Martin Luther never denied purgatory in his 95 thesis.
He maintained a belief in infant baptism.
Luther never denied papal indulgences, he merely said that they should be preached with caution.
Luther defended the papacy in his 95 thesis. If one would read carefully all the tenets of the 95 thesis they would see that Luther never came against the papacy, he merely criticized certain aspects of the evil priests who were corrupt.
Most of the people who love and quote Luther have disinformation about him, elevating his act of placing the 95 thesis on the door of the Vatican as though it were something unusual.
There was a practice in Luther's day of placing documents to the door to spark debate and make points of doctrine. Luther was not doing anything unusual or heroic in this act of placing the thesis, he was merely using a means that many others had used.
We get into a troubling area when we begin to elevate a man above God. Every man has flaws and every man who is elevated seems to have their flaws dismissed as unimportant or ignored completely merely because we like something good we thought they did.
I say "thought they did" because over time, just like gossip, the story changes so that the truth is obscured by emotional hype. Whenever we look to a man for our truth, pretending they are perfect in order to maintain our idol and good feelings, we are place that person above God.
We can either admit wrong and right about a person, or we must ignore the wrong to move into an area of worship of man. If we can only see the wrong in someone, then we have a prejudice, deliberately ignoring the right in them.
When we can admit openly the wrong and the right of anyone we meet, then we are seeing things truthfully. God wants us to remember, "let God be true and EVERY man a liar."
Those who become angry at criticism about their favorite preacher have developed an idol in their own minds. We must stop elevating people and begin to elevate only Christ.
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