The Catholic church had many weaknesses: 1. The Crusades had made the church look dumb and fumbling. 2. The Donation of Constantine showed the same church as being dumb. 3. There were many corrupt officials including the Popes running the church and simultaneously lining their pockets. 4. Rich people were treated better, i.e. able to get annulments, easier penances, etc. Of course, I really don't know when the rich aren't treated better! 5. There was something called the Babylonian Captivity of the Pope. It was named after a time in the ancient world (approximately 600 BC) when the Jews were captured by the Babylonians and made slaves in Babylon. Rome in the Middle Ages was not a nice place to live–much crime and crud. Soon the popes were taking their vacations in Avignon, a town on the French Riviera. The pope started staying much longer than a vacation should last and soon looked like an absentee Bishop of Rome ruling from the Riviera, so some started calling it the Babylonian Captivity of the Popes (about 1309-1377). The pope started living in Avignon (about 1348-1378), which shook up a lot of Catholics up. Avignon was surrounded by France and the French king gave lots of advice to the Pope. Soon, French popes were getting elected and people start thinking that the French are coercing the pope. All the other countries didn't like the pope being in the French king's pocket, not to mention all the money they were paying to the church possibly getting into French hands! This is in the midst of the 100 Years War, during which the pope favored France. The cardinals asked the pope to return to Rome and the pope refused. So the cardinals plotted and the Great Schism came about. A schism is a split. The pope wouldn't come home to Rome so the College of Cardinals got together and deposed him. Then they elected a new pope. The French were backing the old pope (Pope #1–staying in Avignon) and the Germans were backing the newly elected pope (Pope #2). Which was the real one? Which one is the legal pope? It could be a sticky question–if you were married and needed the blessings of the pope, which one do you ask? And which one do you pay the money to? And what if you pick the wrong one and therefore become eligible to be roasted at 480 degrees Centigrade???? Some of the cardinals got together and decided two popes was too many so they deposed both Popes #1 and #2 and elected an old Spaniard (to become Pope #3) who was supposed to resign as soon as the whole thing blew over so they could elect a real one. They had hoped that by electing a 3rd pope, the other two would step down. The German army forced #1 and #2 out of business, but #3 wouldn't resign so the cardinals elected a new one (Pope #4) and everybody ignored the Spaniard (Pope #3) who eventually died. What a mess!!!!! 6. Also helping the church to look stupid was a policy called Indulgences. Eternal sin sent you to hell, but it could be taken away by the death of Jesus, if you prayed as you should. Temporal sins (i.e. stealing nickels, lying to your mother) sent you to Purgatory. The church decided it could grant you an indulgence to get rid of your temporal sins. The Treasury of Merit was an accounting system in Heaven where somebody did the bookkeeping of good and bad. Because of Jesus and the saints, there was an excess of good things. The church said it could transfer some of the good stuff of others to your column with an indulgence. How do you get an indulgence? It used to be you had to go on a Crusade or Pilgrimage or something equally dangerous to prove that you were worthy. Now that there's an excess of money, the church took an amount that would be approximately equal to going on Crusades, etc. The church would rather have money for buildings and armies than Pilgrimages, anyway. In Catholicism, it takes three things to help you get into heaven: Proper faith/belief, Ceremonies–Seven Sacraments, and Good Works.
There were some reform attempts. John Huss of Bohemia was burned at the stake for speaking out against the church. He had gone to a church council (the Council of Constance in 1414) with a safe conduct, or "safe passage." However, he was declared a heretic at the council, so the "safe passage" didn't have to be honored!
Martin Luther was in Northern Germany. He was born in 1483. His dad was a copper miner. He was a general peasant type. He was beaten at home and school, which tends to make kids fearful of parents and, therefore, God (the ultimate parent figure). He was a very sensitive child. He was plagued by questions. How could the lowly, imperfect man please a perfect god? One day he was struck by lightning and pledged that he was going to become a priest. His dad wanted him to become a lawyer. He joined law school but quit to become a monk. He beat and starved himself, because he felt that man is cruddy and deserves bad things. He overdid it even by the standards of the day. He was bright and guilt-ridden. He read the bible to find peace. He found out man couldn't earn his way to heaven but got there by the grace of God alone. He believed that if you have proper faith, you already have heaven and you feel so good that you do good deeds. Man was supposed to do good works cuz he had faith, not for a free ride. Luther moved up in the church hierarchy. He taught at Wittenberg, in charge of 11 different monasteries. He was shocked but not shattered by the corruption he saw in the Catholic church. In Northern Germany, people were selling indulgences carelessly. Tetzel was the man selling freedom from purgatory in Luther's district. Tetzel would sell to anybody cuz part of the money was going to the Archbishop, who had just bought his office, and part of the money was going to Pope Leo X who wanted to build St. Peter's Church in Rome (Leo X is son of Lorenzo the Magnificent of the Medici family) and needed lots of extra cash to pay Michelangelo, etc. Leo X has signed these indulgences to get money, but in fine print at the bottom, it says that they are no good if you don't change. Tetzel, however, was even selling indulgences for the sins people intended to commit (wanna have fun on a Saturday night without that bothersome feeling of Sunday morning guilt?). Luther saw that Tetzel had no religious experience and that this practice favored the rich over the poor and was spiritually corrupting and kicked Tetzel out of the district. Tetzel went across the border and set up shop, so the people of Luther's district still went to him. Luther wrote up his 95 Theses (theses are major points, essentially–"if this is true, then this is true . . .") in Latin (which only the educated could read) and nailed them to the door of his church at Wittenberg in 1517. This was a normal practice, cuz it was like the community bulletin board. Luther was challenging the professors of the college to debate over indulgences. Normal folks didn't know Latin and debates are held in secret, so this wasn't too revolutionary. However, somebody (one of Luther's students probably) translated the 95 Theses into German and passed a lot of copies out to the common crud. Leo X didn't think it was a big deal until the indulgence sales fell off. The church found out and was upset. Dr. Eck, a church official sent by Leo X, challenged Luther to a debate, cuz the money from Germany was falling off due to Luther's opposition to indulgences. Dr. Eck won and got Luther to admit that he thought the church had been wrong in burning John Huss 100 years ago. This is a direct challenge to the church, so Luther was excommunicated. He burned the Bull of Excommunication (a bull in this context is a papal letter or decree) sent to him. He started thinking about church doctrine, started finding other things he thought were wrong with the church, and began writing pamphlets against the church's corruption. Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire called the Diet of Worms (a diet in this context is a meeting of church biggies and Worms is a town in Germany) in 1521. He gave Luther safe conduct. Luther went but wouldn't recant unless he could be proven wrong using the Bible. Charles V was shocked but honored Luther's safe conduct back to home (he had such a big following that Charles V couldn't just kill him like they had Huss), but once home, all bets are off. Frederick the Wise of Saxony protected Luther in his castle. Luther wrote a new translation of the Bible in German. Basically, Catholics say that the bible is complicated, so we need priests, bishops, cardinals, popes, etc. to explain what God wants us to do. Luther says that the bible is easy to understand, just read it and you will know the truth and what you should do. However, Luther is wrong about that cuz there can be various interpretations. Others said Luther didn't go far enough against the church and began splitting off. Luther married an ex-nun named Katharina von Bora (a noble) in 1525, cuz he was against celibacy. He was organizing his own church system. If it wasn't in the bible, he didn't believe it. He rejected many Catholic things including 5 of the 7 Sacraments. He kept Baptism and Communion, but he rejected Transubstantiation. He said there was Consubstantiation. In Transubstantiation ("substance across"--Catholicism), the bread and wine literally become the real body and blood of Jesus after a blessing through a miracle. The real body and blood coexisted with the bread and wine. So, in Catholicism, the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Christ. It only appears to be bread and wine. In Consubstantiation ("substance with"--Luther), the bread and wine are real bread and wine, but they soak up the essence of Jesus. In consubstantiation, it is like the body and blood of Christ get mixed with the bread and wine. So, it is still bread and wine. It just has Christ's essence in with it. It sounds very similar, but wars were fought over this distinction. He wrote the church service in German, preached sermons in German, wrote hymns, and read the bible. Generally, religious documents are only written in Latin during this time period, which means normal folks can't really understand what they say. Luther changes this by writing in his vernacular (native tongue–he is German, so his native tongue is German!). He wrote a Catechism (a question and answer book) to teach to the peasants. Catholics eventually adopt their own form of Catechism for teaching purposes.
In 1524, the peasants revolted in Southern Germany. Peasants are not as bad off as serfs, but pretty close to it. The peasants expected Luther to support them, but he didn't cuz it's not scriptural to revolt against your masters. Luther doesn't support violence, so he met with the nobility, which made the peasants mad. Luther wrote a pamphlet against murderous rebels. The Peasant Revolt cost Luther big, cuz the peasants are mad at him and the nobility is angry with him cuz the peasants only got uppity when Luther told them they could read the Bible for themselves. The peasants and nobles went back to Catholicism after the revolt. Luther died in 1546. Lutheranism spread in Northern Germany up through Sweden, cuz Charles V didn't have time to squash it. Lutheranism is a cold weather religion, cuz it gets going in cold weather regions. Luther succeeded where other reformers failed, cuz people were more educated and the printing press had been invented. Luther is one of the forefathers of the Protestant Reformation.