The Protestant Reformation was a very eventful and important part of time in history. This time in history in a brief statement is were the Protestant Christian church separated from the Roman Catholic Church. The Protestants thought of the Roman Catholic Church to be corrupt, with phony relics, and sold indulgences, which, they did not agree with. With the separation of the Protestant Christian Church came Luther’s Doctrine, Calvinism, and other churches and religious belief systems. Through the separation of the Protestant and Catholics came separation of land territory of where they stayed, but sure enough came disagreements and wars over power because of Democracy.
The Roman Catholic church was considered corrupted for many different reasons. The priest would go around and sell these objects like a piece of a post, cloth, or something to that effect and say this is a piece of the cross that Jesus with crucified on, or this is a piece of Jesus’s clothes, but these were saw as phony relics to some people. The leaders of the Catholic Church would accept donations for these things called Indulgences. Indulgences were a thing you could donate and receive to get you a step closer to Heaven for Catholics. They believe that it shortens the time you spend purgatory. So, Protestants didn’t agree with the things that the Roman Catholic Church was doing. The churches corruption was known by many and there were many attempts to reform the church that failed until Martin Luther.
Martin Luther was struck by lighting preparing for school, so he prayed to St. Anne that if he lived, he’d become a monk, and he did and then a PhD in theology, and became faculty at the University of Wittenberg. This is were he formed Luther’s Doctrine, which, include Predestination, Faith Alone, Scripture Alone, and Priesthood of all Believers. Luther believed that our Salvation was chosen by divine election, and that no matter what our will is that doesn’t matter only Gods will and election can give us our salvation. So, to know you were your saved you would have to see yourself in Christ alone and then receive eternal life.
Luther was a very spiritual and devoted person, but even through all the good thing he did, he still found himself falling into the human nature of sin. Then through studying he came across a scripture that said, “The just shall live by Faith, Romans 1:17” and this led him to see that its Faith Alone that gets you too Heaven not for say doing good works. Although there are still other thin as of believing God, the Son, and the Holy Spirt, reading his word, and repentance. When Luther talks about Scripture Alone, its talking about people in a way that they can learn directly for the bible, Luther and other reformers will look for teachings form scripture rather than what the church taught.
Thanks to the creation of the printing press, which, was made Mainz, Germany in the 15th century, Luther was able to translate the bible into different common languages such as French, Germen, Italian, and English. So, with the creation of the printing press and Luther translating the Bible it allows citizen of these different languages to learn from the bible on their own. Luther had a strong belief about Priesthood of all believers, and this is were they see everyone as equal. This is were they believe that we all have the power to communicate with god. We don’t have through a priest, meditation, or any other thing to talk with our lord. We are all equal in Protestant Christian Church so the same way the priest talks to God a normal citizen can too. So, basically in a sense we all as believers could be a priest but only some are called to be a priest. Luther thought of all Christians as priest, because that is all of our mission from God is the spread his word and his love. So, he as if priest should be as common as Christians because all Christians are supposed to share his word, so why not consider us Christians as “Priest” because that isn’t our job title.
Through, Luther’s Doctrine the Church has split, and you have the Protestant churches like the Lutheran, Calvinist Churches, and the Anglican and then you have you Catholic Churches. The Catholic church was defiantly still dominate at this time in history. The Catholics stayed in Ireland, Portugal, Spain, France, Naples, Papal States, and South and West of the Holy Roman Empire. The Protestant Churches and minorities stayed in England, Norway, Sweden, Prussia, and the North and East in the Holy Roman Empire. The Protestant Reformation helped from democracy through the separation because just like the Priesthood of all Believers, everyone is equal so the thought everyone should be able to have a say. So, it became a self-governing process.
The people started picking there spiritual and political leaders in the New Found land and Germany, and the empire leader feared democracy because if they can pick there spiritual leader they might be able to pick the political leader. Although the King, Queens, and Empire leaders feared it democracy began to spread. The Protestant reformation change the way viewed the churches and their selves which lead to a rise of Capitalism. The Protestant Reformation helped with the spread of democracy and capitalism because it put down the leaders of the catholic church. So, democrats and capitalist thought different about them selves and rose up in Europe demanding more power in the leadership.
