OK! This is why i left this comic long ago! The indulgences, sad that they did exist, did not go to buy things like this! They were meant to be used to create and maintain reforms in the Church, but instead went to line the pockets of clergy who were NOT chosen by the Church, but by the Noblemen (Princes etc of each country) and those whom they chose to be bishops and priests (Simony, another crime/sin that the Church was trying to stop).
So do you see the irony here? What (in part, besides the difference in opinion in theology) caused the Reformation was the Church trying to raise money to fight the things people like Luther were complaining about, and instead the money was used to reinforce the source of those complaints….BY the VERY people who would end up leaving the Church in the Reformation!!!
Luther did not originally want to leave the Church (he was a Catholic priest!) But the Princes of Germany convinced him to start his own church, b/c they knew the power to control the people was in controlling the religion. The only way they could control the Germans was to create and control the church. So they convinced Luther to so this with his ideals. His frustrations with the Church leaders (who 1) did not agree with most of his points, and 2) want to seem weak in changing the ones they did agree with, and 3) those they did try to change met with the problems described above) is what finally tipped him over. But his ideal was shot to literal hell as he discovered 1) he did need to maintain at least the 1st 7 Counsels of the Church to maintain order and some semblance of rules and theology, and 2) that he sparked the idea that every person, now with the permission to interpret the Bible on their own, as opposed to the Teaching Authority of the Church, passed down from the Apostles, could start their own church….hence there are now somewhere between 35,000 and 50,000 Protestant churches, breaking the Body of Christ into pieces, devastating one of the last prayers of Jesus “Father, I pray that they may be One as you and I are One.” (Jn 17:21) The purpose of which, Jesus tells us, is so that “The world may know that you sent me.” Maybe it would have been worth a little compromise on both parts, to suffer each other a bit, so that the world would be spared and Jesus mission be more of a success?
But back to my original grief, this comic is just perpetuating the myth that the Catholic Church is greedy and evil, and all we have now is our sorrow and guilt and the world would be better off if the Church would just realize it and fix it.THAT mentality is sad, to not see all the amazing and wonderful things the Church IS doing and HAS done in the world, even since the Reformation.
So I’m once again leaving this strip, after only one day.
Let’s, in earnest, pray for each other. We are part of the same Body, we have the same mission. IF i thought my words would be taken as helpful criticism, (much less even read, i put down so much, even I probably wouldn’t bother to read it all) then I might stay, but I know how these things go….just back and forth bickering with only il feelings being wrought, and i apologize for my part in that. I just wanted to straighten out some Church history, but I went off….again, sorry.
@Steven Young If you want to express your opinions (not anywhere near accurate, just opinions) that’s fine. However if you wish to stop reading a strip that is liked by many (including me and I’m not Catholic) just go away and stop crying like a baby – just whimper off into the distance.
Not “half”, really. The Photian schism, in particular, came long before Leo X.
But even the original Catholic Encyclopedia concedes that the selling of indulgences aimed specifically at the Basilica was an immediate cause of the Reformation.
socalvillaguy Premium Member about 8 years ago
Ah yes, the bad old days …
Curtis Mathews Premium Member about 8 years ago
A church breathing with one lung!
Plods with ...™ about 8 years ago
Always a nice surprise.
kaystari Premium Member about 8 years ago
OK! This is why i left this comic long ago! The indulgences, sad that they did exist, did not go to buy things like this! They were meant to be used to create and maintain reforms in the Church, but instead went to line the pockets of clergy who were NOT chosen by the Church, but by the Noblemen (Princes etc of each country) and those whom they chose to be bishops and priests (Simony, another crime/sin that the Church was trying to stop).
So do you see the irony here? What (in part, besides the difference in opinion in theology) caused the Reformation was the Church trying to raise money to fight the things people like Luther were complaining about, and instead the money was used to reinforce the source of those complaints….BY the VERY people who would end up leaving the Church in the Reformation!!!
Luther did not originally want to leave the Church (he was a Catholic priest!) But the Princes of Germany convinced him to start his own church, b/c they knew the power to control the people was in controlling the religion. The only way they could control the Germans was to create and control the church. So they convinced Luther to so this with his ideals. His frustrations with the Church leaders (who 1) did not agree with most of his points, and 2) want to seem weak in changing the ones they did agree with, and 3) those they did try to change met with the problems described above) is what finally tipped him over. But his ideal was shot to literal hell as he discovered 1) he did need to maintain at least the 1st 7 Counsels of the Church to maintain order and some semblance of rules and theology, and 2) that he sparked the idea that every person, now with the permission to interpret the Bible on their own, as opposed to the Teaching Authority of the Church, passed down from the Apostles, could start their own church….hence there are now somewhere between 35,000 and 50,000 Protestant churches, breaking the Body of Christ into pieces, devastating one of the last prayers of Jesus “Father, I pray that they may be One as you and I are One.” (Jn 17:21) The purpose of which, Jesus tells us, is so that “The world may know that you sent me.” Maybe it would have been worth a little compromise on both parts, to suffer each other a bit, so that the world would be spared and Jesus mission be more of a success?
But back to my original grief, this comic is just perpetuating the myth that the Catholic Church is greedy and evil, and all we have now is our sorrow and guilt and the world would be better off if the Church would just realize it and fix it.THAT mentality is sad, to not see all the amazing and wonderful things the Church IS doing and HAS done in the world, even since the Reformation.
So I’m once again leaving this strip, after only one day.
Let’s, in earnest, pray for each other. We are part of the same Body, we have the same mission. IF i thought my words would be taken as helpful criticism, (much less even read, i put down so much, even I probably wouldn’t bother to read it all) then I might stay, but I know how these things go….just back and forth bickering with only il feelings being wrought, and i apologize for my part in that. I just wanted to straighten out some Church history, but I went off….again, sorry.
craigwestlake about 8 years ago
@Steven Young If you want to express your opinions (not anywhere near accurate, just opinions) that’s fine. However if you wish to stop reading a strip that is liked by many (including me and I’m not Catholic) just go away and stop crying like a baby – just whimper off into the distance.
John W Kennedy Premium Member about 8 years ago
Not “half”, really. The Photian schism, in particular, came long before Leo X.
But even the original Catholic Encyclopedia concedes that the selling of indulgences aimed specifically at the Basilica was an immediate cause of the Reformation.