Sheila B
Member
The Protestant Movement wasn't/isn't perfect, but there were some legitimate issues with the Catholic Church that they were not, and are not, willing to address. Like the issue of the papacy.
Protestants, in general, need to learn that while truth is important - you don't need to start a church over a minor difference in understanding. This is particularly a problem with those denominations that place all the emphasis on belief vs. works. They fail to understand that what is important is doing God's will, helping those in need, and keeping oneself pure from the world.
Catholics need a similar lesson: you don't need to agree on every piece of doctrine to be unified. In addition: the Church Fathers were just men like you and me. They had to study the scriptures and philosophy and debate to establish their doctrines - and these debates weren't necessarily settled in Godly manners. Accept that while tradition is a solid starting point for one's study of God, there is bound to be some error in there as well - and one needs to be able to openly disagree while maintaining Christian unity.
Remember: many of the early protestants didn't want to depart from Catholicism, but wanted to address issues internally. Rather, they were forced to because the Catholic Church at the time would rather kill them then open discussions on the matters at hand.
Basically, this is true, except that the Church was not interested in killing- just excommunicating!! Big difference! lol
But tragic results just the same, esp since Jesus said our unity is what would draw people to Him.