Has the Reformation petered out?

Twenty years ago, Mark Noll and Carolyn Nystrom published a book entitled Is the Reformation Over? in which they made the case that doctrinal differences between Roman Catholics and Protestants were less sharp than they had ever been.

For example, they cited a 1996 Angus Ried poll that defined “evangelical” as anyone agreeing with the following four statements: (1) “the Bible is the inspired Word of God and is to be taken literally”; (2) “I have committed my life to Christ and consider myself to be a converted Christian; (3) “it is important to encourage non-Christians to become Christians; and (4) “through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, God provided a way for the forgiveness of my sins.” The poll found that 34% of Canadian Roman Catholics agreed with three out of four of these statements and 11% labelled themselves as “evangelicals.” Noll and Nystrom argued that many Roman Catholics are now evangelicals and so the Reformation divisions are breaking down.

What do we make of such an argument?

First of all, the thin definition of “evangelical” makes it impossible to equate “Protestant” with “Evangelical.” Evangelicals, as defined here, may or may not be classical Protestants. What the research (and, granted, the one poll I have cited is just one of many data points), shows is that those in traditions stemming from the Reformation have some important overlapping beliefs with many in the Roman Catholic Church. But this situation has been the case ever since the first generation of the Reformation. John Calvin recognized that there were many true believers in the Roman Church, and his battle was to reform structures so that the Word could be preached freely, sound doctrine could flourish, and the sacraments could be rightly administered.

If we want to judge the health of Protestantism on this Reformation Day 2025, we need to look at the doctrine, stability, and influence of the Protestant churches. In our secular, free church dominated era it is easy to forget that the 16th century Reformation was both a religious revival and a political restructuring at the same time. At the heart of the Reformers’ work was the eviction of Rome’s authority from a city or state so that the doctrinal reforms could be implemented and not crushed by the government. The goal was the reform of the church and also the spiritual and moral reform of society as a whole. To judge the health of the Reformation as a continuing movement today it is therefore necessary to evaluate the degree to which the Protestant churches are influencing the wider society for Christ.

Judged by that criterion, the verdict must be that Protestantism is very weak and ineffectual. If we wish to be brutally honest, over the past 400 years the Reformation has largely petered out. During the 20th century the Protestant churches of the United States and Canada gradually gave up their doctrinal heritage and embraced heresy after heresy. Gnostic views of human nature that see matter as evil and in need of being overcome or changed in essence by an act of will proliferate in Protestantism.

The idea of human nature as a good creation of God being reflected in the male and female body has been replaced by a confusing cacophony of doctrines including androgyny, transgenderism, and the denial of the essential complementarity of the sexes. The doctrine of personal eschatology has been replaced by an almost exclusive focus on salvation as making this life better in economic or therapeutic terms. The idea of the law of God as good and holy has been rejected and the autonomous individual is seen as the source of all value, including moral values.

Contemporary Protestantism has failed to pass on the tradition of teaching from the apostles faithfully. Its relation to the ecumenical creeds is tenuous. Its rejection of the post-Reformation confessions is nearly complete. Its revisionism trumps Biblical teaching. Historically, Evangelicalism has been a revival movement intended to invigorate and strengthen Protestantism, and its success should be calculated by the degree to which it leads to faithful, doctrinally pure, influential Protestant churches. Judged in that way, Evangelicalism must be regarded as sadly ineffectual today.

Reformation Day should remind us that the goal of the Reformation was not to snatch a few individuals from the fires of judgment here and there but to reform the Church and make it strong, faithful, and influential. We need to be reminded of this goal, and to the extent that celebrating Reformation Day does so it is of great importance. It is an occasion for imploring Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Church, to manifest himself among us in judgment and salvation.