The 16th-century Protestant Reformation against the corruption and excesses of the Roman Catholic Church was spearheaded by a number of seminal figures, as diverse as John Calvin in Switzerland, Jan Hus in Bohemia, and Britain‘s King Henry VIII of the eight wives. But the dude who started it all and became its great powerhouse was the German Augustinian monk and theologian Martin Luther. This year Germany is pulling out all the stops to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the launching of the Reformation, when on October 31 Luther published and supposedly nailed his “95 Theses” to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenburg. That includes a yearlong series of events and exhibitions throughout the country, such as a special exhibition through early November at Berlin’s Deutsches Historische Museum called “The Luther Effect. Protestantism – 500 Years in the World” (plus products – even, would you believe, Martin Luther action figures? Gives new meaning to the term “Bible belt“). But they’re especially... keep reading