Re: Question For Protestants
 

I think it's obvious why we believe Catholic doctrine was reformed by Luther and Calvin. That doesn't mean we think anyone has everything right or that Rome had everything wrong. I'm not a historian so I won't comment on the details of the development of the Reformation but I believe it started because Luther had serious problems with certain practices of the church. This lead to re-examination of doctrine and some significant differences between the Reformers and Rome became apparent.

But none of the Reformers have ever claimed perfection in doctrine. So different interpretations arose.

The Bible itself records differences between Christians. Paul warned about this in Corinthians. Acts tells of a major dispute between Paul and Peter. And Roman Catholics disagree among themselves all the time.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

You have not addressed the question of whether there should logically exist one true church/denomination. Read my earlier posts in this thread. And just because some abusive practices did indeed occur by immoral clerics, why would that lead to examination of doctrine?

Regarding dissenting catholics, their dissent in no way calls into question true doctrine. It just means they aren't people of integrity or they would just go join whatever protestant denomination best melds with their beliefs. I have stated before the reasons they don't do this which is they would no longer be the "progressive" darlings of the anti-religious media and would just be more protestant dissenters no longer worthy of news coverage.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

Your analogy of agnostics to ALL religions seems correct.

A caveat I would mention, though, regarding Jews to Christians is that I think Jews believe that a Messiah is to come. They just don’t believe he has yet and they don’t believe it is Jesus. Not sure if this makes any difference or not regarding the Jews to Christianity analogy.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

[ QUOTE ]
But none of the Reformers have ever claimed perfection in doctrine. So different interpretations arose.

[/ QUOTE ]

So what you are saying here is that they didn't believe the catholic church's interpretation was correct, so they went out and came up with other ones that they admitted weren't either. How can anyone possibly buy their interpretations then?

Re: Question For Protestants
 

Hey txaq007, how come you never join my protestant/catholic discussion threads? I feel rejected.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

Say what you want about the Catholic Church at the time, but Martin Luther was an equally nastly little man. He was extremely anti-Semitic, equally supported the torture and burning of witches, and didn't care a hoot about the common peasants of the land while toadying up to the nobility who protected him. Pretty much par for the course for everyone at that time, though.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

You're a man after my own heart, though out of justice and even though I am catholic, I have to acknowledge the abuses and failings of many church leaders then. But you are correct. Many protestants don't know a lot that Luther said and did, including his sanctioning of the bigamous marriage of his patron, Phillip the landgrave of Hesse.

Re: Question For Protestants
 

[ QUOTE ]
Say what you want about the Catholic Church at the time, but Martin Luther was an equally nastly little man.

[/ QUOTE ]

"You can take the boy out of Catholicism, but you can't take the Catholicism out of the boy." [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: Question For Protestants
 

"fundamental Christian doctrines." i think we all agree on the one fundamental Christian doctrine: Christ died for our sins and we can be forgiven and restore a relationship with our Creator-God if we accept that and allow our lives to be ruled and led by Christ. all other doctrine is less than fundamental.

I also don't think that Catholic doctrine concerning this one essential tenet differs.

bah, denominations are antiquated and dumb. why can't the church just be the church? can't we all just love Jesus and love other people in his name? do we have to have a name for it and a board of elders to decide on things like infant baptism and the church's stance on XXXXXX doctrine?

Re: Question For Protestants
 

Read this other thread I started.

What You Protestants Don't Seem To Get