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Denominations come from humans choosing to follow something other than what is taught in the Scriptures. If this is not true then there would be only one church or body as we see in the early history of the Church.
Moderator cut: off-topic
Last edited by Alpha8207; 02-15-2008 at 06:44 AM..
I proudly respond by telling them that I am Catholic. For hundreds of years Christians belonged to the One, Holy, Universal and Apostolic Church until the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century.
Most belonged, but not all. I'm not bashing your religion, but I just wanted to say that even if most belonged, and even if it was almost universal, that is not proof of being a true church. The proof would be in the fruits. It must stand up to these tests (and others): "by their fruits ye shall know them" and "by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another".
As soon as you have a point of doctrine in which you disagree with another Christian, you are in essence another denomination. My in-laws are 2x2ers, and as such would never say what denomination they were, aside from "non-denominational Christian". That told me nothing as to what they believed about things like Baptism, Justification, Sanctification, or Communion. If we want to get to the lowest common denominator of Christianity, the only actual beliefs would have to be to believe that Jesus existed. Beyond even that point, doctrinal dissent starts.
I proudly respond by telling them that I am Catholic. For hundreds of years
Christians belonged to the One, Holy, Universal and Apostolic Church until the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. Now all heck has broken loose and we have over 20,000 Christian denominations. Ouch!
I have my objections to the Catholic Church and Dogma, but that is not something I would want to go into here. Catholics are good people. So are Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons. And yet Protestants still rail against Catholics and Catholics against Protestants. Everyone seems extremely keen to attack the "fringe" denominations like Seventh Day Adventists, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses. All this bickering and quarelling between people who are supposedly followers of the man that placed "Love God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself" at the top of the list of commandments. That taught us to do good things to each other. To not respond in wrath.
Moderator cut: off-topic
My point is, maybe the world of Christendom was NOT a better place under the rulership of the the Pope and the Catholic Church. Maybe the Holy Church has been forced to start behaving itself now that there is a lot of other Churches. Maybe it was NOT a terrible mistake that the Bible got out and into the hands of everyone who could read. If the history of the Catholic Church and it's Popes was not so thoroughly riddled with corruption, blood and scandal, then in principal I'd be happy to have it be the one and only Christian Church. Then again, it wasn't ever the only one. Obviously, there was the Eastern Orthodox, Coptics, Assyrians, flavors of Gnosticism and Arianism and Nestorians in the far flung parts of the world. The Catholic Church never truly was "the unified Christian Church" for all those centuries. There was always some other part of Christianity that was not beholden to Rome.
Last edited by Alpha8207; 02-15-2008 at 06:48 AM..
denominations come from some particular point in the bible the preacher of the church has set as a foundation of the movement of that congragation. it's sort of like if I was greatly impacted by the testimony in the bible about the donkey who talked, then if I was a preacher of a church and thought this was most important in the bible for the shaping of my ministry I may call my local assembly the church of the talking ass. well the bible calls the donkey an ass. check out the story. Balaam beats his own ass about something he was at fault with. Balaam kept tryin to take his ass in a direction that he was not suppose to go. well as the bible shows, Balaam's ass got a clue long before Balaam did so how's that for revelation. Balaam was beatin his ass and his ass was talking still. talk about an ass beatin situation! you guys should really read the short but power truth of it all. Numbers 22
Tee-hee-hee
hey, to me, makes no difference what people call me, so long as God calls me His own.
or rightly called Bible Based. a tiltle I proudly wear.
Conforming to God's word, rather than conforming God to our word.... There is a substantial difference.
Every Christian church is "Bible based". Without it, they'd have no religion. It's all about the interpretation. And the more rigid churches believe they have the correct interpretation and others don't.
Every Christian church is "Bible based". Without it, they'd have no religion. It's all about the interpretation. And the more rigid churches believe they have the correct interpretation and others don't.
So then by your definition ... who decides the level ridgidity? if everyone believes they have the "correct" interpretation?
So then by your definition ... who decides the level ridgidity? if everyone believes they have the "correct" interpretation?
The pastor, bishops, pope, etc., depending on the denomination. Why would anyone go to a church they didn't agree with? People attend churches where they feel comfortable with the beliefs, which vary greatly.
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I'm not bashing your religion, but I just wanted to say that even if most belonged, and even if it was almost universal, that is not proof of being a true church. The proof would be in the fruits. It must stand up to these tests (and others): "by their fruits ye shall know them" and "by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another".
a tiltle I proudly wear.
