r/redeemedzoomer

I was really inspired by reading Luther’s argument that the burning of heretics is against the will of the Spirit, which I consider to be the greatest moment of the whole reformation when Pope Leo denounces that view.

But now I would like to pose the question back to Luther (or Protestants as a whole): is it the will of the Spirit for there to be Protestants, not in the temporary as a resistance movement against Papal abuses, but in the permanent? I’m not simply asking whether the Reformation was justified, but whether the grand schism and the dozens of schism of schisms following it is grievous to God?

Appealing to Scripture, it was Christ Himself that prayed “That they may be One, as We are One.” Not once but twice in John 17 (Our God! How great is our God!) And “Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven”. So that same will for the Church in Heaven is the will of the Spirit on earth, and that will is that we be One even as Christ is one — that is, one in perfect unity and will, which seems to mean a unified body.

This line of thinking has directly led me to inquiry into the Orthodox Church, because if this is against the will of the Spirit, certainly that means every Protestant everywhere has an obligation to recommune with the apostolic traditions and be members of one body. This is evident in that anything against the will of the Spirit is influenced by demons and is to be rejected at all costs.

And yes, because Protestants broke apart from the One Catholic Church it is clear they would be called to recommune rather than vice versa.

So I know there are multiple answers going about on this question depending on whom you ask and what christian background they have.

Question 1:
Is it possible for someone who does not believe in god but is a good person in respects to christianity able to go to heaven? Let us say they have learned about christ but chose not to follow him but are still a good person.

Question 2: (similar but not the same)
Is it possible for someone who does believe that there is something out there (not specifically god but like a general idea of god) but is a good person in respects to christianity able to go to heaven? Let us say they have learned about christ but chose not to follow him but are still a good person.

I was watching a debate recently with an Eastern Orthodox Christian and he said that the Trinity should be properly understood as God being the Father alone and the Son and Holy Spirit as sharing the same divine essence as the Father. He said that Augustine influenced the Western Church into holding an erroneous view of God by declaring that God is the entire Trinity.

Is he correct here?

The Rev. lwk melts RZ's argument on ELCA. What are your thoughts?

God bless the LCMS!

And why do so many in the Reconquista Movement have such disdain for Missouri even though we are the only institutional stalwart?

(at least in the USA)

A pastor at an episcopal church did a cannonball into a kiddie pool during his sermon. Kind of weird. What do you think?

RZ says that Star Wars is unChristian because the Jedi philosophy is closer to Buddhism with its detachment and asceticism rather than Christianity. He even made some videos saying the Sith code is closer to Christianity.

I want to challenge this idea, though more from the Legends or Expanded Universe lore. In my understanding, the series has always criticised the Old Jedi Order for being too ascetic. This is why in the New Order, Luke allows the Jedi to marry and have relations to lovers, children and previous family. We can even see this motif in the Old Republic Era where the Jedi and Sith team up to fight a worse enemy, and that their respective leaders (Darth Marr and Grandmaster Satele Shan) reconcile and seek 'Balance' in the Force.

I actually really like Star Wars and think it can be beneficial media for Christian living. I think the Light-Dark side dichotomy is just the deficiency-excess dichotomy of Aristotle made aestheticised into two rivalling orders. Star Wars always talks about balance between them, and the Christian tradition has historically also prescribed the golden mean between excess and deficiency (specifically, in the case of Star Wars, the virtue is right relation to the world, with the Sith having excessive love to wordly goods and the Jedi having excessive detachment from them).

Moreover, though the Force is more akin to an impersonal energy than a Theistic God, it does have a plan and is providential. Both Jedi and Sith codes even have cool parts, e.g., the last two lines of the Jedi Code are "There is no chaos; there is harmony. There is no death; there is the Force." which professes both providence and the overcoming of death, whereas the last two lines of the Sith Code are "Through victory, my chains are broken. The Force shall free me." which represents freedom.

Finally, Redemption is a big part of the original trilogy and strongly resonates with our instincts that no person is beyond repentance, even if they are as evil as Vader who slaughtered children.

Edit: I just thought too that just as God can bring good out of our evil, so too does the Force in Star Wars explicitly permit evil to allow greater goods to come forth from it.

Penal Substitution is an interesting idea and is fine to believe, but the Christus victory idea is extremely good as it basically ensures that Christ is a cosmological king and a warrior who literally killed death. He was the quintessential super-Jew in the world.

Hey Everyone, As the title suggests I'm trying to better understand the Reformed Doctrine of Mainline Protestantism. I'm a recent catholic convert from Atheism, and prior evangelical dispensational Protestantism, but I have an interest in ecumenicism and inter-denominational dialogue. Recently, I have been reading through the philosophies of John Calvin, Martin Luther, and Huldrych Zwingli to understand the foundational tenants of Mainline Protestantism. So far I have liked a lot of what I have read, despite having some disagreements which was to be expected. The Doctrines of Sola Gratia and Sola Fide are very well articulated, as is the idea of Total Depravity. I also like the Idea of Irresistible, though I understand it from a more universal outlook than it has been previously explained to me. Additionally, from what I've read on Covenant Theology and Kingdom Theology the two frameworks seem amazing additions to the Faith. I particularly like the works I have read by Karl Barth on the subject.

That being said there are Certain ideas i take issue with, however I a similar vein to the issues many protestants espouse towards Catholics (i.e. Accusations of Worship of Saints, Anti-papism, idolatry, etc.) I imagine these issues are due to ignorance on my part and that of my fellow Catholics. So I figured I would ask those of you who hold to some of these ideas to better explain them to me, and correct me if I am in error.

Here They Are in order.

Predestination: To my understanding Predestination feels both unnecessarily cruel and unjust while simultaneously removing free will. Additionally, it seems to place god within time, rather than beyond it, with god making a decision on who are included in the elect at a specific point in the past rather than existing ex temporally and thus knowing the results of individuals actions now without compromising on free will. This confusion extends to all beliefs which stem from predestination.

Sola Scriptura: I know there is a difference between solo and sola scriptura, I know you guys don't hold that the bible alone is the only source of authority. However, the claim that scripture is the ultimate source of authority seems inaccurate to me for two reasons. First, the church existed prior to the compilation of the bible, thus would have authority over it. And second, Had scripture held authority over the oral tradition of the New covenant the proponents of the old covenant, the pharisees, could have used scripture from the old covenant to attack the new covenant before its tenets were transcribed to scripture.

Universal Priesthood: I'm Kind of halfway on this one. I believe that the individual ought to be able to read and comprehend the scriptures on his own, and that the work of the reformers to restore this right was noble. However, personal interpretation has led to the foundation of various heretical groups, namely the JWs and LDS, and thus there ought to be some authority to help the individual define their interpretation, that being the church.

There are other ideas I take issue with, however these are the tree main ones. Hopefully you guys can help me out with understanding, and if you guys can provide sources (either biblical or extra-biblical) that would be phenomenal. Again thank you so much, God Bless.

I have been very curious about what does each branch of christianity believes about the salvation of non-christians and heretics. As I understand it, there are different opinions/views regarding this topic.

Henceforth, I'd like to make a little dynamic here. I'd like you all to write which branch of christianity you belong to (whether it is catholicism, orthodoxy, methodist, presbyterian, baptist, etc) and tell me which is your church's view/take on the salvation of non-christians and/or heretics.

Can they be saved? If yes, how can they be saved? If not, why is that?

I'd also like to know if you have a personal belief that is kinda contrary to what your church teaches (maybe you're a universalist?).

Also, I don't think I'll find sedevacantists here, but if there's someone, I'd like to know your view on this topic.

I'm doing this post because I'm only aware of the catholic view (because I'm catholic lol), but I'd like to know about y'all.

And I know, even if non-christians might be saved, that doesn't mean we should ignore our mission to bring as many souls as possible to God, AT LEAST by praying for non-christians (or at least this is how I interpret what the catholic church teaches).

I feel like among the older generations that didn’t leave the church, they were “loyal” to their denomination, regardless of politics. Always going to a Lutheran Church because their family was always Lutheran or always going to a Methodist Church because their family was Methodist for generations. Which could explain why we also still see some older conservatives in the UMC, TEC, ELCA, etc.

Now it seems like younger Protestants aren’t tied down to a particular denomination. A lot of the younger people that grew up in a mainline church either no longer attend church or are apart of a non-denominational church.

What do you think?

i’m Byzantine Catholic and i Want to know if i can’t watch him

My question is about countries where the historic/national church is Eastern Orthodox (Russia, Romania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Greece). In these places the dominant, institutional church with apostolic succession claims, ancient cathedrals, and cultural establishment is Orthodox, not Protestant.

How do you view Protestant churches planted in these countries over the last 200 years (missionary plants, Baptist, Pentecostal, evangelical, Lutheran remnants, etc.)?

- Are they considered schismatic in your framework, since they exist outside the historic national Orthodox church?

- Or does the “stick with the historic mainline” principle only apply within already-Protestant traditions/countries, and new Protestant plants in Orthodox lands are a different category (more like legitimate missionary work or “new ground” rather than schism)?

- Would you encourage faithful Protestants living there to eventually join the local Orthodox Church, or is it acceptable for them to remain in Protestant congregations?

-If there are literally no classic Protestant churches (Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican) in a big region and the only ones available are non-denominational or Pentecostal, would somebody regularly attending that church be committing the sin of schism?

I’m asking because your schism theology makes a lot of sense in Western contexts with established Protestant bodies, but it’s less clear how it translates to traditionally Orthodox nations.

A little over a year ago, the Mormons pagans began calling themselves "Christians," something that no one would have imagined just a few years ago.

In that context, I recently debated a very sharp Mormon (PhD in philosophy and history). I argued that his religion (I avoided calling it a "Christian denomination") can't be historically traced back to antiquity; he countered that Protestantism can't trace a continuous line before Luther.

In the middle of the debate, he proposed this thought experiment:

—Imagine a distant, unreachable planet where no human religion ever arrived, yet by chance its dominant species developed a religion identical in every respect to primitive Christianity in its purest orthodoxy: same canon, soteriology, ecclesiology, sacraments, everything. Would they be Christians? What could you "reform" if everything is already orthodox? Any attempt would actually corrupt them.

I replied:

—Christianity isn't defined by a checklist of doctrines, since even heresies preserve some orthodox elements. Islam, for instance, affirms Jesus as Messiah, but that doesn't make it Christianity. So those alien pagans, assuming they had moral and religious awareness, would have to turn away from their false religion and join Protestant churches.

He then asked what would distinguish their "orthodoxy" from ours. I answered:

—Origin! Original Christianity is defined by its historical origin: specific first-century individuals. Since those figures didn't originate that alien religion, it isn't original Christianity, even if identical in content (note: this may sound a bit awkward in English, but the conversation wasn't in English, so the wordplay between original and originate felt natural and made my point clear, that "earthly Protestant Christianity" is original because it originates with the apostles).

He replied that this is basically a "papist" view:

—You're appealing to lineage (apostolic succession) rather than pure orthodoxy. True Christianity depends only on having perfect doctrine/practice, not historical pedigree. So, trying to "connect" those aliens to a lineage would actually corrupt a perfectly orthodox faith. And this is basically the kind of "originality" Catholics and Orthodox appeal to when they dismiss Protestantism and stir up "ecclesiastical anxiety" among its members. If you were being honest with yourself, you'd reform your own earthly denomination based on that perfect extraterrestrial one or even join it. But like many Protestants, you're still mentally tied to Babylon (Rome).

We paused there and agreed to continue later.

• How would you push back against the idea that this is basically "papism"?
• How can we as Protestants claim historical "originality" without turning into a poor imitation of Catholicism or Orthodoxy?
• And, fundamentally, would you join the extraterrestrial Church?