Posted on 04/02/2026 5:33:31 PM PDT by ProgressingAmerica
Catholic vs Protestant (w/Nick Fuentes) - EP6
Tried to format transcript, but no way to turn timestops off. Anyway, https://peacebyjesus.net/deformation_of_new_testament_church.html
There appear to be an increasing number of “patriots” who want monarchs these days.
It remains a tiny number to be sure. But the increase is, well.
Curious.
And to see them take their masks off is quite remarkable, at least, they took their masks off half way. They did cloak their tyrannical discussion under the camouflage of a religious discussion with a religious headline so that people would not see it.
I have a curse called curiosity which is why I bothered to click on it.
Back when Rush Limbaugh dominated talk radio, some folks were wearing a button reading, "Suspend the Constitution! Make Rush king!" Given Bill Clinton's leadership at the time, I thought about wearing one of those.
Webbon argues that Protestantism was necessary for settling America due to its “simplicity” and “pioneer spirit”
He’s talking about the period after 1810.
Historically speaking, I think he is PARTIALLY correct (and I’m Catholic0 - during the westward expansion, the Methodist Circuit Riders and Baptist farmer-preachers were incredibly effective. Because Baptists believed in the “priesthood of all believers,” any literate man with a Bible could start a congregation in a barn or a clearing. This “portability” meant the religion could move as fast as the wagons, whereas Catholic or Anglican structures often required formal appointments from a distant central authority.
Yet at the same time we see how Catholics were highly successful at “settling” and “civilizing” vast territories in the Southwest (California, New Mexico, Arizona) and Quebec. The Mission System provided a different but equally effective “toolkit” for expansion, creating permanent agricultural and social hubs.
So, while it was factual that this westward expansion and the decentralized nature of Baptist and Methodist growth was a primary reason the United States became a predominantly non-Anglican Protestant country, it wasn’t strictly speaking “necessary” or “the only way’ as we have Catholic (and in Alaska and Washington, Eastern (Russian) Orthodox)) structures taht settled similarly difficult frontiers in the Americas and Siberia using more hierarchical models.
while Nick Fuentes put forth that America’s current “decadence” is a result of the rebellious, individualistic spirit inherent in Protestantism and the Enlightenment.
hmmm....this is a lot to unpack. A lot of the “decadence” is from the Enlightenment, but was that really influenced or pushed by or enabled by “Protestantism” (and i’m putting it in quotes as there were major differences between Anglican, Calvinistic, Presbyterian, Baptist, Anabaptist, Lutheran etc. societies)
My OPINION is that Nick Fuentes is incorrect - correlation is not causation.
While, in my historical opinion, “Protestantism” as a concept was a necessary condition for the enlightment, it wasn’t the sole cause. While the Enlightenment was a reaction against many religious certainties, it utilized the tools Protestantism built.
“Protestantism” opened the doors to the Enlightenment but i don’t think it caused it.
Also, the concept of individual liberties in ‘messy’ anglicanism is the primary driver of individualism in the English colonies. The Lutherans didn’t have that, and neither did the Calvinists in Geneva, and I think in the Netherlands.
The Anabaptists (mennonites, Amish etc.) are strongly anti-individualism.
the Baptists and Methodists arose from Anglicanism’s messiness (and I mean that non-theologically - Anglicanism was a compromise between Calvinism and Anglo-Catholicism)
ansel12 “Protestants created the nation”
I think it’s more nuanced than that. you could more accurately word it as “English history + Anglican Protestants and Deists/enlightenment folks created the nation”
Many of the leading Founders, such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, were Deists or influenced by the Enlightenment. They argued that rights come from “Nature’s God” rather than a specific church. They sought to create a Secular Republic that protected religious freedom.
Precisely because there were so many competing Protestant sects (Baptists vs. Anglicans vs. Quakers), the Founders were forced to adopt Religious Neutrality (the First Amendment). In a sense, the USA was created by Protestants who realized they couldn’t agree on which kind of Protestantism should rule.
AND, The American legal system was not “created” from the Bible alone; it was a continuation of centuries of English legal tradition (Magna Carta, Habeas Corpus). These were “Protestant” by virtue of being English, but their origins were often medieval and pre-Reformation.
The Founders looked to Republican Rome and Democratic Athens for their models of governance. The architecture of Washington D.C. is intentionally Neoclassical—Greek and Roman—rather than Gothic or Cathedral-style.
The video is actually more about American Christian nationalism.
They do come to the conclusion that we have common enemies: secularism, liberalism, and “the orcs at the gates”
I can’t say I agreed with either “side” - I got bored half-way and then sped it up to 2x and then somewhere later they BOTH went to talking about “ Jewish influence in law and culture”
Webbon (the “Protestant” guy) claims that the “heartbeat” of liberalism is egalitarianism (the push for total equality). He argues this was driven by a Jewish desire to “dismantle and bring down every form of hierarchy” as a means of self-preservation for a minority group.
I think, historically speaking - looking at the 19th century - that he was right. After the French revolution all the “nations” looked around and said “let’s centralize and standardize what it means to be French (no langue d’oc, breton, gascon etc. you all speak Parisian) or English (RP, none of yer Yorkshire or west country dialects)” and “this land is this nations and no one elses’ — that’s when those of the Jewish religion in Europe were stuck. They had 4 options:
1. Assimilate - and many did (with a caveat I’ll point out below * )
2. disassociate and get more “Jewish” - the rise of Hassidism, Orthodox Jewish withdrawal
3. Hey we also have our “land” - let’s perform Aliyah to the mostly empty holy land (only 100K people lived there under Ottoman 19th century - which included Jews, Samaritans, Aramean Christians etc.)
4. Let’s break down ALL the hierarchies - communism.
Fuentes (the Catholic guy) points to Jewish lawyers and organizations (specifically naming the ACLU and ADL) as the primary forces behind ending prayer in schools and enforcing the strict separation of church and state. He argues that these groups viewed any explicit Christian culture as a form of discrimination against them.
I think he is accurate in this
But then Fuentes goes into how Jewish communities “hated organized Christianity” and “Christian kings” because those institutions often marginalized or expelled them. And I must admit that in general this was true - BOTH statements (that they were oppressed and that they hated it)
Fuentes explicitly cites the execution of the Romanov royal family during the Communist revolution in Russia as an act of “vengeance” by Jews who hated the Tsar. I don’t think this is valid based on history.
It is a matter of historical record that individuals of Jewish origin were overrepresented in the early Bolshevik leadership compared to their percentage of the general population. Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev, and Yakov Sverdlov were of Jewish descent. Yakov Yurovsky, the man who led the squad that executed Tsar Nicholas II and his family in the Ipatiev House, was born into a Jewish family (though he had converted to Lutheranism).
NOW on to my * caveat — one of the books I read 11 years ago - “Hitler’s religion” brought to my attention the strong effect of neo-Darwinism i.e. ‘race theory’ — and using Darwinian language of “survival of the fittest” to the idea of “races”.
Using this neo-Darwinism, a person who, in the 17th century converted from Rabbinical Judaism to Christianity would become a Christian full stop, but in the 19th century, he was still ‘considered a Jew’ racially.
I disagree with the idea put forth by both these guys, but I am unsure if this is just my knee-jerk reaction to any sign of anti-semitism. I need to really research it to be impartial (if one can even be)
Now Jan, you know that historically I hold that:
1. Christianity is a 2nd temple Jewish sect
During the Second Temple period (roughly 516 BC to 70 AD), Judaism was not a monolith; it was a collection of competing sects including the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots.2. what we call Judaism is really "Rabbinical Judaism" - a religion created after 70 AD at the council of Jamnia by Rabbi Yohannan bin Zakkai out of the ashes of the Pharisee 2nd temple Jewish sect.Early followers of Jesus were entirely Jewish, observed Jewish law, and worshipped at the Temple in Jerusalem. In the Book of Acts, they are referred to as "the sect of the Nazarenes."
While the Sadducees (whose power was tied to the Temple) and the Essenes (wiped out during the war) largely disappeared after 70 AD, the "Christians" survived because their theology was portable and less dependent on the physical Temple structure.
This is NOT just my "contention" - historians (Jewish and Christian and secular) have this conclusion as out of the major sects, only the Pharisees and the Christians survived the 70 AD catastrophe with their social structures intact. The Pharisees emphasized the Oral Law and local synagogue study, which allowed them to adapt when the sacrificial system at the Temple was destroyed.so, on to the "The idea of a shared Judeo-Christian foundation is a modern invention that obscures the fundamental opposition between the two faiths."Rabbi Yohanan Ben Zakkai started the "Yavne (Jamnia) Moment." According to tradition, he was smuggled out of the siege of Jerusalem and convinced the Romans to let him establish a school at Yavne. This shifted the focus of Jewish life from Sacrifice to Torah study and Prayer.
THEOLOGICALLY -- this is True -- the followers of the Way of Jesus and the Rabbinical Jews are opposing RIVAL SECTS of Judaism and naturally both hated each other (we see the same between say Sunnis and Shias) -- Rabbinical Judaism codified the Talmud and focused on Halakha (legal practice) in the 8th century. Halakha and the Talmud are fundamentally in opposition to Christian belief and thought. in fact the Halakha and the Talmud were finalized in Bagdad under the Mohamedan dynasties - AT THE SAME TIME THAT THE Hadiths, the Quran and the Sharia were finalized. I do hold that both Rabbinical Jewish and proto-Islamic thoughts fed off each other at that time.
By calling it a "shared foundation," we ignore the fact that Rabbinical Judaism and Christianity were actively defining themselves against each other for 500 years. They are more like parallel evolutions than a straight line from one to the other.
politically - I think there are common points, but on the whole I am inclined to agree that there isn't a "Judea-Christian" common idea
Jesus church are born again Christians, period.
I longed for the days of Clinton during the Obama and Biden years.
Monarchy or dictatorship — if you got a “good guy” or “the guy with whom I agree” - then a lot of stuff gets done.
But I think the only modern example of this was Lee Kwan Hua from Singapore. He modernized singapore rapidly, but imprisoned folks who opposed him - so if you were one of those then he was bad.
I think the Republican form of democracy is the least bad form of government for now. Monarchy is just “do i want to be ruled forever by this idiot?”
America was created by the American people, carved out of wilderness and fought for and formed over generations, created by the people and their Protestant worship of God and their culture and perception of man and God, when they are trying to denigrate America the left picks out a few names as though it was created by a king and a couple of his best buddies, and then tries to pigeon hole them.
America was created with no Kings or Popes, no monarchy but a lot of individuality, freedom, and bible reading, something which drives a few hard core Catholics bitter with hatred at the British colonies and the eventual United States coming out of them, something I was shocked to learn from reading a few such Catholics postings here at FR 15 or 20 years ago, I was stunned to read about a preference for the Spanish, and for monarchy and the hatred for the Protestant founding of America.
you first said “Protestants created the nation”
I pointed out that
"I think it’s more nuanced than that. you could more accurately word it as “English history + Anglican Protestants and Deists/enlightenment folks created the nation” Many of the leading Founders, such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, were Deists or influenced by the Enlightenment. They argued that rights come from “Nature’s God” rather than a specific church. They sought to create a Secular Republic that protected religious freedom.Culture and 'spirit' are the matter, but Law and Philosophy are the form. Without a coherent, universalist framework (the Enlightenment and English Common Law), that Protestant energy wouldn't have created a 'Nation'—it would have created a thousand competing 'Sects.'
Early America was actually a series of mini-theocracies: the Puritans in the North, the Anglicans in the South, the Quakers in the middle. They didn’t just 'get along' naturally; they were often hostile to one another. The 'miracle' of the Founding was the creation of a Neutral Public Square.
The Founders used Enlightenment tools to build a structure that mirrored the 'Universal' (Catholic) scope of an empire, even if they were Protestants. They looked to the Natural Law—a tradition deeply rooted in St. Thomas Aquinas—to find 'self-evident' truths that didn't depend on which Protestant denomination you belonged to.
So, while the 'engine' was Protestant, the 'steering wheel' was a secularized version of Catholic Natural Law and Greco-Roman Order. Without that steering wheel, the individual 'pioneer spirit' would have just led to a fractured, bickering wilderness, not a United Republic
I didn’t change anything, Protestants created this nation, Protestants and Protestantism, and I reinforced that in my post.
It is you who is trying to go off into the ozone to recreate some Catholic fantasy.
You say 'Protestants created this nation,' but you’re ignoring that those Protestants were at each other’s throats. In the 1770s, the Anglican Protestants in Virginia were throwing Baptist Protestants in jail for preaching without a license. In Massachusetts, the Puritan Protestants had spent a century banning, ear-cropping, and hanging Quaker Protestants.
If America was just 'Protestant worship and Bibles,' it would have ended up like the 30 Years' War in Europe—Christians slaughtering each other.
The 'ozone' you’re dismissing (the Enlightenment and the Constitution) was the only thing that saved the 'Protestant people' from destroying themselves. The Founders (many of whom were Deists,/b>) had to step in and say: 'Since you can’t agree on whose Bible-reading is correct, we are going to build a Secular Republic where NO particular interpretation gets to rule.'
Even your 'English history' didn't start with Luther. The Magna Carta, Habeas Corpus, and the Common Law—the very things that gave those pioneers their 'perception of man and God'—were built by Catholic Barons and Catholic Jurists in the 1200s.
You’re enjoying the fruit of a Catholic legal tree and an Enlightenment legal fence, but you’re giving all the credit to the gardeners. The gardeners were great, but without the fence, they would have killed each other, and without the tree, they wouldn’t have had any fruit to pick.
LOL, yes I did say Protestants and protestantism created America, because it is fact, Catholics were creating Mexico and many other countries in the new world, and of course they were different from the protestant one, but as we saw here 15 or 20 years ago in the heavy religious discussions, America sticks in the craw of some cult like Catholics here, they seem to despise it and see its history as something to overcome and reshape.
Ansel, comparing the U.S. to Mexico ignores that English Protestants spent 150 years persecuting each other until the Enlightenment forced a “peace treaty.”
The “Protestant worship” you credit didn’t stop Anglicans from jailing Baptists or Puritans from hanging Quakers; only the “ozone” of the First Amendment did that.
You’re enjoying the fruit of an English legal tree planted 300 years before Luther—the Magna Carta—which was a Catholic achievement.
Without the “Enlightenment fence” built by Deists to keep sects from bickering, those “pioneers” would have turned the colonies into a collection of warring theocracies.
America is a success because the Founders used Greco-Roman reason to manage religious zeal, not because they let one specific group’s “spirit” rule.
Giving all the credit to the “gardeners” while ignoring the “legal fence” and the “ancient roots” isn’t history—it’s just tribalism.
What both of these wannabes get wrong is that things were just fine relatively speaking until the progressive era(1900-1920).
The progressives did this to us. There wasn’t mass decadence heck even in the 1900s, that started in the age/during the age of Margaret Sanger.
But both of these guys are interested in expanding government and setting up some sort of tyrannical state, so it is in their interest to get it wrong, by either not looking or through subterfuge, and laying the blame elsewhere such as blaming the Founding Fathers.
Some of the early history they do get correct, but that is a requirement. Half truths sell the best. Whole lies usually are not effective.
In short, individualism is not the problem and never was. Progressivism is a perversion, pretty much a perversion of everything. A collectivism such as progressivism with a dash of a perversion of individualism sprinkled on top of it to appear American is never going to work.
LOL, what a bunch of rambling off into the wild blue yonder to try to overcome a simple reality about America.
Democracy in America in 1835 defined America as Republican in government, democracy in the marketplace. We vote with our feet and money where to live, where to shop, where to worship.
The Civil War was one step in centralizing in DC the power of the states. But the Market Place was mostly left unchecked until Woodrow KK Wilson and William Jennings KKK Bryan. The rash of Constitution Amendments and Political processes greatly centralized Government power and control of the Marketplace.
Some would argue that centralized control is one of the factors that led to the depression. In 1933 FDR centralized banking and did a big move to centralize control of the Marketplace.
LBJ-Nixon did the biggest centralization of political and economic power. They centralized Welfare. They centralized immigration. Nixon made the states addicted to Federal money. Since Nixon state & local policy makers do not ask
What do the voters, taxpayers, citizens want?
What is best for the voters, taxpayers, citizens?
No State & local politicians now ask
How can I get more Federal money?
What is the best way to raise matching money to the Federal money?
Everything since LBJ & Nixon has been attempts to deal with the LBJ/Nixon USA cebtralizaton.
Above is a short 6 step history of the US.
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