One of the most disruptive events in the history of the world will celebrate its 500th anniversary on October 31.
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Ballarat’s St John’s Lutheran Church might be a small community, but the Reformation movement that stated it 500 years ago also irrevocably changed the world.
On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther sent his 95 theses to the Archbishop of Mainz, challenging the Catholic church over its use of indulgences to raise money in Europe.
Church representatives would issue certificates in return for money to forgive people for their sins.
St John’s pastor Rev Adrian Kramer said the Reformation was still relevant to Christian’s today.
“Luther saw the behaviour and teaching of the church did not align with the teachings of God,” he said.
“He didn’t want anything new, he wanted reform.
“Our culture is always changing, our culture is always trying to influence the church.
“We live in the world, we are influenced by it and we need to check, have we wandered off track?’”
St John’s congregation has already marked the 500th anniversary of the Reformation with a special mass on Sunday.
The church’s musicians will also attend more celebrations in Hamilton in the coming week, ahead of October 31.
Although the rise of Lutheranism started with the 95 theses being nailed to the All Saints Church in Germany, it has led to hundreds of new Protestant churches.
The path to building St John’s was started when two pastors visited the Ballarat in 1855 to minister to about 2000 German people living there.
A church was first opened on north of the current one in July, 1880.
The current church was then built as the original started to deteriorate and was opened in March, 1876.
Rev Kramer said although the church celebrated the reformation every year, 2017 was marked with dedications to Martin Luther.
“We used all Martin Luther hymns, because we don’t always do that, and all our musicians participated,” he said.