The European Reformation Trivia Quiz

Answer: How to deal with Church corruption

The Reformation occurred in large part because of widespread dissatisfaction with the corrupt practices that the Roman Catholic Church had allowed to exist. Over the centuries, the church, particularly in the office of the papacy, had become deeply involved in the political life of western Europe.

The resulting intrigues and political manipulations, combined with the church's increasing power and wealth, contributed to the bankrupting of the church as a spiritual force. Abuses such as the sale of indulgences (or spiritual privileges) and relics and the corruption of the clergy exploited the pious and further undermined the church's spiritual authority.

The Church itself recognized this and held the nine Councils in an attempt to resolve the issue of corruption and abuse of power. All of teh Councils failed to reach any resolution.

There were other reforms though that attempted to stem the corruption, such as the reformations achieved by St. Francis, Peter Waldo, Jan Hus, and John Wycliffe, which addressed abuses in the life of the church in the centuries before 1517.

In the 16th century, Erasmus of Rotterdam, a great Humanist scholar, was the chief proponent of liberal Catholic reform that attacked moral abuses and popular superstitions in the church and urged the imitation of Christ, the supreme teacher.

Answer: Nailing a list of grievances to a door

The Reformation movement began essentially on Oct. 31, 1517 (the Eve of All Saints day) when a Martin Luther posted a list of grievances, called the Ninety-Five Theses, against the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. Although he had become uncomfortable with many Church teachings, what fundamentally spurred him to action was an incident that occurred when a friar named Tetzel (who was selling indulgences issued by the pope, to acquire the finances needed in the building of St. Peter's) made his way to Germany. Luther took the offense against the Church's doctrine.

In his Theses, he reviewed ninety-five points in which the Church had erred in its interpretation of the New Testament. He touched on major teachings of the Church, including the sacrament of Penance, transubstantiation, and papal authority. Luther claimed that what distinguished him from previous reformers was that while they attacked corruption in the life of the church, he went to the theological root of the problem--the perversion of the church's doctrine of redemption and grace. Luther, a pastor and professor at the University of Wittenberg, deplored the entanglement of God's free gift of grace in a complex system of indulgences and good works.

He proposed an ethical and theological reform of the church: Scripture alone is authoritative (sola sciptura) and justification is by faith (sola fide), not by works. While he did not intend to break with the Catholic Church, a confrontation with the papacy was not long in coming.

Answer: The Imperial Diet of Worms

In 1521, Luther was tried before the Imperial Diet of Worms. The Diet was presided over by The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, who was trying to gain control of a dangerous situation. Luther was excommunicated, but was engendering mass support amongst the general population and so Charles wanted to be the figure who settled the situation down.

It is believed that Charles wanted to have Luther burnt at the stake as a heretic at the outset of the Diet, but was prevented from doing so by Luther's quick abscondance from the scene.

The Diet of Speyer in 1529 was important as being the occasion when Protestantism was given its name. The Diet of Speyer also rescinded most of what toleration had been granted to the followers of Martin Luther three years earlier and set the stage for the violence that followed.

The Diet of Regensburg, held in 1541, again presided over by Charles, was an attempt to reconcile the increasingly entrenched Protestants by offering major concessions. Both Luther and the Pope later rejected the concessions.

The Imperial Diet of Augsburg saw the publication of the 'Interim,' a formula conciliatory to the Protestants but retaining the Roman Catholic ritual in general. Although Charles V believed that he had granted far-reaching concessions to the people and the Protestant authorities in this document, his main concern was to make the Protestants return to the Catholic Church.

Answer: Huldrych Zwingli

The Reformation movement started by Luther in Germany diversified almost immediately, but other reform movements also arose independently of Luther. Huldrych Zwingli was the founder of one such movement. He built a Christian theocracy in Zurich in which church and state joined for the service of God. Zwingli agreed with Luther in the centrality of the doctrine of justification by faith, but he espoused a much more radical understanding of the Eucharist. Calvinism, named for John Calvin (a French lawyer who fled France after his conversion to the Protestant cause) adopted the majority of Luther's teachings and espoused his theories in the Institutes of the Christian Religion in 1536 (an extensive, systematic, theological treatise). Calvin agreed with Luther's teaching on justification by faith, however, he found a more positive place for law within the Christian community than Luther did in his concern to distinguish sharply between law and gospel. John Knox, who had spent time in Geneva and was greatly influenced by John Calvin, led the establishment of Presbyterianism in Scotland, which made possible the eventual union of Scotland with England. Arminius was born in Holland in 1560, by which time the majority of the Protestants in the Netherlands were Calvinists, and essentially taught a revised version of Calvinism.

The essential dispute that Arminius had with Calvinism was regarding the doctrine of predestination.

Answer: Eisleben

Martin Luther was born on November 10, 1483, in Eisleben, Saxony (now a part of Germany). His parents, Hans and Margarethe Luther, had moved to Eisleben from Mohra. They soon moved on again to Mansfeld, where Hans Luther worked in the copper mines, making enough money for his son's education. Luther was educated at a school in Magdeburg and at Eisenach, and then went on to University at the University of Erfurt, one of the oldest and best attended universities in Germany at the time.

He attained his B.A. degree in 1502 and then his M.A. in 1505.

Answer: Augustinian

The Order of St. Augustine, commonly known as the Augustinians, is one of the four great mendicant religious orders of the Middle Ages. In joining the eremitical order of St. Augustine, Luther had joined an important mendicant order, which by the middle of the 15th century had over 2,000 chapters.

As a result of reforms carried through in 1473, the house at Erfurt, to which Luther went, accepted the strict, observant interpretation of the Rule of St. Augustine, written about 400 A.D. which is a guide to religious life divided into 8 chapters, which are the Purpose and Basis of Common {Life;} {Prayer;} Moderation and Self {Denial;} Safeguarding Chastity,and Fraternal {Correction;} The Care of Community Goods and Treatment of the {Sick;} Asking Pardon and Forgiving {Offenses;} Governance and {Obedience;} and, Observance of the Rule.

Answer: Jesuit

St. Ignatius Loyola founded the Society of Jesus (which became known as the Jesuit Order), noted for its educational, missionary, and charitable works, once regarded by many as the principal agent of the Counter Reformation and later a leading force in modernizing the church.

The Jesuits have always been a controversial group, regarded by some as a society to be feared and condemned and by others as the most laudable and esteemed religious order in the Catholic Church. Loyola was a Spanish soldier who experienced a religious conversion during a period of convalescence from a wound received in battle.

After a period of intense prayer, he composed the Spiritual Exercises, a guidebook to convert the heart and mind to a closer following of Christ.

The society grew rapidly, and it quickly assumed a prominent role in the Counter-Reformation defense and revival of Catholicism. Almost from the beginning, education and scholarship became the principal work.

Answer: That the bread and wine of the Eucharist became the body and blood of Christ

Luther rejected the Catholic Church's doctrine of transubstantiation, according to which the bread and wine in the Eucharist became the actual body and blood of Christ. According to Luther's doctrine of consubstantiation, the body of Christ was physically present in the elements because Christ is present everywhere. Luther was not willing to go as far as Zwingli, however, who claimed that the Eucharist was simply a memorial of the death of Christ and a declaration of faith by the recipients.

Answer: Anabaptists

From the group surrounding Zwingli emerged those more radical than himself. These Radical Reformers, part of the so-called 'left wing' of the Reformation, insisted that the principle of scriptural authority be applied without compromise. Unwilling to accept what they considered violation of biblical teachings, they broke with Zwingli over the issue of infant baptism, thereby receiving the nickname 'Anabaptists' on the grounds that they rebaptized adults who had been baptized as children.

The Swiss Anabaptists sought to follow the example of Jesus found in the gospels.

They refused to swear oaths or bear arms, taught the strict separation of church and state, and insisted on the visible church of adult believers--distinguished from the world by its disciplined, regenerated life.

Answer: A league of Lutheran Princes

In 1530, Charles, attempting to bring about a reformation within the Catholic Church through the convocation of a universal council, also tried to find a modus vivendi with the Protestants. The Catholics, however, replied to the Confession of Augsburg, the basic confessional statement of the Lutheran Church, with the Confutation, which met with Charles's approval.

The final decree issued by the Diet accordingly confirmed, in somewhat expanded form, the resolutions embodied in the Edict of Worms of 1521.

As a result of this, Charles, had basically made it clear that it was his intention to crush the growing heresy initiated by Martin Luther. In defense, the Lutheran princes banded together in 1531 in the Schmalkald League, and between 1546 and 1555 a sporadic civil war raged.

Answer: Huguenots

Francis I tolerated the French Protestants depending upon how advantageous it was to him at any given time, although persecutions did occur. Under Henry II, the son of Francis, repression was intensified, particularly when in 1559 France and Spain made peace and thus each was free to devote attention to the suppression of heresy at home.

The persecution of the Huguenots, as the Protestants came to be called in France, would have been intense save for the death of the King in a tournament.

Answer: The Peace of Augsburg

The Peace of Augsburg was the first permanent legal basis for the existence of Lutheranism as well as Catholicism in Germany, and was promulgated on Sept. 25, 1555, by the Diet of the Holy Roman Empire assembled earlier that year at Augsburg. The Diet determined that in the future no member of the empire should make war against another on religious grounds and that this peace should remain operative until the denominations were peacefully reunited. Only two denominations were recognized, the Roman Catholics and the adherents of the Confession of Augsburg--i.e., the Lutherans.

Moreover, in each territory of the empire, only one denomination was to be recognized, the religion of the prince's choice being thus made obligatory for his subjects. Any who adhered to the other denomination could sell his property and migrate to a territory where that denomination was recognized.

The free and imperial cities, which had lost their religious homogeneity a few years earlier, were exceptions to the general ruling. Protestant and Catholic citizens in these cities remained free to exercise their religion as they pleased.

The same freedom was furthermore extended to Protestant knights and to towns and other communities that had for some time been practicing their religion in the lands of ecclesiastical princes of the empire. This last concession provoked vehement Catholic opposition, and Ferdinand circumvented the difficulty by deciding the matter on his own authority and including the clause in a separate article.

Answer: Pope Leo X

Pope Leo X was born on December 11, 1475, in Florence, Italy and died December 1, 1521, in Rome. His original birth name was Giovanni De' Medici, son of Lorenzo De' Medici (also known as Lorenzo the Magnificent). Leo has been cited as being the most extravagant of the Renaissance popes (reigned 1513-21), who made Rome a centre of European culture and raised the papacy to significant political power in Europe.

He depleted the papal treasury, and, by his response to the developing Reformation, he contributed to the dissolution of the unified Western church. Leo excommunicated Martin Luther in 1521.

Answer: Henry VIII

In England the Reformation's roots were primarily political rather than religious. Henry VIII, incensed by Pope Clement VII's refusal to grant him a divorce, repudiated papal authority and in 1534 established the Anglican Church with the king as the supreme head.

In spite of its political implications, in the longer run the reorganization of the Church of England was primarily based on the teachings of Erasmus and Luther, although some Calvinism was filtered in.

Answer: De' Medici

The hugely powerful Medici family from Italy were not only the power behind the throne, but also the throne itself for three periods of reign. Catherine De' Medici was the queen consort of Henry II of France (reigned 1547-59) and subsequently regent of France (1560-74), and was also one of the most influential personalities of the Catholic-Huguenot wars. Three of her sons were kings of France: Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III.

She was the daughter of Lorenzo the Magnificent, and niece of one Pope and sister of another. Catherine was actually probably the strongest figure in the entire period of French history, not only protecting her sons on the French throne, but fighting off and playing Catholic and Protestant forces against each other to lessen their influences on the French Kings.

Answer: Massacre at Vassy

The main Protestant body in France were Calvinist believers. The French too, like the majority of Europe, were becoming tired of the continual violence erupting over the difference of religious beliefs, but could not adopt the Treaty of Augsburg, due to the fact that it excluded Calvinists. France seemed on the verge of all out religious war, but this was averted when Catherine De' Medici granted an Edict in 1562 allowing the Huguenots limited toleration in restricted areas. Francois, duc de Guise (head of the most powerful Catholic family in France and advisor to the King) discovered a group of Huguenots worshipping outside the prescribed limits in a barn in Vassy, as he claimed, and opened fire.

The Massacre of Vassy set off the wars. The Huguenots now were led by a prince of the blood, Louis I, 1st prince de Conde, of the House of Bourbon.

There followed three inconclusive wars. Conde was killed in the first and Francois, duc de Guise, was assassinated.

Answer: A Truce

Catherine made another effort at a settlement in the form of a truce, which was to be cemented by the marriage of Henry of Navarre (the future King of France, Henry IV), a Bourbon, the son of Jeanne d'Albret and the hope of the Huguenots, and her own daughter Margaret (Marguerite de Valois), a Catholic. On Aug. 18, 1572, they were married, with all of the leaders of all parties came to Paris for the wedding.

Answer: A Massacre

While all of France's powerful nobility were gathered in Paris for the Royal wedding between Henry of Navarre and Margaret De Valois, an assassination attempt was made on Admiral Coligny's life. This was not the event which sparked the wars. Coligny was the main Protestant rival of the Catholic Guise family, whom they blamed for the murder of Francoise De Guise in 1563. Catherine feared Coligny's influence over her son and, therefore, gave approval to a Guise plot to murder Coligny during the wedding festivities.

The plot failed and Coligny was only wounded. To placate the angry Huguenots, the government agreed to investigate the assassination attempt. Fearing discovery of her complicity, Catherine met secretly with a group of nobles at the Tuileries Palace to plot the complete extermination of the Huguenot leaders, who were still in Paris for the wedding festivities. Charles was persuaded to approve of the scheme, and, on the night of August 23, members of the Paris municipality were called to the Louvre and given their orders. Shortly before dawn on August 24 the bell of Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois began to toll and the massacre began. One of the first victims was Coligny, who was killed under the supervision of Henry de Guise himself. Even within the Louvre, Navarre's attendants were slaughtered, though Navarre and Henry I de Bourbon, 2nd Prince de Conde, were spared.

The homes and shops of Huguenots were pillaged, and their occupants brutally {murdered;} many bodies were thrown into the Seine. Bloodshed continued in Paris even after a royal order of August 25 to stop the killing, and it spread to the provinces. Huguenots in Rouen, Lyon, Bourges, Orleans, and Bordeaux were among the victims. Estimates of the number that perished in the disturbances, which lasted to the beginning of October, have varied from 2,000 by a Roman Catholic apologist to 70,000 by the contemporary Huguenot Duke de Sully, who himself barely escaped death. Modern writers put the number at 3,000 in Paris alone.

Answer: The Peasant's War

In the summer of 1524 the Peasants' War had broken out in the Black Forest area. Their program was variously motivated. Their demands were for concrete medieval liberties connected with the game and forest laws or with tithes. Some of them drew on Catholic teaching, others on the theology of Zwingli and of Luther, who had set an example of successful defiance of authority, had been no respecter of dignities, and whose teachings about Christian liberty and a priesthood in which all believers shared were plainer than his subtle distinctions between two kingdoms.

In the spring of 1525 the Thuringian peasants rose, with Thomas Muntzer among their leaders, and at first seemed likely to carry all before them. Faced with imminent political chaos, Luther wrote a brutal, virulent broadsheet, Wider die rauberischen und morderischen Rotten der andern Bauern ('Against the Murdering and Thieving Hordes of Peasants').

The writing was less violent than Muntzer's hysterical manifestos, but it was bad enough.

Answer: Printing by movable type

Until the invention of printing by movable type, spiritual teachings relied on mural painting, mosaic, and stained glass which are common in Catholic churches. Protestant reform rejected visual imagery and insisted upon the primacy of the word. Mass production of printed material meant that religious and philosophical literature was widely available at affordable prices.