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Lutheranism: Roman Catholic
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Lutheranism appeared in Europe after a century of reformist stirrings in Italy under Girolamo SAVONAROLA, in Bohemia under John HUSS, and in England under the LOLLARDS. The personal experience of the troubled monk Luther gave shape to many of the original impulses of the Protestant REFORMATION and colors Lutheranism to the present. Like many people of conscience in his day, Luther was disturbed by immorality and corruption in the Roman Catholic church, but he concentrated more on reform of what he thought was corrupt teaching. After he experienced what he believed to be the stirrings of GRACE, he proclaimed a message of divine promise and denounced the human merits through which, he feared, most Catholics thought they were earning the favor of God.
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Lutheranism is generally friendly to the Ecumenical Movement, and with some exceptions, Lutheran churches have participated in worldwide gatherings of Christians across confessional and denominational boundaries. Lutherans consider themselves to be both evangelical and catholic because they have points in common with the other Protestant churches on the one hand, and with Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Anglican Christians on the other. In the ecumenical age... they have kept a very distinct identity through their general loyalty to the teachings of 16th century Lutheranism.
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The early development of Lutheranism was greatly influenced by political events. Holy Roman Emperor Charles V was unable to undertake the forceful suppression of Lutheranism because the Holy Roman Empire was being threatened by the Ottoman Empire. Despite the Edict of Worms (1521), which placed the Lutherans under imperial ban, the movement continued to spread. Intermittent religious wars followed, ending in the Peace of Augsburg (1555), which stipulated that the religion of the ruler of each territory within the Holy Roman Empire was to be the religion of his subjects... in effect sanctioning the Lutheran churches and also establishing the territorial princes as primates of their churches. The Formula of Concord (1577), prepared by theologians to resolve disputes among Lutherans, was signed by political leaders to ensure Lutheran unity at a time when renewed religious warfare threatened. The survival of Lutheranism after the Thirty Years' War was the result of the intervention of the Lutheran Swedish king Gustav II Adolph and of Roman Catholic France on the side of the Protestants.
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Lutheranism would become known as a separate movement after the 1530 Diet of Augsburg, which was convened by Charles V to try to stop the growing Protestant movement. At the Diet, Philipp Melanchthon presented a written summary of Lutheran beliefs called the Augsburg Confession. Several of the German princes (and later, kings and princes of other countries) signed the document to define "Lutheran" territories. In 1531, these princes would form an alliance known as the Schmalkaldic League, which in 1547, a year after Luther's death, led to the Schmalkald War, which pitted the Lutheran princes of the Schmalkaldic League against the Catholic forces of Charles V.
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