Task: “Luther was both a revolutionary and a conservative.” Evaluate this statement with the respect to Luther’s responses to the political and social questions of his day. During the 16th century, the Catholic Church was seen as corrupt because of certain practices such as indulgences. This corruption, lead many people to stand up against the Church, and this began The Protestant Reformation. One of the most influential people of this time was Martin Luther. Martin Luther’s responses to political and social questions during this time were often either revolutionary or conservative.
Here in America, we do not have a national religion, yet the idea of separation of church and state has been raised more than once. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison were very clear when they talked about church and state. Madison wrote in a letter, "The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe with blood for centuries." Madison and Jefferson feared the harsh monarchs of Europe and did not what that to happen to their new country. Countries that do have a national religion often face more violent and extreme problems.
Religious Right author David Barton, perhaps the most outspoken of the “wall of separation” critics, devoted an entire book, The Myth of Separation, to proving his claim that church-state separation is “absurd” and was a principle completely foreign to the Founding Fathers. He states: “In Jefferson’s full letter, he said separation of church and state means the government will not run the church, but we will use Christian principles with government.” More recently, two researchers have published books that criticize the almost infamous status the metaphor has achieved, especially before the U. S. Supreme Court. Daniel Dreisbach, who wrote, Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation between Church and State, is critical of the courts for making the metaphor a practical rule of constitutional law. Dreisbach’s basic argument is that the metaphor fails to distinguish between the conception of “separation” and “non-establishment.” Dreisbach is correct in saying that metaphors can be overstated, misused, and made poor substitutes for legal
If we try to mix in logic, we end up with a rhetorical disaster. American politics has a Christian bias. Remember how much crap Obama went through when people found out he was born half Muslim? He had to swear to several newspapers that he regularly attended church. To answer the second part of the question, no, religious arguments do not hold water for nonbelievers.
FRQ: Compare and contrast Lutheran and catholic reformations The catholic and Lutheran reformations were revolutionary events in history in which the Christian religion divided into the different sects that exist today, Catholicism and Protestantism. The Lutheran reformation is when Luther studied scriptures and came to the conclusion that the papacy was an invalid power and corrupt. The catholic reformation was the Catholic Church’s attempt to resolve corruption and other serious issues within the Catholic Church. This was also done to reform the catholic church so it is more appealing and hence, less conversions to protestant branches of Christianity such and Lutheranism. These two events were similar and different in two aspects: they were different because while the Lutheran reformation had many doctrinal changes, the catholic reforms made no revisions whatsoever to the beliefs of the catholic church; and they were similar because they both resolved many corrupt practices which was critical for both Protestantism and Catholicism because it added an appeal to the two sects of Christianity allowing either of them to gain popularity.
The uniformity and rigid adherence to the Catholic Church, and its various forms of debauchery in the 16th century, spawned the idea that such an entity was not truly needed. To that extent, the author proves that the individualistic component of Protestantism is the commonality between its many scions, as in this religion “the individual’s relationship with God is direct” (McGrath, p. 44). And although the author spends a substantial amount of time chronicling several different varieties of Protestantism and some of the more notable and lesser known figures who have helped to extend its principles in defense of this central premise (such as Martin Bucer and John Calvin), the very nature of this historical accounting does not allow him to do so with a depth of analysis that would truly benefit his thesis. Unfortunately, Christianity’s Dangerous Idea: The Protestant Revolution: A History from the Twenty-First Century to the Sixteenth “often sacrifices depth and focus for breadth and span”
People turned to the church for guidance, if the pope was of strong character the leadership of the church was the law but if the pope was weak or lost control leadership was in the hands of the current emperor which meant whatever group had the ruler’s ear at any given minute influenced the course of events. This continued from Constantine (324-337) in the west through Arcadus (395-408) in the east. Christianity became the authorized government belief of Rome in 391 however it certainly did not begin or end there as nonspiritual and religious groups seeking supremacy and status for themselves over others to the disadvantage of God’s people. This is still true today with the church and state especially during this election year. Mitt Romney if a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Barack Obama is either a Christian or Muslim depending on who you ask, both men want the power and both men have used religion as a stepping stone and a political platform.
Traditional society within the Middle Ages and Renaissance were very hectic in comparison to the time period after the Enlightenment. This is mainly because, during the Middle ages and Renaissance The Church had the most control over the people and government, Religion played a huge role in everyday life and the only religion that existed was the Catholic religion. For different crimes committed, there were multiple unjust and inconsistent punishments, also people did not have equal human rights. However, after a while philosophes began to produce these Enlightenment ideas which state that all people should be treated equally, have more say in government, have more rights, and have equal punishments according to the crime committed. Enlightenment ideas
Rome’s emperors contradicted each other many times in history, not the least of which on the topic of Christianity. ``Some of the Roman emperors persecuted the Christians and murdered them but then Constantine came around and adopted it as Rome’s religion`` (Source: Oxford dictionary of the Christian Church). The way the different emperors of Rome jumped between religions made their citizens have less faith in them and not letting the citizens not know what to belief in destroyed unity in Rome. The adoption of Christianity disconnected the falling Western Roman Empire further from the thriving Byzantine Empire (Source: history-world.org/churchseperate.htm). This is significant because the Romans could have learned a lot from the Byzantine.
Most of the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church were dogma that could not be challenged or refused by Christians of the middle ages. And as it were, those teachings which forced down the throats of the people. Between 1170 and 1498 AD the glimpse of religious light began to shoot over the age, foretokens of the coming of the reformation. Before these tokens the papacy office became more involved in politics, they claimed to be more superior to the kings. The major concern was money in the Roman Catholic Church.