A 01 - The Reformers of the Church prayed

1. The Reformers of the Church prayed. The Reformation appears to us as a great whole : a work of study, thinking, preaching, discussion, polemic, and organization. But it was more than all this. From what we know, it was also an act of continuous prayer, an invocation and, let us add, an action of certain men and, at the same time, a response on the part of God. In Luther’s Greater Catechism (Catechisms of 1529 are still standard summaries of faith among Lutherans) there is a remarkable passage from which some sentences may be quoted

’We know that our defence lies in prayer alone. We are too weak to resist the Devil and his servants. Let us hold fast to the weapons of the Christian; they enable us to fight the Devil. What has won these great victories over the undertakings of our enemies, which the Devil has used to enslave us, except the prayers of those good men who rose up like a rampart of brass to protect us? Our enemies may mock at us, but we shall defy them and the Devil if we continue steadfast in prayer. For we know that when a Christian prays thus : "Dear Father, thy will be done," God answers him, "Dear child, it shall be done in spite of the Devil and the whole world".

There are some obscurities in the events of the sixteenth century, but here we touch upon a point of particular importance. Perhaps the faults and weaknesses which we observe at other moments of history are due to the fact that we no longer understand the meaning of these words of Luther’s.