They arose from the nonconformity of the German priest Martin Luther (1483-1546) in accepting some practices of the Catholic Church. Luther strongly attacked the sale of indulgences, that is, obtaining forgiveness for a certain sin in exchange for money.
On October 31, 1517, Luther nailed to the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany, a manifesto with 95 theses in which he attacked not only the sale of indulgences, but also other procedures of the Catholic Church, such as the negotiation of ecclesiastical positions. . Pope Leo X demanded a recantation from the priest, threatening to condemn him for heresy. But Luther did not go back and broke with the Catholic Church, starting the so-called Protestant Reformation, a movement that spread across Europe, driven by the greater religious flexibility it offered.
Enemies of the Reformists began to refer to their followers as «Lutherans.» These, in turn, preferred to be called “evangelicals”, a term widely used today to refer to the faithful of Protestant churches. The freedom preached by Luther would end up making room for the emergence of various religious currents.
“Protestantism has a cornerstone: autonomy. The idea that only God saves, the subjectivity of the individual and the possibility of assuming and living differences will generate a huge variety of churches”, says religion scientist João Décio Passos, from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo (PUC-SP). ). This helps to understand why today there are so many branches among Protestants.
belief in autonomy
Freedom preached by Luther gave rise to various religious currents
Lutherans
The break with the Catholics, in 1517, laid the foundations for the expansion of Protestantism. Lutherans condemned the moral behavior of Catholic priests and believed that salvation was in the holy scriptures.
Presbyterians
Inspired by the French theologian John Calvin (1509-1564), they preached divine predestination: that is, only those chosen by God would be saved. The Dutch theologian James Arminius (1560-1609) would later create another strand of Presbyterianism: Arminianism
Anglicans
English King Henry VIII (1491-1547) wanted to annul his first marriage in order to marry another woman. After the refusal of Pope Clement VII, he broke with the Catholic Church and created the Anglican in 1534, being free of papal interference.
Baptists
The Anabaptist movement already existed when Luther began to question the Catholic Church. But, like other Protestant currents, the movement only gained expression after the Reformation. Ended up giving rise to the Baptist Church
Methodists
They appeared in England in the 18th century, proposing to reform the Anglican Church. Based on the belief in salvation through faith in Christ, Methodist ideas failed to change Anglicans, but gave rise to a new Protestant current.
Pentecostals
They began to appear in the early 20th century as an offshoot of Methodists. In 1910, the Christian Congregation of Brazil was founded; the following year, the Assembly of God, and in 1962, Deus é Amor. Pentecostals believe in faith healing
Neopentecostals
The Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, from 1977, and the Renascer em Cristo Church, from 1986, are part of the group.