Thank you so much for your excellent posts, betty boop! Hugs!!! Following is some background information on correcting “bad behavior” within a church. To the Protestants, the most severe method for correcting bad behavior is to have a member "churched" which is basically, having them kicked out. This is roughly the equivalent of the Catholic excommunication.
But as you say, people are well advised to be careful about such things. I offer this as the strongest example known to me:
Martin Luther - A Strong Stand - VI. (emphasis mine)
As he was no longer able to tolerate Luther, the pope issued a ban against him. He hoped that the German people would rally around him and follow the edict of the ban, which read as follows:
Arise, O Lord, and judge thy cause. A wild boar has invaded thy vineyard. Arise, O Peter, and consider the case of the Holy Roman Church, the mother of all churches, consecrated by thy blood. Arise O Paul, who by thy teaching and death hast and dost illumine the Church. Arise, all ye saints, and the whole universal Church, whose interpretation of Scripture has been assailed. We can scarcely express our grief over the ancient heresies which have been revived in Germany. We are the more downcast because she was always in the forefront of the war on heresy. Our pastoral office can no longer tolerate the pestiferous virus of the following forty-one errors. [They are enumerated.] We can no longer suffer the serpent to creep through the field of the Lord. The books of Martin Luther which contain these errors are to be examined and burned. As for Martin himself, good God, what office of paternal love have we omitted in order to recall him from his errors? Have we not offered him a safe conduct and money for the journey? [Such an offer never reached Luther.] And he has had the temerity to appeal to a future council although our predecessors, Pius II and Julius II, subjected such appeals to the penalties of heresy. Now therefore we give Martin sixty days in which to submit, dating from the time of the publication of this bull in his district. Anyone who presumes to infringe our excommunication and anathema will stand under the wrath of Almighty God and of the apostles Peter and Paul. Dated on the 15th day of June, 1520
[snip] Luther made his initial appearance before the Diet of Worms on April 17, 1521. This was an impressive assembly of persons. It was not merely an ecclesiastical court of the Roman Catholic Church, but involved the emperor himself, as well as many lesser officials.
The scene lends itself to dramatic portrayal. Here was Charles, heir of a long line of Catholic sovereigns—of Maximilian the romantic, of Ferdinand the Catholic, of Isabella the orthodox—scion of the house of Hapsburg, lord of Austria, Burgundy, the Low Countries, Spain, and Naples, Holy Roman Emperor, ruling over a vaster domain than any save Charlemagne, symbol of the medieval unities, incarnation of a glorious if vanishing heritage; and here before him a simple monk, a miner’s son, with nothing to sustain him save his own faith in the Word of God. Here the past and the future were met.
Luther was examined by John Eck, a representative of the archbishop of Trier (not the Eck of the Leipsic debate). Eck confronted Luther with a pile of books and asked whether they were his. He answered: “The books are all mine, and I have written more.” The door was closed, but Eck opened it again. “Do you defend them all, or do you care to reject a part?”
Luther considered the matter carefully:
“ This touches God and his word. This affects the salvation of souls. Of this Christ said, ‘He who denies Me before men, him will I deny before My father.’ To say too little or too much would be dangerous. I beg you, give me time to think it over.”
A day was given for him to consider his answer. The next day he appeared and said that he would not retract anything he had said in his writings. He stated that if he were to be shown error from the Scriptures, he would be the first to throw his books into the fire. To this Eck responded:
Your plea to be heard from Scripture is the one always made by heretics. You do nothing but renew the errors of Wyclif and Hus.
Luther answered:
Since then Your majesty and your lordships desire a simple reply, I will answer without horns and without teeth. Unless I am convicted by Scripture and plain reason—I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other—my conscience is captive to the word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen. A stormy debate ensued over what was to be done with this heretic. The more Luther was pressed to recant, the more he persisted in his views. When the time allotted to Luther expired, the matter was closed; Luther was pronounced a heretic. The following edict to all the people of the Empire was drawn up declaring Luther to be an outlaw:
You shall refuse the aforesaid Martin Luther hospitality, lodging and bed; none shall feed and nourish him with food or drink; … wherever you meet him … you shall take him prisoner and deliver him to us…. As for his friends … and supporters … we order that you shall attack, overthrow, seize and wrest their property from them, taking it all into your own possession…. As for the books of Martin Luther … we order that nobody shall dare to buy, sell, keep, copy, print them … or support, preach, defend or assert them in any way…. We decree … that the works of Luther are to be burned and by this and other means utterly destroyed.
The final draft of the Edict of Worms read:
He has sullied marriage, disparaged confession, and denied the body and blood of our Lord. He makes the sacraments depend on the faith of the recipient. He is pagan in his denial of free will. This devil in the habit of a monk has brought together ancient errors into one stinking puddle and has invented new ones. He denies the power of the keys and encourages the laity to wash their hands in the blood of the clergy. His teaching makes for rebellion, division, war, murder, robbery, arson, and the collapse of Christendom. He lives the life of a beast. He has burned the decretals. He despises alike the ban and the sword. He does more harm to the civil than to the ecclesiastical power. We have labored with him, but he recognizes only the authority of Scripture, which he interprets in his own sense. We have given him twenty-one days, dating from April the 25th. We have now gathered the estates. Luther is to be regarded as a convicted heretic. When the time is up, no one is to harbor him. His followers also are to be condemned. His books are to be eradicated from the memory of man.
In light of all this, I assert again the wisdom of Gamaliel in Acts 5:
And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought: But if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.