The Reformation (1517-c. 1560)

What you'll learn

Trace the main events and people of the Reformation from Luther's Ninety-five Theses to the Scottish Reformation of 1560.
Explain the central doctrinal issues (the authority of Scripture and justification by faith alone) and how the Council of Trent answered them.
Answer the charge that the Reformation was a sixteenth-century novelty that broke up the one true church.

Why the Reformation still matters

The Reformation was not mainly a quarrel about corruption, politics or bad popes, although all of those were present. At its heart were two questions every Christian still has to answer: What is the final authority for the church's faith? and How is a sinner made right with God? The Reformers answered: Scripture is the final authority, and sinners are justified by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

You will meet three common claims: that the Reformers invented new doctrines in the 1500s, that Protestantism proves Christianity is endlessly divided, and (from Protestants who know little history) that the Reformation was simply about bad priests. This lesson gives you the facts to answer all three.

What two questions does the lesson say lay at the heart of the Reformation, and how did the Reformers answer them?Show answer

The Reformation was not mainly about corruption, politics or bad popes, though all were present. At its heart were two questions: what is the final authority for the church's faith, and how is a sinner made right with God? The Reformers answered that Scripture is the final authority and that sinners are justified by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

not mainly about corruption
question of authority
question of justification
Scripture; grace, faith, Christ alone

Martin Luther: from indulgences to Worms

Martin Luther was born in Eisleben on 10 November 1483. After a vow made in a thunderstorm in July 1505 he entered the Augustinian monastery at Erfurt, and in October 1512 he received his doctorate in theology at Wittenberg, where he lectured on the Bible.

The spark was an indulgence campaign preached by the Dominican friar Johann Tetzel. The money raised was meant for rebuilding St Peter's in Rome, but half went to Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz to repay debts from securing his office. A saying attributed to Tetzel claimed that a soul leaves purgatory as soon as the coin rings in the chest. On 31 October 1517 Luther wrote to Archbishop Albrecht and enclosed his Latin Disputation on the Power of Indulgences, the Ninety-five Theses. The letter's date is certain. That he also posted the theses on the door of the Castle Church is attested by Melanchthon (writing in 1546) and by a note of Luther's assistant Georg Rörer; some historians doubt the door-posting, but posting theses on the church door was the normal way to announce a university disputation. Thesis 1 reads, in a standard translation: “When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, 'Repent,' he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.” Thesis 27 targets the coin-in-the-chest preaching. Printed copies spread rapidly: editions appeared in Leipzig, Nuremberg and Basel, several hundred copies were printed in Germany in 1517, and Kaspar Nützel of Nuremberg made a German translation.

Events moved fast. At the Leipzig Debate (June-July 1519) Johann Eck pressed Luther into admitting that popes and councils could err. In 1520 Luther wrote three landmark treatises, including On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, which attacked the sacramental system. The papal bull Exsurge Domine (15 June 1520) threatened excommunication; Luther burned it on 10 December 1520, and he was excommunicated on 3 January 1521.

Summoned before Emperor Charles V at the Diet of Worms, Luther was asked on 17 April 1521 to recant his books. The next day he refused unless convinced by Scripture and plain reason, declaring that his conscience was “captive to the Word of God.” The famous words “Here I stand, I can do no other” appear in early printed versions but not in the official transcript, so treat them as traditional. The Edict of Worms (25 May 1521) declared him an outlaw. Friends spirited him away to the Wartburg Castle, where he translated the New Testament into German (published 1522; the complete Bible followed in 1534).

What sparked the Ninety-five Theses, and what does the lesson say about the famous door-posting?Show answer

The spark was Johann Tetzel's indulgence campaign, supposedly for rebuilding St Peter's, though half the money went to Archbishop Albrecht to repay debts; a saying attributed to Tetzel claimed a soul leaves purgatory as soon as the coin rings in the chest. On 31 October 1517 Luther wrote to Albrecht enclosing the theses, and that date is certain. The door-posting is attested by Melanchthon and Rörer and was the normal way to announce a disputation, though some historians doubt it.

Tetzel's indulgence campaign
money to St Peter's and Albrecht
letter date of 31 October certain
door-posting likely but doubted

What happened at the Diet of Worms, and how should we treat the words 'Here I stand, I can do no other'?Show answer

Asked on 17 April 1521 before Charles V to recant his books, Luther refused the next day unless convinced by Scripture and plain reason, saying his conscience was captive to the Word of God. The Edict of Worms declared him an outlaw, and friends hid him at the Wartburg, where he translated the New Testament into German. 'Here I stand' appears in early printed versions but not in the official transcript, so it should be treated as traditional.

refused without Scripture and reason
conscience captive to the Word
outlawed; translated New Testament
'Here I stand' is traditional

The doctrine at the centre: justification by faith alone

Looking back in 1545, Luther described how he had hated the phrase “the righteousness of God” in Romans 1:17, thinking it meant the justice by which God punishes sinners. When he grasped that it is the righteousness God gives to the believer as a gift, received by faith (“The righteous shall live by faith”), he said he felt altogether born again, as though he had entered paradise through open gates.

The Reformation doctrine can be stated precisely. Justification is God's legal (forensic) declaration that a sinner is righteous in his sight. It rests not on any righteousness infused into us or worked by us, but on the perfect righteousness of Christ imputed (credited) to us. Faith is the instrument that receives Christ, not a work that earns anything (Rom 3:28; 4:4-5; Gal 2:16; Phil 3:9). Good works necessarily follow as the fruit of a living faith, but they are not the ground of our acceptance. (You studied justification in Know Your Faith, Lesson 7; Doctrines Under Fire, Lesson 3, shows how to defend it.)

The Lutheran Augsburg Confession, written mainly by Philipp Melanchthon and presented to Charles V on 25 June 1530, put it plainly in Article IV (quoted in this lesson's creed section). The Reformed churches confessed the same doctrine in their own confessions. Luther and the Reformed did disagree about the Lord's Supper (see below), but on justification they spoke with one voice.

What did Luther come to understand about 'the righteousness of God' in Romans 1:17?Show answer

Luther had hated the phrase, thinking it meant the justice by which God punishes sinners. He came to see that it is the righteousness God gives to the believer as a gift, received by faith: 'The righteous shall live by faith.' He said he felt altogether born again, as though he had entered paradise through open gates.

once thought it meant punishing justice
a righteousness God gives
received by faith
felt born again

Explain the doctrine of justification in your own words, using the terms 'forensic', 'imputed' and 'instrument'.Show answer

Justification is God's legal (forensic) declaration that a sinner is righteous in his sight. It rests not on righteousness infused into us or worked by us, but on Christ's perfect righteousness imputed, or credited, to us. Faith is the instrument that receives Christ, not a work that earns anything (Rom 3:28; 4:4-5). Good works necessarily follow as fruit, but they are not the ground of our acceptance.

legal declaration
Christ's righteousness credited
faith receives, does not earn
works are fruit, not ground

Zwingli, the Anabaptists and Calvin

In Switzerland the Reformation had a different starting point. Huldrych Zwingli began preaching through the Gospel of Matthew at the Grossmünster in Zurich in 1519. After a public breach of the Lenten fast in 1522, the city council held the First Zurich Disputation in January 1523, where Zwingli defended his Sixty-seven Articles. At the Marburg Colloquy (October 1529), Luther and Zwingli agreed on fourteen of fifteen points but could not agree on the Lord's Supper: Luther insisted on Christ's bodily presence “in, with and under” the bread, while Zwingli taught a symbolic memorial. Zwingli was killed in battle at Kappel in October 1531, and Heinrich Bullinger succeeded him.

Some of Zwingli's younger followers concluded that he had not gone far enough. On 21 January 1525, at the house of Felix Manz in Zurich, Conrad Grebel baptised George Blaurock, who then baptised others: the first believers' baptisms of the Reformation era. These Anabaptists (“re-baptisers”) sought a church of committed believers separate from the state. The Schleitheim Confession (24 February 1527) summarised their convictions in seven articles, including believer's baptism, church discipline, separation from the world, nonresistance and refusal of oaths. They were persecuted by Protestants and Catholics alike: Zurich made rebaptism punishable by drowning in March 1526, and Felix Manz was drowned in the Limmat on 5 January 1527; Michael Sattler, a leader at Schleitheim, was executed at Rottenburg in May 1527. The violent seizure of Münster (1534-35) by radical apocalyptic Anabaptists discredited the movement, but Menno Simons, who left the Catholic priesthood in January 1536, rejected Münster's violence and gathered the peaceful communities later called Mennonites.

Honesty matters here. Reformed Christians differ from the Anabaptists on the Christian's relation to the state, oaths and the sword, and paedobaptist Reformed churches also differ on infant baptism. (Reformed Baptists, whom you will meet in Lesson 6, share believer's baptism with the Anabaptists, but their 1689 Confession affirms lawful oaths and the civil magistrate.) All of us should be ashamed that Protestant magistrates drowned them. Their courage, their love for Scripture and their insistence on a confessing church deserve respect.

John Calvin was born in Noyon, France, on 10 July 1509 and converted around 1532-33. He published the first edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion in Basel in 1536; the final, greatly expanded Latin edition appeared in Geneva in 1559. Passing through Geneva in 1536, he was pressed into service by William Farel. Expelled in April 1538, he ministered in Strasbourg, then returned to Geneva on 13 September 1541, where he drew up the Ecclesiastical Ordinances that organised the church under pastors, teachers, elders and deacons. In 1559 he founded the Genevan Academy with Theodore Beza as rector. He died on 27 May 1564.

Calvin's record includes the execution of Michael Servetus, burned at Geneva on 27 October 1553 for denying the Trinity and infant baptism. Calvin was the main instigator of the prosecution, though he asked for beheading rather than burning. The Catholic Inquisition had already condemned Servetus to the same fate. In 1903 Calvin's own admirers raised a monument in Geneva calling the execution an error of its age. We need not defend it.

Who were the Anabaptists, what did they believe, and how should Reformed Christians speak about them today?Show answer

Some of Zwingli's younger followers began believers' baptisms in Zurich in January 1525, seeking a church of committed believers separate from the state; the Schleitheim Confession included believer's baptism, church discipline, separation from the world, nonresistance and refusal of oaths. They were persecuted by Protestants and Catholics alike: Felix Manz was drowned and Michael Sattler executed. Reformed Christians differ from them on the state, oaths and the sword (and paedobaptists also on infant baptism, though Reformed Baptists share believer's baptism), but should be ashamed that Protestant magistrates drowned them and should respect their courage, love of Scripture and insistence on a confessing church.

believers' baptism, church separate from state
Schleitheim Confession
persecuted by Protestants and Catholics
disagree, yet respect them

How should you respond honestly when someone raises Calvin's role in the execution of Michael Servetus?Show answer

Servetus was burned at Geneva in 1553 for denying the Trinity and infant baptism, and Calvin was the main instigator of the prosecution, though he asked for beheading rather than burning. The Catholic Inquisition had already condemned Servetus to the same fate, and in 1903 Calvin's own admirers raised a monument calling the execution an error of its age. We need not defend it.

Calvin main instigator
asked for beheading, not burning
Inquisition had condemned him too
we need not defend it

Sola Scriptura and the “five solas”

Behind justification lay the question of authority. Luther at Leipzig and Worms appealed to Scripture over popes and councils. This is sola Scriptura: Scripture is the only infallible rule of faith, the final judge of every tradition, council and teacher. It does not mean the Reformers ignored the church fathers or the creeds; they quoted Augustine and the early councils constantly and gladly confessed the Nicene and Chalcedonian faith. They argued that Rome, not they, had departed from the ancient church.

Today the Reformation is often summarised by the five solas: sola Scriptura (Scripture alone), sola gratia (grace alone), sola fide (faith alone), solus Christus (Christ alone) and soli Deo gloria (glory to God alone). Every one of these ideas appears in the Reformers' writings, but no Reformer listed them as a set of five. Lutheran writers in the early twentieth century spoke of three principles of the Reformation (Theodore Engelder, 1916), and the five-fold list became standard later in the twentieth century. Use the slogans, but do not claim Luther or Calvin coined the list.

Explain what sola Scriptura means, and what it does not mean.Show answer

Sola Scriptura means Scripture is the only infallible rule of faith, the final judge of every tradition, council and teacher, as Luther argued at Leipzig and Worms. It does not mean ignoring the church fathers or the creeds: the Reformers quoted Augustine and the early councils constantly and gladly confessed the Nicene and Chalcedonian faith. They argued that Rome, not they, had departed from the ancient church.

only infallible rule
final judge of tradition and councils
not ignoring fathers and creeds
Rome departed, not the Reformers

What caution does the lesson give about using the 'five solas'?Show answer

Every one of the five ideas appears in the Reformers' writings, but no Reformer listed them as a set of five. Early twentieth-century Lutheran writers spoke of three principles, and the five-fold list became standard later in that century. So use the slogans, but do not claim Luther or Calvin coined the list.

ideas are in the Reformers
no Reformer listed five
list is twentieth-century
don't claim Luther coined it

Rome responds: the Council of Trent

The Catholic Church answered with the Council of Trent, which met in three periods between 13 December 1545 and 4 December 1563 (25 sessions under Popes Paul III, Julius III and Pius IV). It brought real pastoral reform and defined Catholic doctrine against the Protestants.

In its fourth session (8 April 1546) Trent received the Scriptures, including the books Protestants call the Apocrypha, and the unwritten traditions “with an equal affection of piety, and reverence,” and declared the Latin Vulgate authentic for public use. In its sixth session (13 January 1547) it issued its Decree on Justification. Trent taught that justification includes the inward renewal of the person by infused grace, that it can be increased by good works and lost by mortal sin, and it condemned the Protestant doctrine. Canon 11 anathematised anyone who says we are justified “by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ”, and Canon 24 anyone who says good works are “merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained” rather than a cause of its increase.

Be fair: Trent also insisted that nothing before justification, whether faith or works, merits the grace of justification. The disagreement is not grace versus no grace. It is whether we are accepted on the basis of Christ's righteousness counted to us (Protestant) or on the basis of grace-enabled righteousness worked in us (Trent). That is a difference about the gospel itself. Trent's canons have never been repealed, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992) still cites Trent's decree on justification. You will engage Catholic teaching in detail later in the course, in Roman Catholicism (m11).

What did the Council of Trent teach about Scripture and tradition, and about justification?Show answer

In 1546 Trent received the Scriptures, including the Apocrypha, and the unwritten traditions with equal reverence, and declared the Vulgate authentic. Its Decree on Justification in 1547 taught that justification includes inward renewal by infused grace, can be increased by good works and lost by mortal sin. Its canons anathematised anyone who says we are justified by the sole imputation of Christ's justice.

Scripture and tradition equally received
Apocrypha and Vulgate
justification includes infused renewal
condemned sole imputation

Put the real difference between Trent and the Reformers on justification into a sentence or two you could say to a Catholic friend.Show answer

The difference is not grace versus no grace, because Trent also said nothing before justification merits it. The question is whether we are accepted on the basis of Christ's righteousness counted to us, or on the basis of grace-enabled righteousness worked in us. That is a difference about the gospel itself, and Trent's canons have never been repealed.

not grace vs no grace
counted to us vs worked in us
a gospel-level difference
Trent never repealed

England and Scotland

In England, William Tyndale (born c. 1494) resolved to give ordinary people the Bible in English; John Foxe records him telling a cleric that, if God spared his life, he would cause a boy who drove the plough to know more of the Scripture than the cleric did. His New Testament was printed at Worms in 1526 and smuggled into England. Arrested near Antwerp in 1535, he was strangled and burned at Vilvoorde, traditionally on 6 October 1536; Foxe reports his last words as “Lord! Open the King of England's eyes.” Scholarly estimates of how much of the King James New Testament's wording comes from Tyndale vary, from about 55 percent to about 83 percent (the higher figure from a 1998 study by Nielson and Skousen).

Henry VIII broke with Rome for dynastic reasons when the pope would not annul his marriage; the Act of Supremacy (1534) made him Supreme Head of the Church of England. But real Protestant theology came through Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury from 1533. Under Edward VI (1547-1553) Cranmer produced the Book of Common Prayer (1549, revised 1552) and the Forty-Two Articles (1553). Under the Catholic Mary I (1553-1558) at least 280 Protestants were burned, including Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley at Oxford on 16 October 1555. Cranmer, after signing several recantations, renounced them at the end and on 21 March 1556 thrust into the flames first the hand that had signed them. Under Elizabeth I the Religious Settlement of 1559 restored Protestantism, and the Thirty-nine Articles were finalised in 1571.

In Scotland, Patrick Hamilton (29 February 1528) and George Wishart (1 March 1546) were burned at St Andrews. John Knox (c. 1514-1572), Wishart's companion, served as a galley slave (1547-1549), ministered in England, then lived in Geneva, which he praised as “the most perfect school of Christ that ever was in earth since the days of the Apostles.” He returned to Scotland on 2 May 1559. On 17 August 1560 the Scottish Parliament ratified the Scots Confession, written by six ministers all named John, including Knox, and abolished papal authority. The Church of Scotland grew into a Presbyterian church that would later shape the Westminster Assembly (Lesson 6).

Why is it misleading to say the English Reformation was simply about Henry VIII's marriage?Show answer

Henry did break with Rome for dynastic reasons, and the Act of Supremacy (1534) made him Supreme Head of the Church of England. But real Protestant theology came through others: Tyndale, who gave ordinary people the English New Testament and died for it, and Cranmer, who produced the Book of Common Prayer and the Forty-Two Articles. Under Mary at least 280 Protestants, including Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer, were burned for their faith.

Henry's motives were dynastic
Tyndale's English New Testament
Cranmer's Prayer Book and Articles
martyrs under Mary

How did the Reformation come to Scotland, and what happened in 1560?Show answer

Early Scottish Protestants such as Patrick Hamilton and George Wishart were burned at St Andrews. John Knox, Wishart's companion, served as a galley slave, ministered in England and lived in Geneva before returning in 1559. On 17 August 1560 the Scottish Parliament ratified the Scots Confession and abolished papal authority, and the Church of Scotland grew into a Presbyterian church.

Hamilton and Wishart martyred
Knox: galley slave, Geneva
Scots Confession 1560
papal authority abolished

Was the Reformation a novelty?

The Reformers did not claim to start a new church. They claimed to call the existing church back to the apostles' gospel. Three facts help in conversation.

First, the Reformers confessed the ancient creeds and the doctrine of the early councils (Lesson 2). The disputed points (papal supremacy, purgatory, indulgences, transubstantiation as defined in 1215, the treasury of merit) were medieval developments (Lesson 4), not apostolic teaching. Second, they argued from Scripture, which all sides accepted as God's word, and from the fathers, especially Augustine on grace. Third, the New Testament itself describes a church that must be tested by the apostolic word (Acts 17:11; Gal 1:8-9). Reformation is what Josiah did with the rediscovered book of the law (2 Kgs 22-23): not a new religion, but a return to the old one.

Be honest about the costs: Luther's late writings, such as On the Jews and Their Lies (1543), contain vile antisemitic rhetoric that Christians must repudiate; Protestants persecuted Anabaptists; and divisions multiplied. But the question is not whether the Reformers were flawless. It is whether they were right about Scripture and the gospel.

Example: 'Where was your church before Luther?'

Catholic friend: I love that you read your Bible, but where was your church before Luther? Protestantism only started in 1517.

You: Good question. What do you mean by 'my church'? If you mean a denomination, you're right. If you mean the faith, I'd say it was there all along.

Catholic friend: But no one taught faith alone before Luther.

You: The Reformers didn't claim to invent anything. They confessed the Nicene Creed and Chalcedon, just as you do. Their doctrine of grace came from Augustine, and their Old Testament canon was Jerome's. What they rejected were things defined much later: transubstantiation in 1215, purgatory in 1274, and the claim in Unam Sanctam (1302) that everyone must be subject to the pope to be saved.

Catholic friend: Trent says salvation is by grace too. Isn't this just words?

You: Trent did insist on grace, and I'm glad of that. The difference is the ground of acceptance: is it Christ's righteousness counted to me, or a righteousness worked in me? Paul says God 'justifies the ungodly' who trust him (Rom 4:5).

Catholic friend: You really care about this.

You: I do, because it's about where I find peace with God. Could we read Romans 4 together sometime?

Give the three facts the lesson offers for answering the claim that the Reformers started a new church.Show answer

First, the Reformers confessed the ancient creeds and councils, while the disputed points such as papal supremacy, purgatory and indulgences were medieval developments. Second, they argued from Scripture, which all sides accepted, and from the fathers, especially Augustine on grace. Third, the New Testament says the church must be tested by the apostolic word (Acts 17:11; Gal 1:8-9); like Josiah's reform (2 Kgs 22-23), reformation is a return to the old faith, not a new religion.

confessed ancient creeds
disputed points were medieval
argued from Scripture and fathers
church tested by apostolic word

How should an apologist handle the Reformers' sins, such as Luther's late writing against the Jews?Show answer

Be honest: Luther's late writings contain vile antisemitic rhetoric that Christians must repudiate, Protestants persecuted Anabaptists, and divisions multiplied. But the question is not whether the Reformers were flawless. It is whether they were right about Scripture and the gospel.

admit the sins plainly
repudiate Luther's antisemitism
Reformers not flawless
were they right about the gospel?

Key texts

Romans 1:16-17: The text that broke Luther open: the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel is a gift received by faith, not a standard we must reach.
Romans 3:21-28: Righteousness from God apart from the law, through faith in Christ, with boasting excluded. The heart of the Reformation case for justification by faith apart from works of the law.
Romans 4:4-5: God 'justifies the ungodly' and counts faith as righteousness for the one who does not work. Use it to show justification is a gift, not a wage.
Galatians 2:16: Paul repeats three times that no one is justified by works of the law but through faith in Christ.
Philippians 3:8-9: Paul wants to be found in Christ 'not having a righteousness of my own' but the righteousness from God that depends on faith: an alien, imputed righteousness.
James 2:14-26: Trent and many Catholics cite James 2:24. Show that James addresses a dead, workless 'faith' and how genuine faith is shown, while Paul addresses the ground of acceptance before God.
Matthew 4:17: Jesus' call to repent, which Luther's first thesis applies to the whole Christian life rather than to a sacrament of penance.
Acts 17:11: The Bereans tested even an apostle's preaching by the Scriptures: a biblical model for testing church teaching by the word of God.
2 Kings 22:8-13; 23:1-3: Josiah's reform after the book of the law was found: a biblical pattern of reformation as return to God's word, not invention of something new.

Objections and answers

Try answering each one yourself before you open the response.

“The Reformers invented justification by faith alone. Nobody taught it for 1,500 years before Luther.”Show a response

First, the question is what Scripture teaches, not who said it first. Paul says God 'justifies the ungodly' and counts faith as righteousness 'to the one who does not work' (Rom 4:5); if Paul taught it, it is apostolic. Second, the Reformers did not claim to be inventors. They read Augustine's anti-Pelagian works closely and found in them grace alone, even where Augustine did not draw every Reformation distinction. What was clarified in the 1500s was the precise distinction between justification (a legal declaration) and sanctification (inner renewal). Doctrinal clarification under pressure is normal: Nicaea clarified the Son's deity in 325 without inventing it.

“The Reformation shattered Christian unity. Protestantism has produced tens of thousands of denominations.”Show a response

The often-quoted figure of around 45,000 denominations (for 2019) comes from the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell, which counts separate church organisations country by country (so the Catholic Church in 234 countries counts as 234 'denominations') across every Christian tradition, including Catholic, Orthodox and independent bodies. It does not mean 45,000 different Protestant creeds. Confessional Protestants share a remarkably consistent core: the ecumenical creeds, Scripture's authority and justification by faith. Unity also did not exist in the way the objection assumes: East and West had been divided since 1054, and the Western church endured the Great Schism with rival popes (1378-1417). Finally, unity is not the highest value if it requires unity in error. Paul rebuked Peter publicly for compromising the gospel (Gal 2:11-14). Real unity is unity in the truth (John 17:17-21; Eph 4:13).

“Luther hated the Jews, Calvin burned Servetus and Protestants drowned Anabaptists. Why trust them?”Show a response

Agree with the facts. Luther's 1543 writing against the Jews is vile and was later exploited by others; Christians should repudiate it plainly. Calvin was the main instigator of Servetus's prosecution in 1553, and Zurich drowned Felix Manz in 1527. Saying so honestly wins more trust than any defence. But notice the logic: the Reformers never asked anyone to trust them. They pointed to Scripture as the judge of every teacher, including themselves. Their sins show they needed the grace they preached; they do not show that justification by faith or the authority of Scripture is false. The same standard applied to any tradition (Catholic, Orthodox or secular) would condemn every human institution. The gospel stands or falls with Christ and his word, not with the character of the Reformers.

“Henry VIII started the Church of England so he could get divorced. The whole Reformation was politics.”Show a response

Henry's break with Rome in 1534 was indeed driven by his marriage and his desire for power, and Henry himself remained conservative in much of his theology. But Henry is not the Reformation. Luther's protest began in 1517, Zwingli was preaching in Zurich from 1519 and Calvin in Geneva from 1536, all without Henry's help. In England, the evangelical theology came from people like Tyndale, who was executed in 1536, and Cranmer, Latimer and Ridley, who died at the stake under Mary in 1555-56. People do not usually go to the stake for a king's divorce. Politics shaped how the Reformation spread, as it shaped the councils of the early church, but the substance was a recovered conviction about Scripture and the gospel.

“Sola Scriptura refutes itself. The Bible never says 'Scripture alone', and you needed the church to give you the Bible in the first place.”Show a response

It's a serious objection, so start by clarifying the claim. Sola Scriptura doesn't mean 'ignore the church' or 'the Bible is the only book worth reading'. The Reformers quoted the fathers and gladly confessed the ancient creeds. It means Scripture is the only infallible rule, the final judge of every tradition, council and teacher. That is how Jesus treated tradition: he judged the traditions of the elders by the word of God (Mark 7:8-13). The Bereans checked even Paul's preaching against the Scriptures and were commended (Acts 17:11), and Paul calls Scripture God-breathed, equipping the believer for every good work (2 Tim 3:16-17). As for the church 'giving' us the Bible, the church received and recognised books that already carried God's authority, much as Israel recognised the Old Testament without becoming infallible itself.

“Trent says salvation is by grace too. Isn't the whole Catholic-Protestant argument about justification just a quibble over words?”Show a response

It's good that both sides insist on grace, and we should say so. Trent taught that nothing before justification, whether faith or works, merits the grace of justification. So the disagreement isn't grace versus no grace. It is about the basis on which God accepts us. Trent taught that justification includes inward renewal by infused grace, that it can be increased by good works and lost by mortal sin, and it condemned anyone who says we are justified by the sole imputation of Christ's righteousness. The Reformers taught that God declares us righteous because Christ's perfect righteousness is credited to us, received by faith alone (Rom 4:4-5; Phil 3:9). One looks to righteousness worked in us; the other to righteousness counted to us. That isn't a quibble; it shapes where a believer finds peace with God.

Written task

A Catholic friend says: 'Luther invented faith alone and broke the church apart.' Write a 300-400 word reply. Explain in your own words what the Reformers meant by justification by faith alone, show it from at least three passages of Scripture, describe accurately how the Council of Trent answered it, and address the charge of division honestly (including at least one real failure of the Reformers). Write in a tone you could use with a friend.

Hand this in to Mr Scott. He will look for:

States the doctrine precisely (forensic declaration, imputed righteousness, faith as instrument, works as fruit)
Uses at least three relevant Scripture passages correctly (e.g. Rom 3-4, Gal 2:16, Phil 3:9) and handles James 2 fairly
Represents Trent accurately (sixth session, 1547; infused righteousness; canons 9, 11 or 24) without caricature
Answers the division charge with historical facts and admits at least one genuine failure
Gracious, clear and persuasive tone