Cuius regio, eius religio
[2] The principle of "cuius regio" was a compromise in the conflict between this paradigm of statecraft and the emerging trend toward religious pluralism (coexistence within a single territory) developing throughout the German-speaking lands of the Holy Roman Empire.
Chief figures during the later period, prominently being John Hus and Martin Luther, at first called for the reform of the Catholic Church, but not necessarily a rejection of the faith per se.
The new Protestant theology galvanized social action in the German Peasants' War (1524–1526), which was brutally repressed and the popular political and religious movement crushed.
Despite these efforts, and the cooperation of Charles V, rapprochement of the Protestants with Catholicism foundered on different concepts of ecclesiology and the principle of justification.
[5] In the same year, the Schmalkaldic League called its own council, and posited several precepts of faith; Luther was present, but too ill to attend the meetings.
This effort succeeded in alienating Protestant and Catholic princes and the Curia; even Charles, whose decree it was, was unhappy with the political and diplomatic dimensions of what amounted to half of a religious settlement.
He himself did not attend, and delegated authority to his brother, Ferdinand, to "act and settle" disputes of territory, religion and local power.
Those inhabitants who could not conform to the prince's religion were allowed to leave, an innovative idea in the 16th century; this principle was discussed at length by the various delegates, who finally reached agreement on the specifics of its wording after examining the problem and the proposed solution.
Cuius regio, eius religio went against earlier Catholic teaching, which held that the kings should faithfully obey the pope.
First, Ferdinand had rushed the article on ecclesiastical reservation through the debate; it had not undergone the scrutiny and discussion that attended the acceptance of Cuius regio, eius religio.
Perhaps the greatest weakness of the Peace of Augsburg was its failure to take into account the growing diversity of religious expression emerging in the so-called evangelical and reformed traditions.
Tolerance was not officially extended to Calvinists until the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, and most Anabaptists eventually relocated east to Transylvania, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Ottoman Empire, or Russia, west to England and the New World or were martyred.
The Electors of Brandenburg already tolerated Catholicism in Ducal Prussia, which lay outside the borders of the Holy Roman Empire and was held in fief to the King of Poland.
[16]: 241 No agreement had been reached on the question of whether Catholic bishops and abbots who became Lutheran should lose their offices and incomes until Peace of Augsburg under the reservatum ecclesiasticum clause.
He was able to officially change his lands to the Lutheran faith and convert his ecclesiastical position as Grand Master of the Order into a secular duchy.
When Archbishop-Elector of Cologne, Gebhard Truchsess von Waldburg converted to the Reformed faith, he thought he could do the same, despite the terms of the Peace of Augsburg.
The Reformation brought the medieval unity to an end and replaced it with the Augsburg formula of religious compromise, cuius regio eius religio.
