Martin Luther's Attitude

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When Martin Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the door of All Saint’s Church on the eve of All Saint’s Day, the timing was symbolic and not accidental. Instead of the festival being a call to remember the souls of the saints who had died, Luther made it a call for people to be freed from the grave of a scholastic and religious dictatorship. Luther’s action ignited the coals that had been smoldering from the minds of John Wycliffe, John Hus, and Desiderius Erasmus, into a raging fire that swept Europe and brought the Roman Catholic Church to its knees. The Mystics had won, after all. In a letter written by Ignatius of Loyola, on August 13, 1554, he reveals the true nature and haughtiness of the Catholic elite when he writes, “In the first …show more content…
Martin Luther, whether knowingly or not, opened the mystics Pandora’s Box “with the heart rather than the head, through spiritual feelings rather than through intellectual prowess.”6 It would be presumptuous to assume Luther did not use his intellect to pen the ninety-five theses, if not inherently incorrect to do so. However, his epiphany came in the reading of Romans 1:17, when he realized the absolute truth of God’s grace and that “…the just shall live by faith.”7 Here is where the mystics had the advantage over the pure, scholastic thinkers, from the middle ages through the renaissance period, that led to the reformation era. The proof text is found in Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”8 (emphasis mine) The literal definition of the word ‘substance’ is “ultimate reality that underlies all outward manifestations and change.”9 And what is evidence? It is “something that furnishes proof.”10 By this verse, the Apostle Paul has nailed his signature upon the very nature of the mystic theology, along with the ninety-five theses of …show more content…
There was a growing emphasis on individualism, which was rooted in the renaissance. The movement of many people into cities and towns had afforded the populace more freedom than they had known during the feudal system. News of church corruption traveled faster, and citizens could witness the actual lack of concern of the priests and bishops for the spiritual welfare of the people. By the time of the Reformation, the Roman Catholic church hierarchy and its lower priesthood had lost much of their influence. Finally, with the growth of kingdoms and the spreading power of monarchs, the quest of the Catholic church to gain absolute power was met with increasing suspicion. These rulers opted to protect the Protestants under their
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