Replies

Roman Catholic historians readily admit that doctrines such as the assumption of Mary and papal infallibility were completely unknown in the teaching of the early Church.

'The Lutheran pastor and scholar, Charles Dickson, notes that “the feast [of the Assumption] celebrated by the Church on August 15, dates from the forth century, when numerous festivals honoring our Lady were common practice.” The history of Church feasts demonstrates that these celebrations grew from beliefs that existed long before the feasts themselves were formally inaugurated. “Interestingly enough, the sixteenth-century Protestant reformer, Martin Luther, included this feast on a list of liturgical celebrations that should, in his words, ‘be observed among Evangelical Catholics as a sign of continuity and order’“.' - http://www.scborromeo.org/papers/assume.pdf

'the fact cannot be denied that from the beginning there was a widespread acknowledgment by other churches of some kind of supreme authority in the Roman pontiff in regard not only to disciplinary but also to doctrinal affairs. This is clear for example, from:

Clement's Letter to the Corinthians at the end of the first century,
the way in which, shortly afterwards, Ignatius of Antioch addresses the Roman Church;
the conduct of Pope Victor in the latter half of the second century, in connection with the paschal controversy;
the teaching of St. Irenaeus, who lays it down as a practical rule that conformity with Rome is a sufficient proof of Apostolicity of doctrine against the heretics (Adv. Haer., III, iii);
the correspondence between Pope Dionysius and his namesake at Alexandria in the second half of the third century;'

- http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07790a.htm#IIIB

You may want to rethink Luthers thoughts on the assumption

He uses similar argumentation of Stravinskas and Cole, but with a twist: Luther must have held a lifelong belief in the Assumption because he never denied it. In my earlier post, I traced the popular notion that Luther simply affirmed the Assumption, even though never pronouncing on it clearly, and that this notion comes from a mis-reading of a footnote by Max Thurian. His argument is only slightly different but just as weak. I pointed out this faulty method of argumentation in part one, via this quote:

“But an argument from silence is recognized by all to be quite weak. It implies that one must have almost total evidence before demonstration is possible. If this is the case, one could argue cogently that there may have been airplanes in the time of Christ.” Dewey M. Beegle, Scripture, Tradition, and Infallibility (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1973), p. 178.

http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2007/09/luther-assumption-was-settled-fact-part_24.html