Test Your Knowledge of the Protestant Reformation

Huldrych Zwingli is considered a key reformer within the Swiss Protestant Reformation, having founded the Swiss Reformed Church. He was appointed people’s priest in Zurich in 1518, and began delivering sermons in 1520 that directly led to the initiation of the Swiss Reformation in 1522. Zwingli published his “67 Artikel” in 1523, which served a similar role to Luther’s “Ninety-five Theses.”

Held in three parts between 1545 and 1563, the Council of Trent served as the formal response by the Roman Catholic Church to the issues raised by Protestant reformers. The council was a key event within the Counter-Reformation, and saw the Catholic Church undergo a series of sweeping reforms through clarifying its previously ambiguous church doctrines.

The Jesuits were founded in 1534 by Ignatius Loyola, a Spanish priest and former soldier. Officially called the Society of Jesus, they were particularly tasked with renewing the Catholic Church in the aftermath of the Reformation. As such, their two main objectives were missionary work and Catholic education, both of which helped grow the church. Many Jesuit missions are still found throughout Latin America.

Born Giovanni de’ Medici, Leo X came from a wealthy and powerful family. He spent lavishly as pope, and made Rome a cultural center of Renaissance Europe. Leo X did not take Luther’s movement seriously, and doubted it would significantly threaten the church. After several attempts to order Luther into silence were refused, the pope finally excommunicated him in 1521.

Born in 1509 and trained as a lawyer, John Calvin succeeded Martin Luther as the leading figure of the Reformation. His “Institutes of the Christian Religion” clearly synthesized the essentials of Protestant beliefs. He stated that salvation was predestined by God’s grace and could not be lost. Calvin also gained political power, becoming the most powerful figure in Geneva by the end of his life.

Holy Roman Emperor Charles V convened the Diet of Worms in 1521 to discuss Martin Luther’s criticisms of the church. Luther appeared and was told to repudiate his works, but he refused, saying his conscience was bound by God. He famously stated, “Here I stand; I can do no other.” The Diet’s edict banned Luther’s writings. It also called for him to be captured, which was never enforced.

According to legend, Martin Luther nailed his “Ninety-five Theses” to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517, marking the beginning of what began the Reformation. But Luther did not intend to break from the church; he was inviting other clergy to debate his ideas about sin and redemption. Today, historians doubt that the theses were actually nailed to the door, but no one doubts their influence.

At the time of the Reformation, Latin was no longer a spoken language, but it was the official language of the Catholic Church for prayer and the Bible. Translations had already been made into living Western European languages, but they were rarely seen, especially by the common people. With the proliferation of the printing press and a new emphasis on the direct word of God, reading the Bible in one’s own language became much more common.

It’s not exactly known why French Protestants were called Huguenots, but etymologists suspect it is connected to a political figure named Besançon Hugues. As Calvinists, the French Huguenots were most active in the 16th century and were heavily persecuted in the long French Wars of Religion. As a result, over 300,000 people became refugees, settling in places including England and the North American colonies.

Mary I took the English throne in 1553 upon the death of her brother Edward VI. Their father, Henry VIII, had broken with Rome and founded the Church of England when the pope refused him an annulment. But Mary was a devout Catholic; she reversed her family’s religious policies and revived the law against heresy. Some 283 Protestants were executed during her reign, and even more were imprisoned.

In 1054, Christianity’s Great Schism divided the Roman Catholic Church in Western Europe and the Eastern Orthodox church, a split that still remains. The Coptic Orthodox Church was founded in the first century in Egypt, and split with the Catholic Church in 541 CE. Presbyterianism is a form of reformed Protestantism.

A craftsman and smith from Mainz, Germany, Johannes Gutenberg invented and assembled a printing press that used movable type. By 1455, he had used it to print the Bible, enabling many more people to read it directly. Before Gutenberg, books were very slow and expensive to make by hand. With the printing press, information and literacy could spread much more rapidly — including Protestant criticism of the church.

On February 25, 1570, Pope Pius V issued a papal bull known as “Regnans in Excelsis,” which excommunicated England’s Queen Elizabeth I from the Catholic Church. The act was in response to the British Parliament reestablishing an official Protestant Church of England in 1559. English Catholics were placed in a bind deciding whether to honor their queen or obey their church.

An indulgence is full or partial remission of punishment for a sin. It was often granted by a church authority in response to good works, which could include a monetary donation to a charitable cause. The system was easily abused: Some church officials took large sums in exchange for freeing souls. Sale of indulgences was banned in 1570, but the Reformation that had objected to it could not be stopped.

Martin Luther lived a quiet life as a German monk until 1517, when he wrote a scandalous document criticizing the Catholic Church. He insisted that salvation could come through only faith, not deeds, and that the only supreme authority was the Bible. Luther also produced the first German translation of the New Testament so that the common people could read the holy text.