The students are now shown how Martin Luther’s personal faith journey evolved from being a devout Catholic to hating the vengeful God he found in the bible. He concluded that no matter how “good” he tried to be, he could never earn his way to heaven. Luther re-read St. Paul, who wrote “The just shall live by faith” (Romans 1:17). Luther had a eureka moment and began to understand that those who go to heaven will get there by faith alone – not by doing good works. In other words, God’s grace is something freely given to human beings, not something we can earn. This belief was not shared by the Catholic Church. Luther and other reformers also disagreed regarding the transubstantiation of the Eucharist. Luther thereby challenged one of the central sacraments of the Catholic Church, one of its central miracles, and thereby one of the ways that human beings can achieve grace with God, or salvation. Luther was excommunicated by Pope Leo X when he refused to recant his theses and other works at the diet of Worms. There needs to be balance in any teaching session and it is important to look at the church’s response; which was called the Counter-Reformation. The slides include information about the 1545 Council of Trent and its discussions to deal with the issues raised by Luther. This is important as it shows that the Catholic church attempted reconciliation and although many of its former practices and traditions were upheld, there was some attempt to stamp out the corruption that had in many ways led to the reformation. This and the later values of the Oxford movement are discussed. It is only then that the involvement of Henry VIII and his daughter Elizabeth are brought into the session. The influence of religion upon the political world and the wars and persecution that happened then; and is still happening today, are addressed. The Reformation was a very violent period in Europe. Each side, both Catholics and Protestants, were certain that they were in the right.>