Martin Luther
Leader of the great religious revolt of the sixteenth century in Germany; born at Eisleben, 10 November 1483; died at Eisleben, 18 February 1546. His father, Hans, was a miner, a rugged, stern, irascible character. In the opinion of many of his biographers, it was an expression of uncontrolled rage, an evident congenital inheritance transmitted […]
Henry VIII’s Defense of the Seven Sacraments
King Henry VIII 1491-1547 In 1521, just four years after supposedly posting his famous “Ninety-five theses” on a church door in Wittenberg, and the same month he was excommunicated, Martin Luther published a controversial work called The Babylonian Captivity of the Church. This book denounced the seven sacraments as corruptions and papist inventions. When Luther’s […]
CHRIST, LUTHER, AND ZWINGLI IN ONE PAINTING
Christ is present in the Holy Sacrament of the altar. There have been numerous heretical teachers who have denied the Catholic doctrine of Our Lord’s presence in the Holy Eucharist and have given various interpretations to his words: “This is My body; this is My blood.” Consequently, the Council of Trent declared that Christ is […]
500 YEARS OF PROTESTANTISM: THE 38 MOST RIDICULOUS THINGS MARTIN LUTHER EVER WROTE
As we move beyond five-hundred-year anniversary of the Protestant reformulation on October 31, 2017, it is good for us to look back and examine how that all worked out for them. For, how are we to judge the fruit of tree over the last 500 years unless we first examine the roots of that tree? […]
Transubstantiation v. Consubstantiation
Victor R. Claveau, MJ John 6:51-58—Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition[1] “ I am the living bread[a] which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.” The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How […]
Luther Rewrites the Bible
Victor R. Claveau, MJ 2 Macc. 12:43-46 provides the primary scriptural foundation for the Catholic belief in purgatory.[1] There was no legitimate defense for Luther to remove the Second Book of Maccabees alone, so he simply excluded the deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament, as the Jews of old had done fourteen centuries before, albeit, for entirely […]
Luther Debates Eck
Victor R. Claveau, MJ The ablest Catholic theologian of the day in Germany was Dr. Johann Eck[1] of the University of Ingolstadt. Some three years younger than Luther, he completed his master’s degree at the University of Tübingen at the early age of fourteen, while Luther was still an undergraduate. In May 1518, Luther’s friend Andreas Bodenstein […]
Believe; Simply Believe!
Victor R. Claveau, MJ As a nervous, sensitive young religious who had entered the monastery without a true vocation, Martin Luther, no doubt, had to struggle against many trials and temptations. He was tormented by a constant sense of his own sinfulness in spite of contrition and penance, and by the thought of his own […]
Martin Luther’s Ninety-five Theses
Victor R. Claveau, MJ Many people believe the final tearing of the fabric of Church teaching began when Martin Luther supposedly nailed his ninety-five theses to the castle church door at Wittenberg on October 31, 1517. In actuality, according to noted historian Hubert Jedin, Luther sent the ninety-fire theses to the bishops concerned on that date, the eve […]
Martin Luther and the Doctrine of Indulgences
Victor R. Claveau, MJ Many correlate the Church’s teaching on the granting of indulgences, with the beginning of the Reformation. The Dominican, John Tetzel, had been commissioned to preach the indulgence, which was to raise funds for the rebuilding of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. According to Hartmann Grisar, the foremost biographer of Luther, Tetzel misrepresented the […]