Well, there's that islamic sacrament of severing heads that hasn't yet been adopted by protestants.
I'm sure you consider this a serious, informed, well-researched comparison of Protestantism to Islam. Excuse me for a minute....
BWA HAHAHAHAHA
A ping to your Catholic list would be appreciated.
Orthodox ping.
Interesting suggestions. But many of the beliefs and practices of Protestantism are actually common to just about any of the earlier heresies: a rejection or weakening of belief in the Trinity, for example, or the rejection of the Eucharist and the sacramental priesthood. Others seem to be regular features of various heresies of "personal revelation," such as Mormonism, which frequently involve an attempt to adopt a distorted form of OT ritual law and a literal adherence to OT practices. As a result they often dabble in polygamy or adopt a decidedly pre-Christian view of women. Bear in mind that Islam developed in a climate that had been heavily influenced by Arian Christianity, and in which the divisions left by Arianism and other heresies made Middle Eastern Christians particularly weak in doctrine and vulnerable to attacks.
However, the idea of the Protestants' literal adherence to a book as being taken from Islam is something I'd never thought of before, and the author may be right on this. To my knowledge, there is no other, earlier Christian heresy that involves an attempt to cling to the literal words of a text. Perhaps it was Islam that suggested this to Luther's mind.
I must say I think this article is a bit over the top, but that said, reading the posts of the Protestants concerning the scriptures it has occurred to me more than once that the Protestant view of those scriptures and to a lesser extent, their view of God, is pretty thoroughly Mohammedan. Now its apparent that Mohammedanism didn't learn to read and use the Koran from Protestants, they didn't create their vengeful and thoroughly capricious god under the influence of Protestants, and they didn't condemn icons or dispense with a priesthood under the influence of Protestantism. Nor is the converse true so far as I know. I do think that both represent a continuing heretical variation of both Jewish and Christian theology and praxis current at the time of their inception, however.
There are Spanish Jews in India, settled there couple of centuries ago, as a result of fleeing the Catholic church's Inquisition. And those were the lucky ones who could escape.
Do the dots connect with the Islamic aspect now?
Why is it that most Protestant-majority countries are far well-off than most Catholic-majority ones? Is this an ignorant observation, or does it have something to do with that Protestant work ethic that was supposedly famous in that community, years ago?
I'm still undecided as to bothering with the rest of this silly article.
pull this trash!
Hmm, no mention of the Islamic-esque inquisitions. No mention of spreading faith by the sword in Latin America. I could go on but why bother.
This is simply cherry picking history.
As a Christian Catholic, I publicly reject it. Helium could not make this rise to the level of offal
An interesting read, but I wonder what the expected audience was for this article. To whom was he writing?
It seems irrational to begin the article by comparing Protestantism with Islam, since Protestants claim to be Christians. At least most Protestans are Christians, but with so many sects and branches out there, it begins to become fuzzy. When I was a child, there was no reason to question whether a Protestant was a Christian, although a better description of a Protestant now might be a Christian belonging to neither the Catholic Churches or the Orthodox churches.
Actually the author was describing some similar characteristis between Islam and many Protestant practices; although even here they are general similarities and certainly do nothing to clarify the most important difference - being that Protestants (good Protestants) accept Jesus as Lord and Savior and Muslims think Jesus was only a prophet, and a lesser one than Mohammed.
The article misses the mark because Islam is so anti-Christian and Anti-Semitic, that it appears to be almost a caricature of the anti-Christ. Which renders the article to be both irrational and irrelevant.
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This was a shameful article. It is an insulting hit piece, not something intended for rational discussion.
A similar article could be written claiming the Catholics of TODAY were embracing Islam. For instance, Catholics are against abortion and homosexuality, just as Islam is against these things. "Little" things like the POPE kissing the Koran could be added as frosting to the cake.
This would, of course, be a spurious attack that was in no way valid. I would expect the Catholics at FR to be outraged by the slander, and justifiably so.
However, in this case, the attack was launched by Catholics against Protestants. Why should the Protestants of FR be any less outraged than the Catholics would be?
I'm disgusted.
I have also read many books on how Catholicism co-opted many practices from any country it has evangelised, including many middle eastern ways of being. Religions tend to do this - it is not right but it happens. Thefore it woud seem that adherence to the bible and the early church fathers would be seen as a good thing. It tends to get one back to their roots so to speak. Error enters the church through many mediums as you may well know - look at what has been happening with the tolerance of Homosexuals in the priesthood. If their is no looking back to the scripture and the decisions of the Early Church then eventually these errors can find their way into doctrine. I am not saying that this has happened in the Catholic Church but a regular purge of societal influence on the church is a good thing - pity Luther felt he had to go outside of the church to do this.
Certainly branches of Protestantism have, at various times, been intensely concerned with the Law to the point of obsession. One would have to doubt these group's ability to understand the broad sweep of Scripture rather than assign to them a draw towards Islam.
I think the article takes broad leaps in logic without the least bit of supporting evidence and is a bit of an embarrassment really.
Blessings
Mel
well, I guess when Billy Graham kneels down and prays with an Imam in a mosque, this article will have convinced me. This is a hit piece, pure and simple. I hope you got whatever thrill you were seeking in posting it.
The author didn't touch on the one area that might have been interesting. The predestination taught by Islam is like Calvin on steroids. The two theological positions do not have common roots, so it didn't serve the author's purposes (though that didn't stop him in other areas).
The article is a piece of crap, on par with the rantings of leftists who point out how the USA is Nazi Germany. The fact that Catholics on this board aren't the first to see this for the steaming pile of manure it is, is disappointing. Get that beam out of your eye, Francis Lynch. It's ugly.
State Theocracy? The author doesn't see the irony?
Sexual immorality amongst the clergy? He still doesn't see it?
Muslims and Protestants and the role of women? Is this one a joke?
Scripture? Many Muslims have never even read theirs. Many are illiterate. They count on the Imam. Sounds kind of like another religion until translations and the printing press came along, and with it ...........
"the key point of Islamic and Protestant divergence?" Really? Is that really the key point? Does the author really believe that? Does the author know anything at all about Protestant belief other than that he hates it? This morning at the United Methodist Church, I will pray that Allah will enlighten and forgive him.
Some of us Christians are hoping some day the Catholic church will actually find Christ. But with Popes praying in Mosques and kissing Korans that may not happen.
A Calvinist scholar, David Chilton, suggested that the Reformers borrowed their notion of ears-only worship from Islam. As a former Catholic, I can attest to the power of the liturgical year and colors to structure time for God's glory. The prototypical worship service, as portrayed in Apocalypse, includes incense and imprecatory prayers.
I don't normally poke into the catholic-protestant threads. Can you tell me, is this really where modern catholicism is at this point? If so, catholicism is even more messed up than I thought.