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The work of wycliffe and the ongoing need of reform in the church today
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The Pope is human, just like the rest of us, so how can he be above Jesus and the Bible? Wycliffe is the reason for the Reformation because he argued that the Bible and Jesus are above the pope, he caused people to ban together to fight against the pope, and even after his death, his legacy lives on.
First off, Wycliffe is the reason for the Reformation because he argued that the Bible and Jesus Christ were above the Pope. This is an issue because the Pope was seen as a leader in the times before the Reformation. Wycliffe argued against the Pope saying, “Trust wholly in Christ; rely altogether on his sufferings; beware of seeking to be justified in any other way than his righteousness.” (Christianity today, John Wycliffe). At this point John has been saying that Christ is first, so therefor Jesus has the last word. You cannot argue with the Bible in this era, so how can the Pope be above Christ? He can't.
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There are people being injured and slaughtered for standing up against the Pope. They are being killed because the Catholic church calls them heretics. It all happens when Martin Luther starts posting his thoughts about the Church on the door (95 Theses). Now you can imagine how mad that his postings made the Pope and the clergy. Luther had a lot of pride in what he had to say, but with that pride comes a price. Pope Leo X had Luther excommunicated. But his legacy lives on with people like John Wycliffe. As stated above, Wycliffe kept people fighting by banning them together and arguing with the pope, which later on gets them slaughtered. But they keep fighting for what they believe is
Since heretics were a big problem according to the church, Pope Innocent III got involved. Pope Innocent III called a crusade on heretics which started a war. Pope Innocent III called the crusade on heretics because he believed they were too big of a threat to ignore. It was a 20 year, long, bloody battle against the heretics. The result of the war was that the war destroyed many towns and thousands of people were killed. The war took place in France. He and the church wanted the country to be heretic free. Almost all heretics were killed during the bloody 20 year war. (Burstein and Shek).
Throughout the ten-century, particularly in France, the world had become an extremely violent place. Feudal Knights were often quarreling over land possession, looting, and looking to lay people to provide them with sustenance . Likewise, the power of these knights and the extent of violence flourished due to the increasingly lacking power and authority of the kings . The Church, in an attempt to halt the violence and anarchy attempted to take control and issued such concepts as “the Peace of God” . Similarly, at this time other movements for peace by the Church were underway, and one of the commonly held ideas was the need to transform the world to more “monkish ideals”. From these ideals also sprouted the concept of the laity having “God-given functions to perform, functions that could include fighting to protect the Church”. Pope Leo IX (1049-1054) is an example of this idea; he often used militia to fight against his opponents. In the early eleventh century, there came a pivotal figure in the ideas of Church sanctioned war, Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085). Pope Gregory was involved in the Investiture Contest, and soon turned to scholars to seek out “justification for his conviction that violence could be used in defense of the Church and could be authorized by it”. The movements generated by Pope Gregory, as well as the results of the Inve...
Boniface Wimmer is regarded as one of the greatest missionaries of the nineteenth century. His mission was to establish a Benedictine monastery abroad in the United States to help the thousands of Catholic Germans who fled from their homeland in search of a better life. “Today, there are over thirty Abbeys and monasteries that take their root from Archabbot Boniface Wimmer, O.S.B.” With the grace of God, Boniface Wimmer succeeded. He was considered to be a “man on a mission.” His tenacious attitude aided him in spreading the mission of the Benedictine Order across the Atlantic Ocean. The Benedictines were seen not only as missionaries, but also as teachers and priests. The strong sense of bonding and connection within the community was vital to the Benedictine Order then, as it still is today.
Also, the monarchs or Europe challenged the church and the pope’s power, since church was even more powerful than some of the European kingdoms and monarchies. European monarchies did not like that the church was wealthy and had influence upon people, so they got against the church and its pope.
others on the greedy, false doctrine of indulgences. And the Pope at the time was Pope Leo X. Pope Leo reigned from 1513 to 1521 when he died. This was the act that started the Reformation and the stand that Martin Luther took to go against the Pope.
...The Pope creates many sides to his argument, conveying the need not only to redeem but also to repay their debts to God for making them the chosen race. He provokes the temper of many by speaking of the horrific crimes the Muslims are apparently committing, using distinctly graphic images to engage his followers.
Born in Germany, in 1483, Martin Luther went on to become one of western history’s most significant figure. Luther spent his early life as a priest and a lawyer. He was also the professor of theology. Considering his background it was a total surprise that Luther protested and criticized the catholic church. Even more surprising since he was a priest. However, Martin Luther didn’t want to destroy the church after all he was a priest. He just wanted to reform some of the church’s perceived abuses. There are different reasons that sparked Martin Luther’s protestant reformation, namely. 1) salvation or getting to heaven, was won by faith alone, 2) the selling of indulgences, 3) the bible
The first Christians who challenged the doctrines of the Catholic Church had already pleaded their cases long before Martin Luther, the acclaimed founding father of Protestantism, ultimately broke away from the Catholic Church. Prior to the Reformation and official formation of Protestantism, many philosophers, theologians, and logicians who led the inquiry for greater knowledge and education, spoke out against the doctrines of the Catholic Church. Peter Abelard, John Wycliffe, Jan Hus, and Peter Waldo were all great masterminds of the Middle Ages who contributed to the fall of the domineering Catholic Church and the rise of Protestantism. Although they were deemed as heretics, they set precedents for future reformers and gave cultural importance to their new beliefs and ideas.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century church theologian, Martin Luther, wrote the 95 Theses questioning the corruption of the Roman Catholic Church. In this essay I will discuss: the practices of the Roman Catholic Church Martin Luther wanted to reform, what Martin’s specific criticism of the pope was, and the current practices Pope Francis I is interested in refining in the Roman Catholic Church today.
During the Middle ages, there was strong disagreement among church leaders. A prime example of this is what is called the “Great Schism.” The Great Schism occurred in 1378 and lasted until 1417. It represented a time where there was a split in church leadership. To put it simply, this split occurred when two people, Pope Urban VI and Clement VII, disagreed strongly on matters of church reform and both claimed to be the rightful pope (McKay 340). During this time, the people were divided and didn’t know who to look to for strength as they had previously done. Accordingly, Papal power over the people lessened and
Luther, a pastor and professor at the University of Wittenberg, deplored the entanglement of God’s free gift of grace in a complex system of indulgences and good works. In his Ninety-five Theses, he attacked the indulgence system, insisting that the pope had no authority over purgatory and that the doctrine of the merits of the saints had no foundation in the gospel. Here lay the key to Luther’s concerns for the ethical and theological reform of the church: Scripture alone is authoritative (sola sciptura) and justification is by faith (sola fide), not by works. While he did not intend to break with the Catholic church, a confrontation with the papacy was not long in coming. In 1521 Luther was excommunicated; what began as an internal reform movement had become a fracture in western
There were many people and attempts made to change the way the church functioned before the Reformation, but they had always been crushed by the inquisition. There were many factors political, religious, and economic, which had been developing for centuries that would make it possible for the Reformation to come about. There were quite a few practices of the church that were in question at this time. Some of these practices included simony, indulgences, excessive papal wealth, and clerical violations of church and biblical rules of behavior (Fide, Scriptura, Solus, Sola, & Soli, 2014). The one that was the biggest concern to the people looking for church reform, was the selling of pardons from the pope to lessen the time a person’s soul would be in purgatory, these pardons were also called
...blatant example of how religion was misused. Innocent people were killed in the name of Christianity - this was a terrible parody of the religion whose main principle was not to injury or kill your enemy but to love him. Moreover, these were not enemies but ordinary people who for different reasons were not to the liking of the church. Last but not least, there were even religious wars in France and Spain. Soldiers killed their friends and compatriots because of the fight for power of their leaders.
The Reformation was a decisive period in the history not only for the Catholic Church, but also for the entire world. The causes of this tumultuous point in history did not burst on the scene all at once, but slowly gained momentum like a boil that slowly festers through time before it finally bursts open. The Reformation of the Church was inevitable because of the abuses which the Church was suffering during this period. At the time of the Reformation, a segment of the Church had drifted away from its mission to bring Christ and salvation to the world. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Church had gradually become weaker because of abusive leadership, philosophical heresy, and a renewal of a form of the Pelagian heresy.
Early in history, the Roman papacy consolidated its power. It became one of the most influential organizations in the medieval period. This rise to power resulted from the decline in the Western Empire, the leadership of Roman bishops, and special grants that gave the church land holdings. This rise to power caused some positive ramifications, such as the protection of the church from heresy. However, the absolute power of the pope also caused corruption and abuses, many of which would eventually spark the reformation.