I’m curious as to why you would consider Jehovah Witness and Mormons as a cult but you don’t do the same for the Catholics?
I can understand why you would consider Jehovah Witness and Mormons, but why don’t you point the finger at the Catholics too?
There are surely more things the Catholic Church does that go against the teachings of the bible, alot more than both the Mormons and Jehovah Witness do combine. But I never see any complaints. Even with the current molestation issues the church is having now.
I’m sure if it had been one of the other two, you guys would be up in arms about it.
Going thru the history of the Catholic church I realized so many wrongs that they have committed against the bible but also to humanity.
Well if you went to a Catholic grade school and got beat over the head with a stick every time you questioned any of their doctrines, you eventually start to agree with them.
the Catholic Church teaches that God is Triune & the Second Person incarnated as Jesus for our salvation; the Watchtower Society however teaches that Jesus is the First Creation of the
Father Jehovah God & that the Holy Spirit is Jehovah’s Energy
but not a Divine Personage; the Latter Days Saints leadership
teaches that God the Father is an exalted man who became God thru faithfulness to His Father God & that Jesus is literally His Firstborn Son & our Elder Brother. While Protestant Christianity
may differ with the Roman Catholic Church over a whole lot,
Catholicism, Protestantism & Orthodoxy all agree on Trinitarian
Incarnationist Christian teaching.
The Catholic Church and the Protestant churches accept the same basic definition of God: God as the Trinity, and Jesus Christ as God the Son, that is God incarnate and co-eternal with God the Father and the Holy Spirit. Generally speaking both Catholics and Protestants accept the Apostle’s Creed or the Nicene Creed.
By contrast, Jehovah’s Witnesses have a very different view of the nature of Jesus Christ (and the nature of Jesus Christ is, after all, pretty central to the Christian religion). The beliefs of the Jehovah’s Witnesses include that “Christ is God’s Son and is inferior to Him” and “Christ was first of God’s creations”, as opposed to the traditional view of Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Christians that Jesus Christ is God, and that God the Son has existed as part of the Trinity for all eternity. (From the 1917 Catholic Encyclopedia article The Blessed Trinity: “…in the words of the Athanasian Creed: ‘the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three Gods but one God.’ In this Trinity of Persons the Son is begotten of the Father by an eternal generation, and the Holy Spirit proceeds by an eternal procession from the Father and the Son. Yet, notwithstanding this difference as to origin, the Persons are co-eternal and co-equal: all alike are uncreated and omnipotent.” No traditional Protestant theologian would disagree with any of that.)
The Mormons also have very different views on the nature of the Godhead and the persons of the Trinity than do Catholics and Protestants. They "believe in God the Father, in his Son Jesus Christ and in the Holy Ghost. The three make up the Godhead – one in purpose but separate in being. " (Core Beliefs and Doctrines: Godhead from the official website of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.)
“Cult” is obviously a pejorative word as used in these discussions, but I don’t think anyone really denies that probably Jehovah’s Witnesses and certainly Mormons are more different from Catholics and Protestants than Catholics and Protestants are from each other.
It is of course historically fatuous to say that Catholics are not Christians.
Sorry, you guys, but the Catholic Church traces its ministry right back to Christ himself through the Apostolic Succession, and those who reject Her teachings risk eternal damnation for embracing most pernicious heresy, for nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! (dramatic musical sting)
Whew, that felt better.
Anyhoo, the OP is full of it. Sure, the Catholic Church burned heretics (where are my matches?), persecuted the Jews, and instigated wars, but then so did the Protestants. Mary I burned Lutherans, then Edward I and Elizabeth I burned Catholics who would not swear loyalty to the monarch as Supreme Head of the Church. As for picking on Jews, Martin Luther himself wrote poisonous sermons demanding the extermination of the Jews in Germany, and Protestant nations made life hellish for them as much as Catholic nations did.
As far as “the Catholic Church going against the Bible”, you’re going to need a cite. In fact, in regard to the most important sacrament, the Eucharist, the Catholic church follows the Bible by believing in the True Presence, where the Protestants do not. Matthew 26:26-28 :
Moreover, Protestants who reject the authority of the Vicar of Christ are also defying Christ Himself, who said to Peter:
Actually, the odd Christian people who are insistent on condemning Catholicism, generally do not stop at claiming it is a cult, but actually ask Catholics not Christians? or Catholics not Christian?
Of course, I am curious as to why the OP separates Baptists from Protestants, as if they were not, themselves, Protestant.
(In terms of the use of the word cult, it probably stems from the specific meaning (from among the four common meanings*) of cult to indicate a group that was founded around the personality of a single leader. The LDS with Joseph Smith (and, to a lesser extent, Brigham Young) and the Jehovah’s Witnesses with Charles Taze Russell have an individual to whom opponents can point. People who claim that Catholicism has wandered astray from Christianity have to point to whole collections of people in various fourth century councils, so the RCC gets a pass on the word cult when used as an epithet.)
as a direct cognate translation of the Latin cultus, meaning any well-organized set of religious beliefs. In this sense, the various sects and denominations of Christianity and Islam could each be called cults.(The RCC, in official documents, uses the Latin cultus to refer to all religions–Catholicism, Judaism, the Protestant denominations, the Orthodox Christians, and others. The word is sometimes translated into English using cult)
A religious group that focuses its attention on a specific, living or recently dead founding person. (Christianity would met this definition of a cult up to the point where the Apostles began to die off and the next generation of Church Fathers began trying to systematize the belief so that it could be passed to later generations. The CoJCoLdS was probably a cult through the life of Brigham Young, after which this meaning no longer applied. That I am aware, the JW would not ever have been a cult, in this sense, since I do not recall them ever focusing their beliefs based on Russell’s personality.)
a nominally religious-based group enforcing control over all aspects of the lives of its adherents in the manner described in the previous posts.
any religious group opposed by various fundie groups.
Apropos of very little, I has an acquaintance once of the tiny, cute, and very goth stripe. Being small and attractive and terminally morose, she had the nickname “Death Cookie.”
'Course she dropped that apellation in a hot second when I introduced her to Mr. Chick. Poor gal.
Yes, that is the Papalist interpretation. You proof-text like a Protestant, though. The previous verse refers to the faith, that is the true rock. Likewise, elsewhere in Gospels, the “powers” given are given to the Apostles as a group.
Perhaps you should consult with the Patriarch of Constantinople on the matter…
There is a bit of folklore among some Baptists. The tale is told that Baptists have existed since before Christ’s ministry. They were the followers of John the Baptist, who then went to follow Christ upon the beginning of His ministry on earth. Throughout history, or so the folklore says, these “primitive Baptists” have had an endangered and underground existence, persecuted by the evil minions of Emperor Constantine and his heirs. They only emerged in the 15th century, when the world somehow suddenly became safe for them.
Thus, according to this lore, Baptists are not Protestants, since Protestantism did not exist Martin Luther while the Baptists were of the opinion that they, as a group, actually existed before Christ even began preaching.
And where in this passage does Jesus say that the powers he is giving to Peter are to be passed on to his successors in perpetuity, rather than being a recognition of the special, personal role Peter is to play?
I love the OP- all “so-called” Christians see LDS and JW as cults. Which Christians are “so-called” and which are “real” Christians? Especially since Catholics are Christian- it’s that tricky little “christ” bit in the middle of the word.
Eh mon, work on those brain cells, they are terrible things to waste.
As a person, I don’t consider all religions different from my own to be cults, or evil. They are just different. Yes, I am Methodist, but I can see beauty and truth in the Catholic faith, Buhddism, Judaism, and many other “-isms.”
Well, being a former fundamentalist we were always kept aware of some of the teachings of the Catholic church…ie, worshipping idols, worshipping not only Jesus, but the virgin Mary (and other saints and former priests and such), the confession thing and the so called Apocrah(sp?) books.
They were always critical of the Catholic church doing this, but they never publicly denounced it as a whole like they would do the Jehovah Witness and Mormons. It is even accepted that the so called whore of Babylon in Revelations is in reference to the Catholic Church, but its something they don’t publicly acknowledge out loud.
I’m not trying to condemn anyone or make fun of someone’s religion…being a former right wing christian, i’ve grown to accept people of all faiths, lifestyles etc. Its just that recently I went to a non denominational church which was still doing the same things as before, condeming the teachings of other churches yet publicly only mentioning the Mormons and Jehovah’s.
Maybe my question should be, “Why do they criticise the Catholic church teachings so much, yet kiss their ass in public”
I’m not Catholic, but I didn’t think that Catholics worshipped saints, the Virgin Mary, etc. I thought that it was a request for intercession on one’s behalf.
I suspect that you are working from a limited population for your sample. There are still people who openly criticize the RCC. (Check out the threads to which I linked, above, or do a Google search of “Ian Paisely Catholic Church”.)
In terms of the “cult” issue, we have already provided an answer, above (Smith/Young and Russell provide easier targets for the word “cult” than does the assorted bodies at the Council of Nicaea).
I suspect, further, that the reason that some Protestant denominations are less hostile to the RCC than others is that they recognize the similarities outlined by FriarTed, MEBuckner, gobear, and I while other Protestant groups focus on the different perceptions to which you have alluded. It all depends on what church you stumble into and how anti-Catholic that preacher is on a given Sunday.
(And I have no idea what Protestant group has ever “kissed ass” regarding the Catholics.)