The Protestant Question.


Until about 6 months ago, I was a cradle Episcopalian. Part of the Anglican Communion. Growing up, I didn’t know a lot about my faith. I knew that Jesus is our savior. God is creator of all things. The Holy Trinity consisted of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. I knew the Nicene Creed. I even knew the Apostles Creed. But most important of all, I knew I was an Episcopalian!

I didn’t really know why I was an Episcopalian as compared to other denominations. Growing up in and around Boston, many of my friends were Catholic. I didn’t really know why I wasn’t a Catholic or they weren’t an Episcopalian. I just knew what my father had told me when I asked him what denomination we were.

Boy, was I proud to be an Episcopalian!

Then when I went to college, I learned that the Episcopal Church was a part of the wider Anglican Communion which was started by the Church of England. I didn’t really know why the Anglican Communion broke away from the Catholic Church, only that I wasn’t a Catholic.

I wasn’t really taught that the Catholic Church was bad, I just kind of had it institutionally taught to me. After all, most of the founders of America were Anglican. Why, even George Washington was Anglican! I’ve even sat in his pew in St. Paul’s Church in New York City.

I was content being Anglican because that was all I knew. After all, I was Anglo-Catholic!

(Whoopee!)

Then the Anglican Communion went to pot! (That’s putting it nicely!)
I started to read about the history of the Episcopal Church. I wasn’t surprised at all after reading about it to see where it was today. The orthodox just sat back watching while the liberals turned it into a Universalist sect.

I read about the Oxford Movement. I dreamt of starting a new “Oxford Movement” within the Episcopal Church to save it from it’s downward spiral. I admired Newman and thought of him as a hero…even if he left the Anglican Communion. I wasn’t going to leave! No way, Keble and Pusey stuck with it.

Then, I started reading theology. More importantly, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger. After reading “God and the World,” I had this spark inside of me that kept growing ever greater until an overwhelming fire consumed me with a desire to read more theology. I read more and more. Some Protestant theologians, but mostly Ratzinger.

I began to realize that I held many of the same beliefs as Catholics. After all I was an Anglo-Catholic, so the there wasn’t much difference. I considered myself Catholic without a pope. I didn’t have any objections to the pope. It was just that I had been Anglican all my life. Why Change? I was with the orthodox side of the Anglican Communion. I was doing fine!

The problem was that I didn’t know where the Anglican Communion was going. There is such a wide variance of beliefs in the Communion. Even between priests of the same church!

Not wanting all the stress that the Anglican Communion offered, I started to look into the Catholic Church. I wanted a Church with authority. Where there is a stated and upheld Truth that it teaches. The Catholic Church is all that and so much more. I found that it was the fullest expression of the Christian faith handed down from Christ to his Apostles and down to Pope Benedict XVI.

The hardest part of leaving the Anglican Communion was leaving the comfortable surroundings I had known and not worshipping in communion with friends who remained. But what’s more important? Comfort? Or salvation? I choose salvation.

I am most grateful that God led me to Ratzinger. Reading his books were an essential part of my decision to convert. He became my favorite theologian. And when he became pope, I saw it as a sign from God that I was supposed to be in the Catholic Church.

I am also blessed that God inspired me to learn more about my faith. Part of what inspired me was the example I saw from my priest in college, Fr. Brad Page. It’s because of his example and love for God, that I wanted to become a priest, which led me to study and learn what I believed. If I hadn’t desired to learn about my faith, I would probably still be Anglican.

I wish I had become Catholic earlier. However, I was ignorant of my faith. Ignorance should not be an excuse! Parents need to teach their children about the faith. Mine didn’t. Bishops, priests, and leaders should make sure that everyone has knowledge of their faith. Not only must people be knowledgeable, but they must be able to defend their faith! For as 1 Peter 3:15 says, we must “always be prepared to make a defense to anyone who calls you to account for the hope that is in you."

The most disturbing thing in the world is when a Protestant who is educated and well versed in the Bible leads Catholics away from the Catholic Faith with false doctrines. Why is that happening? Because Catholics aren’t being educated in their faith! Their education shouldn’t stop when they are confirmed. The education of a Catholic should be ongoing till the end of their life! Even then, they won’t know all about the Faith. But they will have a much better understanding.

I also find it disturbing when Protestants who are scholars of the Bible are unable to see that Protestantism is contrary to Scripture. Sola Scriptura? Sorry, but the Church was around before the Bible. Where in the Bible does it mention Sola Scriptura? It doesn’t! If Protestants would read the Bible and truly see what it is saying, instead of twisting it to say what it doesn’t, they would realize that the Catholic Faith is the One True Faith.

After all, the Bible was given to the world by the Catholic Church! And as we see in 1 Timothy 3:15, the Church is “the pillar and bulwark of the truth.” The Church at that time was the Catholic Church. The authority of the Bible depends on the Catholic Church! It is the Church that interprets the Bible. Not some individual Protestant who was supposedly led by the “Holy Spirit.” Or some other Protestant led by the “Holy Spirit” who contradicts what the previous Protestant said. The Holy Spirit does not contradict itself!

Jesus founded ONE Church! Look at Matthew 16:18, “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it.”
Jesus didn’t say he was going to build “churches.” He said he was going to build his “church,” singular.

In John 10:16, Jesus says:
“And I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd.”

One Flock!

Again in Ephesians 4:4-5:
“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism.”

One Body! One Faith!

The Catholic Church also has authority given to it by Jesus Christ himself which is handed on down from the Apostles and the successors of the Apostles, who are the Bishops.

In Matthew 28:18-20:
“Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.’ "

Then in John 20:21:
“Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ "

Jesus was sent by the Father to have “All authority in heaven and on earth.” In John we see Jesus bestowing that authority on the Church.

We also see in Matt 18:15-17, that the Church has the final authority amongst Christians:
"If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.”

We know that in 397 at Carthage, the official canon of the Bible was confirmed. It stayed that way for about 1100 years.

Then came Martin Luther. In about 1520 Martin Luther broke from the Catholic Church, thus starting the Reformation.

By 1600, more than 200 Protestant denominations existed.

In 1900, there were almost 1,000 different Protestant denominations.

Then in the year 1999, according to government statistics, there were between 25 to 30,000 different Protestant denominations!

All of these denominations claimed to be based on the Bible alone and guided by the Holy Spirit. Yet, all have different doctrines and many contradict each other!

As I said before, THE HOLY SPIRIT DOES NOT CONTRADICT ITSELF!

Now, some Protestants will say that Catholics use a different Bible, because they added books to it (meaning the Apocrypha). Well, they are half right. We do use a different Bible. But that’s not because Catholics added books, it’s because Martin Luther took books out. Among the Apocrypha, he took out James and Revelation. All because they didn’t fit his theology!

A year later he was persuaded by his fellow Protestants to put the books back. When he put them back he also added the word “alone” to Romans 3:28.

If any pope did this as an article of faith, Catholics would never here the end of it! For it would prove that the Catholic Church was not of God…and it wouldn’t be! Yet when Luther did it, all the Protestants held him in the highest esteem.

Why?

Who’s authority did he have to do this?

Certainly not God’s and definitely not the Bible’s!

For in Revelation 22:18-19 it says:
“I warn every one who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if any one adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if any one takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.”

Now, Luther didn’t just take words out of Revelation, he took out the WHOLE book!

It’s time for our Protestant brother and sisters to stop rejecting the Catholic Church founded by Christ and come back home, where we will be waiting with open arms like the return of the prodigal son.

As Jesus told his Apostles, "He who hears you hears me, and he who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects him who sent me" (Luke 10:16).