Why I'm discontent with my Protestantism

[ripple the car]

Bless you, Meg! Hapoy Easter! This is basically how I feel, too. My final thoughts are along the lines of "there are great Christians everywhere, but if you have the chance to come Home, come Home".

A slow and careful reading of early Christian history leads many, many souls back Home.

 

[Mary Meg]

There is a lot more to Protestantism than the. Baptists.

THere’s the Calvinist block
The Lutheran block
The Zwinglian block
THe Anglican/‘Methodist block

All have their distinctives.

Yes... I know that. I know most about the Calvinists by osmosis but am maybe not getting a full picture. From what I read, Zwingli maybe had a good bit of influence on Baptists and Evangelicals in general -- he was the first one to really say that Baptism and the Lord's Supper were symbols. I'd like to learn more about all of them.

 

[Mary Meg]

Your discontent might push you to investigate apostolic Christianity, but do not join up until you have multiple positive reasons to do so, which I see you forming even now, and your discontent is no longer one of the reasons to join. There are great reasons to become an apostolic Christian, so that should be easy enough for you to get there. Don't join out of discontent with where you are. When you can treat it as a positive stepping stone in your journey, then you will be ready.

Thanks so much for the support and the advice.

 

[Mary Meg]

There are and always have been believers with zero relationship to Rome, neither RCC or Protestant.

What would you put in this category?

I tend to think (since I apparently like putting things in boxes), that a church that sprang up in the Protestant world of western Europe or America, is probably "Protestant" by tradition, whether it ever had any formal association with Rome at all. Baptists technically sprang up after the main thrust of the Reformation was over and were never formally part of the Catholic Church, but they still were following in the Protestant tradition with Protestant assumptions.

 

[Mary Meg]

Have you looked a step back from the faithful ministers who came to Alabama? Also, please clarify what you mean by opening a book and seeing everything, and seeing emptiness. And if you could, let us know what book. There's plenty of books out there, perhaps another one or five will fill it in.

Well, emptiness: I named the two or three historical points I had on my timeline growing up. 1,500-year and then 300-year gaps between events is an awful lot of nothing on my screen.

And, everything: opening a history book and seeing all the other things that happened in those long gaps. It's like opening my eyes and seeing the stars for the first time. Why isn't this important to anybody else?

I used the two-volume Church History by Everett Ferguson and John D. Woodbridge for Church history. I also did Western Civilization by Jackson Spielvogel.

And there are other views than Calvinism and Arminianism that are orthodox within Protestantism pushed by some very smart people (Dr. William Lane Craig being a famous and easy example of one). Furthermore, no matter what church tradition anyone comes from - Lutheran, Baptist, Anglican, Pentecostal, Catholic, Orthodox - they leave some room for divine mystery. Sometimes, that's the best thing to do.

Yes, I know, that's just what I've been exposed to personally.

While non-Protestants may appeal to Tradition, remember that the New Testament records Tradition as it was in the first century. Whatever we do must not contradict or displace it.

Yes, but if you read my other post, that can be problematic. The New Testament leaves a lot of gaps that need to be filled in with assumptions, and depending on what tradition you draw your assumptions from, another tradition may appear to contradict it, or not.

Cyril of Alexandria is an ugly example

What was wrong with Cyril of Alexandria?

They were brutal times with the relationship of politics and religion, no matter who committed the offenses.

Yes, brutal.

 

[ripple the car]

And, everything: opening a history book and seeing all the other things that happened in those long gaps. It's like opening my eyes and seeing the stars for the first time. Why isn't this important to anybody else?

I hear what you're saying. It's important to me, too. It should be important to all of us.

 

[Mary Meg]

It seems to me that you think you bear the "guilt" of European reformation wars, even of some not so polite letters from reformers, their struggles about new/rediscovered biblical theology and on the other hand being in quite disconnected small american baptist church that is not teaching any theology at all.

I tend to think all Christians have to bear that guilt to some extent.

Reformation was necessary. If you like history, you know what the Catholic church was doing and teaching in the medieval era.

Yes, I know there was corruption, and reform was necessary. But why was division and murder and war necessary?

Now, when the reformation gave you the freedom, you can use it for your own path in Christianity, freely and without a fear about life. You would not have this freedom without these European wars between Christians.

What I really want to do is follow's Jesus's path.

There is no evil that is not needed for a higher good.

Really? Evil in the pursuit of good? "The ends justify the means"? I have a really hard time with that. What happened to "do unto others as you would have them do unto you"?

"Sola Scriptura" is a historical concept, needed to get freedom from spoiled and greedy bishops, mainly the Roman ones. It does not mean you cannot get any good information from elsewhere.

It's not a concept that I've encountered in history... unless you mean it's historical in the context of the Reformation.

Also, you must realize that history is not "what should be all the time". Its just "what was". We are making the history for somebody else in the future. The fact that Ignatios or Ireneus wrote something does not mean it must be so also today, in a very different situation we have now. They did not live in a situation where the mainstream Christianity got so spoiled, greedy and worldly as in the medieval era.

No, but I would like to follow the model Jesus set up for His Church as closely as possible.

 

[Mary Meg]

Welcome, Mary. I have been praying that you will come through this time of questioning with your faith in Jesus as the only hope of mankind intact. Whether you remain Baptist, or come to identify with another Protestant group, Catholicism, or an Orthodox church is a minor issue by comparison.

Thank you so much!

I would encourage you to read about the Waldensians and the Anabaptists. Some Baptists claim their faith came from these groups, not from the movements started by Luther and Calvin. Certainly the ideas did influence early Baptists, but the early Baptist founders were more likely Protestants before they accepted these "strange" ideas like believer's baptism and non-violence.

You're right, I really don't know anything about those. I will check them out!

 

[Sanoy]

I'm not concerned about what section of the body you belong to as long you are being fed, and you are growing. So I'll just ask a few questions. Do you go for apostolic leadership because you know they have been given authority? Or do you go for apostolic leadership because it removes the responsibility from you to search out the truth and deal with the weight of something not certain?

 

[Mary Meg]

Much of this 'praise and worship' music you hear on the radio is Protestant. But then Matt Maher is Catholic. And you can tell by listening closely to his music.

Really? I had no idea. I do like him a lot... and you're right, there is something different than others.

And other Catholics make this kind of music too, but don't always get time on Protestant radio stations. Sometimes but not commonly.

Very interesting!

Catholics have a lot of music over the years. We have chant, which was basically inherited from Judaism. We invented four part vocal music (polyphony) at Notre Dame Cathedral soon after it was built. Invented the pipe organ. Mozart and Schubert and Haydn works are still used in worship, as is music by William Byrd and Tallis and Tomás Luis de Victoria and Gregorio Allegri, oh, and Palistrina.

Yes! I love classical music and have really loved hearing Masses and other Christian works by classical composers.

Then there are hymns, there is even guitar music. We had a classical guitar something or other last night at the Easter Vigil and it was beautiful, but normally we have voice, organ, occasionally some brass or woodwinds, once a harp. No drums, no synthesizer, oboe but no sax yet.

That's very cool!

For the most part the 'praise and worship' genre seems fine, yet is likely not going to make a major intrusion into Catholic corporate worship. It has it's place in the life of a Catholic but we have not used any of it for worship in my parish. With a good pipe organ and a superb organist and a rich historical treasury of music, why bother?

Ha, I love me some organ too!

Oh, and this one was stolen from the Anglicans. At least the melody and the translation. The words come from a 14th century Latin hymn 'Surrexit Christus hodie":

Oh, I like that!

Thanks very much!

 

[Tone]

Happy Easter! He is Risen!

If you've been following my other musings the past couple days, you probably know a little of what I'm going through... how I'm questioning my Protestant heritage, and struggling with how to read Church history and remain a Protestant. If you're new to me, hi -- a little about me: I was raised in a small, conservative Southern Baptist church where my family has a long tradition. I love my church, because I love my family, but I've made the mistake, maybe, of reading too much history, and now I'm having some serious questions about Protestantism. You may all think I'm really down on Protestantism, but I'm really not. So I wanted to make this post to try to give a more balanced picture of where I'm at. (This proved to be longer than I expected, so at risk of ending up with unbalanced audiences, I may wait until another post to tell in detail why I feel drawn to more apostolic forms of faith.)

What I love about Protestantism (by which I mean my Baptist Evangelicalism)

• The simplicity. Honestly, reading about Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Lutheranism, even Calvinism -- it's really complicated! A lot of hard, confusing, and even troubling things. Growing up I can just open my Bible and read and understand (though often, when I don't understand, my eyes just glaze over and I say, "Okay, God") ... and go to church and love one another and live my faith and everything is fine. All I have to do is have faith ... no other expectations really.
• The worship. I go to a little tiny church, with traditional worship, but I love our hymns and singing together. But I also, just recently, am getting to contemporary worship music on Internet radio, like Chris Tomlin and Crowder and Matt Maher and Jeremy Camp and Bethel Music and Hillsong. And it seems like that's a mostly Protestant thing?
• My own history. I complain sometimes about the history of the Protestant Reformation (which I'll do more below), but my own history is something I love. It's the history of how faithful pioneers came to the hills of North Alabama and founded a church. There are a lot of regaling tales of early ministers, early church minutes to peruse, and especially my own family history -- the histories of my church and my family are largely intertwined for like 6 or 7 generations.
• The people. I love the people -- because they are my family, my friends, my loved ones.
• The belonging. Because this is my church, I am her daughter -- I belong and am accepted and have a place. I can minister (I teach V.B.S., among other things) and really feel I am serving.

What I don't like about [my] Protestantism (or, why I'm having problems)
Over the past few years, as I've gotten deep in studying Church history and theology and languages and read a lot on my own, I've gradually grown more discontent. This lays out my basic problems.

• Lack of historical foundation. This may be more a problem of my own upbringing than of Protestantism in general, I don't know -- but I feel disconnected from history. Before I started high school, I knew almost nothing about the history of Christianity. Just Bible stories, then BAM! Martin Luther is nailing something to the door! And POW! The church comes to Alabama! There were anecdotes scattered here and there in sermons about "great Christians"... Luther, Calvin, Spurgeon, maybe a few others... but these were disconnected dots on a blank sea. And I really didn't realize how empty it was, until I opened a book and saw everything that was there.
• Lack of theological rigor. Growing up, I don't think I ever heard the word theology. My Church taught the Bible and the Bible alone, just the Gospel and that's all. I didn't understand until much later (I was homeschooled and didn't have any friends outside my immediate community until high school) that there is more than one way of understanding the Bible and the Gospel. At first I was floored. Then I started studying theology and languages, and the idea that different people could have different interpretations made more sense. I discovered that my church lives in a sort of quasi-Calvinist-Armenian limbo. Preachers can appeal to either, but avoid the objectionable points of both. But the bottom line is, there's no rigor. Our theology is a wet noodle. And maybe that's okay? But it feels very intellectually unsatisfying.
• Fascination with the Early Church. As I said previously, when I read the New Testament growing up, it was mostly with a confirmation bias, seeing in it a vision of my own church experience. It wasn't until I started reading excerpts of the Church Fathers that I started to get the feeling that this doesn't actually look anything like my church. And let's not get distracted by arguments about sola scriptura or relying on Scripture -- it really doesn't. Whether you believe this is because the post-Apostolic Church quickly fell away from the truth of the faith, or because our modern tradition is just a really long way from the second century -- it really doesn't.
  
  What I admire about the Early Church is more than just the visible things like the liturgy, the way they have church (which you can see in early writers like the Didache and Justin Martyr) -- it's an overall feeling. In our modern Christianity -- especially once you get outside the walls of my little church -- there's a lot of disagreement about faith and practice, what to believe and do; a lot of argument about interpretation of Scripture; a lot of divisions and numerous different denominations. And that's just not what I see in the Early Church. Sure, eventually there were doctrinal questions and crises and schisms, and even in the second century there were heresies -- but to the orthodox faith (and yes, I think that's something that can be objectively seen, not just something that is decided by the victor), there was unity and certainty. These people were sure in what they had been taught, by people who knew or had been taught by the Apostles. And when there was a controversy with these heretics (I'm reading Ignatius and Irenaeus here), they didn't appeal to "Scripture alone" and argument over interpretation, they appealed first to the authority of the bishop, and his agreement with every other bishop in what had been received from the Apostles.
  
  And all of this is getting long, but it's just to say that I admire that certainty of orthodoxy.
• Disillusionment with the Protestant Reformation. And I got to the Protestant Reformation in history, and rather than finding the glorious scenes of Martin Luther rediscovering the true Gospel from corruption and restoring the true faith, I was appalled. I had grown to like the Catholic Church, with all the popes and monks and saints -- not that I necessarily agreed with it, but I liked it. So I was disappointed, first, that things in that were becoming corrupted. But it still seemed like a good thing that could be fixed, right? Of course I knew that wasn't where it was going...
  
  And then the Reformation very quickly got ugly. Luther calling the pope "antichrist," everybody writing nasty letters to each other, revolts and people getting killed... And then everybody else starts jumping on board, and it seems like a free-for-all, and political opportunism in a lot of cases more than anything else... And before long, anybody with a beef against the Catholic Church, for any reason, is breaking away and grinding their own axe... And then martyrdoms (murders) on both sides, and wars... Christians killing Christians... And this is not a glorious picture at all.
  
  And I just think, again and again, to Jesus's prayer "that we all might be One" (John 17:21). And I just think none of this is what Jesus wanted at all.

So this is really long, sorry about that, and more emotional than I really meant for it to be. But this is my heart. Go easy on me, ok?

I like your journey so far and I can relate! I would encourage you to continue to go back further,to the true foundation. Two things to consider:

1. The "Church" (called out ones) are way back in the "Old Testament".

2. The Apostles are the "little branches" that sprouted forth and led to all subsequent growth. They are inextricably connected with all that came before (Torah) and this is the Seed that they preserved for us, that we may bear fruit.

I would submit to you that you have been successful at tracing your roots back to a couple of great splits, but I encourage you to go further still...past the "church fathers", unto your Hebrew roots!

 

[Mary Meg]

Do you go for apostolic leadership because you know they have been given authority? Or do you go for apostolic leadership because it removes the responsibility from you to search out the truth and deal with the weight of something not certain?

I don't really know how to answer that... I don't really think I'm going for anything right now.

 

[Tone]

When you go back far enough, you'll find there is nothing left to protest...

 

[peregrinus2017]

Mary Meg,

He is risen indeed!

I have been down the road of Christian history. The further back I went the more right it seemed, and the more it answered the many seeming contradictions I found in the church around me. I am now a catechumen in the Orthodox Church. While I would not have the audacity to say that everyone else is all wrong, or that the Orthodox Church on Earth is perfect, in Orthodoxy I find the fullness of Christs Church, and a better understanding of my relationship both with God and man.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

Happy Easter! He is Risen!

If you've been following my other musings the past couple days, you probably know a little of what I'm going through... how I'm questioning my Protestant heritage, and struggling with how to read Church history and remain a Protestant. If you're new to me, hi -- a little about me: I was raised in a small, conservative Southern Baptist church where my family has a long tradition. I love my church, because I love my family, but I've made the mistake, maybe, of reading too much history, and now I'm having some serious questions about Protestantism. You may all think I'm really down on Protestantism, but I'm really not. So I wanted to make this post to try to give a more balanced picture of where I'm at. (This proved to be longer than I expected, so at risk of ending up with unbalanced audiences, I may wait until another post to tell in detail why I feel drawn to more apostolic forms of faith.)

What I love about Protestantism (by which I mean my Baptist Evangelicalism)

• The simplicity. Honestly, reading about Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Lutheranism, even Calvinism -- it's really complicated! A lot of hard, confusing, and even troubling things. Growing up I can just open my Bible and read and understand (though often, when I don't understand, my eyes just glaze over and I say, "Okay, God") ... and go to church and love one another and live my faith and everything is fine. All I have to do is have faith ... no other expectations really.
• The worship. I go to a little tiny church, with traditional worship, but I love our hymns and singing together. But I also, just recently, am getting to contemporary worship music on Internet radio, like Chris Tomlin and Crowder and Matt Maher and Jeremy Camp and Bethel Music and Hillsong. And it seems like that's a mostly Protestant thing?
• My own history. I complain sometimes about the history of the Protestant Reformation (which I'll do more below), but my own history is something I love. It's the history of how faithful pioneers came to the hills of North Alabama and founded a church. There are a lot of regaling tales of early ministers, early church minutes to peruse, and especially my own family history -- the histories of my church and my family are largely intertwined for like 6 or 7 generations.
• The people. I love the people -- because they are my family, my friends, my loved ones.
• The belonging. Because this is my church, I am her daughter -- I belong and am accepted and have a place. I can minister (I teach V.B.S., among other things) and really feel I am serving.

What I don't like about [my] Protestantism (or, why I'm having problems)
Over the past few years, as I've gotten deep in studying Church history and theology and languages and read a lot on my own, I've gradually grown more discontent. This lays out my basic problems.

• Lack of historical foundation. This may be more a problem of my own upbringing than of Protestantism in general, I don't know -- but I feel disconnected from history. Before I started high school, I knew almost nothing about the history of Christianity. Just Bible stories, then BAM! Martin Luther is nailing something to the door! And POW! The church comes to Alabama! There were anecdotes scattered here and there in sermons about "great Christians"... Luther, Calvin, Spurgeon, maybe a few others... but these were disconnected dots on a blank sea. And I really didn't realize how empty it was, until I opened a book and saw everything that was there.
• Lack of theological rigor. Growing up, I don't think I ever heard the word theology. My Church taught the Bible and the Bible alone, just the Gospel and that's all. I didn't understand until much later (I was homeschooled and didn't have any friends outside my immediate community until high school) that there is more than one way of understanding the Bible and the Gospel. At first I was floored. Then I started studying theology and languages, and the idea that different people could have different interpretations made more sense. I discovered that my church lives in a sort of quasi-Calvinist-Armenian limbo. Preachers can appeal to either, but avoid the objectionable points of both. But the bottom line is, there's no rigor. Our theology is a wet noodle. And maybe that's okay? But it feels very intellectually unsatisfying.
• Fascination with the Early Church. As I said previously, when I read the New Testament growing up, it was mostly with a confirmation bias, seeing in it a vision of my own church experience. It wasn't until I started reading excerpts of the Church Fathers that I started to get the feeling that this doesn't actually look anything like my church. And let's not get distracted by arguments about sola scriptura or relying on Scripture -- it really doesn't. Whether you believe this is because the post-Apostolic Church quickly fell away from the truth of the faith, or because our modern tradition is just a really long way from the second century -- it really doesn't.
  
  What I admire about the Early Church is more than just the visible things like the liturgy, the way they have church (which you can see in early writers like the Didache and Justin Martyr) -- it's an overall feeling. In our modern Christianity -- especially once you get outside the walls of my little church -- there's a lot of disagreement about faith and practice, what to believe and do; a lot of argument about interpretation of Scripture; a lot of divisions and numerous different denominations. And that's just not what I see in the Early Church. Sure, eventually there were doctrinal questions and crises and schisms, and even in the second century there were heresies -- but to the orthodox faith (and yes, I think that's something that can be objectively seen, not just something that is decided by the victor), there was unity and certainty. These people were sure in what they had been taught, by people who knew or had been taught by the Apostles. And when there was a controversy with these heretics (I'm reading Ignatius and Irenaeus here), they didn't appeal to "Scripture alone" and argument over interpretation, they appealed first to the authority of the bishop, and his agreement with every other bishop in what had been received from the Apostles.
  
  And all of this is getting long, but it's just to say that I admire that certainty of orthodoxy.
• Disillusionment with the Protestant Reformation. And I got to the Protestant Reformation in history, and rather than finding the glorious scenes of Martin Luther rediscovering the true Gospel from corruption and restoring the true faith, I was appalled. I had grown to like the Catholic Church, with all the popes and monks and saints -- not that I necessarily agreed with it, but I liked it. So I was disappointed, first, that things in that were becoming corrupted. But it still seemed like a good thing that could be fixed, right? Of course I knew that wasn't where it was going...
  
  And then the Reformation very quickly got ugly. Luther calling the pope "antichrist," everybody writing nasty letters to each other, revolts and people getting killed... And then everybody else starts jumping on board, and it seems like a free-for-all, and political opportunism in a lot of cases more than anything else... And before long, anybody with a beef against the Catholic Church, for any reason, is breaking away and grinding their own axe... And then martyrdoms (murders) on both sides, and wars... Christians killing Christians... And this is not a glorious picture at all.
  
  And I just think, again and again, to Jesus's prayer "that we all might be One" (John 17:21). And I just think none of this is what Jesus wanted at all.

So this is really long, sorry about that, and more emotional than I really meant for it to be. But this is my heart. Go easy on me, ok?

I for one do not believe you are a Protestant based on your responses. One could go on and on for days about historical ugliness of the pre-Reformation Catholic Church and calling it the "One True Church" does not make it all magically disappear so as to erase the pages of history. If you want to be Catholic, you'll have to learn how to own up to the ugliness and embrace it as your own, as a part of the "ONE TRUE CHURCH". Enjoy!

 

[ripple the car]

Meg, I think the first thing that I examined was salvation. How are we saved? Is our salvation by grace alone through faith alone, or do works play an active role, too? What about the Bible? How do we know what books the Bible is meant to contain? How did that happen? What about the Saints? What about Mary? Why do the Catholics and Orthodox love her so? Is she unique? Can I praise her directly? It's a journey.

 

[ripple the car]

Also, discounting 1,500 years of men and women like Saints Francis of Assisi, John Chrystostom, Teresa of Avila, Gertrude, and John of the Cross, who were certainly not theologically Protestant, just seemed dumb.

 

[Tone]

Also, discounting 1,500 years of men and women like Saints Francis of Assisi, John Chrystostom, Teresa of Avila, Gertrude, and John of the Cross, who were certainly not theologically Protestant, just seemed dumb.

And be mindful that the Apostles were not theologically RCC or Orthodox as well... (not sure what that is)

 

[S.O.J.I.A.]

appeal to emotion isn't a good way to get to the truth.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

Also, discounting 1,500 years of men and women like Saints Francis of Assisi, John Chrystostom, Teresa of Avila, Gertrude, and John of the Cross, who were certainly not theologically Protestant, just seemed dumb.

I'm the kind of Protestant who never thought it wise to throw out the baby with dirty water. Honestly if we go back to Genesis, from the beginning of history to today, we'll find much to be praised and much to criticized. So it's not a matter of discounting so much as accepting their theology based on Scripture, and not wholeheartedly embracing their theology without support in Scripture, no matter what "Church" they claim. Not wholeheartedly embracing may or may not entail a wholesale rejection, and in some matters there is wiggle room, as God intended.