Corinthians xii.

79. To say that the cross, emblazoned with the papal arms, which is set up [by the preachers of indulgences], is of equal worth with the Cross of Christ, is blasphemy.

80. The bishops, curates and theologians who allow such talk to be spread among the people, will have an account to render.

81. This unbridled preaching of pardons makes it no easy matter, even for learned men, to rescue the reverence due to the pope from slander, or even from the shrewd questionings of the laity.

82. To wit: "Why does not the pope empty purgatory, for the sake of holy love and of the dire need of the souls that are there, if he redeems an infinite number of souls for the sake of miserable money with which to build a Church? The former reasons would be most just; the latter is most trivial."

83. Again: "Why are mortuary and anniversary masses for the dead continued, and why does he not return or permit the withdrawal of the endowments founded on their behalf, since it is wrong to pray for the redeemed?"

84. Again: "What is this new piety of God and the pope, that for money they allow a man who is impious and their enemy to buy out of purgatory the pious soul of a friend of God, and do not rather, because of that pious and beloved soul's own need, free it for pure love's sake?"

85. Again: "Why are the penitential canons long since in actual fact and through disuse abrogated and dead, now satisfied by the granting of indulgences, as though they were still alive and in force?"

86. Again: "Why does not the pope, whose wealth is today greater than the riches of the richest, build just this one church of St. Peter with his own money, rather than with the money of poor believers?"

87. Again: "What is it that the pope remits, and what participation does he grant to those who, by perfect contrition, have a right to full remission and participation?"

88. Again: "What greater blessing could come to the Church than if the pope were to do a hundred times a day what he now does once, and bestow on every believer these remissions and participations?"

89. "Since the pope, by his pardons, seeks the salvation of souls rather than money, why does he suspend the indulgences and pardons granted heretofore, since these have equal efficacy?"

90. To repress these arguments and scruples of the laity by force alone, and not to resolve them by giving reasons, is to expose the Church and the pope to the ridicule of their enemies, and to make Christians unhappy.

91. If, therefore, pardons were preached according to the spirit and mind of the pope, all these doubts would be readily resolved; nay, they would not exist.

92. Away, then, with all those prophets who say to the people of Christ, "Peace, peace," and there is no peace!

93. Blessed be all those prophets who say to the people of Christ, "Cross, cross," and there is no cross!

94. Christians are to be exhorted that they be diligent in following Christ, their Head, through penalties, deaths, and hell;

95. And thus be confident of entering into heaven rather through many tribulations, than through the assurance of peace.

Post-Script to the Ninety-Five Theses

Those are the 95 theses that changed the world!

Basically, this document, nailed to the cathedral door at Wittenberg (a common thing to do when you wanted to make a public announcement), ruined the trade in indulgences in that area.

Pope Leo X was engaged in building St. Peter's Basilica, and Martin Luther, an unknown monk, had suddenly stopped the inflow of money. It was this problem, begun by these 95 theses, that started the Reformation and changed the world.

Return to the Reformation

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The Protestant Reformation, explained

Five hundred years ago, Martin Luther changed Christianity — and the world.

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This week, people across the world are celebrating Halloween. But Tuesday, many people of faith marked another, far less spooky, celebration. October 31 was the 500-year anniversary of the day Martin Luther allegedly nailed his 95 theses — objections to various practices of the Catholic Church — to the door of a German church. This event is widely considered the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.

The event was celebrated across Germany , including in Luther’s native Wittenberg (T-shirts for sale there proudly proclaim, “Protestant since 1517!”), as well as by Protestants of all denominations worldwide. As the inciting incident for the entire Reformation, Luther’s actions came to define the subsequent five centuries of Christian history in Western Europe and, later, America: a story of constant intra-Christian challenge, debate, and conflict that has transformed Christianity into the diffuse, fragmented, and diverse entity it is today.

This week, Twitter has been full of users discussing Reformation Day. Some have used the opportunity to post jokes or funny memes about their chosen Christian denomination. Others are debating Luther’s legacy, including discussing the degree to which he either created modern Christianity as we know it or heralded centuries of division within Christian communities.

Basically, every protestant on #ReformationDay pic.twitter.com/HiouAT7w5e — Andrew Mullins (@AndrewWMullins) October 31, 2017

While Reformation Day is celebrated annually among some Protestants, especially in Germany, the nature of this anniversary has brought debate over Luther and the Protestant Reformation more generally into the public sphere.

So what exactly happened in 1517, and why does it matter?

What started as an objection to particular corruptions morphed into a global revolution

While the Catholic Church was not the only church on the European religious landscape (the Eastern Orthodox Churches still dominated in Eastern Europe and parts of Asia), by the 16th century, it was certainly the most dominant. The church had a great deal of political as well as spiritual power; it had close alliances, for example, with many royal houses, as well as the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, which at that time encompassed much of Central Europe, including present-day Germany.

The church’s great power brought with it a fair degree of corruption. Among the most notable and controversial practices of that time was the selling of “indulgences.” For Catholics of that time, sin could be divided into two broad categories. “Mortal sin” was enough to send you to hell after death, while “venal sin” got you some years of purifying punishment in purgatory, an interim state between life on earth and the heavenly hereafter.

By the 16th century, the idea that you could purchase an indulgence to reduce your purgatorial debt had become increasingly widespread. Religious leaders who wanted to fund projects would send out “professional pardoners,” or quaestores, to collect funds from the general public. Often, the sale of indulgences exceeded the official parameters of church doctrine; unscrupulous quaestores might promise eternal salvation (rather than just a remission of time in purgatory) in exchange for funds, or threaten damnation to those who refused. Indulgences could be sold on behalf of departed friends or loved ones, and many indulgence salesmen used that pressure to great effect.

Enter Martin Luther. A Catholic monk in Wittenberg, Luther found himself disillusioned by the practices of the church he loved. For Luther, indulgences — and the church’s approach to sin and penance more generally — seemed to go against what he saw as the most important part of his Christian faith. If God really did send his only son, Jesus, to die on the cross for the sins of mankind, then why were indulgences even necessary? If the salvation of mankind had come through Jesus’s sacrifice, then surely faith in Jesus alone should be enough for salvation.

In autumn 1517 (whether the actual date of October 31 is accurate is debatable), Luther nailed his 95 theses — most of the 95 points in the document, which was framed in the then-common style of academic debate, objections to the practice of indulgences — to a Wittenberg church door.

His intent was to spark a debate within his church over a reformation of Catholicism. Instead, Luther and those who followed him found themselves at the forefront of a new religious movement known as Lutheranism. By 1520, Luther had been excommunicated by the Catholic Church. Soon after, he found himself at the Diet (council) of the city of Worms, on trial for heresy under the authority of the (very Catholic) Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. At that council, the emperor declared Luther to be an outlaw and demanded his arrest.

Political, economic, and technological factors contributed to the spread of Luther’s ideas

So why wasn’t Luther arrested and executed, as plenty of other would-be reformers and “heretics” had been? The answer has as much to do with politics as with religion. In the region now known as Germany, the holy Roman emperor had authority over many regional princes, not all of whom were too happy about submitting to their emperor’s authority.

One such prince, Frederick III, Elector of Saxony, “kidnapped” Luther after his trial to keep him safe from his would-be arrestors. In the years following the trial, and the spread of Luther’s dissent as the basis for a Lutheranism, Protestantism often became a means by which individual princes would signal their opposition to imperial power. And when a prince converted, his entire principality was seen to have converted too. This led, for example, to the catastrophic Thirty Years’ War from 1618 to 1648, in which conflict between pro-Catholic and pro-Lutheran German princes morphed into a pan-European war that killed up to 20 percent of Europe’s population.

As it happens, the term “Protestant” began as a political rather than theological category. It originally referred to a number of German princes who formally protested an imperial ban on Martin Luther, before becoming a more general term for reformers who founded movements outside the Catholic Church.

Meanwhile, Luther was able to spread his ideas more quickly than ever before due to one vital new piece of technology: the printing press. For the first time in human history, vast amounts of information could be transmitted and shared easily with a great number of people. Luther’s anti-clerical pamphlets and essays — which were written in German, the language of the people, rather than the more obscure and “formal” academic language of Latin — could be swiftly and easily disseminated to convince others of his cause. (The relationship between Luther and the printing press was actually a symbiotic one : The more popular Luther became, the more print shops spread up across Europe to meet demand.)

Luther’s newfound popularity and “celebrity” status, in turn, made him a much more difficult force for his Catholic opponents to contend with. While earlier would-be reformers, such as John Hus, had been burned at the stake for heresy, getting rid of someone as widely known as Luther was far more politically risky.

Luther’s success, and the success of those who followed him, is a vital reminder of the ways politics, propaganda, and religion intersect. Something that began as a relatively narrow and academic debate over the church selling indulgences significantly changed Western culture. Luther opened the floodgates for other reformers.

Although Luther can be said to have started the Reformation, he was one of many reformers whose legacy lives on in different Protestant traditions. Switzerland saw the rise of John Calvin (whose own Protestant denomination, Calvinism, bears his name). John Knox founded the Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Each denomination of Protestantism had its own specific theology and approach. But not all Protestant reformations were entirely idealistic in nature: King Henry VIII famously established the Church of England, still the state church in that country today, in order to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn.

Nearly all Protestant groups, however, shared Luther’s original objections to the Catholic Church — theological ideals that still define the Protestant umbrella today.

The most important of these is the idea that salvation happens through faith alone. In other words, nothing — not indulgences, not confession or penance, not even good works — can alter the course of a person’s salvation. For Protestants, salvation happens through divine grace received through faith in Jesus Christ. The second of these is the idea that biblical Scripture, and a person’s individual relationship with the Bible, is the most important source of information about God and Christian life. (This is in stark contrast with the Catholic Church, in which a wider body of church teaching and church authority play a major role.)

While it would be too simplistic to say that Protestants as a whole favor individualism and autonomy over established tradition, it’s fair to say that most Protestant traditions place a greater premium on individuals’ personal religious experiences, on the act of “being saved” through prayer, and on individual readings of Scripture, than do Catholics or members of orthodox churches.

Other differences between Catholic and Protestant theology and practice involve the clergy and church. Protestants by and large see the “sacraments,” such as communion, as less important than their Catholic counterparts (the intensity of this varies by tradition, although only Catholics see the communion wafer as the literal body of Christ). Protestant priests, likewise, are not bound by priestly celibacy, and can marry.

That said, for many Christians today, differences are cultural, not theological. Earlier this fall, a study carried out by the Pew Research Center found that average Protestants more often than not assert traditionally Catholic teachings about, among other things, the nature of salvation or the role of church teaching.

Protestantism today still bears the stamp of Luther

Today, about 900 million people — 40 percent of Christians — identify as Protestant around the world. Of these, 72 million people — just 8 percent — are Lutherans. But Lutheranism has still come to define much of the Protestant ethos.

Over the centuries, more forms of Protestantism have taken shape. Several of them have had cataclysmic effects on world history. Puritanism, another reform movement within the Church of England, inspired its members to seek a new life in the New World and helped shape America as we know it today. Many of these movements classified themselves as “revivalist” movements, each one in turn trying to reawaken a church that critics saw as having become staid and complacent (just as Luther saw the Catholic Church).

Of these reform and revivalist movements, perhaps none is so visible today in America as the loose umbrella known as evangelical Christianity. Many of the historic Protestant churches — Lutheranism, Calvinism, Presbyterianism, the Church of England — are now classified as mainline Protestant churches, which tend to be more socially and politically liberal. Evangelical Christianity, though, arose out of similar revivalist tendencies within those churches, in various waves dating back to the 18th century.

Even more decentralized than their mainline counterparts, evangelical Christian groups tend to stress scriptural authority (including scriptural inerrancy) and the centrality of being “saved” to an even greater extent than, say, modern Lutheranism. Because of the fragmented and decentralized way many of these churches operate, anybody can conceivably set up a church or church community in any building. This, in turn, gives rise to the trend of “storefront churches,” something particularly popular in Pentecostal communities, and “house churches,” in which members meet for Bible study at one another’s homes.

The history of Christianity worldwide has, largely, followed the Luther cycle. As each church or church community becomes set in its ways, a group of idealistic reformers seeks to revitalize its spiritual life. They found new movements, only for reformers to splinter off from them in turn.

In America, where mainline Protestantism has been in decline for decades, various forms of evangelical Protestantism seemed to flourish for many years. Now evangelicals — particularly white evangelicals — are finding themselves in decline for a variety of reasons, including demographic change and increasingly socially liberal attitudes on the part of younger Christians. Meanwhile, social media — the printing press of our own age — is changing the way some Christians worship: Some Christians are more likely to worship and study the Bible online or attend virtual discussion groups, while in other churches, attendees are encouraged to “live-tweet” sermons to heighten engagement.

What happens next is anyone’s guess.

But if the history of Lutheranism is anything to go by, we may be due for another wave of reformation before too long.

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Luther’s Ninety-five Theses: What You May Not Know and Why They Matter Today

More By Justin Holcomb

For more accessible overviews of key moments in church history, purchase Justin Holcomb’s new book, Know the Creeds and Councils (Zondervan, 2014) [ interview ]. Additionally, Holcomb has made available to TGC readers an exclusive bonus chapter, which can be accessed here . This article is a shortened version of the chapter.

If people know only one thing about the Protestant Reformation, it is the famous event on October 31, 1517, when the Ninety-five Theses of Martin Luther (1483–1586) were nailed on the door of the Castle Church of Wittenberg in protest against the Roman Catholic Church. Within a few years of this event, the church had splintered into not just the “church’s camp” or “Luther’s camp” but also the camps of churches led by theologians of all different stripes.

Luther is known mostly for his teachings about Scripture and justification. Regarding Scripture, he argued the Bible alone ( sola scriptura ) is our ultimate authority for faith and practice. Regarding justification, he taught we are saved solely through faith in Jesus Christ because of God’s grace and Christ’s merit. We are neither saved by our merits nor declared righteous by our good works. Additionally, we need to fully trust in God to save us from our sins, rather than relying partly on our own self-improvement.

Forgiveness with a Price Tag

These teachings were radical departures from the Catholic orthodoxy of Luther’s day. But you might be surprised to learn that the Ninety-five Theses, even though this document that sparked the Reformation, was not about these issues. Instead, Luther objected to the fact that the Roman Catholic Church was offering to sell certificates of forgiveness, and that by doing so it was substituting a false hope (that forgiveness can be earned or purchased) for the true hope of the gospel (that we receive forgiveness solely via the riches of God’s grace).

The Roman Catholic Church claimed it had been placed in charge of a “treasury of merits” of all of the good deeds that saints had done (not to mention the deeds of Christ, who made the treasury infinitely deep). For those trapped by their own sinfulness, the church could write a certificate transferring to the sinner some of the merits of the saints. The catch? These “indulgences” had a price tag.

This much needs to be understood to make sense of Luther’s Ninety-five Theses: the selling of indulgences for full remission of sins intersected perfectly with the long, intense struggle Luther himself had experienced over the issues of salvation and assurance. At this point of collision between one man’s gospel hope and the church’s denial of that hope the Ninety-five Theses can be properly understood.

Theses Themselves

Luther’s Ninety-five Theses focuses on three main issues: selling forgiveness (via indulgences) to build a cathedral, the pope’s claimed power to distribute forgiveness, and the damage indulgences caused to grieving sinners. That his concern was pastoral (rather than trying to push a private agenda) is apparent from the document. He didn’t believe (at this point) that indulgences were altogether a bad idea; he just believed they were misleading Christians regarding their spiritual state:

41. Papal indulgences must be preached with caution, lest people erroneously think that they are preferable to other good works of love.

As well as their duty to others:

43. Christians are to be taught that he who gives to the poor or lends to the needy does a better deed than he who buys indulgences.

44. Because love grows by works of love, man thereby becomes better. Man does not, however, become better by means of indulgences but is merely freed from penalties. [Notice that Luther is not yet wholly against the theology of indulgences.]

And even financial well-being:

46. Christians are to be taught that, unless they have more than they need, they must reserve enough for their family needs and by no means squander it on indulgences.

Luther’s attitude toward the pope is also surprisingly ambivalent. In later years he called the pope “the Antichrist” and burned his writings, but here his tone is merely cautionary, hoping the pope will come to his senses. For instance, in this passage he appears to be defending the pope against detractors, albeit in a backhanded way:

51. Christians are to be taught that the pope would and should wish to give of his own money, even though he had to sell the basilica of St. Peter, to many of those from whom certain hawkers of indulgences cajole money.

Obviously, since Leo X had begun the indulgences campaign in order to build the basilica, he did not “wish to give of his own money” to victims. However, Luther phrased his criticism to suggest that the pope might be ignorant of the abuses and at any rate should be given the benefit of the doubt. It provided Leo a graceful exit from the indulgences campaign if he wished to take it.

So what made this document so controversial? Luther’s Ninety-five Theses hit a nerve in the depths of the authority structure of the medieval church. Luther was calling the pope and those in power to repent—on no authority but the convictions he’d gained from Scripture—and urged the leaders of the indulgences movement to direct their gaze to Christ, the only one able to pay the penalty due for sin.

Of all the portions of the document, Luther’s closing is perhaps the most memorable for its exhortation to look to Christ rather than to the church’s power:

92. Away, then, with those prophets who say to Christ’s people, “Peace, peace,” where in there is no peace.

93. Hail, hail to all those prophets who say to Christ’s people, “The cross, the cross,” where there is no cross.

94. Christians should be exhorted to be zealous to follow Christ, their Head, through penalties, deaths, and hells.

95. And let them thus be more confident of entering heaven through many tribulations rather than through a false assurance of peace.

In the years following his initial posting of the theses, Luther became emboldened in his resolve and strengthened his arguments with Scripture. At the same time, the church became more and more uncomfortable with the radical Luther and, in the following decades, the spark that he made grew into a flame of reformation that spread across Europe. Luther was ordered by the church to recant in 1520 and was eventually exiled in 1521.

Ongoing Relevance

Although the Ninety-five Theses doesn’t explicitly lay out a Protestant theology or agenda, it contains the seeds of the most important beliefs of the movement, especially the priority of grasping and applying the gospel. Luther developed his critique of the Roman Catholic Church out of his struggle with doubt and guilt as well as his pastoral concern for his parishioners. He longed for the hope and security that only the good news can bring, and he was frustrated with the structures that were using Christ to take advantage of people and prevent them from saving union with God. Further, Luther’s focus on the teaching of Scripture is significant, since it provided the foundation on which the great doctrines of the Reformation found their origin.

Indeed, Luther developed a robust notion of justification by faith and rejected the notion of purgatory as unbiblical; he argued that indulgences and even hierarchical penance cannot lead to salvation; and, perhaps most notably, he rebelled against the authority of the pope. All of these critiques were driven by Luther’s commitment, above all else, to Christ and the Scriptures that testify about him. The outspoken courage Luther demonstrated in writing and publishing the Ninety-five Theses also spread to other influential leaders of the young Protestant Reformation.

Today, the Ninety-five Theses may stand as the most well-known document from the Reformation era. Luther’s courage and his willingness to confront what he deemed to be clear error is just as important today as it was then. One of the greatest ways in which Luther’s theses affect us today—in addition to the wonderful inheritance of the five Reformation solas (Scripture alone, grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, glory to God alone)—is that it calls us to thoroughly examine the inherited practices of the church against the standard set forth in the Scriptures. Luther saw an abuse, was not afraid to address it, and was exiled as a result of his faithfulness to the Bible in the midst of harsh opposition.

Is there enough evidence for us to believe the Gospels?

Justin Holcomb is an Episcopal priest and a theology professor at Reformed Theological Seminary and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He is author with his wife, Lindsey, of God Made All of Me , Is It My Fault? , and Rid of My Disgrace: Hope and Healing for Victims of Sexual Assault . Justin also has written or edited numerous other books on historical theology and biblical studies. You can find him on Facebook , Twitter , and at JustinHolcomb.com .

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The 95 Theses – a modern translation

1. When Jesus said “repent” he meant that believers should live a whole life repenting

2. Only God can give salvation – not a priest.

3. Inwards penitence must be accompanied with a suitable change in lifestyle.

4. Sin will always remain until we enter Heaven.

5. The pope must act according to canon law.

6. Only God can forgive -the pope can only reassure people that God will do this.

7. A sinner must be humbled in front of his priest before God can forgive him.

8. Canon law applies only to the living not to the dead.

9. However, the Holy Spirit will make exceptions to this when required to do so.

10. The priest must not threaten those dying with the penalty of purgatory.

11. The church through church penalties is producing a ‘human crop of weeds’.

12. In days gone by, church penalties were imposed before release from guilt to show true repentance.

13. When you die all your debts to the church are wiped out and those debts are free from being judged.

14. When someone is dying they might have bad/incorrect thoughts against the church and they will be scared. This fear is enough penalty.

15. This fear is so bad that it is enough to cleanse the soul.

16. Purgatory = Hell. Heaven = Assurance.

17. Souls in Purgatory need to find love – the more love the less their sin.

18. A sinful soul does not have to be always sinful. It can be cleansed.

19. There is no proof that a person is free from sin.

20. Even the pope – who can offer forgiveness – cannot totally forgive sins held within.

21. An indulgence will not save a man.

22. A dead soul cannot be saved by an indulgence.

23. Only a very few sinners can be pardoned. These people would have to be perfect.

24. Therefore most people are being deceived by indulgences.

25. The pope’s power over Purgatory is the same as a priest’s.

26. When the pope intervenes to save an individual, he does so by the will of God.

27. It is nonsense to teach that a dead soul in Purgatory can be saved by money.

28. Money causes greed – only God can save souls.

29. Do we know if the souls in Purgatory want to be saved ?

30. No-one is sure of the reality of his own penitence – no-one can be sure of receiving complete forgiveness.

31. A man who truly buys an indulgence (ie believes it is to be what it is) is as rare as someone who truly repents all sin ie very rare.

32. People who believe that indulgences will let them live in salvation will always be damned – along with those who teach it.

33. Do not believe those who say that a papal indulgence is a wonderful gift which allows salvation.

34. Indulgences only offer Man something which has been agreed to by Man.

35. We should not teach that those who aim to buy salvation do not need to be contrite.

36. A man can be free of sin if he sincerely repents – an indulgence is not needed.

37. Any Christian – dead or alive – can gain the benefit and love of Christ without an indulgence.

38. Do not despise the pope’s forgiveness but his forgiveness is not the most important.

39. The most educated theologians cannot preach about indulgences and real repentance at the same time.

40. A true repenter will be sorry for his sins and happily pay for them. Indulgences trivialise this issue.

41. If a pardon is given it should be given cautiously in case people think it’s more important than doing good works.

42. Christians should be taught that the buying of indulgences does not compare with being forgiven by Christ.

43. A Christian who gives to the poor or lends to those in need is doing better in God’s eyes than one who buys ‘forgiveness’.

44. This is because of loving others, love grows and you become a better person. A person buying an indulgence does not become a better person.

45. A person who passes by a beggar but buys an indulgence will gain the anger and disappointment of God.

46. A Christian should buy what is necessary for life not waste money on an indulgence.

47. Christians should be taught that they do not need an indulgence.

48. The pope should have more desire for devout prayer than for ready money.

49. Christians should be taught not to rely on an indulgence. They should never lose their fear of God through them.

50. If a pope knew how much people were being charged for an indulgence – he would prefer to demolish St. Peter’s.

51. The pope should give his own money to replace that which is taken from pardoners.

52. It is vain to rely on an indulgence to forgive your sins.

53. Those who forbid the word of God to be preached and who preach pardons as a norm are enemies of both the pope and Christ.

54. It is blasphemy that the word of God is preached less than that of indulgences.

55. The pope should enforce that the gospel – a very great matter – must be celebrated more than indulgences.

56. The treasure of the church is not sufficiently known about among the followers of Christ.

57. The treasure of the Church are temporal (of this life).

58. Relics are not the relics of Christ, although they may seem to be. They are, in fact, evil in concept.

59. St. Laurence misinterpreted this as the poor gave money to the church for relics and forgiveness.

60. Salvation can be sought for through the church as it has been granted this by Christ.

61. It is clear that the power of the church is adequate, by itself, for the forgiveness of sins.

62. The main treasure of the church should be the Gospels and the grace of God.

63. Indulgences make the most evil seem unjustly good.

64. Therefore evil seems good without penance or forgiveness.

65. The treasured items in the Gospels are the nets used by the workers.

66. Indulgences are used to net an income for the wealthy.

67. It is wrong that merchants praise indulgences.

68. They are the furthest from the grace of God and the piety and love of the cross.

69. Bishops are duty bound to sell indulgences and support them as part of their job.

70. But bishops are under a much greater obligation to prevent men preaching their own dreams.

71. People who deny the pardons of the Apostles will be cursed.

72. Blessed are they who think about being forgiven.

73. The pope is angered at those who claim that pardons are meaningless.

74. He will be even more angry with those who use indulgences to criticise holy love.

75. It is wrong to think that papal pardons have the power to absolve all sin.

76. You should feel guilt after being pardoned. A papal pardon cannot remove guilt.

77. Not even St. Peter could remove guilt.

78. Even so, St. Peter and the pope possess great gifts of grace.

79. It is blasphemy to say that the insignia of the cross is of equal value with the cross of Christ.

80. Bishops who authorise such preaching will have to answer for it.

81. Pardoners make the intelligent appear disrespectful because of the pope’s position.

82. Why doesn’t the pope clean feet for holy love not for money ?

83. Indulgences bought for the dead should be re-paid by the pope.

84. Evil men must not buy their salvation when a poor man, who is a friend of God, cannot.

85. Why are indulgences still bought from the church ?

86. The pope should re-build St. Peter’s with his own money.

87. Why does the pope forgive those who serve against him ?

88. What good would be done to the church if the pope was to forgive hundreds of people each day ?

89. Why are indulgences only issued when the pope sees fit to issue them ?

90. To suppress the above is to expose the church for what it is and to make true Christians unhappy.

91. If the pope had worked as he should (and by example) all the problems stated above would not have existed.

92. All those who say there is no problem must go. Problems must be tackled.

93. Those in the church who claim there is no problem must go.

94. Christians must follow Christ at all cost.

95. Let Christians experience problems if they must – and overcome them – rather than live a false life based on present Catholic teaching.

Why Did Martin Luther Post the 95 Theses?

In the little town of Wittenberg, Germany,  on this day, October 31, 1517 , a priest nailed a challenge to debate on the church door. No one may have noticed then, but within the week, copies of his theses would be discussed throughout the surrounding regions; and within a decade, Europe itself was shaken by his simple act. Later generations would mark Martin Luther's nailing of the 95 theses on the church door as the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, but what did Luther think he was doing at the time? To answer this question, we need to understand a little about Luther's own spiritual journey.

Martin Luther

As a young man in Germany at the beginning of the sixteenth century, Luther was studying law at the university. One day he was caught in a storm and was almost killed by lightning. He cried out to St. Anne and promised God he would become a monk. In 1505, Luther entered the Augustinian monastery and in 1507 became a priest. His monastic leaders sent him to Rome in 1510, but Luther was disenchanted with the ritualism and dead faith he found in the papal city. There was nothing in Rome to mend his despairing spirit or settle his restless soul. He seemed so cut off from God, and nowhere could he find a cure for his malady.

Martin Luther was bright, and his superiors soon had him teaching theology at the university. In 1515, he began teaching Paul's epistle to the Romans. Slowly, Paul's words in Romans began to break through the gloom of Luther's soul. Luther wrote

My situation was that, although an impeccable monk, I stood before God as a sinner troubled in conscience, and I had no confidence that my merit would assuage him. Night and day I pondered until I saw the connection between the justice of God and the statement 'the just shall live by faith.' Then I grasped that the justice of God is that righteousness by which through grace and sheer mercy God justifies us through faith. Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. The whole of Scripture took on a new meaning...This passage of Paul became to me a gate to heaven.

The more Luther's eyes were opened by his study of Romans, the more he saw the church's corruption in his day. The glorious truth of justification by faith alone had become buried under a mound of greed, corruption, and false teaching. Most galling was the practice of indulgences -- the certificates the church provided for a fee, supposedly to shorten one's stay in Purgatory. The pope was encouraging the sale of indulgences. He planned to use the money to help pay for the building of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.

Johann Tetzel was one of the indulgence sellers in Luther's vicinity. He used little advertising jingles to encourage people to buy his wares: "As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs." Once Luther realized the sufficiency of Christ's sacrifice alone for our sins, he found such practices revolting. The more he studied the Scriptures, the more he saw the need to show the church how it had strayed from the truth.

Reason for the 95 Theses

So, on this day, October 31, 1517 , he posted a list of 95 propositions on the church door in Wittenberg. In his day, this was the means of inviting scholars to debate important issues. No one took up Luther's challenge to debate at that time, but once news of his proposals became known, many began to discuss the issue Luther raised that salvation was by faith in Christ's work alone. Luther initially expected the Pope to agree with his position since it was based on Scripture, but in 1520, the Pope issued a decree condemning Luther's views. Luther publicly burned the papal decree. With that act, he also burned his bridges behind him.

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Read the Full List of Luther's 95 Theses .

Photo Credit: WikimediaCommons

Bibliography:

• Adapted from an earlier Christian History Institute story.
• Bainton, Roland. Here I Stand. New York: Mentor, 1950.
• Durant, Will. The Reformation. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1957.
• Köstlin, Julius. Life of Luther. New York, C. Scribner's sons, 1884.
• Wells, Amos R. A Treasure of Hymns; Brief biographies of 120 leading hymn- writers and Their best hymns. Boston: W. A. Wilde company, 1945.
• Various encyclopedia articles.

Last updated July 2017.

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The lasting impact of Martin Luther and the Reformation

Published: October 26, 2017

Author: Brandi Klingerman

In October 1517, Martin Luther famously published his 95 Theses, unleashing criticisms that resulted in a rejection of the pope’s authority and fractured Christianity as he knew it. Exactly 500 years later, Brad S. Gregory , the Dorothy G. Griffin Professor of Early Modern European History at the University of Notre Dame, explains how this eventually, but unintentionally, led to a world of modern capitalism, polarizing politics and more.

In Gregory’s latest book, “Rebel in the Ranks” (HarperOne) , he explains that in the early 1500s religion was more than just one component of a person’s lifestyle in Western Europe and that Christianity, as the dominant religion, influenced all areas of Christians’ lives. However, after Luther’s initial concerns inadvertently created a movement — the Reformation — the result was a division between Catholicism and the varied Protestant traditions, conflicts among those traditions and, eventually, changes in how religion influenced people’s lives.

“The Reformation gave rise to constructive forms of several different Christian traditions, such as Lutheranism and Calvinism,” said Gregory. “But this also meant that people of differing faiths had to work out how they could coexist when religion had always been the key influence on politics, family and education. Although in the 17th and 18th centuries some political leaders continued to use the idea of religious uniformity to manage their territories, beginning with the 17th-century Dutch they realized that religious toleration was good for business.”

This effort to coexist and the desire for economic prosperity, Gregory argues, resulted in a “centuries-long process of secularization.” Religion was redefined and its scope restricted to a modern sense of religion as individual internal beliefs, forms of worship and devotional preferences. This made religion separable from politics, economics and other areas of life. With this, Western society has increasingly struggled to come to a consensus on politics, education and other social issues without the direction of an overarching faith or any shared substantive set of values to replace it.

“One result of the Reformation has been the political protection of individuals to believe or worship how they want,” said Gregory. “However, this freedom has also delivered — contrary to what Luther would have wanted — the right for people to practice no religion at all, and more, in recent decades, the seeming inability of citizens to agree on even the most basic norms important for shared political and social life.”

The Reformation’s unintended consequence of modern individual freedom has positives and negatives, he explained. Although people benefit from individual freedoms that were not available 500 years ago, these freedoms have also led, for instance, to the right for someone to purchase whatever they want without regard for the needs of anyone else.

“To match demand and thrive financially, factories produce the goods people want. In doing so, factories pollute the environment in ways that contribute to global warming. When religion was a pervasive and shared reality, individual freedom restrained the consumerist behaviors we see today,” said Gregory. “This is just one of many ways in which the long-term, unintended consequences of the Reformation are still influencing our lives today.”

Gregory is the director of the Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study and author of “The Unintended Reformation . ” To learn more about him as well as his latest book, “Rebel in the Ranks,” visit https://ndias.nd.edu/books/rebel-in-the-ranks/ .

Contact : Brittany Kaufman, assistant director, Office of Media Relations, 574-631-6335, [email protected]

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This Day In History : October 31

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Martin Luther posts 95 theses

On October 31, 1517, legend has it that the priest and scholar Martin Luther approaches the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, and nails a piece of paper to it containing the 95 revolutionary opinions that would begin the Protestant Reformation .

In his theses, Luther condemned the excesses and corruption of the Roman Catholic Church, especially the papal practice of asking payment—called “indulgences”—for the forgiveness of sins. At the time, a Dominican priest named Johann Tetzel, commissioned by the Archbishop of Mainz and Pope Leo X, was in the midst of a major fundraising campaign in Germany to finance the renovation of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Though Prince Frederick III the Wise had banned the sale of indulgences in Wittenberg, many church members traveled to purchase them. When they returned, they showed the pardons they had bought to Luther, claiming they no longer had to repent for their sins.

Luther’s frustration with this practice led him to write the 95 Theses, which were quickly snapped up, translated from Latin into German and distributed widely. A copy made its way to Rome, and efforts began to convince Luther to change his tune. He refused to keep silent, however, and in 1521 Pope Leo X formally excommunicated Luther from the Catholic Church. That same year, Luther again refused to recant his writings before the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V of Germany, who issued the famous Edict of Worms declaring Luther an outlaw and a heretic and giving permission for anyone to kill him without consequence. Protected by Prince Frederick, Luther began working on a German translation of the Bible, a task that took 10 years to complete.

The term “Protestant” first appeared in 1529, when Charles V revoked a provision that allowed the ruler of each German state to choose whether they would enforce the Edict of Worms. A number of princes and other supporters of Luther issued a protest, declaring that their allegiance to God trumped their allegiance to the emperor. They became known to their opponents as Protestants; gradually this name came to apply to all who believed the Church should be reformed, even those outside Germany. By the time Luther died, of natural causes, in 1546, his revolutionary beliefs had formed the basis for the Protestant Reformation, which would over the next three centuries revolutionize Western civilization.

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Luther's 95 Theses

95 theses martin luther nailed on the church door at wittenburg..

OCTOBER 31, 1517

Out of love for the truth and the desire to bring it to light, the following propositions will be discussed at Wittenberg, under the presidency of the Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts and of Sacred Theology, and Lecturer in Ordinary on the same at that place. Wherefore he requests that those who are unable to be present and debate orally with us, may do so by letter.

In the Name our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

• When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, "Repent" ( Matthew 4:17 ), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.
• This word cannot be understood as referring to the sacrament of penance, that is, confession and satisfaction, as administered by the clergy.
• Yet it does not mean solely inner repentance; such inner repentance is worthless unless it produces various outward mortification of the flesh.
• The penalty of sin remains as long as the hatred of self (that is, true inner repentance), namely till our entrance into the kingdom of heaven.
• The pope neither desires nor is able to remit any penalties except those imposed by his own authority or that of the canons.
• The pope cannot remit any guilt, except by declaring and showing that it has been remitted by God; or, to be sure, by remitting guilt in cases reserved to his judgment. If his right to grant remission in these cases were disregarded, the guilt would certainly remain unforgiven.
• God remits guilt to no one unless at the same time he humbles him in all things and makes him submissive to the vicar, the priest.
• The penitential canons are imposed only on the living, and, according to the canons themselves, nothing should be imposed on the dying.
• Therefore the Holy Spirit through the pope is kind to us insofar as the pope in his decrees always makes exception of the article of death and of necessity.
• Those priests act ignorantly and wickedly who, in the case of the dying, reserve canonical penalties for purgatory.
• Those tares of changing the canonical penalty to the penalty of purgatory were evidently sown while the bishops slept ( Matthew 13:25 ).
• In former times canonical penalties were imposed, not after, but before absolution, as tests of true contrition.
• The dying are freed by death from all penalties, are already dead as far as the canon laws are concerned, and have a right to be released from them.
• Imperfect piety or love on the part of the dying person necessarily brings with it great fear; and the smaller the love, the greater the fear.
• This fear or horror is sufficient in itself, to say nothing of other things, to constitute the penalty of purgatory, since it is very near to the horror of despair.
• Hell, purgatory, and heaven seem to differ the same as despair, fear, and assurance of salvation.
• It seems as though for the souls in purgatory fear should necessarily decrease and love increase.
• Furthermore, it does not seem proved, either by reason or by Scripture, that souls in purgatory are outside the state of merit, that is, unable to grow in love.
• Nor does it seem proved that souls in purgatory, at least not all of them, are certain and assured of their own salvation, even if we ourselves may be entirely certain of it.
• Therefore the pope, when he uses the words "plenary remission of all penalties," does not actually mean "all penalties," but only those imposed by himself.
• Thus those indulgence preachers are in error who say that a man is absolved from every penalty and saved by papal indulgences.
• As a matter of fact, the pope remits to souls in purgatory no penalty which, according to canon law, they should have paid in this life.
• If remission of all penalties whatsoever could be granted to anyone at all, certainly it would be granted only to the most perfect, that is, to very few.
• For this reason most people are necessarily deceived by that indiscriminate and high-sounding promise of release from penalty.
• That power which the pope has in general over purgatory corresponds to the power which any bishop or curate has in a particular way in his own diocese and parish.
• The pope does very well when he grants remission to souls in purgatory, not by the power of the keys, which he does not have, but by way of intercession for them.
• They preach only human doctrines who say that as soon as the money clinks into the money chest, the soul flies out of purgatory.
• It is certain that when money clinks in the money chest, greed and avarice can be increased; but when the church intercedes, the result is in the hands of God alone.
• Who knows whether all souls in purgatory wish to be redeemed, since we have exceptions in St. Severinus and St. Paschal, as related in a legend.
• No one is sure of the integrity of his own contrition, much less of having received plenary remission.
• The man who actually buys indulgences is as rare as he who is really penitent; indeed, he is exceedingly rare.
• Those who believe that they can be certain of their salvation because they have indulgence letters will be eternally damned, together with their teachers.
• Men must especially be on guard against those who say that the pope's pardons are that inestimable gift of God by which man is reconciled to him.
• For the graces of indulgences are concerned only with the penalties of sacramental satisfaction established by man.
• They who teach that contrition is not necessary on the part of those who intend to buy souls out of purgatory or to buy confessional privileges preach unchristian doctrine.
• Any truly repentant Christian has a right to full remission of penalty and guilt, even without indulgence letters.
• Any true Christian, whether living or dead, participates in all the blessings of Christ and the church; and this is granted him by God, even without indulgence letters.
• Nevertheless, papal remission and blessing are by no means to be disregarded, for they are, as I have said (Thesis 6), the proclamation of the divine remission.
• It is very difficult, even for the most learned theologians, at one and the same time to commend to the people the bounty of indulgences and the need of true contrition.
• A Christian who is truly contrite seeks and loves to pay penalties for his sins; the bounty of indulgences, however, relaxes penalties and causes men to hate them -- at least it furnishes occasion for hating them.
• Papal indulgences must be preached with caution, lest people erroneously think that they are preferable to other good works of love.
• Christians are to be taught that the pope does not intend that the buying of indulgences should in any way be compared with works of mercy.
• Christians are to be taught that he who gives to the poor or lends to the needy does a better deed than he who buys indulgences.
• Because love grows by works of love, man thereby becomes better. Man does not, however, become better by means of indulgences but is merely freed from penalties.
• Christians are to be taught that he who sees a needy man and passes him by, yet gives his money for indulgences, does not buy papal indulgences but God's wrath.
• Christians are to be taught that, unless they have more than they need, they must reserve enough for their family needs and by no means squander it on indulgences.
• Christians are to be taught that they buying of indulgences is a matter of free choice, not commanded.
• Christians are to be taught that the pope, in granting indulgences, needs and thus desires their devout prayer more than their money.
• Christians are to be taught that papal indulgences are useful only if they do not put their trust in them, but very harmful if they lose their fear of God because of them.
• Christians are to be taught that if the pope knew the exactions of the indulgence preachers, he would rather that the basilica of St. Peter were burned to ashes than built up with the skin, flesh, and bones of his sheep.
• Christians are to be taught that the pope would and should wish to give of his own money, even though he had to sell the basilica of St. Peter, to many of those from whom certain hawkers of indulgences cajole money.
• It is vain to trust in salvation by indulgence letters, even though the indulgence commissary, or even the pope, were to offer his soul as security.
• They are the enemies of Christ and the pope who forbid altogether the preaching of the Word of God in some churches in order that indulgences may be preached in others.
• Injury is done to the Word of God when, in the same sermon, an equal or larger amount of time is devoted to indulgences than to the Word.
• It is certainly the pope's sentiment that if indulgences, which are a very insignificant thing, are celebrated with one bell, one procession, and one ceremony, then the gospel, which is the very greatest thing, should be preached with a hundred bells, a hundred processions, a hundred ceremonies.
• The true treasures of the church, out of which the pope distributes indulgences, are not sufficiently discussed or known among the people of Christ.
• That indulgences are not temporal treasures is certainly clear, for many indulgence sellers do not distribute them freely but only gather them.
• Nor are they the merits of Christ and the saints, for, even without the pope, the latter always work grace for the inner man, and the cross, death, and hell for the outer man.
• St. Lawrence said that the poor of the church were the treasures of the church, but he spoke according to the usage of the word in his own time.
• Without want of consideration we say that the keys of the church, given by the merits of Christ, are that treasure.
• For it is clear that the pope's power is of itself sufficient for the remission of penalties and cases reserved by himself.
• The true treasure of the church is the most holy gospel of the glory and grace of God.
• But this treasure is naturally most odious, for it makes the first to be last ( Matthew 20:16 ).
• On the other hand, the treasure of indulgences is naturally most acceptable, for it makes the last to be first.
• Therefore the treasures of the gospel are nets with which one formerly fished for men of wealth.
• The treasures of indulgences are nets with which one now fishes for the wealth of men.
• The indulgences which the demagogues acclaim as the greatest graces are actually understood to be such only insofar as they promote gain.
• They are nevertheless in truth the most insignificant graces when compared with the grace of God and the piety of the cross.
• Bishops and curates are bound to admit the commissaries of papal indulgences with all reverence.
• But they are much more bound to strain their eyes and ears lest these men preach their own dreams instead of what the pope has commissioned.
• Let him who speaks against the truth concerning papal indulgences be anathema and accursed.
• But let him who guards against the lust and license of the indulgence preachers be blessed.
• Just as the pope justly thunders against those who by any means whatever contrive harm to the sale of indulgences.
• Much more does he intend to thunder against those who use indulgences as a pretext to contrive harm to holy love and truth.
• To consider papal indulgences so great that they could absolve a man even if he had done the impossible and had violated the mother of God is madness.
• We say on the contrary that papal indulgences cannot remove the very least of venial sins as far as guilt is concerned.
• To say that even St. Peter if he were now pope, could not grant greater graces is blasphemy against St. Peter and the pope.
• We say on the contrary that even the present pope, or any pope whatsoever, has greater graces at his disposal, that is, the gospel,spiritual powers, gifts of healing, etc., as it is written, 1 Corinthians 12:28 ).
• To say that the cross emblazoned with the papal coat of arms, and set up by the indulgence preachers is equal in worth to the cross of Christ is blasphemy.
• The bishops, curates, and theologians who permit such talk to be spread among the people will have to answer for this.
• This unbridled preaching of indulgences makes it difficult even for learned men to rescue the reverence which is due the pope from slander or from the shrewd questions of the laity.
• Such as: "Why does not the pope empty purgatory for the sake of holy love and the dire need of the souls that are there if he redeems an infinite number of souls for the sake of miserable money with which to build a church? The former reason would be most just; the latter is most trivial.
• Again, "Why are funeral and anniversary masses for the dead continued and why does he not return or permit the withdrawal of the endowments founded for them, since it is wrong to pray for the redeemed?"
• Again, "What is this new piety of God and the pope that for a consideration of money they permit a man who is impious and their enemy to buy out of purgatory the pious soul of a friend of God and do not rather, because of the need of that pious and beloved soul, free it for pure love's sake?"
• Again, "Why are the penitential canons, long since abrogated and dead in actual fact and through disuse, now satisfied by the granting of indulgences as though they were still alive and in force?"
• Again, "Why does not the pope, whose wealth is today greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build this one basilica of St. Peter with his own money rather than with the money of poor believers?"
• Again, "What does the pope remit or grant to those who by perfect contrition already have a right to full remission and blessings?"
• Again, "What greater blessing could come to the church than if the pope were to bestow these remissions and blessings on every believer a hundred times a day, as he now does but once?"
• "Since the pope seeks the salvation of souls rather than money by his indulgences, why does he suspend the indulgences and pardons previously granted when they have equal efficacy?"
• To repress these very sharp arguments of the laity by force alone, and not to resolve them by giving reasons, is to expose the church and the pope to the ridicule of their enemies and to make Christians unhappy.
• If, therefore, indulgences were preached according to the spirit and intention of the pope, all these doubts would be readily resolved. Indeed, they would not exist.
• Away, then, with all those prophets who say to the people of Christ, "Peace, peace," and there is no peace! ( Jeremiah 6:14 )
• Blessed be all those prophets who say to the people of Christ, "Cross, cross," and there is no cross!
• Christians should be exhorted to be diligent in following Christ, their Head, through penalties, death and hell.
• And thus be confident of entering into heaven through many tribulations rather than through the false security of peace ( Acts 14:22 ).

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Rev. William Lawson, civil rights leader who worked with Martin Luther King Jr., dies at 95

HOUSTON — The Rev. William “Bill” Lawson, a longtime pastor and civil rights leader who helped desegregate Houston and worked with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. during the civil rights movement, has died. He was 95.

Lawson’s longtime church, Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church in that Texas city, announced on its website that he had died on Tuesday.

“He has completed his time of service here on earth and is now enjoying eternal rest,” the church said in its announcement.

Lawson founded Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church in 1962 and served as its pastor for 42 years before retiring in 2004. He was known as “Houston’s Pastor” and remained active in his church and the community after retirement.

He worked with King during the civil rights movement by setting up the local office of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the civil rights organization that was led by King.

During an interview in 2021 with his daughter Melanie Lawson, an anchor  with KTRK in Houston , William Lawson recalled how he offered to play host to King at his church when others would not after the FBI wrongly accused King of being a communist.

“I told his staff I don’t have a big church. But he’s perfectly welcomed to come to my church and he came to Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church and he preached there,” Lawson said.

Both men remained close friends until King’s assassination in 1968.

Community leaders in Houston praised Lawson and his legacy on Tuesday.

“He is one of the reasons why our city is so great. He helped us during the period of civil rights and social justice,” Mayor John Whitmire said. “Houston benefited from his leadership, his character.”

Harris County Commissioner Rodney Ellis said although Houston mourns his loss, “we celebrate a legacy that will guide us for generations to come.”

Memorial services celebrating Lawson’s life were set to be held at Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church on May 23 and May 24.

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The Associated Press