✊ June 15, Arise, O Lord —, 1520

🧈 The Butter Letter

In the Middle Ages, canon law forbade not only meat but also dairy—milk, butter, cheese—during Lent. Unlike southern Europe, rich in olive oil, Germany, where the olive did not grow, depended on butter as an essential source of fat. To eat butter, Germans had to pay the Roman Curia for a "butter letter" (Butterbrief).

Martin Luther condemned this system.

"Why must we pay Rome to eat the good butter of our own land? Do not turn the freedom God gave us into a means of profit."

His reasoning won the hearts of the German people.

🔥 June 15, 1520, the Bull

Luther's criticism turned toward indulgences and the authority of the pope. The Ninety-five Theses he posted on the door of the Wittenberg church in 1517 spread across Europe by way of the printing press.

On June 15, 1520, Pope Leo X issued the bull Exsurge Domine ("Arise, O Lord"). It condemned forty-one propositions drawn from Luther's writings as heresy, and gave notice that he would be excommunicated unless he recanted within sixty days. Luther's books were to be burned, and anyone who held them faced excommunication as well.

✊ December 10, 1520, Burning the Bull

Luther did not recant. On December 10, 1520, the sixtieth day, he burned the bull together with books of canon law before the Elster Gate in Wittenberg. With this, the break between Luther and Rome became irreversible.

⛓️ January 3, 1521, Excommunication

On January 3, 1521, Martin Luther—priest, professor, and district vicar of the monasteries—was finally excommunicated by Pope Leo X.

Four months later, at the Diet of Worms, he again refused to recant.

💍 Marriage

Four years later, in 1525, Luther married Katharina von Bora, a nun he had helped escape from her convent. It was a marriage that defied the canon law requiring the celibacy of the clergy.