Why Was The Protestant Reformation Significant?

1) Why was the Protestant Reformation significant? The Protestant Reformation separated Europe and it affected the power of the church, monarchs, and individual states. Because the Reformation lowered the authority of the church, the monarchs and independent states took advantage and seized more power. Many people started asking about their place in society, for it was tied into politics and religion. Hence they demanded more of democracy. The base was laid for the future without taking notice of religion because church authority wasn't accepted by the majority of people. In the end, the Protestant Reformation lead to the division of the church and state, the Enlightment, revolutions, imperialism, and the contemporary world.

The concept of the Protestant Reformation was change within the church, or reformation. This was in order for it to have justified and be available to everyone no matter what their social status was. (http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil/pages/huntreformaca.html) In 1500 CE the Roman Catholic Church was the single church that existed in Western Europe. The pope in Rome was the highest in church and he governed everything. The Protestant Reformation resulted with the separation in Western Christendom. Reformation was more involved with how the church and its ideas differed within people.
Luther's bold stand at the Diet of Worms, in the face of the pope and the emperor, is one of the sublimest events in the history of liberty, and the eloquence of his testimony rings through the centuries. To break the force of the pope, who called himself and was believed to be, the visible vicar of God on earth, and who held in his hands the keys of the kingdom of heaven, required more moral courage than to fight a hundred battles, and it was done by an humble monk in the might of