User:Ernio48/sandbox

Reformation in Germany
Officially, Protestantism remained an exclusively German phenomenon that concerned the Holy Roman Empire through the late 1510s. It did not became an international issue until the 1520s. In 1521, King Gustav I of Sweden broke any contact with the papal authorities in Rome and in 1527, he formally introduced Reformation in his realm (see Reformation in Sweden).

In 1517, the Reformation began with Luther and caught on instantly. Different reformers arose independently of Luther in 1518 (for example Andreas Karlstadt, Philip Melanchthon, Erhard Schnepf, Johannes Brenz and Martin Bucer) and in 1519 (for example Huldrych Zwingli, Nikolaus von Amsdorf, Ulrich von Hutten), and in the following years. Each year drew new theologians to embrace the Reformation and participate in the ongoing, European-wide discussion about faith.

Before princely support
The early Reformation in Germany mostly concerns the life of Martin Luther until he was outlawed and excommunicated in 1521.

The exact moment Martin Luther realized the key doctrine of Justification by Faith is described in German as the Turmerlebnis. It is often seen as the breakthrough of the reformational ideas. In Table Talk, Luther describes it as a sudden realization. Experts often speak of a gradual process of realization between 1514 and 1518.

In 1517, Martin Luther was convinced to publish his Ninety-Five Theses, being provoked by the behavior exhibited by Albrecht of Brandenburg, the prince-elector and archbishop of Mainz, who instructed Johann Tetzel to introduce indulgences so that he may have the money to resolve his large debt to both the Pope and the Fugger family of bankers. Luther did not intend for his theses to be translated into German, nor did he think Albert of Mainz knew anything of Tetzel selling indulgences. Albert of Mainz upon receiving Luther's theses intended to silence the monk and notified both the University of Mainz and the Pope of Luther's findings. Perceived by the Catholic hierarchy as "another Hus", Luther went through an interrogation process led by Thomas Cajetan (1517), defended his beliefs in the Leipzig Disputation (1518) against his Catholic opponent Johannes Eck, and eventually before the Holy Roman Emperor and imperial princes at the Diet of Worms (1521). Following the Diet of Worms, Luther was declared an outlaw (vogelfrei) by the Holy Roman Emperor. By then, he was also excommunicated by the Pope. Following the Diet, Luther was captured and brought to safety at Wartburg Castle by Saxon soldiers where he hid until his return to Wittenberg in 1522. Frederick the Wise, the elector of Saxony, ultimately never delivered Luther into the Emperor's authority, claiming he never knew that such person existed.

After the Heidelberg Disputation (1518) and the Leipzig Disputation (1519), the faith issues were more and more brought to the attention of other German theologians throughout the Holy Roman Empire. Other Protestant reformers arose independently from Luther almost immediately throughout Germany. The pace of the Reformation proved unstoppable already by 1520. Reformational ideas and Protestant church services were first introduced in cities, being supported by local citizens and also some nobles. The Reformation did not receive state support until 1525. It was more of a movement among the German people between 1517 and 1525, and then also a political one after 1525.

Princes' Reformation
The first state to formally adopt a Protestant confession was the Duchy of Prussia (1525). Albert, Duke of Prussia formally declared Lutheranism to be the state religion. Ducal Prussia was followed by many imperial free cities and other minor imperial entities. The next sizeable territories were the Landgraviate of Hesse (1526; at the Synod of Homberg) and the Electorate of Saxony (1527; Luther's homeland), Electoral Palatinate (1530s) and the Duchy of Württemberg (1534). The reformational wave swept first the Holy Roman Empire, and then extended beyond it to the rest of the European continent.

Germany was home to the greatest number of Protestant reformers that developed the Reformation. Nearly each state that turned Protestant had their own reformers responsible for the implementation of the renewed faith and the foundation of churches. Martin Luther pioneered these activities in Electoral Saxony, where under his own supervision, the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Saxony was organized and served as an example for other states.

1524

 * Strassburg

1525

 * Anhalt-Köthen
 * Duchy of Prussia
 * Principality of Ansbach
 * Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg

1526

 * Landgraviate of Hesse
 * Anhalt-Bernburg

1527

 * Electoral Saxony
 * Principality of Lüneburg

1534

 * England
 * Duchy of Württemberg

1536

 * Denmark

1539

 * Margraviate of Brandenburg

1556

 * Baden-Durlach

1557

 * Electoral Palatinate

1575

 * Aalen

1581

 * Aachen

Demographics
The issue of demographic strengh and geographical spread of the Reformed tradition in France has been covered in a variety of sources. Most of them usually agree that the Huguenot population reached as many as 10% of the total population, or roughly 2 million people on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in 1572.

The new teaching attracted sizeable portions of the nobility and urban bourgeoisie. The number of French Protestants steadily swelled to ten percent of the population since John Calvin introduced the Reformation in France, or roughly 1.8 million people in the decade between 1560 and 1570. During the same period there were some 1,400 Reformed churches operating in France. Hans J. Hillerbrand, an expert on the subject, in his Encyclopedia of Protestantism: 4-volume Set claims the Huguenot community reached as much as 10% of the French population on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, declining to 7-8% by the end of the 16th century, and further after heavy persecution began once again with the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV of France.

Among the nobles, Calvinism peaked on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. Since then it has been sharply decreasing, as the Huguenots were no more tolerated by the French royalty and Catholic mass. By the end of the sixteenth century Huguenots constituted 7-8% of the whole population, or 1.2 million people. By the time Louis XIV of France revoked the Edict of Nantes, Huguenots accounted for 800,000 to 1 million people.

Huguenots controlled sizeable areas in central and southern France. They used to be nobles in the countryside and merchants, artisans and sailors in the coastal cities. The population around the Massif Central and the area around Dordogne was almost entirely Reformed. John Calvin was a Frenchman and largely responsible for the introduction and spread of the Reformed tradition in France. He wrote in French, but unlike the Protestant development in Germany where Lutheran writings were widely distributed and could be read by the common man, it was not the case in France where only nobles adopted the new faith and the folk remained Catholic. This is true for areas in the west and south controlled by the Huguenot nobility. Although large portions of peasant population became Reformed, the people remained majority Catholic.

Overall, Huguenot presence was heavily concentrated in the western and southern portions of the French kingdom, as nobles there secured practise of the new faith. That included Languedoc-Roussillon, Aquitaine and even streched into the Dauphiné. They lived on the Atlantic coast in La Rochelle, and spread across provinces of Normandy and Poitou. In the south, towns like Castres, Montauban, Montpellier and Nimes were Huguenot strongholds. In addition, a dense network of Protestant villages permeated the rural montainous region of the Cevennes. It continues to be the backbone of French Protestantism to this very day. Roughly four-fifths of all Huguenots lived in the western and southern areas.

Today, there are some Reformed communities around the world that retain their Huguenot identity apart from some Calvinists in the United Protestant Church of France, including a rural community in the Cevennes and around Alsace-Moselle region. Huguenot emigrees in the United Kingdom, the United States, South Africa and Australia still retain their identity.

3
=GGG= [[File:Map of state religions (detailed).svg|border|thumb|550x550px|Countries with state religion (detailed).

=Chan= Every German Chancellor was a follower of a Christian church. German society has been affected by the Catholic-Protestant divide since the Protestant Reformation, and the same effect is visible in this list of German Chancellors. It is largely dominated by Roman Catholics and Lutherans as these remain the main confessions in the country. One chancellor was Reformed (Calvinist). Although there were some religiously sceptic chancellors, such as Friedrich Ebert, they never officially renounced their faith and were given a Christian funeral. A significant portion of Protestant chancellors belonged to the Prussian Union of churches, which united the Reformed and Lutheran confessions throughout the Kingdom of Prussia, and was in force since 1817. Roman Catholic chancellors during Imperial Germany came from the Catholic Centre Party, while Protestants.