Shall i provide you will names of converts to evangelical faith from Rome, which are far more? The reason why the % of RCs in the U.S. has remained overall steady is due to immigration (68% of all Latinos in the U.S. ID as RCs, and among Catholics under the age of 45% are Latino) although 20% of all Latino American Catholics have left Roman Catholicism, an overall 68% of those raised Roman Catholic still are Catholic, while 80% of adults who were raised Protestant are still Protestant. http://www.peacebyjesus.com/RC-Stats_vs._Evang.html
But atheism and witchcraft are the fastest growing religions, and conversion itself does not prove Scriptural authenticity, nor does unity, and the reason why one converts is the real issue.
Roman Catholic apologists often charge that converts to evangelical Churches are driven by desire for a more liberal form of Christianity due to strictness of doctrine within Catholicism, Yet based upon the evidence it is easier to say that majority of Catholics remain because of the very lack of strictness of doctrine.
And in contrast to the above idea, 71% of Protestants converts from Catholicism said it was not really doctrine but that that their spiritual needs were not being met in Catholicism, with 78% who became evangelical Protestants concurring, versus 43% of those now unaffiliated, The latter class being the ones who most likely to leave because of rejection of moral doctrine.
Less than 30% of former Catholics agreed that the clergy sexual abuse scandal was a reason played a role in their departure.
I myself was raised As part of a devout Catholic family Two God-fearing parents with five kids (and two uncles who were priests) whom they sought sought to raise that way, but I was not born again until age 25 in sincere personal repentance toward God and faith to the Lord Jesus Christ to save me as a Holy Spirit convicted, morally destitute and damned sinner.
And yet I remained Catholic, if not totally all my beliefs, weekly attending services for 6 years, during which I served as a lecturer and CCD teacher and went to many charismatic meetings, before I sincerely prayed whether God might have me leave for a different church (more for desire of working/serving fellowship in a active church than simply doctrine).
Which he promptly answered in an evident manner which has been confirmed abundantly through the years since, and i know the vast and positive difference between the institutionalized Christianity - which includes a good deal of Protestantism - in the gospel which effects manifest regeneration and doctrine accompanying it. Even though I have a long way to for Christ to have preeminence in all things in me, and for love and faith that “Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. “ (1 Corinthians 13:7) To say the least
And from what I have read of conversions it seems like most of the time the people are mesmerized by selective appeals to the so-called church fathers as if they were they profoundly enlightened determinative interpreters of Scripture, and always consistent with themselves and with each other, and supported Rome in such a way as the latter-day apologists make them out to be. And even if they were that carries little weight with me. http://peacebyjesus.witnesstoday.org/Ancients_on_Issues.html
The Orthodox largely based on interpretation of the same sources, critically dissent from Rome (papal infallibility no less among other things.
There is even a scholar in a certain Christian commune which has read all the anteNicene fathers uses them to justify his premise that Christians must leave all and live is a commune.
Lost in all this is the supremacy of Scripture, which paradoxically some writings of the church fathers can be seen to support over that of the church, and tradition as being equal to Scripture.
Scripture is the only material transcendent source which is stated in the wholly inspired wholly inspired of God, and is abundantly evidenced in Scripture, as shown before, that it is the supreme standard for obedience and the testing truth claims.
And it is upon that basis that evangelicals contend for common core truths and against those who deviate from them as well as against teachings which flow from tradition and the self-proclaimed supremacy of an supposedly assuredly infallible magisterium.
And as also said, the church began in dissent from those who presumed the like and authenticity based upon historical dissent, while Christ and the church were established by conformity to Scripture in its means of attestation, while comprehensive doctrinal unity was ever a goal not realized.
Enough said.
“I was not born again until age 25 in sincere personal repentance toward God and faith to the Lord”
You were “born again” when you were baptised and if you still went to the Catholic Church you would be “saved” each and every time you properly presented yourself for communion.
The sad thing about relapsed Catholics and protestants that have never known the beauty of the Catholic faith is they will never get a chance to be in the actual presence of Jesus Christ at the Eucharist.
Before he was given up to death, a death he freely accepted,
Jesus took bread, and gave you thanks.
He broke the bread, gave it to his disciples and said:
“Take this, all of you, and eat it:
This is my body which will be given up for you.”
When supper was ended, he took the cup.
Again he gave you thanks and praise, gave the cup to his disciples, and said:
“Take this, all of you, and drink from it:
This is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant.
It will be shed for you and for all, so that sins may be forgiven.
Do this in memory of me.”
You’ll notice Jesus does not say the bread SYMBOLIZES his body or the cup of wine SYMBOLIZES his blood. He said it was HIS BODY AND BLOOD. I’ve never understood why Protestants think Jesus was lying to them.
Writing to the Christians of Smyrna, in about AD 106, Saint Ignatius warned them to “stand aloof from such heretics”, because, among other reasons, “they abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again.”
St Paul teaches the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. He states that the cup of blessing is the participation in the blood of Christ and the bread we break is the participation in the body of Christ (see 1 Corinthians 10:16). What must the cup and the bread be to make possible this participation in the blood and body of Christ? The most obvious and logical answer is that the bread and cup of wine must really be the body and blood of Christ. St Paul also said that whoever eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord; and any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself (See 1 Corinthians 11:27, 29). How can eating mere bread and wine unworthily be so serious? Paul’s comments make sense only if bread and wine become the real body and blood of Christ.
http://www.justforcatholics.org/a39.htm