The Protestant Reformation was the 16th-century schism within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. It was sparked by the 1517 posting of Luther's Ninety-five theses. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals, and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led to the creation of new national Protestant churches. The Reformation was precipitated by earlier events within Europe, such as the Black Death and the Western Schism—in which, over the course of almost a century, there were... at times three men claiming to be Pope simultaneously—which eroded people's faith in the Catholic Church and the Papacy which governed it. This, as well as many other factors, such as the mid 15th-century invention of the printing press, the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire, the end of the Middle Ages, and the beginning of the modern era, contributed to the creation of Protestantism.
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