The Existence of Abuses in the Roman Catholic Church

In 1500’s the Roman Catholic was all-powerful in Europe as there was no legal alternative at the time. The Church jealously guarded its position with so much force that if anyone went against the learning’s and the ways of the church was burned at the stake and labeled as a heathen. Some of the causes for Protestant reformation were the corruption within the Catholic Church because during the time of the black plague as soon as people knew they had the plague they knew they were going to die within a 3 day period after developing the symptoms of the black plaque, so the people affected would have paid their local catholic ministers for indulgences so they were guarantied to get into heaven and not go to hell or purgatory. Martin Luther exposed this particular practice in 1517 through the 95 theses, as he was upset that people and Catholic ministers could make God over look peoples sin just by being bribed through brought indulgences.

In my essay I will attempt to give an overview of the many positive and negative changes that the reformation groups and individuals had to Roman Catholic Church and other churches. The reformation was a religious movement that started officially by Martin Luther challenging the sale of the indulgences in Roman Church.

Martin Luther was a friar very devoted to the Church but after analyzing all these aspects he decided to do something about it. On October 31, 1517 he attached to the door of Wittenberg Castle a list of 95 theses or propositions on indulgences. These theses criticized papal policies and were objections about he church put on hold for discussion.

During the 16th Century there was a religious revolution in Christianity throughout Europe. Martin Luther, a German monk, revolted against the Church because of what he saw as hypocrisy of the Catholic clergy and authority against Biblical beliefs. This was counter acted by the Catholic Church in an internal, peaceful and reform minded Catholic Reformation and by a conflicting and fighting Counter- Reformation to stop the spread of his teachings. Martin Luther believed the Clergy’s blatant disregard of duties and rules and the selling of indulgences justified his revolt while the Catholic Church disagreed both internally reforming the Church though rules and regulations and by counteracting and fighting though enforcement to stop it.

The practices of The Catholic Church during the sixteenth century caused a monk named Martin Luther to question The Church’s ways. Luther watched as families suffered physically, emotionally and economically by the hands of The Church. Luther saw no basis for The Church to charge people for their sins or prevent them from learning to read The Bible themselves. He watched as the money built up The Palace, yet tore apart the fundamental and spiritual reasons one goes to church in the first place. In an effort to change the practices of The Church, he wrote the 95 Thesis. In these, he stated his views on the abuses of The Church. This was the beginning of a large movement that would change religious practices over the world.

On the thirty-first of October 1517, the world was changed forever. Martin Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the door of the Catholic Church. His ninety-five theses attack the Church for being corrupt and greedy.In the 1500s, the Catholic Church had insurmountable power. People believed that there only way to Heaven was through the Church. People could buy indulgences to grant salvation. The priests had a great amount of power and were seen as a direct gateway to salvation. People could also buy higher positions in the Catholic Church and they thought that this would help increase their chance of salvation. Peasants had to pay to baptise their child, as non-baptised children wouldn’t be granted salvation, as told by the Church. The Catholic Church was centered around money. They cared more about how they could take advantage of someone’s money rather than Catholicism.

The sales of indulgences was an idea that the church created to help fund papal projects such as, the ceiling paintings of the Sistine Chapel. Essentially, the idea of the sales of indulgences was that it assured that the purchaser would be allowed entry into Heaven. Luther saw this as a corrupt scam, he claimed that the Pope and Church didn’t have control over how long people would stay in purgatory and their sins. People finally came to their senses and stopped buying indulgences, causing a fall in sales of indulgences.

Martin Luther’s witnessing of the sale of indulgences changed him. The idea that a piece of paper signed by the Pope could justify the sins of the living was enough to infuriate him. But the claim was that an indulgence could also free someone from purgatory. Martin Luther dug deeper than the original Augustinian view “impelled by the urgent problem of indulgences.” The Bib...

The stories elaborate on doing things to make up for your sins. They feel like if God was able to give his only son up for us to live and have our way we should be able to manifest in salvation. In “The Machinery of Indulgence” thinks we should be like God and have the same heart as him and be able to give out faith and grace like him.In Martin Luther’s article “The Ninety-Five Thesis” he constructed three main points. One point that was made is he insisted that it was wrong to sell indulgences for worldly task such as financing of the building of ST.Peters. He thinks that the money that is obtained from the sins should be consumed in well places and to assist people instead of assisting themselves. The people that are stating the Germans and laughing and calling it the common treasure of Christendom are the reasons he speak for himself and others. Soon all the bridges, walls and palaces of Rome will directly be built out for wealth

According to the Associated Press, since 1980, there have been as many as 3,000 abuse claims made against the Catholic Church in the United States. Many of the cases have not reached a courtroom; instead they have been settled by the defendants for millions of dollars. Just in 2003, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Louisville announced that it would pay $25.7 million to 243 people who claimed they were sexually abused by its clergy. This settlement came after years of lawsuits, such as John Doe v. Diocese of Dallas and Rigazio v. Archdiocese of Louisville, in which the plaintiffs fought to change the statute of limitations.