At this point in our series on the Reformation we're asking the "why" questions: Why did the Reformation happen and why did it happen at the time it happened?
In Part I we looked at the revolution the invention of the printing press brought about in the decades leading up the Reformation, resulting in an explosion of new theological ideas expressed in an explosion of pamphlets and books making the case for these new ideas. And as though still short on explosions, the time witnessed as well an explosion in the number of people who could read and who naturally began to want to interact more critically with what they were being taught..
In Part II we looked at the simultaneous rise of a humanist educational philosophy, sweeping the universities at earth 16th century, that mocked the kind of theology being done by the great scholastic theologians and doctors of the Church (including St. Thomas Aquinas) and called for a return to the "pure" study of Scripture and the Fathers.
Add this all together and it just doesn't take a genius, or a rocket scientist, or a brain surgeon, or even a lowly Catholic apologist, to see how this could create and feed into a growing atmosphere of independence. Mix in a few more critical ingredients and an atmosphere of independence easily becomes an atmosphere of outright revolt and rejection of the spiritual authority of the Catholic Church.
And this is what the Reformation was at its heart. It was a rejection of the idea that Jesus had established a spiritual authority on earth, to preserve, interpret and pass down the apostolic faith, and that the Catholic Church represented that spiritual authority.
So what about these added ingredients?
Well, at the same time all these other factors were in play, and related to them, there was the rise of a strong emphasis on religion as something intimate and personal.
In 1503, the humanist priest Erasmus published a book titled Enchiridion, or Handbook of the Christian Soldier. It emphasized the need for Christians to nourish a "personal" faith in Christ by the "personal" reading of Scripture. It also promoted the renewal of the Church through a return to the study of Scripture and the Fathers. The book was an instant runaway hit. It went through 23 editions in its first six years alone. It was being devoured throughout Catholic Europe.
And of course Erasmus was right in insisting that our relationship with Christ ought to be intimate and personal. Heck, the official Catechism of the Catholic Church defines Christian faith as "the commitment of the entire person to God.” When we talk about putting our trust in the living God, we're talking about the commitment of mind, emotion and will. Faith must be inward and personal.
And as Alister McGrath notes in his excellent biography of John Calvin, these ideas were spreading everywhere at the time and not in any sense considered “heretical.”
In Italy the movement often known as “Catholic evangelicalism”…with it’s stress on the question of personal salvation, became firmly established within the church, even penetrating deeply within its hierarchy, without being regarded as in any way heretical
Now, depending on the cultural sensitivity of your history teacher, those of you who attended our public school system may have been preserved from images such as the one below.
If so, I can only offer advance warning and suggest that you might wish to shield your eyes and quickly scroll down to the next paragraph. Don't want to be accused of indoctrinating impressionable readers into a Eurocentric view of the world by not showing a painting from 16th century Chad or Indonesia while talking about the Italian Renaissance. For those who wish to look, this is called the Mona Lisa. It was painted by someone named Leonardo da Vinci.
Finally, this trend toward individualism in the decades leading up to the Reformation -- it didn't express itself merely in an emphasis on religion as something intimate and personal. The fact is, there was at the time, throughout Catholic Europe, the rise of a strong spirit of individualism and resentment of centralized authority --- in the empire as well as the Church.
For instance, in Germany, McGrath tells us…
Intense resentment was felt against the pope. In part, this reflected an incipient German nationalism, marked by a resentment of all things Italian. It also reflected popular irritation at the fact that ecclesiastical revenues (including the proceeds of indulgence sales) were destined for Rome, and the maintenance of the somewhat extravagant lifestyles, building programs and political adventures of the Renaissance popes....
In many ways, Luther’s reforming program made an appeal to (perhaps even to the point of a crude exploitation of) German nationalism and anti-papalism, allowing the Reformation to ride on the crest of a wave of popular anti-papal sentiment.
In other words, along with all the other factors we've already discussed, it turns out the very idea of centralized authority was being rejected at the time, and not just in the Church but in the Empire as well. Nationalism was on the rise. Anti-papal sentiment was growing. The authority of the Catholic Church was resented. Christendom was beginning to break apart.
And the leadership of the Catholic Church was at fault for much of this.
How so? Stay tuned for Part IV.