The Pope Is Not The Anti-Christ

I, along with 99.9% of my fellow Lutherans, do not believe the Pope is the anti-christ.

I mention this because of the recent press regarding Michele Bachmann, a congressional candidate from Minnesota.

According to her website, Bachmann attends Salem Lutheran
Church in Stillwater, Minnesota. This congregation belongs to the
Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS), one of the most right-wing
Lutheran denominations. Not to be confused with the Evangelical
Lutheran Church of America or the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, WELS
broke with its denominational brethren because it felt they were
abandoning core biblical principles and doctrine.

So where does this belief that the Pope is the anti-christ come from? Into the way-back machine to the early 16th century…Pope Julius II
was far more interested in waging war against the Venetians to expand
his worldly empire than in tending to the spiritual realm of Roman
Catholicism. Pope Leo X,
who succeeded Julius, spent lavishly on the arts and St. Peter's
Basilica. He issued indulgences to raise funds for his various
projects, and when Martin Luther objected on theological grounds, he
excommunicated him and put out a bounty for him, dead or alive. Some of
Luther's followers were burned at the stake as heretics, a fate Luther
escaped only through the protection of Elector Frederick. The
reformation led to the Schmalkald War between Lutherans and Catholics,
and later, the Thirty Years War which led to the deaths of perhaps 15% to 20% of the German population.

Looking at all this through 16th century eyes, it's easy to see how the
early Lutherans would consider the Pope as the anti-christ. Looking at
this from the 21st century, this is obviously untrue.

The Roman Catholic church reformed itself from within, as the Reformation was pushing for change from without. The Council of Trent
put an end to some of the worst corruption of the church hierarchy.
Over time the Pope became strictly a religous leader, not a worldly
one. The Catholic church's theology regarding justification by faith,
the main theological controversy of the Reformation, also evolved. In
1999, the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church signed the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, reconciling their views on justification by faith.

Every religion seems to have its fundamentalists, and the Wisconsin
Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) is the fundamentalist sect of
American Lutheranism. They seem to be stuck in the 16th century. While
the rest of Lutheranism around the world and in the U.S. saw the
doctrine of Pope-as-Antichrist as an anachronism that does harm to the
body of Christ, the WELS has stuck to this view as though it were, well, gospel.

(Cross-posted from I am a Christian Too .)

The Pope is Not the Anti-Christ