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Reformation Day Worksheet

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Martin Luther was excommunicated in January of 1521. Most of Europe was ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor, who was crowned by the Pope and asked the Pope for approval of most of his decisions. The Holy Roman Emperor, for example, might collect taxes used to support the church.  Things were very different 500 years ago, and being in trouble with the Pope meant that Luther was also in trouble with the Emperor.  The Emperor decreed that Luther could travel to the Diet of Worms in April of 1521 without being arrested.  It was here that Luther would be put on trial for his writing and preaching.

The Diet (pronounced dee-et) of Worms (pronounced Verms) was a meeting of the Holy Roman Emperor and the princes of all the German states.  The Pope was not there, but he gave Johann Eck the honored position of questioning Luther.  Eck was a German whom the Pope said was "the dauntless champion of the one true faith."  He was a very well educated man in church history and practice, and had debated and won arguments against others who found fault with the Catholic Church.  High ranking church leaders from throughout the Empire and from Rome arrived. 

Luther's writings were posing a great threat to the power of the Pope.  They had been distributed throughout Germany, but Luther wrote them in the privacy of his rooms.  The Pope believed that forcing Luther to respond to Eck in a room full of educated and powerful men, facing certain imprisonment for his heresies (disagreements with Church law and practice) would certainly scare Luther (who was after all just a lowly monk) into saying that everything that he had been preaching and writing was wrong.

Eck placed Luther's published works on a table and asked the monk if he had written them.  Luther answered that he had written all of them, but not all of his works were on the table and he could provide them if Eck wanted them.  Eck ignored the offer. Eck's second question was whether or not Luther would admit that any of his writings were wrong, especially 41 sentences that a special group of experts had found to contradict Church teaching.  Luther asked for time to consider his answer.

The next day his response was clear and pointed, "Unless I shall be convinced by Scripture or by clear reason ... I neither can nor will make any retraction, since it is neither safe nor righteous to act against conscience." He is reported to have closed his remarks with the simple but courageous words that have come down through the ages:

Here I stand.

I can do no other.

God help me.

Amen.