In 1535, the French Lutheran theologian, John Calvin (1509–1564), broke off from Luther on the question of predestination. Because of his radical religious teachings, John Calvin was driven out of France, and he fled to Switzerland. In his book, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, he taught that all men were predestined for heaven or hell. The Council of Trent (1545–1563) condemned this teaching because it destroys free will and makes God the author of sin. Besides his erroneous doctrine on predestination, Calvin followed Zwingli in denying the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. He forbade all religious ceremonies, such as the Mass or ordinations to the priesthood. Although John Calvin worked in Geneva, Switzerland, his influence was felt in France and throughout Europe. The Calvinists in France were known as the Huguenots.

In England, Protestantism began with King Henry VIII (1491–1597). In the beginning, Henry VIII was opposed to the teachings of Martin Luther and even wrote a book against him, for which he was honored by Pope Leo X with the title “Defender of the Faith.” In 1509, he married Catherine of Aragon. Twenty-four years later, he fell in love with the queen’s attendant, Anne Boleyn. When Pope Clement VII refused to grant a divorce between him and his lawful wife, he denied papal authority and, with the help of Thomas Cromwell, confiscated all church properties in England and transferred them to the crown. Then he declared himself Head of the Church of England, forced the British Parliament to divorce him, and publicly married Anne Boleyn (whom he had privately married earlier). Three years later, he had Anne beheaded and married another woman. He had remarried several times and had already married six women when he died. It was a tragic story of passion and failed marriages, but that was how Anglicanism, or Protestantism in England, was born. The Church of England, now called the Anglican Church, was continued by Henry’s successors, who violently suppressed any opposition to their claim to supremacy in spiritual matters.

Although the so-called “Protestant Reformation” is usually stated as ending in 1550, Protestantism as a religion continued to gain followers and break up into various religious sects up to the present. In Scotland, the apostate Catholic priest, John Knox, led the Presbyterian movement in 1560, which aimed at the destruction of the Catholic Church, while in 1609, John Smyth led the General Baptist Church in Holland. In 1650, George Fox founded a new Religious Society of Friends, also known as the Quakers, in England. In 1739, John Wesley also broke off from Anglicanism and started the Methodist revival. The Episcopal Church in the United States is a member of the worldwide Anglican Communion. On account of these divisions, the current number of Protestant denominations today probably runs into the hundreds.

The often-quoted idea that the total number of Protestant denominations today is upward of 33,000 came from the two-volume World Christian Encyclopedia by Barrett, Kurian, and Johnson. However, the 33,000 figure is misleading because of its questionable use of the word “denomination,” which includes practically any non-Catholic group that calls itself Christian. Of course, if the word “denomination” includes not merely the Protestants but also all those who follow Christ or who call themselves Christians—even if they do not believe in the Divinity of Christ or the Blessed Trinity (such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Mormons, etc.)—then the total number of Christian “denominations” could indeed run into the thousands. 

Violence During the Protestant Reformation

Catholics are often unfairly criticized, sometimes by Protestants, due to the excesses and cruelty observed during the time of the Papal Inquisition. However, if the Inquisition appears cruel to us today, it is not because its activities were Catholic but because they were medieval. It should be kept in mind that torture and the application of the death penalty for convicted heretics and terrorists were the custom of the time and not the result exclusively of Catholic policy. In fact, during the Protestant Reformation, Lutheran leaders inflicted excesses and punishments similar to those that were observed during the Spanish Inquisition on their dissident subjects. In addition to the example of Christian III of Denmark, who violently forced Lutheranism on his subjects, the Lutheran princes and nobles in Germany ruthlessly suppressed the Catholic peasants who, led by Anabaptist reformers, revolted against their feudal lords. This rebellion, now known as the German Peasant’s War (1524–1525), did not have a purely economic cause. Although the peasants were mostly Catholics who merely wanted freedom from serfdom, they were being led and inspired by the reformation ideas of the Anabaptist leader, Thomas Muntzer. The German princes and lords, against whom the peasants revolted, were friends and followers of Martin Luther. These Lutherans hated and condemned the Anabaptists (See the Augsburg Confessions, Art. 9, 12, 16, and 17), and Martin Luther himself despised the peasants. What is relevant to note here is that Martin Luther admitted that the violent suppression of the revolution, which resulted in the deaths of about 100,000 rebels, was done on account of his bidding: "I, Martin Luther, smote all the peasants in their rebellion. For I commanded them to be slain; all their blood is on my head. But I put the responsibility upon our Lord God, who ordered me to say what I did." See Conversations with Luther, p. 95. This example shows that Martin Luther himself, the founder of the Protestant Reformation in Germany, had no scruples about using violence and death, if necessary, to eliminate what he regarded as evil elements in society and enemies of his faith.

In addition to the Lutheran violence described above, the Zwinglians and Anabaptists also persecuted and killed each other for holding opposite views, especially on the issue of infant Baptism. In Switzerland, Calvinists regarded death as a penalty for heresy and blasphemy, and Calvin himself requested the burning of Michael Servetus, a Spanish doctor, for denying the Trinity. In Antwerp (Belgium), Calvinists destroyed the Cathedral of Antwerp and sacked thirty other Catholic churches for teaching “heretical” doctrines. In 1560, the Scottish Parliament, inspired by the reformation ideas of John Knox, imposed Protestantism as the state religion and threatened exile and death for those who attended Mass. In Ireland, hundreds of Catholic priests were martyred and thousands more were exiled when Queen Elizabeth I of England conquered the country and tried to impose Protestantism in the land. In England itself, the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Elizabeth I, James I, Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, and their successors were marked by a series of fines, confiscation, imprisonment, banishment, torture, and death for Catholics who refused to acknowledge the English monarch as head of the Church of England. Among those who were beheaded on account of their opposition was St. Thomas More (1478–1535), who served as Chancellor of England from October 1529 to May 1532. St. Thomas More is still remembered for his famous remark, “I am the king’s good servant, but God’s first.”

The above examples show that the excesses and hostilities committed against heretics and those who held positions opposed to the State were not exclusively a Catholic phenomenon.