Reformation Day - in Commemoration and Celebration of the Event that went on to shake the World

Martin Luther is known as 'the Monk who shook the world'. The event that set off this religious
earthquake was his nailing of his 95 Thesis against the sale of indulgences to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. The subsequent tremors were felt across the nations of Europe for decades and centuries to come.

Selling Indulgences

The selling of salvation by the means of the hawking of indulgences around the nations of Europe in order to increase ecclesiastical wealth was a growing scandal in the Roman Catholic Church. In particular the selling of a 'Jubilee Indulgence,' authorised by Pope Leo X to pay for the rebuilding of St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome, infuriated Luther and stirred him to take action.

Romanism based this corrupt practice on a verse in the Gospel of John, where Jesus gave the Apostles the authority to forgive or retain the sins of humanity, John 20:23: Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained. The Roman Church justified this practice of selling indulgences by citing that, although God released the offender from his heavenly obligation, he was still required to pay an earthly price for his sin.