Essays on the Protestant Reformation & Christianity

The Protestant Reformation in Europe was a result of a combination of a number of factors, exacerbated during what Noll (2003) maintains was an "era of general, dynamic change in European society" (188). Prior to the Reformation, regionalism, nationalism, increased trade and economic development, and new intellectual worldviews precipitated the climax of the distinct spiritual crisis within society and the Church. Centuries of internal strife within the Roman Catholic Church, including warring popes and a focus on worldly (i.e. material) matters, also helped ripen the sowing field for Protestants roots. By the time of Luther's Ninety-Five Theses, Protestantism was taking shape in Europe. Nevertheless, it would remain The English Act of Supremacy (1534) that would forever alter relations between church and state. Within an intellectual genealogy of the major players and theological arguments of the Reformation, it becomes apparent that the struggle for power between church and state represented the foundation of the era that would forever alter the Church in England.

There are a number of significant players in the Reformation in Europe, including Luther, Zwingli, Bucer, Calvin, Mary, Elizabeth, Archbishop Cranmer, King Charles V of Spain and, of course, England's King Henry VIII. Luther's interpretation of freedom of the individual within Christianity was perfectly suited to the aims of Henry VIII, who was unsuccessful in his efforts to get

Rome" but their influence on missionary activity was a product of their zeal (201). Ironically, Jenkins (2002) maintains that the very regions where Christianity took hold now threaten to dominate Western Christianity, so successful were Christians in spreading Christianity in what he calls the "South." Body As early as 1552, Xavier, an associate of Loyola, journeyed as a missionary to India, Malaysia, Indonesia, and India. Noll (2003) cautions that it is important to view the spread of Christianity as a combination of "direct responses to the challenge of Protestantism and�a product of internal Catholic impulses" (202). Missionaries discovered quite early that it is virtually impossible to find converts to Christianity without adopting some of the rituals and customs associated with native cultures. Ironically, such rituals and customs that lead to different interpretations of Christianity in theory and practice have resulted in a contemporary conflict between what Chidester (2000) labels a battle between "North" and "South." Jenkins argues that in the modern era, Christianity is becoming significantly a non-Western, non-white religion whose biggest numbers are in Africa, Asia, and South America, all majors areas of early mi

Category: Philosophy - E