What so special about Germans eating night crawlers?
-Today in Religious History
485 years ago today, the Diet of Worms (Dee-ay of Verms) commenced. Most Protestants don’t realize the significance of this day, but, were it not for this, we’d likely still be praying to saints and laying out some cash for our salvation. A quick layman’s history (by someone who knows just enough to be dangerous):
About 488 years ago, a German priest named Martin Luther nailed up his thoughts about the direction the church was taking (the “95 theses”) on the church house door. It is assumed that he used the door as a forum because he did not have access to a blog, it being 1517 and all.
As is typical of most blog posts (at least, as is typical of my blog posts), his thoughts lacked “warm-and-fuzzies”; feelings the Catholic Church had become so accustomed to getting from its servants and congregation. They all tended to fall in line after it was made clear by the church that its process of counseling concerned or curious parishioners was pretty much limited to execution.
Luther’s 95 theses can be pretty much summed up as so:
“Salvation is not a fundraiser. Sure, the church can offer you absolution if you confess your sins, but charging you cash to pull you out of the grips of hell for your sins is a load of crap. That’s God’s job, and it doesn’t cost a thin dime…as long as you truly repent of your sins. If anyone from the church would like to have a civil discussion about this issue, have your people call my people. We’ll chat over punch and pie.”
The church declined the invitation and branded him a heretic…but they didn’t go out of their way to find him and barbecue him. I guess they figured that if they ignored him, he’d go away. He didn’t.
Over the next few years, Herr Luther went out and expressed his opinions to anyone who would listen. As is typical of us mere mortals, the more he talked, the more pissed he got and his simple disagreement with the church evolved into the proclamation that “Der Papst ain’t Scheiße”.
This little proclamation proved to be pretty popular with the unwashed masses and Luther was becoming a rock star, writing books and touring Europe. Unpleased over this development, the Pope formally excommunicated him, went to the Emperor and asked “Can you help a brutha out?” As a goodwill effort, the emperor called Luther down to the office.
Luther shows up in Worms and sits down before the assembly. He’s asked by the Pope’s representative if he will renounce all of his previous works. Calmly, Luther shakes his head, says he’s guided by Scripture, the Pope can pound salt, gives him the finger and walks out.
OK, maybe I’m exaggerating a little about giving him the finger.
Luther bails, and the assembly issued a pretty fierce edict that all of his writings are banned and that Luther should be killed on sight. He went into hiding until the heat died down. To kill some time, he translated the Bible into German. Once the heat died down, he went back on tour, in essence establishing a new school of religious thought which eventually gave birth to all of the protestant religions, thus proving a little heresy can be a good thing. Yea, Martin.
Here endeth our lesson.
485 years ago today, the Diet of Worms (Dee-ay of Verms) commenced. Most Protestants don’t realize the significance of this day, but, were it not for this, we’d likely still be praying to saints and laying out some cash for our salvation. A quick layman’s history (by someone who knows just enough to be dangerous):
About 488 years ago, a German priest named Martin Luther nailed up his thoughts about the direction the church was taking (the “95 theses”) on the church house door. It is assumed that he used the door as a forum because he did not have access to a blog, it being 1517 and all.
As is typical of most blog posts (at least, as is typical of my blog posts), his thoughts lacked “warm-and-fuzzies”; feelings the Catholic Church had become so accustomed to getting from its servants and congregation. They all tended to fall in line after it was made clear by the church that its process of counseling concerned or curious parishioners was pretty much limited to execution.
Luther’s 95 theses can be pretty much summed up as so:
“Salvation is not a fundraiser. Sure, the church can offer you absolution if you confess your sins, but charging you cash to pull you out of the grips of hell for your sins is a load of crap. That’s God’s job, and it doesn’t cost a thin dime…as long as you truly repent of your sins. If anyone from the church would like to have a civil discussion about this issue, have your people call my people. We’ll chat over punch and pie.”
The church declined the invitation and branded him a heretic…but they didn’t go out of their way to find him and barbecue him. I guess they figured that if they ignored him, he’d go away. He didn’t.
Over the next few years, Herr Luther went out and expressed his opinions to anyone who would listen. As is typical of us mere mortals, the more he talked, the more pissed he got and his simple disagreement with the church evolved into the proclamation that “Der Papst ain’t Scheiße”.
This little proclamation proved to be pretty popular with the unwashed masses and Luther was becoming a rock star, writing books and touring Europe. Unpleased over this development, the Pope formally excommunicated him, went to the Emperor and asked “Can you help a brutha out?” As a goodwill effort, the emperor called Luther down to the office.
Luther shows up in Worms and sits down before the assembly. He’s asked by the Pope’s representative if he will renounce all of his previous works. Calmly, Luther shakes his head, says he’s guided by Scripture, the Pope can pound salt, gives him the finger and walks out.
OK, maybe I’m exaggerating a little about giving him the finger.
Luther bails, and the assembly issued a pretty fierce edict that all of his writings are banned and that Luther should be killed on sight. He went into hiding until the heat died down. To kill some time, he translated the Bible into German. Once the heat died down, he went back on tour, in essence establishing a new school of religious thought which eventually gave birth to all of the protestant religions, thus proving a little heresy can be a good thing. Yea, Martin.
Here endeth our lesson.
posted by Big Bad Dad at 11:57 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home