[HarleyD]

The way that Protestants were believing and worshipping 100 years after Luther started the ball rolling was very different from the way their Catholic parents and grandparents had believed and worshipped. There was a real break and real innovation

I will agree that there were "innovations" in worship in the Protestants/Catholic split. However, there have always been innovations throughout the ages-sometimes good, sometimes not. I doubt if any church (Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox) can lay claim that they actually worship as the 1st century disciples.

Protestant usage of patristic writings seem mainly to me to be in the spirit of "see, Catholics, even these guys you call saints disagree with you on this or that point." ....If you tell an Orthodox Christian that a given Father seems to contradict Orthodox teaching, he will... show that this particular Father is out of the consensus Patrum.

To me there is not much difference and underscores a problem; how do you know that the minority view is wrong? It's extremely gentlemanly to say they're "out of consensus" but it amounts to no less then saying their wrong.

Luther seems to have seen a window of opportunity, and taken it.

I think that is a rather harsh and cynical view of Luther. He was simply following standard procedures of the order of the day. Tacking his theses onto the door was what everyone did that had a disagreement for discussion. His actions before Charles and the Church, in which he faced almost certain death, does not sound to me like a "window of opportunity".

[Agrarian]

"I think that is a rather harsh and cynical view of Luther."

I don't see how it can be considered to be a harsh and cynical view to say that what began as a concern over something that pretty much everyone knew was wrong (the sale of indulgences) quickly expanded to a very radical change in virtually every aspect of Catholic theology.

I'm not defending medieval Catholic theology. I'm just saying that if one wants to defend Luther, one must defend most of what he changed or tried to change, and not just keep drumming on the sale of indulgences -- something that is non-controversial in the extreme.

[Forest Keeper]

Agrarian as quoted by FK: "Protestant usage of patristic writings seem mainly to me to be in the spirit of "see, Catholics, even these guys you call saints disagree with you on this or that point." ... If you tell a Catholic that a particular Father contradicts a Catholic teaching, he will show how you can technically read that Father in a way that supports the Magesterium. If you tell an Orthodox Christian that a given Father seems to contradict Orthodox teaching, he will ... show that this particular Father is out of the consensus Patrum."

Harley: "To me there is not much difference and underscores a problem; how do you know that the minority view is wrong? It's extremely gentlemanly to say they're "out of consensus" but it amounts to no less then saying their wrong."

I agree with you Harley. I don't see much difference either, all of these are different ways of saying the other one is wrong. I like your point about the minority view, after all, didn't all three of the faiths start out in the minority? :)

I was wondering if Agrarian's comparison might have been a little broader. I was thinking about the difference between "Magesterium" and "Consensus Patrum". Agrarian, did you mean "Sacred Magesterium", denoting only the Pope, and his loyal bishops? If so, that would be an important distinction to make, it seems to me, between that and the Consensus Patrum.

All of this reminds me of a way I think Protestants are closer to the Orthodox than with Catholicism. Agrarian has written eloquently about how the Orthodox "look back to move forward" (my paraphrase). I see Protestantism, especially the Reformers, as being like this too. Whenever we Reformers are faced with anything new, where do we look first and always? We go back to the beginning, to the Bible. The Orthodox go back to the beginning also.

So, I guess what I'm getting at is when we face new questions in our culture such as "What does God think of human cloning, or sex-selection, or whether to disobey man's laws concerning hiding illegal aliens, etc.?", the approaches are more similar among the Protestants and the Orthodox, in my opinion. We would go back to the beginning to find the answer, whereas the Catholics might try to adapt to current circumstances, eventually culminating in a Vatican III.