Martin Luther’s doctrine is known as ‘justification by faith’ and is contrasted with the traditional Roman Catholic Church teaching of ‘justification by works’. So far Luther’s views have had huge consequences, although according to a source he had no intention of cutting himself off from the church, even after hugely criticising the Roman Catholic churches way of teaching.
As well as contrasting the traditional teaching of the Church, Martin Luther also wrote ninety five theses against the sales of indulgences. In these he showed that the selling of the indulgences was totally against the teaching of the Bible. He claimed that the fact the church could mislead people into believing salvation could be bought for money was a massive problem. Luther believed salvation was a matter of divine, grace and not of his good works.
Due to his actions Luther was summoned to Rome but it is believed that he was protected by his popularity. According to a local monk there was a remarkable response to Luther’s teachings from ordinary people for many reasons:
• They had new economic, social and political aspirations
• They were disillusioned with the church hierarchy
• The road to salvation seemed to be complex, expensive and church centred
• Most of all many people were spiritually hungry.
This has caused people to pick out faults from our beloved Roman Catholic Church and overall it has a merge that there is a great dissatisfaction with many aspects of the church:
• Many clergy’s are only interested gaining wealth and power
• People are abusing their roles in the church for their own greed
• The spiritual needs of ordinary people is