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| Read how Roman Catholics and the ELCA have "moved from the divisions of Martin Luther's 95 theses to 32 statements of agreement" in this National Catholic Register story by Peter Jesserer Smith from 2016. |
With all the talk of Lutheran/Roman Catholic unity going on out there, one might get the impression that the Reformation is obsolete. It was an important part of the history of Western Civilization, but the curtain has closed on that scene a long time ago. Today, we can look back at the Reformation as a period during which medieval people argued about medieval issues, and sometimes tried to kill each other as a result (not that we modern, enlightened people could relate to that situation at all). Indeed, this why the Vatican is commemorating the Reformation – because it is dead. It is over. Finished. Kaput. You don’t commemorate something that is still alive, vital, and relevant. You celebrate that. You commemorate something that has passed away, like the anniversary of the death of a loved one.
The reason this is such a big deal now, is because 2017 marks the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Reformation. This is because history has chosen to designate the date that Dr. Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, October 31, 1517, as the official beginning of the Reformation.[1] For the last year, and even longer, Christians of all stripes have been getting ready for 2017. Confessional Lutheran groups, like the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, have been preparing for the anniversary by emphasizing the things that were taught during the Reformation: That man is justified before God by grace, through faith alone in Jesus Christ. Liberal Lutherans, like those in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, have chosen a different path. These Lutherans have been working for unity with the Roman Catholic Church. These two churches have been meeting, issuing statements, and signing declarations since at least 1999 to achieve this end.[2] The Vatican has even issued a commemorative Reformation stamp.[3]
Not that I’m against unity. I am not. I would love nothing more than for Christendom to be truly united in one church body, under its head, Christ. I am against a false and contrived unity.
As much as some groups might try to say that the differences between the Roman Catholic Church and Confessional Lutheranism (what resulted from the Reformation, and is codified in the Book of Concord) are now so insignificant that we could join together in communion, it simply is not the case. Theologically liberal Lutherans who disregard the Lutheran Confessions may like to hold hands with theologically liberal, academically enlightened, Roman Catholics, stroking each other’s feelings, and cooing to each other in the language of Higher Criticism about how Holy Scripture is faulty. Their confessional counterparts, however, have made no such concessions. The argument between Wittenberg and Rome – or Augsburg and Trent, if you like – is about how man is justified before God. It has not yet been resolved, and is not likely to be, in my opinion, before Christ returns.
The main issue surrounding the posting of the 95 Theses, in a nutshell, was that of purgatory and indulgences. Luther wanted to debate the subject, so he posted the Theses, written in Latin, on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517. This was not some act of defiance or vandalism. Lacking the modern means of communication, this was normal practice at the university. The Theses were quickly reprinted, translated, and distributed throughout Germany and Europe. Luther addressed the issue of indulgences from a number of angles[4]: The Pope doesn’t have the power he claims over the souls in purgatory; The Pope can only release people from punishments that he has imposed; Every truly penitent Christian already has pardon for his sins; Indulgences discourage works of mercy. Probably most famously, Luther talks about the Pope’s claim to control the so-called treasury of merit,[5] by asking why he does not simply grant indulgence to all the souls in purgatory:
Why does not the pope empty purgatory, for the sake of holy love and of the dire need of the souls that are there, if he redeems an infinite number of souls for the sake of miserable money with which to build a Church? The former reasons would be most just; the latter is most trivial.[6]
While this may have been a pressing issue in the 16th Century, the selling of indulgences isn’t really a “thing” anymore, right? Well, yes and no. The Roman church doesn’t actually sell indulgences in the way they did when the Pope was trying to raise money for building St. Peter’s basilica. There is no man like Johannes Tetzel, wandering the countryside, frightening people with the prospect of thousands of years of torture in purgatory, to get them to part with their money. Indulgences, however, still play a large and important role in the Roman Catholic religious system. The system of indulgences was modified in 1968 from a system of specific time periods (hours, days, weeks, months, years, etc.) to one of “partial” and “plenary” indulgence.[7]
An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain prescribed conditions through the action of the Church which, as the minister of redemption, dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints. An indulgence is partial or plenary according as it removes either part or all of the temporal punishment due to sin. Indulgences may be applied to the living or the dead.[8]
This isn’t simply some forgotten dogma in the Catechism of the Catholic Church that goes untaught. There are scores of pamphlets, popular books, and devotionals written about the souls in purgatory, and how to gain indulgence for them, and for one’s self. In one such booklet, Maria Simma talks about what Purgatory is, how she has been visited by souls being purified there, and what she does to gain for them indulgence:
What exactly is Purgatory? I’d say that it’s a marvelous invention of God...Suppose that one day a door opens, and a splendid being appears, extremely beautiful, of a beauty that has never been seen on earth. You are fascinated, overwhelmed by this being of light and beauty, even more so that this being shows that he is madly in love with you – you have never dreamed of being loved so much. You sense too that he has a great desire to draw you to him, to be one with you. And the fire of love which burns in your heart impels you to throw yourself into his arms. But wait – you realize at this moment that you haven’t washed for months and months, that you smell bad; your nose is running, your hair is greasy and matted, there are big dirty stains on your clothes, etc. So you say to yourself, “No, I just can’t present myself in this state. First I must go and wash; a good shower, then straight away I’ll come back.” But the love which has been born in your heart is so intense, so burning, so strong, that this delay for the shower is absolutely unbearable. The pain of the absence, even if it only lasts for a couple of minutes, is an atrocious wound in the heart, proportional to the intensity of the revelation of the love – it is a “love-wound.” Purgatory is exactly like this. It’s a delay imposed by our impurity, a delay before God’s embrace, a wound of love which causes intense suffering, a waiting, if you like, a nostalgia for love. It is precisely this burning, this longing which cleanses us of whatever is still impure in us.[9]
Maria goes on to describe how, when she was a little girl, she saw visions of people in her bedroom at night. She told her priest about the occurrences, and he confirmed to that she was being visited by the souls in purgatory. Maria described the reason for their visits:
In most cases, they ask to have Masses celebrated and that one be present at these Masses; they ask to have the rosary said and also that one make the Stations of the Cross...We must do a great deal for the souls in Purgatory, for they help us in their turn. We must have much humility; this is the greatest weapon against evil, against the Evil One. Humility drives evil away.[10]
This teaching about how the guilt of sin is remitted by our human works is contrary to God’s Word. God the Father, out of his mercy, and because of the death of Jesus on the cross, forgives sinners. We have redemption through the blood of Christ. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace...And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world (Ephesians 1:7; 1 John 2:2).
In fact, Scripture teaches that God declares sinners righteous for Christ’s sake. Our sins have been “credited” to Christ, and his righteousness has been credited to us. When we believe the Gospel, this message of reconciliation, our faith is credited to us as righteousness.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek...Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law...But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness (Romans 1:16; 3:28; 4:5).
The Lutheran Confessions boldly confess the Scriptural teaching on man’s justification, the doctrine by which the Church stands or falls:
Our churches teach that people cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works. People are freely justified for Christ’s sake, through faith, when they believe that they are received in to favor and that their sins are forgiven for Christ’s sake. By His death, Christ made satisfaction for our sins. God counts this faith for righteousness (Romans 3:21-26; 4:5).[11]
This is what the Roman Catholic Church has to say, officially, about the doctrine of Justification:
If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.[12]
The canons on Justification from the Council of Trent make for some interesting reading. They systematically anathematize the Gospel. That word anathema, incidentally, means “cursed”. So, what Canon IX, quoted above, is saying, is that anyone who believes that they are justified before God by faith alone, without an act, or movement, of their own will (works), is cursed. This is official teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, and has never been modified, or rescinded.
The only Lutherans and Roman Catholics who have come to agreement on the doctrine of Justification are the Lutherans and Roman Catholics who have abandoned Holy Scripture and the teachings of their churches.
[1] The Augsburg Confession, not the 95 Theses, is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church and one of the most important documents of the Lutheran Reformation. The Augsburg Confession was written in both German and Latin and was presented by a number of German rulers and free-cities at the Diet of Augsburg on June 25, 1530. The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V had called on the Princes and Free Territories in Germany to explain their religious convictions in an attempt to restore religious and political unity in the Holy Roman Empire and rally support against the Turkish invasion. It is the fourth document contained in the Lutheran Book of Concord. Central to the document and its subsequent Apology is its explanation of the Biblical doctrine of Justification. Confessional Lutherans teach forensic, or "legal", justification. This means that God declares the sinner to be "not guilty" (justified) because Christ has taken his place, living a perfect life according to God's law and suffering for his sins. For Confessional Lutherans justification is in no way dependent upon the thoughts, words, and deeds of those justified through faith alone in Christ. The new obedience that the justified sinner renders to God through sanctification follows justification as a consequence, but is not part of justification. For these reasons, if I were in charge of picking a date for the start of the Reformation, I would choose June 25, 1530, rather than the conventional October 31, 1517. Joseph Klotz, “Augustana,” The Hodgkins Lutheran, April 25, 2013, http://hodgkinslutheran.blogspot.com/2013/04/augustana.html.
[2]The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (JDDJ) is a document created, and agreed to, by the Catholic Church's Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity (PCPCU) and the Lutheran World Federation in 1999. It states that the churches now share "a common understanding of our justification by God's grace through faith in Christ.” “Joint Declaration of the Doctrine of Justification,” Wikipedia, accessed August 22, 2017, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Declaration_on_the_Doctrine_of_Justification.
You can read the document here:
[3]Jan Bentz, “Breaking: Vatican to issue stamp featuring Martin Luther,” LifeSiteNews, January 17, 2017. https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/vatican-gives-stamp-of-approval-to-martin-luther The Vatican office charged with issuing stamps, known as the Philatelic and Numismatic Office, confirmed Tuesday to LifeSiteNews that Luther, who broke away from the Catholic Church in a schism 500 years ago, will be celebrated with a postage stamp in 2017. The office is in charge of the annual commission of stamps, coins, and other commemorative medals.
[4] Martin Luther, Disputation of Doctor Martin Luther on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences, trans. Adolph Spaeth, L.D. Reed, Henry E. Jacobs, et. Al., (Philadelphia: A. J. Holman Company, 1915), Vol.1, pp. 29-38. Accessed August 22, 2017. http://bookofconcord.org/95theses.php.
[5] The Treasury of Merit, as concisely defined by Merriam Webster, is the superabundant satisfaction of Christ for human sins and the excess of merit of the saints which according to Roman Catholic theology is effective for salvation of others and is available for dispensation through indulgences. “Treasury of Merits,” Merriam-Webster, accessed August 22, 2017. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/treasury%20of%20merits.
[6] Theses 82, ibid.
[7] “The Divine Mercy Devotion,” EWTN, accessed August 22, 2017, https://www.ewtn.com/devotionals/mercy/what.htm. A plenary indulgence means that by the merits of Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints, the full remission of the temporal punishment due to sacramentally forgiven sins is obtained. The person becomes as if just baptized and would fly immediately to heaven if he died in that instant. A partial indulgence means that a portion of the temporal punishment due to forgiven sin is remitted. Partial indulgences are received either by doing some act to which a partial indulgence is attached (e.g. praying a partially indulgenced prayer), or by the incomplete fulfillment of the conditions attached to a plenary indulgence.
[8] Catechism of the Catholic Church. New Hope, KY: Urbi et Orbi Communications, 1994.
[9] Medjugorje, Sister Emmanuel. The amazing secret of the souls in purgatory. Santa Barbara, CA: Queenship Pub. Co., 2005.
[10] ibid. p. 7-8, 14.
[11] AC IV 1-3.
[12] “On Justification,” The Council of Trent, accessed August 22, 2017, http://www.thecounciloftrent.com/ch6.htm.
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