MB: “It’s okay for a penniless monk to magically become a wealthy landowner (why not go back and research the times and see just how high up the rungs of society he ascended), isn’t it? Now when I point out that double standard you guys get all upset. “
http://www.luther.de/en/geburt.html
How about money from the family. He wasn’t born a penniless monk. Besides, you didn’t read the link at the other post where it says that he was GIVEN property.
I find it hard to believe that he was given more wealth than the Catholic church has and that ANY pope ever lived a spartan lifestyle.
MB:”Some day, you guys will realize that the Reformation was primarily secular - and it was about power and wealth, not about theology. Theology was the means to power and wealth for the Reformation. It was secondary, and only a tool to use.”
Sounds more like you just described the Roman Catholic church. The escapades of most of the popes, with their immorality and debauchery and absurd trials of dead people from their hate filled motives, shows that more than anything Catholics can claim about Protestantism.
A simple google search of corruption of church in Middle ages provides a plethora of information about the condition of the RCC during that time. Hardly pristine and pure.
Papacy “In the Middle Ages”
http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/society/A0860222.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avignon_Papacy
Corruption of the Church in the Middle Ages
http://ezinearticles.com/?Corruption-of-the-Church-in-the-Middle-Ages&id=969734
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod
He was given stolen property that he gladly accepted. What does that make him, besides a democrat?