Here I Sit (I Can Do No Other)

April 18th is supposedly the day on which Luther made his immortal “Here I stand” proclamation. But few know what actually led up to this soaring declaration.

Martin Luther, patron saint of the Fart Joke, suffered from chronic constipation. (This probably accounts for his fascination with lavatory humor.)

He spent hours in the loo, praying for relief as well as revelation. It was while he was on the John that he finally understood that the just would live by faith, acquainted as he was with the futility of simply trying harder. *Luther said himself that he made his reformatory discovery 𝑖𝑛 𝑐𝑙𝑜𝑎𝑐𝑎 [Latin for "in the sewer"].

Some have suggested that he may have even written his famous “Theses” while cloistered on the can. His constipation may explain why there so many of them.

So it may well be that the instrumental cause of the Protestant Reformation was as much physiological as it was theological—namely, that Luther was full of crap. Just perhaps not in the way that his papistical detractors would have you believe.