The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1892-11-12

Luther lliittiings all g,ing to show that
The .refo & when he began his at.
lacks upon ae Catholic church, was
striking aE and blindly led b.
pride, raths tihan governed BY reason or
logic. iii. I55 s5
I. No doubt there were abuses committed
by certain Catholic preachers at the
time that the general indulgence pro-
claimed by Pope Leo was being preached
in Germany. These abuses, however. in
no wise affected the Catholic doctrine,
which was clearly set forth by Tetzel, in
the following words, the very year that
Luther issued his famous challenge:
"Indulgences do not forgive sin, but
only the temporal punishment due to sin
and this only when the sin has been sin
cerely repented Of and confessed
Neither did the abuses that were com
mitted alone prompt Luther's challenge,
nor doss it seem that at the outset he
aimed at creating schism in the church
mo cause, " he wrote in 1919, two years
after the event commemorated this week
at Wittenberg, lis 80 great, or could be-
come SO great, that enc should separate
himself from the Romish church." The
facts in ths case are that Luther was
prompted by that sense of rivalry which
divided the religious orders OF his day,
being an Augustinian, to oppose the
Dominican, Tetzel, of whose popularity
he was jealous. His original aim was
simply to win for himself something OF
the popularity which the Dominican
preacher enjoyed, and when he succeeded
in doing that by the publication OF his
theses, he lost his head, and allowed
himself to be carried away by the APP
plause that surrounded him, until be
forgot his priestly VOWS and committed
such excuses as to draw from Erasmus,
his own disciple, the following forcible
declaration: ut must be evident to the
most feeble intellect that one who raised
so great storm in the world, who al
ways found pleasure in using language
either indecent or oaustic, could not have
been called of God. He arrogance, to
which no parallel can be found, was
scarcely disting .ishable from madness,
and his buffoonery was such that it
could not be supposed possible in one
doing the work of God.''
1t may be asked, though, why such q
character as Luther is shown to have
been by his own writings and by the adj
missions of his associates could have OBJ
tained the great influence he exerted in
his day, and why the religion which he
invented should have been accepted by
so many people. The answer to both
queries may be found in the fact that
Lutheranism, to call the Performers" re-
ligion by his own name, appealed to the
pa ~sions and did away with many of the
notifications and acts of self-denial
which Catholicity requires from it's fol-
towers. Luther virtually absolved his
believers from all restraints, and by his
own Life encouraged them to indulge
their inclinations, no matter in what di-
rection these led them. The miserable
condition in which the poorer classes
found themselves, IN consequence OF the
tyranny and exactions of the feudal
lords, also helped the spread Of Luther
anism. whose founder began by preach
lug the widest sort of communism, but,
when be saw the baneful effects of his
doctrines, took the opposite tack and
endeavored to incllcate slavish sub
mission to authority even going
SO far as to say on one occasion
that ssthe abolition of slavery would be
directly against the gospel" The late
Cardinal Hergenrother, in writing in ono
of mis- works on this question, mentions
number of causes that contributed to
the spread of the Lutheran doctrines,
among others the mistaken manner in
which some Of the Catholic representa-
tives opposed them, "the alluring doc.
trine of justification by faith alone; Of
the enslavement of the human will; OF
the assurance of salvation; Of invalidity
OF conventual vows; OF the harmfulness
of celibacy and good works; and, more
than all, the violence Of princes and cit
les, who, after the expulsion of Catholic
priests, forced the people to hear the
new gospel, go that in many places the
people were torn away from the old
church by brutal force; and with insid-
! ious fraud Catholic rites were for long
time preserved, and the old form Of relig-
ion kept intact, SO that the blinded PEG
pie might not be aware Of any essential
change in their faith"
Modern Professionalism retains very
little semblance to the doctrines which
Luther preached after his apostacy and
remuneration Of his Catholic vows and
faith; and were the .reformer,' in whose
honor those Important ceremonies were
I'LL - last xr,<,1> 81, ,1&,, -,