An Honest Question

[Ann M]

In a thread over at General Theology @@Paul@@ said "Well 'Baptists' can trace their lineage back through the "Donatists" and the "Monatists".---------- Heretical yes,,, but no different than we are labeled now." and I just wish to understand how this works.

I have encountered a similar thought to this before but when I asked my Baptist Pastor about it he said that it was not correct and the Baptists were a Wesleyan Group. Could anyone please help.

Thank you Ann M.

 

[TexasCatholic]

In a thread over at General Theology @@Paul@@ said "Well 'Baptists' can trace their lineage back through the "Donatists" and the "Monatists".---------- Heretical yes,,, but no different than we are labeled now." and I just wish to understand how this works.

I have encountered a similar thought to this before but when I asked my Baptist Pastor about it he said that it was not correct and the Baptists were a Wesleyan Group. Could anyone please help.

Thank you Ann M.

Hmm. Baptists are not a Wesleyan group. However, the theory of tracing modern Baptist history back to the early church is shaky. However, there HAVE always been people who in some way shared the spirit of the Baptists, but there is not a direct lineage. Perhaps we are connected in the spirit of our worship and belief, but not in lineage.

This is a very interesting discussion though. If you want to read more about the idea behind this, you should read the "Trail of Blood" at this address:

http://www.independencebaptist.org/trail_of_blood.htm

I guess the idea that what Baptists believe is not entirely new ("new" relatively speaking) is true. Christians who didn't fit into the framework of the Roman Catholic Church have received persecution from the early times to present. Thankfully the bloodshed has stopped in the modern age (at least between Christians -- as far as I know).

The Catholic Church would probably like to make all Catholics believe that there was always Christian unity up until the Reformation. If nothing else, there is significant evidence that this is NOT true. There have always been those who were believers, but did not believe in the Catholic Church.

The good thing is that we no longer get tortured or massacred for that belief.

-James

 

[@@Paul@@]

In a thread over at General Theology @@Paul@@ said "Well 'Baptists' can trace their lineage back through the "Donatists" and the "Monatists".---------- Heretical yes,,, but no different than we are labeled now." and I just wish to understand how this works.

I have encountered a similar thought to this before but when I asked my Baptist Pastor about it he said that it was not correct and the Baptists were a Wesleyan Group. Could anyone please help.

Thank you Ann M.

Lineage may have been a strong word...

Baptists can trace their "lineage" through the reformation... what they beleive can be traced back at least to the Montanists....

If you're really interested, i'll see what i can put together.. should take a while, but i have been wanting to do it.