Wibrandis Rosenblatt 1504–1564
The Bride of the Reformation In 1504, Wibrandis Rosenblatt was born in Säckingen, Germany. Over the next sixty years, she would marry and be widowed four times, inspiring one writer to describe her as the Reformationfrau —...
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Philip Melanchthon 1497–1560
The Gentle Lutheran He was not the kind who started revolutions, but the kind who brought order to the ensuing chaos. His mentor, Martin Luther, was brash, impulsive, and forceful. But Philip Melanchthon was...
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Girolamo Savonarola 1452–1498
The Florentine Forerunner Surrounding the base of the Luther monument in Worms, Germany, sit the four forerunners of the Protestant Reformation — Jan Hus, John Wycliffe, Peter Waldo, and Girolamo Savonarola. They could not...
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Jan Hus c. 1369–1415
The Goosefather On December 17, 1999, the pope issued the ceremonial equivalent of a modern apology: “Our bad.” John Paul II addressed a crowd in the Czech Republic, expressing “deep regret for the cruel...
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The First Tremor
Peter Waldo – Died by 1218 More than three hundred years before Martin Luther was born, an unlikely reformer suddenly appeared in the city of Lyon in southeast France. His protests against doctrines and...
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The Morning Star of the Reformation
John Wycliffe c. 1330–1384 John Wycliffe has been called “The Morning Star of the Reformation.” The morning star is not actually a star, but the planet Venus, which appears before the sun rises and...
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