By the early sixteenth century, the call to conversion had moved in other and more radical directions, resulting initially in renewed personal spiritual commitment at odds with the Catholic Church and then moving to outright schism and a change of institutional commitment. Reformers such as Martin Luther and John Calvin experienced new and profound reorientations through their focus on the Bible and its teaching of salvation by faith alone, by grace alone, and through Christ alone. Anabaptists such as Menno Simons embraced these basic teachings but also placed emphasis on conversion (the “new birth”) as a life of discipleship. The reformers’ success in transmitting a thoroughgoing change of heart and mind to the populace, however, had mixed results. Political resistance, spiritual indifference, theological polemics, Catholic intransigence, and the persistence of ancient magic lore and occult practices ensured that the wholesale reformation of Europe, even in Protestant-controlled areas, would never become a reality.
Remembrance of Jews in contemporary catholic homilies