Tag Archives: Reformation
Reformation Day in Rome
Yesterday morning we woke up extremely early, though not because we aren’t craving excessive amount of sleep—only because Daylight Savings Time ended in Europe today. For all that, we still managed to be a few minutes late to church. The … Continue reading
All Hallows’ Eve, Reformation Day, and Two Anniversaries
According to legend, 493 years ago today Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses on indulgences on the door of the castle church in Wittenberg, Germany, sparking off what came to be the Reformation. Of the ninety-five, these two are the … Continue reading
An Interview with Jared Wicks, S.J., Catholic scholar of Luther
Jared Wicks is a theologian and writer at John Carroll University in University Heights, Ohio. We asked him a few questions about his unusual vocation. How did you as a Jesuit become a scholar of Luther? My pre-ordination theology studies … Continue reading
The New Catholic—and Lutheran—View of Luther
Luther is a stumbling block for Catholics—and often enough for Lutherans, who tend to have equally caricatured if more positive views of him. The real Luther is an incredibly complicated person. The absolute best statement of a mature, ecumenical view … Continue reading
Elsewhere in 1510
It’s easy to overlook, when diving into the details of the Reformation, that a lot of other very important things were happening at the same time. There’s the Renaissance, of course, whose capital—Florence—we’ve just visited. Boticelli died the same year … Continue reading
Ecumenical Instructions for Catholics (Protestants, Please Eavesdrop)
While much visible ecumenical work takes place at an official level—like in the national and international dialogues—Unitatis Redintegratio expects all Catholics to get involved in some way or another. The decree lays down the marching orders for this new Catholic … Continue reading
Rats, Walls, and Needlemakers: Welcome to Late Medieval Cities
Thomas Hobbes’s famously depressing description of life in a “state of nature” as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” has often been applied to describe life in the Middle Ages. From our vantage point, sitting on sofas in climate-controlled homes … Continue reading
Where Luther Slept
We can’t know with any great certainty where Luther stepped for each of the 1500 km he walked during the six weeks of his southward journey. And even if we did, the chances that we could still walk in his steps would be pretty slim. He would have kept to major roads—really only muddy cart paths at the time. The problem is that many of these have become today’s roads and highways: hardly routes conducive to a pleasant walk.
We can know with a bit more certainty, however, where he laid his head at night. Continue reading
Martin Luther in 1510
Martin Luther in 1510 is an intriguing figure. Here we have a theologian who belongs to both of our churches, and as such is unsettling to both of our perceptions of who and what we are. Scholars on both sides have tried to manage this Luther. Some on the Lutheran side have liked to emphasize his “Reformation breakthrough” to an extreme degree. There is supposed to be an absolute, abject break with his past, a lightning-bolt discovery of the true but long obscured gospel, a relentless rejection of all that came before—you see this even in certain kinds of paintings of Luther, where he hammers the 95 Theses to the door of the church with a strident certainty. This is the ultra-Protestant Luther who has no use for Rome, the Catholic church, or pretty much anything that came before him. Continue reading
