WI: Martin Luther killed after Diet of Worms?

What would be the results of Martin Luther being snatched after the Diet of Worms, then brought to Rome, tried for heresy, and burned at the stake? What would his followers do, and would Europe be worse off than OTL?
 
I don't think the Reformation was particularly avoidable, considering the widespread resentment of Papal actions, from Kings to peasants alike. If Martin Luther gets burnt then he's simply going to end up like Jan Hus... a precursor to the actual religious movement. Or, as mentioned above, a martyr for the cause.

The specifics of the Reformation might change... however, I'm not sure how great these differences would be since it seems pretty natural for any reformer seeking to change the prestige/power of the Pope + Catholic Church to a) deny that salvation comes because you do what Catholic Church says is good (i.e. grace through faith, not through good works) and b) to argue for vernacular preaching, Bibles, etc.

I guess a non-Martin Luther Reformation could have done away with the anti-Semitism that happened OTL, but it's not like Martin Luther was the sole cause of that phenomenon.
 
I'm going to say this before I check out Emperor Constantine's timeline, but I think one interesting possibility is that the German Peasants War may have gone differently. On one hand, the uprising was provoked by the nobility tightening the screws on the peasantry in terms of rents, feudal rights and the legal system more than it was the Reformation, so it would still happen. On the other, Martin Luther's ultimate condemnation may have had a crucial role in curbing it and preventing it from co-opting the Reformation. So one interesting (albeit unlikely, the military dimensions of this being what they are) possibility would be a longer, stronger, more durable rebellion.

Where that might get really interesting is that I think there's a tendency to idealize Muentzer and his colleagues. The societies they might create might be far from appealing.

Once again, all this is somewhat unlikely, but nonetheless this is where the prompt sent my thinking.
 
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