Discourse on the Protestant Reformation

A Story by SVermeer

I wrote this in April of 2007, for a vocab quiz makeup test. o.O

Discourse on the Protestant Reformation

“How the Catholic Church got metaphorically b***h-slapped”

The 16^th Century hammer smashed against the edifice Wittenberg with impending celerity, its iconoclastical-cries echoing through the surrounding church yard.

Oh, the ignominy!

Martin Luther, the star of this reformation of the orthodox, this upturning of the accepted, boldly illuminated the heresy within the church: the unholy sale of salvation; the corrupt indulgence! Hence, a series of ubiquitous and vehement uproars, with the power comparable to in-church flatulence, caused a reform of the dastardly-practices of the church bishops against the choir boy eunuchs.

But such a discussion would prove to be too upsetting.

Ergo, Luther will remain at the forefront. Two-weeks after his 1517 Wittenberg romp, the 95 Theses spread to all of Germany; within two months, the rest of Europe had leant an ear to Luther’s pejorative opinions of indulgences, nepotism, absenteeism, pluralism, and eunuch molestation (the latter being most-widely disputed historically). Following this, Luther continued to speak out against ol’ C.C., and published his three greatest known works under protection of a few homogenous-thinking strongmen (Ulrich von Hutten and Franz von Sickingen, respectively); the works are as follows: To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation, On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, and On the Freedom of a Christian. Interestingly enough, they all came out of the year 1520, when things were good: the printing press was churning out thoughts, the peasants were as amenable as ever, and the church was so far up its rear-end that Pope Leo X himself, in his own insipid way, dismissed Luther for a mere drunk.

Truly, it was a banal statement.

Meanwhile, on the Swiss-sidelines, Ulrich Zwingli formulated ideas homogeneous to Luther’s, yet not without a large degree of heterogeneity. For instance, his theology carried a degree of military-nature to it, comparing the Christian sacrament to a military pledge, one to the word of God. He also believed that Christ was not in the bread and wine physically in the Eucharist, thus contradicting Luther’s cannibalistic views of Jesus’ physical presence thereof. Ergo, nonchalantly, deeply pious and overall Lutheran Luther can be compared to a Mayan pagan who sacrificed, enslaved, cannibalized, and did overall very unchristian (or un-Lutheran, for that matter) things.

But, what a digression that was.

Returning to Zwingli and his Swiss-protests, it is interesting to note that his movement garnered far more support from his surroundings than Luther’s. Zwingli also claimed that he heard nothing of Luther’s reformation, and that his idea to reform was completely free of telepathy of any kind. He dynamically opposed indulgences too, but two years after Luther himself did. Put two and two together, and it’s almost cryptic that Zwingli did so without any influence or suggestion, at least.

Aside from his denial of Lutheran influence, Zwingli was a powerful (and secular) statesman. When the other five Roman Catholic cantons didn’t listen to him, he drew up a battle plan, armed his Protestant soldiers to the teeth, marched in, and back-handed every dissident to his doctrine. Simply, the 5^th Commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Murder,” was something that everyone tended to kinda’ just ignore when they wanted to.

But, Zwingli eventually got a taste of his own virulent medicine. After never reaching an agreement on the Cannibalistichirst, a.k.a. the Eucharist, Zwingli went AWOL and kept to his own doctrine of Protestantism. At least with the Catholic faith, everyone adheres to the Pope (no matter how corrupt he may be). With the Protestant faith, there’s a million- and-a-half different interpretations and vicissitude of the same damn thing; off the bat there’s Lutheranism, Calvinism, Anglicanism, Methodism, Baptists, Pentecostals, Brethren, Mennonites, Amish, Universalists, Unitarians, Latter-day Saints, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Adventists.

It would be abominable to have to choose between them.

One could go on and on about the incompetence of the Catholic Church, but it would be redundant. It is already easy to see that the C.C. was corrupt, and that the Counter Reformation was only launched to cover the Pope’s metaphorical-donkey: euphemistical to tucking his tail between his legs and running.

Well, at least Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, and all those other “reformers” (a.k.a. anarchists) got what they wanted: their own damn interpretation of the Bible.