[jo kus]

If memory serves me correctly, it was the Church that asked Luther to recant; the Church never questioned whether it was in error.

You are wrong. While Luther was correct to point out abuses, abuses that many OTHER Catholics were already calling for reform of, Luther's teaching of Sola Fide were ALWAYS considered heresy. His rejection of Apostolic Tradition was ALSO considered a rejection of the Church of Christ. This was before 1521...

It was 100 years later that the Church finally admitted that selling indulgences was a bad thing.

That's flat out wrong. Consider looking at the Council of Trent for official teachings on indulgences. Even before the Council, the Popes began to curb abuses of the legitimate practice of indulgences - the giving of alms or fasting or prayers for the sake of remission of temporal punishment for sins ALREADY forgiven.

Regards

[HarleyD]

That's flat out wrong. Consider looking at the Council of Trent for official teachings on indulgences. Even before the Council, the Popes began to curb abuses of the legitimate practice of indulgences

Oh, please. This is nothing more than revisionist history touted by the Roman Church to excuse the egregious error. Luther 95 Theses was all about indulgences and the abuse goes back to Wycliff in the early 1400s.

In the fourteenth century we find the partial substitution of money gifts for works of mercy and charity, a fact which already laid the train for the Reformation: even notable Roman Catholics such as Juan de Valdez, the brother of the secretary of the Emperor Charles V, admitted the corruption of such practices:
"I see that we can scarcely get anything from Christ's ministers but for money, at bishopping money, at marriage money, for confession money - no, not extreme unction without money! They will ring no bells without money, no burial in the church without money; so that it seemeth that Paradise is shut up without money. The rich is buried in the church, the poor in the churchyard. [...] The rich man may readily get large indulgences, but the poor none, because he wanteth money to pay for them."

European Institute for Protestant Studies

If the Church was trying to reign in indulgences, Pope Leo certainly wouldn't have sent Johann Tetzel around to collect money for the building of the Vatican. I'm sure Pope Leo, known for his lavish spending habits, was wringing his hands over how to stop the "abuse". Did the Vatican ever return the money Tetzel stole for his practices?

The Catholic Church owes Luther an apology. The Orthodox, much to their credit, had nothing to do with this. A simple, "Luther, we're truly sorry; will you forgive us." will do.