Page 6, 23rd December 1983
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Fresh attitude to Luther
How can Luther be so tolerantly referred to (by John Paul II in Rome recently) when he revolted against the papacy? T. W.
IT SEEMS to me that the trend today is to look for the good in those around us and to attempt to build on that, rather than to remember past quarrels or sins or divisions when these can be avoided.
In the case of Luther, I first heard of him at school when he was introduced as an heretical monk who married a nun.
Nowadays he might be more accurately and fully referred to as a monk who was perplexed by his own doubts and who came to be part of the flash-point of the Reformation and of the
Counter-Reformation (understanding the latter in its partial sense as the Roman Catholic Church at last putting her own house in order through the reforms of the Council of Trent). So Luther is a significant figure.
A further approach for us today is that notwithstanding that the 16th century onwards were different times from ours, nevertheless since both sides emerged from those times with more than a little blood on their hands, it is better now to seek mutual reconciliation than to continue mutual recrimination. The ecumenical movement provides this opportunity.
There is also the question of papal authority which is worth considering in the times we live in now. Although the position of the Pope is found in the New' Testament, and although our Church regards it as an essential part of our faith, it remains for all that a secondary essential belief and not a primary belief.
Papal authority is only there to serve other basic beliefs and to enable a spiritual Church to flourish.
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