Question: The protestant my wife is dialoging with has now taken to the historical attack. She states that Martin Luther broke with the Church because the Pope was selling indulgences. Was it the Pope or wayward bishops who were selling indulgences at the time?
Answer: The protestant my wife is dialoging with has now taken to the historical attack. She states that Martin Luther broke with the Church because the Pope was selling indulgences. Was it the Pope or wayward bishops who were selling indulgences at the time?
Really NOBODY was selling indulgences. There was a program to raise money for the building of St. Peter's Basilica and a plenary indulgence was offered. A donation was asked for in proportion to one's earnings, but it was possible to gain the same plenary indulgence by prayers for the project and the usual conditions (confession, & communion).
It appears that SOME of the people sent to offer the indulgence to the peasants used slogans, over-simplified examples and other techniques to speak down to the crowds to entice them to make a donation. The priest charged with overall supervision of the offer in Germany was Fr. Tetzel. Luther attacked him in the 95 Theses and that was the start of the prot revolt.
After the Luther matter erupted, the Church launched an investigation to figure out what went wrong and who was to blame. This was hardly an objective investigation. This was a major fiasco and they were looking for someone to pin it on. The investigation cleared Tetzel and his people of any wrong-doing. It said that there was evidence of improprieties at the grass-roots level but that this was spontaneous and not due to poor directions from higher authorities. The directives and standards imposed by Fr. Tetzel and the German bishops were declared appropriate. This result is remarkable because in those days it was more important to find a scapegoat than to clear someone's name. Fr. Tetzel was fully exonerated.
Prots generally have been told a very simplistic and inaccurate story about the indulgence in Germany. Luther and his cronies frankly lied and misrepresented the matter shamelessly. They too were not interested in the objective truth but in justifying themselves and their revolt.
Art Sippo
The Catholic Legate