Question For Protestants

[BluffTHIS!]

How can all you protestants logically believe that the Reformation reformed Christian doctrine and worship that had become false and defective under the Catholic Church when there are so many different protestant denominations that espouse so many different beliefs/interpretations about various fundamental points of doctrine? Note that I am only referring to doctrine and worship and not about abuses, corruption and immoral practices of some Catholics including clerics, bishops and popes. And you need only examine conflicting doctrines preached by Luther and Calvin to see how early such disagreements arose.

[siegfriedandroy]

Bluff, let me answer your question with a question (zoolander!)

-Does rampant disagreement and widespread dissension among a certain group necessarily determine that no one within the group is correct?

[BluffTHIS!]

I am talking here about different protestant groups that all say they are the result of the reformation but have differing views on fundamental Christian doctrines. The logical implication to my mind is that they all are in error to some greater or lesser degree, and thus the resulting doctrines and worship practices of each all contain significant error and thus cannot really be reformed themselves, or that precisely one of them is correct. If they say that there doesn't have to be one demonmination that is entirely true, then they are saying that Jesus doesn't care how his teachings are intrepreted, including those relating to salvation.

[siegfriedandroy]

You are incorrect to assume that they are all wrong b/c disagreement exists. That in no way follows logically. I would wager that none of the Christian groups that exist today perfectly believe exactly and precisely all of the same things that Peter, Paul and company believed. In fact, Im sure the disciples themselves disputed many issues themselves. Does this mean none of them were correct?

Two problems I can see with your statement:

1. The same argument can be applied by the Jewish religion against ALL christianity.

2. A revolt does not mean that the original party was correct. Far from it. Listen very carefully to this so you understand it. The Church they revolted against is the SAME Catholic Church that once killed and persecuted people for saying the Earth was round, when the bible clearly showed it was flat. And drowned/burnt women at the stake because they were witches (God would save them if they weren't). Who killed women for sleeping with men out of wedlock because they were succubus (or something - devil incarnate).

Is it possible that some of their doctrine, and interpretations of the bible, were innacurate? (It's a pretty big thing to kill people for disagreeing with you in spite of the bible saying THOU SHALT NOT KILL)
Accepting that, why can't some of the revolters have it MORE correct than the original Catholic Church?

[BluffTHIS!]

Both of the two posts above do not notice my use of the qualification "or precisely one of them is correct", and the arguement for why their can only be one true denomination either among them or in the Catholic Church. The same applies to the Jewish position regarding Christian denominations - either Judaism is totally correct, or only one Christian denomination is. What isn't logical, is for their to be no true church that is entirely correct, because otherwise God doesn't care whether His message is intrepreted correctly or not.

[KidPokerX]

[ QUOTE ]
How can all you protestants logically believe that the Reformation reformed Christian doctrine and worship that had become false and defective under the Catholic Church when there are so many different protestant denominations that espouse so many different beliefs/interpretations about various fundamental points of doctrine?

[/ QUOTE ]

ughm ... sounds a little runny.

[ QUOTE ]
The same applies to the Jewish position regarding Christian denominations - either Judaism is totally correct, or only one Christian denomination is.

[/ QUOTE ]
No necessarily. They can have versions that are closer to or further away from the truth. I don't see the logic of having one completely accurate religion:

[ QUOTE ]
What isn't logical, is for their to be no true church that is entirely correct, because otherwise God doesn't care whether His message is intrepreted correctly or not

[/ QUOTE ]
Given the vast number of different religions in the world, and the fact Catholics only comprise 1/5 of the world's people, it would indeed seem that God doesn't care if his message is interpreted correctly.

We have already established that Catholics have no credibility with regard to interpretation of scripture (history clearly shows this). So God hasn't chosen to inspire Catholics to get the correct message. If not them, then who?

And the final point is, if God wanted to communicate his message accurately, he would have made sure that a clear, inerrant bible was written without clear contradictions. A lot of human suffering would have been avoided, that's for sure. And maybe less people would have gone to hell.

[David Sklansky]

"Two problems I can see with your statement:

1. The same argument can be applied by the Jewish religion against ALL christianity."

But why is that a problem? BluffTHIS's point is in fact very valid. Even though it leads to this. But that doesn't mean that Jews should take heart. Because the same argument can be applied by agnostics against ALL religions.

[BluffTHIS!]

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Given the vast number of different religions in the world, and the fact Catholics only comprise 1/5 of the world's people, it would indeed seem that God doesn't care if his message is interpreted correctly.

[/ QUOTE ]

You are missing the difference between God caring that His messaged is preached and thus intrepreted correctly by at least one church, and His allowing through free will for various denominations to exist.