Months ago, in my English class we were discussing Puritan literature. We were discussing customs, traditions, way of thinking, etc. I do not remember most of it, but I remember part of a chat a classmate and I had. It was something about the Puritan religion. I said they were Protestant, and she promptly replied that no, Puritans were Catholics.
I considered them Protestants because:
They didn’t recognize the authority of the Pope.
Their religion service was different from the structure of the Catholic Mass.
I do not remember they believed in saints, nor in marian devotions.
They did not had the same sacraments.
She considered them Catholics because:
They were originally from England, and in England the official church was the Anglican Church.
The Anglican Church separated from the RCC.
The Puritans where an offshot of the Anglican Church.
I know…this is a probably a world changing question. But, please, can you answer it?
The Anglican church SEPARATED FROM the Roman Catholic Church. That’s the key point of HER argument that actually supports YOURS. Separated from means NOT a part of any more. The Puritans were Protestants.
They were Protestants. It is true that the Anglican church was the official church of England, but it was Protestant too! Saying that “X is Y” because “X is an offshoot of Y” makes about as much sense as saying that Christians are Jews, because Christianity is an offshoot of Judaism, or Americans are European, because the colonies were originally English.
They most certainly were NOT CAtholic, but they weren’t what you’d call your standard Protestants, either. Although anything not Catholic, Orthodox or Antioch is generally considered Protestant, I believe.
Anyhoo, I THINK they were Calvinists, but I’m not sure.
Racinchikki, thanks, that was the thing I was going to tell her, but class demanded our attention and I wasn’t really in the mood of talking religion with her.
Guinastasia… Calvinists where the ones who believed in predestination, right? I think the Puritans had predestination of part of their beliefs, but I may be wrong.
English Protestants in the 17th century who didn’t belong to the Anglican Church were called Dissenters or Nonconformists. There were a lot of them proliferating in those days. The Puritans are the most famous because they actually held political power in two situations. But there were also the Quakers, the Diggers, the Ranters, and Lord knows what all else.
From the look of this message board, the Ranters never died out!
The Puritans were NOT Catholics! Indeed, they hated the Catholic CHurch more than anything else on Earth! They were radical Protestants who thought that the English Reformation (led by Henry VIII and Thomas Cranmer) hadn’t gone nearly far enough. The Church of England rejected the leadership of the Pope, but it DIDN’T reject the basic theology of the Roman Catholic Church. That’s why, even today, a Catholic can feel very much at home in many “high” Anglican churches.
The Puritans, who were strongly influenced by John Calvin, HATED what they saw as lingering Catholicism in the Church of England. The very name “Puritan” came from their belief that the Anglican Church was still too Catholic, and needed to be “purified” of its remaining Catholic elements.
Their desire to remain Anglicans, while “purifying” the Church of England of all traces of Catholicism, was what distinguished the Puritans from the Pilgrims, who were “Separatists.” The Separatist Pilgrims thought the Anglican Church was hopelessly tainted by Catholicism, and wnted to break completely away from it.
Don’t you love it when you encounter insistant ignoramuses like this? It always reminds me of the scene from “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory” where the teacher hears a few notes from “The Magic Flute” and says with authority “Rachmaninoff!”
Today, for the 10-second soundbite we’d obviate any details and lump them in with “fundamentalists”.
“Protestant” is commonly used to refer to any recognizably Christian church that spun off after the 16th-century Reformation. Anglicans, Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists and their first-and second- generation iterations like Methodists, Puritans, Baptists, CoC-Disciples, CMA’s, Pentecostals…etc. Some very-very-hardline fundies like the much-beloved Jack Chick claim to not be protestants but to represent a “real Christianity” that had always been “underground” all along. And some groups like the JW’s and LDS are so divergent from historic Christian doctrine that it pains many “Protestants” to have them lumped in.
jrd
I wondered why no one noticed this error. It must read:
**I know…this is probably NOT a world changing question.
**
Not really, not when the comments come out of the mouth of one of my best friends. Basically, for her the Orthodox, RCC, and Anglican/Episcopalian churches are Catholic because they follow a strict lithurgy, the way they organize Mass, their sacraments, etc.
Azazel, I think Presbyterians, contrary to Methodists or Puritans, practice infant bapstism. While I’m not sure about Methodists or Puritans, here at least the sacrament of baptism in the Presbyterian chuch is given to the kids.
Technically, the CofE initially didn’t claimed directly to be Protestant in the way that Luther did. The CofE liturgy still claims it is part of the ?universal and catholic church.
Good old Henry VIII didn’t claim to be creating a new church, merely continuing the catholic church because the Pope was leading the church away from the true light(i.e. what he wanted).
Of course, later it became indistinguishable from other Protestant churches in most ways.
There is still a recognized Anglo-Catholic wing of the CofE.
Hmmm… I have seen Presbyterian infant baptisms, and, although I have not personally witnessed any, I believe that Methodists practice them also. I’m not sure about Puritans/Congregationalists (who actually now call themselves UCC -for United Church of Christ).
Yes, Nixon was a Quaker. In this book review which discusses his religious background, he is quoted as saying that “The impact of my Quaker heritage on my personality has been underestimated.” His parents were strict fundamentalists Quakers, but Nixon’s own religious views became more liberal when he grew up.
::raising hand:: I’m a nonpracticing Methodist. I was baptized as a wee baby. Yes, they practice them. Also, an adult who was not baptized as a baby can opt to be baptized in a special ceremony in order to join the church, but that’s rare.
If I recall correctly from religion classes a decade ago, it is a rather odd fact that the Unitarian-Universalists evolved from New England Puritanism, through the Congregationalists, which I would say are also now one of the more liberal denominations.
And at our Methodist church, virtually all baptisms are infant baptisms. Hence Confirmation, at which the youngster confirms the promises that were made in his name at baptism.
Bob, nope we didn’t read about the English Civil War. Basically, all I know is that for some years, instead of a monarchy, Great Britain had something called Commonwealth. The class was about US Literature, not about History of Great Britain.
Jack Chick claim to not be protestants but to represent a “real Christianity” that had always been “underground” all along. And some groups like the JW’s and LDS are so divergent from historic Christian doctrine that it pains many “Protestants” to have them lumped in.