Did the Protestant Reformation do anything good?

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Do you think the Protestant Reformation did anything good? I personally thing it was one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the human race, but could’ve been avoided. And if it were avoided, things would be a lot better off today. Why did it happen, and what could have been done to stop it, and what can be done now to reverse the damages wrought by it?
 
The first part of your question, and I do not begrudge you asking it, will simply result in another round of Reformation “what might have been” scenarios. Its been done a hundred times. But it always gets a lot of responses so who can argue with success?
Now, the part about what can be done is I think rather easy.
Catholics, Orthodox, and other such groups should learn their faith and confront misinformation. I think it is already working. Okay, maybe its not working in secular Europe but in other places I think it is.
 
joshrp said:
Do you think the Protestant Reformation did anything good? I personally thing it was one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the human race, but could’ve been avoided. And if it were avoided, things would be a lot better off today. Why did it happen, and what could have been done to stop it, and what can be done now to reverse the damages wrought by it?
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From a Catholic perspective, might the Protestant Reformation be considered part of G-d’s plan to spread Christianity, which, although fractured, will eventually be reconciled? Similarly, according to some of the Jewish faith, Christianity may be looked at as part of G-d’s plan to spread ethical monotheism, and the Jewish and Christian (both Catholic and Protestant) faiths will also be reconciled at the end of days.
 
It made the Church wake up to how widespread the clergy’s abuse was. The Council of Trent, a response to the Reformation, did a lot of good.

So, in my simple opinion, it didn’t do anything good directly, but only to the extent how the Church reacted to it.
 
It was important for the socio-political developement of Europe. It was a theological disaster, as the muli- beliefs of protestantism will testify to. It also led to a reliance on worship with ‘feelings’, the dismissal of objective sin, with the overflow of this directly influencing the West today - the triumph of the individual & subjective experience.

This is more a US thing than a European practice, which partly explains why Europeans prefer going loopy at rock-concerts rather than church services!🙂
 
The_Scott said:
It made the Church wake up to how widespread the clergy’s abuse was. The Council of Trent, a response to the Reformation, did a lot of good.

So, in my simple opinion, it didn’t do anything good directly, but only to the extent how the Church reacted to it.
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Yes, this is what I think too. The Church has got a hard job to do.
 
philial said:
It was important for the socio-political developement of Europe. It was a theological disaster, as the muli- beliefs of protestantism will testify to. It also led to a reliance on worship with ‘feelings’, the dismissal of objective sin, with the overflow of this directly influencing the West today - the triumph of the individual & subjective experience.

This is more a US thing than a European practice, which partly explains why Europeans prefer going loopy at rock-concerts rather than church services!🙂
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Honestly, I think certain “reformers” were heavily manipulated and used by various oligarchical factions to try to create chaos in Europe. If you can create chaos and get a bunch of people to destroy each other, you can come in and wipe out the winners, who have been weakened by the fighting.
 
What was the point of the Reformation? What were the reformers trying to do? I personally think that Martin Luther was just kind of neurotic about his own salvation and went to extremes to justify his terror. He didn’t think he could do what was required of him so he just gave up and worked on rationalizing his resignation with doctrines like sola fide and sola sciptura. He was building a roller coaster instead of looking at reality.
 
My thoughts about this was the Reformation was tragic but necessary. There was widespread abuse within the Church, and it was the correction of the abuses that first spurred Luther to action.
 
ltwin said:
My thoughts about this was the Reformation was tragic but necessary. There was widespread abuse within the Church, and it was the correction of the abuses that first spurred Luther to action.
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Luther might have been a decent guy, I don’t know. But he was a real loose cannon.
 
ltwin said:
My thoughts about this was the Reformation was tragic but necessary. There was widespread abuse within the Church, and it was the correction of the abuses that first spurred Luther to action.
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It’s kind of interesting how you have to go about trying to piece together what actually happened and comprehend what the causes were, and who was involved in what. I think it is important to do if we are to appreciate how to improve on what we did in the past.
 
I thought about his many times and always wondered why things went the way they did. In my natural thinking sin begets more sin. Personally I think the CC was at fault
for the schism and was going off track. Another try to fix it was the reformation and the original split fractured even more…But in spite of all that His church survives, the gospel is preached and daily men commit their lives to Christ all around the world. Another reason I believe this is the CC has way more problems( in spite of the size) then the Orthodox church as a whole…Just a simple observations/thoughts of someone who has walking with Christ for over 40 years…
 
Yes it did some good. It got the church to wake up by realizing how corrupt the clergy was. The sale of indulgences stopped - the Council of Trent did a ton of good. But long term, it was a disaster. Didn’t Luther once say that if he had known what would’ve happened he never would’ve broke?
 
It would appear that God uses error to enable us to discover and prove the truth. Although we strictly need no proof of the Catholic Church outside of itself, the various alternatives, eg. Protestantism and the Reformation, do build up the argument for the Church. A couple of arguments that I see are: 1. The church was as corrupt then as it has been at any time, yet it did not crumble under this attack (the Reformation) which was partially justified 2: The unity of Catholic faith and Catholic people is shown to be miraculous by comparison with Protestantism - which shares our Bible and much of our teaching, yet started fracturing from the moment it was conceived. No Protestant movement, however impressive, lasts long without fracturing. Which proves to me that the unity and stability of the RCC is from God.

Each heresy also does the Church some good by removing a particular source of doubt or confusion. It is often said that no heresy repeats itself. Sola Fides and Sola Scriptura are very persuasive and powerful heresies. After they had taken full hold in the 16th century they will never bother the ordinary Catholic again. Even modern dissenters in the Church don’t bother with Sola Scripture. Without the Reformation, we Catholics might sometimes be tempted by some of the Reformation principles.

And, as others have said, the abuses attacked by the Reformers, and addressed in the Counter Reformation, were real and were poisoning the Church.
 
It was a tragedy. But it had to happen at some point in the history I guess, I mean all this is biblical and was said to happen.
 
joshrp said:
What was the point of the Reformation? What were the reformers trying to do? I personally think that Martin Luther was just kind of neurotic about his own salvation and went to extremes to justify his terror. He didn’t think he could do what was required of him so he just gave up and worked on rationalizing his resignation with doctrines like sola fide and sola sciptura. He was building a roller coaster instead of looking at reality.
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While it is true that Luther was neurotic about his salvation and he was trying to assuage his terror, his doctrines were more a reaction to widespread abuses in the Catholic hierarchy. The faithful were being grossly misled and were not being taught the faith. His own witness of the corruption when he was in Rome, and the activities of Tetzel, supported by the Pope, pushed him to extremes. The reality of Catholicism he saw was very different than the one we see today.
 
I believe that the Lutheran Reformation did good because it got the Roman Church to take a hard look at itself and hold the Council of Trent and codify its doctrines. I do decry the others that caused more harm than Luther such as Zwingli, Karlstadt, Müntzer, Schwenkfeld, Calvin and some others. It is too bad that the Church didn’t hold the Council of Trent and invite Luther with a safe conduct sooner.
But hey, the President of the LC-MS, Rev. Matthew Harrison was invited to lunch with the Archbishop of St. Louis, Robert J. Carlson at the Archbishop residence. President Harrison blessed the food with the prayer from the Small Catechism, “Lord God, heavenly Father, bless us and these Your gifts which we receive from Your bountiful goodness, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.” The Archbishop noted that he had used that very same prayer to bless the meal in certain settings.
 
ltwin said:
My thoughts about this was the Reformation was tragic but necessary. There was widespread abuse within the Church, and it was the correction of the abuses that first spurred Luther to action.
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Men are always in need of reform, and the abuses were truly tragic. More tragic, though is changing the doctrine of Jesus Christ.
 
meltzerboy said:
From a Catholic perspective, might the Protestant Reformation be considered part of G-d’s plan to spread Christianity, which, although fractured, will eventually be reconciled? Similarly, according to some of the Jewish faith, Christianity may be looked at as part of G-d’s plan to spread ethical monotheism, and the Jewish and Christian (both Catholic and Protestant) faiths will also be reconciled at the end of days.
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No.

God does often bring good out of even the most evil things. But He never wills that men do evil.

And what gave you the idea that the Protestant Revolt somehow helped, rather than massively hindered, the spread of Christianity? If you’re thinking of Protestant missionaries, they didn’t even get started until the mid 19th century, 300 years after Protestants began colonising and exploiting non-Europeans.
 
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