The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-11-11
Services Last Night Commence
rating the Birth of Luther.
ADDRESSBY REV. GUNBERG
"LUTHER'S LIFE AND THE REF
ORMATIONv HIS THEME
Rev. p. E. AsIev Speaks on ..The
Reformation In Sweden"-The
Services Held Mt the Swedish Luz
theran Church.

At the Swedish Lutheran church. on
Fourth East street, reformation
service, in commemoration of the four
hundred and thirteenth anniversary Of
the birth of Martin Luther, was held
last night. This being the only COM
memorative service held, the attend
ance was large. Rev. A. N. Gunberg
of Provo lectured on "Luther'S Life and
Reformation" and P. L. Aslev, the pas
tor, spoke on THE Reformation IN
Sweden" Mr.. Gunberg said in part:
Martin Luther was born in Eislaben,
Germany, in the year 14S3. He re-
ceived very thorough classical edu-
cation, and entered monastery at
Wittenberg at the age of q. While
there, he happened to lind the Holy
Bible locked up in the library. He
studied it thoroughly and soon saw the
many indulgenceS practiced in the
Catholic church. He at once started a
TRADE against this abuse of the word
and commandments of God, and the
Catholic priesthood became so
frightened that the pope of Rome was
sought for advice on the matter. An
ambassador was sent to Luther, to
quiet his abuse against the mother
church, but only succeeded partly. AT
last the church rose up against him.
Charles V, the emperor of Germany at
that time, called a great council at
Worms, TO prepare the preliminaries of
crushing the uprising. This council did
no good, however, as Luther still kept
to the Bible, and denounced the by
laws of the Catholic church as sacri-
legiouS in some forms. For this, he,
with a few of his followers, was ban
iShed from the church. The first thing
the great reformer did after his Danish
ment was to translate the Bible from
the Latin to the German tongue. This
was one of the reasons of the success of
the reformation. This great man
started several schools throughout Ger
many. in which the Bible was taught,
and published several books for the
scholars and teachers. Several councils
between the emperor of Germany, the
pope and the Catholic priesthood, were
held in 1880 to form plans TO counterfeit
the influence of the schools, but all TO
no avail. The Protestants, as the fol-
lowers of Luther were called, had
formed a confessional, founded on the
Scripture. A new church was organized
under this banner, composed of the fol-
lowers of the refOrmer. Besides preach
ing and teaching against he church of
Rome, Luther wrote and published
many sacred books. the greatest of
which, was the translation of the Bible
from the Latin to the German.
Luther was a poet, composer, and
doctor of philosophy and theology. He
Travelled a great deal in Germany and
Italy, visiting Rome several times.
He died in the year 1916, at his birth
place, Eislaben, Germany, at the age
of g.
The Lutheran church now contains
about 50000.000 members, and has the
Bible and confessional as its corner
stone.
Rev. P. E. Aslev said that the
reformation in Sweden had it's origin in
disciple of Luther, named Claus
Peter
The first step of the reformation was
brought about by the ''ricksdag'' or
congress of Sweden. In some respects
the political condition of the country
necessitated freedom from papaI rule.
and thus helped TO bring about the re-
bellion in the church, but CLAUS Peter
was no doubt the genesis of the move
ment. Together with King Gustave.
he formed new system of government
in Sweden, that was entirely free of
any church rule.
Several attempts were made by the
Catholic church to keep down the
movement, but in the year 1893. the
whole Lutheran confessional was
adopted as one of the principles in the
government of Sweden.