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In this episode Trent reveals four things Catholics need to stop saying to Protestants.
Transcription:
I watch a lot of interactions between Catholics and Protestants on social media and I’ve noticed 4 things Catholics often say to Protestants that they really shouldn’t. So let’s take a look at what not to say:
- “Protestant churches are always ugly, Catholic churches are always beautiful”
Recently I came across this meme showing a simple church allegedly being the “most ornate” Protestant church and a beautiful Catholic church being the “least ornate” Catholic church. And when I hear that I say, “what kind of incense have you been smoking?”
Most Catholic churches I’ve attended are bland or beige as Bishop Barron might say. They aren’t hideous, but they aren’t memorable either. They are just the product of uninspired architectural trends in the 1970’s. And you don’t get to ignore them because you just really want to dunk on Protestant architecture. In fact, the atrocious example of church architecture I used in my episode on why liberals love ugly art was the Catholic Newman Center at UC-Berkeley.
Now it’s true, a lot of Protestant churches are also bland, but there are Protestant churches that have beautiful architectural designs that inspire genuine awe in those who see them. There’s the episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine built to rival St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, The Hallgrímskirkja in, Iceland, and St. Matthew’s Lutheran church in Charleston.
Finally, the Catholic church in this meme is the San Augustine church in the Philippines. It’s a 400 year old church in a country where 80 percent of the population is Catholic. In contrast, the simple Protestant church in the meme is one in Algeria church in Algeria where the population is 99% Muslim. Christians have very limited religious freedom in the country and has recently closed churches for allegedly not being registered with the government. According to this article, “Youssef Ourahmane, the leader of a Protestant church in Algeria, has denounced the closure of his church which has been around for more than 20 years. Last November, local authorities closed the church, claiming it had been used to “illegally print Gospels and publications intended for evangelism”.
Unless you have the benefit of a basilica that already existed when Algeria was a French colony, you’re going to have trouble building an ornate Christian church in the city today. But I’d rather praise these protestants for risking their freedom to spread the Gospel and then dialogue with them about the nature of the church than just take potshots at the simple way they express their worship of God.
It’s fair to point out problems in major elements of Protestant architecture, like how some Protestants will engage in altar calls even though there is no altar in their church for people to approach. But saying Protestant churches are ugly is like saying Protestant churches are just rock concerts or TED talks. That’s true for some of them, but there are also banal Catholic churches with cringey liturgies. And as I noted in my episode on the Protestant worship problem, there are some Protestant churches that have retained at last the appearance of classical liturgies and the problem is with the deeper theology of the Eucharist and the role of the liturgy.
Let’s talk about that, instead of trying to pick out the speck in a Protestants eye while ignoring the beige 1970’s plank of wood in our own Catholic eyes.
- Sola scriptura has split the church into 33,000 Protestant denominations
It is true that making the Bible the only infallible rule of faith and rebuking the idea of a universal, living magisterium had gravely damaged the body of Christ and allowed serious theological errors to spread. But Catholics shouldn’t be hyperbolic when pointing this out and it is hyperbolic to say that this has resulted in 33,000 different Protestant denominations.
This figure comes from the World Christian Encyclopedia by Barrett, Kurian and Johnson. It says:
A denomination is defined in this Encyclopedia as an organized aggregate of worship centers or congregations of similar ecclesiastical tradition within a specific country; i.e. as an organized Christian church or tradition or religious group or community of believers . . . As defined here, world Christianity consists of 6 major ecclesiastico-cultural blocs, divided into 300 major ecclesiastical traditions, composed of over 33,000 distinct denominations in 238 countries
This definition includes not just Protestants but also Catholics and Eastern Orthodox. It says there are 9000 Protestant denominations and 22,000 independents. But the number is only this high if you say the Baptist church of Mexico is a different denomination of the Baptist church of Guatemala, even though they probably believe the same doctrines. We know the encyclopedia makes this kind of error because it falsely claims that there are 242 different denominations of Catholicism, but that doesn’t mean there are 242 separate denominations with conflicting belief systems.
The truth is, we have no idea how many Protestant denominations exist because there are so many independent Protestant and evangelical churches in strip malls and house churches. But ultimately, it doesn’t matter. For example, it doesn’t take tens of thousands of heresies to throw Christendom into chaos. A few dozen would do the trick. Likewise, even if there were only a few dozen different Protestant denominations, properly speaking, that would still be far more than the one universal Church our Lord desired when he prayed to the Father, “keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.”
Ultimately, the number of Christian denominations isn’t the issue. A Protestant could say that the Byzantine or Syro-Malabar Catholic churches are separate denominations but they only differ in legitimate customs, not essential doctrines. The real problem, which I’ve addressed on this channel numerous times, is that Protestantism leads to divisions in the body of Christ between churches on the very dogmas God wants us to know so that we can truly know him and have eternal life.
Let’s focus on that, rather than on quibbling about exactly how many Protestant denominations exist.
Before I get to number 3, a runner up would be, “Don’t support the Counsel of Trent if you are not Catholic.” We have many Catholic supporters, but we also have non-Catholics who support our work defending God’s existence, Christ’s resurrection, and basic moral truths like the wrongness of abortion. If you want to help us equip anyone of good will, Catholic Protestant or otherwise, then please subscribe to the channel and support us financially at trenthornpodcast.com For as little as 5 dollars a month of 50 dollars a year you get access to bonus content and keep the Counsel of Trent sponsor-free. Check it out at trenthornpodcast.com.
Alright, number 3:
- Martin Luther and John Calvin were depraved
Protestants don’t treat Martin Luther and John Calvin as infallible orators or mini-popes. I know Calvinists who proudly say Calvin would have them burned at the stake for some of their theological developments. Just as it isn’t helpful for a Protestant to harp on the immorality of some medieval popes when he’s trying to reach a Catholic, it doesn’t help Catholics trying to reach Protestants for us to harp on the alleged immoralities of Calvin and Luther. Even if the allegations were true, they don’t prove anything substantial.
Luther and Calvin did have their fair share of culpable faults like any person. But some Catholics take the low road and spread propaganda against them which just isn’t helpful. All it does it make Catholics look ignorant some of which I’ve addressed in a previous episode I’ll link to in the description below.
For example, some Catholics say John Calvin was actually gay and Martin Luther visited prostitutes. Concerning Calvin, these Catholics say he was convicted of sodomy when he was 18 years old in his hometown of Noyon France. However, the source of the rumor, Jerome Bolsec, previously debated Calvin on predestination and had a bitter grudge against him. R Scott Clark, a professor of Church history at Westminster Seminary, points out that when Calvin was 18 he was studying law at the university of Orleans 150 miles away from Noyon and the town registry doesn’t record this particular crime. Plus, if this had happened, then the scandal of the arrest would have prevented Calvin from completing his studies at Orleans or his degree at Bourges a few years later. So this is an urban legend.
When it comes to Luther and the prostitutes, this probably comes from Patrick O Hare’s book The Facts About Luther, a 1916 work that is extremely critical of Luther and extremely lacking in research. It says of Luther “The evidences of his depravity are so overwhelming and convincing that they are forced to the conclusion that this shameless advocate of brazen prostitution could not be and was not a ‘messenger of the all Holy God.’”
But that’s wrong. Luther was famous for demanding brothels be closed down and he contradicted Augustine and Aquinas who tolerated legal prostitution in order to prevent uncontrolled lust from spreading.
Other people take Luther quotes out of context to make him sound as bad as possible. This includes quotes like this one: “Be a sinner and sin boldly . . . No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day.”
This makes it sound like Luther thought a Christian could never lose his salvation, which isn’t true. Luther said that baptism “throws away unbelief” but through sin people could fall away into unbelief and . . . soil themselves again in filth.” Instead, this was a personal letter to his friend Phillip Melanchthon of which Luther biographer Eric Metaxas says,
“Luther was hardly saying that Melanchthon should try to sin, as many have misinterpreted quotation, but that he should forget about trying not to sin, because in the end this was not possible. He must understand that in all that we do, we will doubtless sin—because we are sinners—but if your faith is in Christ, who has already defeated sin and paid for our sins on the cross, we are redeemed.”
This hyperbolic language to underscore the depths of God’s mercy. Now, there are deficiencies in Luther’s soteriology that can be rightly critiqued, but it isn’t fair to focus on a person’s rhetoric to the exclusion of the substance of his view. Doing that is no different than Protestants thinking they can debunk Catholic Mariology by just complaining about grandiose language in something like The Glories of Mary by St. Alphonsus Liguori or a random Tweet they saw that was over the top in its description of Mary.
If we as Catholics would want Protestants to engage the substance of our Faith, then we must be willing to do the same with what they believe.
- Protestants don’t believe in repentance or Church history
There are some Protestants who blatantly ignore Church history or think good works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation.
For example, free grace theologians like Robert Wilkin believe that repentance and good works are not necessary for salvation, even as merely signs one is saved. Other Protestants like John MacArthur reject this view and say repentance is necessary but that it’s not a work that earns salvation. Repentance is just the natural consequence of accepting Jesus as Lord. That’s why this view among Protestants has been called Lordship salvation.
Only a few Protestants embrace an antinomian heresy that says we can be degenerate people and still be saved. But in reaction to that heresy, some Catholics have imposed a kind of Pelagianism or legalism that makes works necessary even for initial salvation.
For example, some people, including Catholics, have criticized fitness Nala, a former pornographer turned Christian, for not giving away the large amounts of money she made producing pornography.
Some went so far as to say that Nala’s claim she doesn’t have to give the money away to be saved shows Protestantism is wrong and that you do have to do good works to be saved.
Now, I’m not going to comment on Nala’s current work as an influencer and some of the controversial things she’s said. My point is just that Catholicism teaches that you do not have to do good works, including giving up money you earned from evils like prostitution or performing abortion, in order to be saved.
When we are baptized, and I’m assuming Nala’s baptism was valid, the eternal and temporal punishment for our sins is removed from our souls. You don’t have to do anything to make up for past sins after you’ve received baptism because baptism washes away all sin and its effects. What baptism, as well as absolution in the sacrament of confession, does not do is give us a license to commit new sins.
For example, if you were a car thief and then converted and received baptism or went to confession, you would still have to return the cars you stole. You don’t have to do that to make your baptism valid, since no future act has any baring on the validity of baptism. Instead, your baptism doesn’t communicate forgiveness of sins committed after baptism. And every day you keep the stolen cars entails a new sin of theft that was not remitted in baptism. Similarly, if you genuinely express sorrow in confession for car theft but you change your mind later and don’t return the cars, then you have committed the sin of theft all over again and are no longer in a state of grace.
This is why Zacchaeus told Jesus he would return money to anyone he defrauded and this shows he genuinely converted.
However, if you made money doing something wrong instead of taking what rightfully belonged to others, such as if you were dealing drugs, or making pornography, or committing abortions, you wouldn’t have to give away the money you made in order to be forgiven of your sins because keeping the money would not be a continuation of the sin of theft.
It would be saintly and heroic for you to give the money away, but it wouldn’t be necessary for your salvation because you aren’t morally required to return the money to those who freely gave it to you when they purchased an evil thing from you.
St. Thomas Aquinas covers this in the Summa in the section on the question, “Whether one may give alms out of ill-gotten goods?” Aquinas says there are three ways to get money when you shouldn’t. If money is simply stolen he says, “a man may not give alms [of it] since he is bound to restore them.” In the second case, if someone gives you stolen money that can’t be lawfully returned, then the money should be given to the poor. Aquinas then says there is a third case of bad money. He writes:
a thing is ill-gotten, not because the taking was unlawful, but because it is the outcome of something unlawful, as in the case of a woman’s profits from whoredom. This is filthy lucre properly so called, because the practice of whoredom is filthy and against the Law of God, yet the woman does not act unjustly or unlawfully in taking the money. Consequently it is lawful to keep and to give in alms what is thus acquired by an unlawful action.
So, to give another example, if you were an abortionist who became Catholic and your house and car were paid with blood money, you would not be bound to give those things away in order to remain in a state of grace. You might feel God is personally calling you to make that sacrifice and you’re free to make a heroic witness through such a sacrifice, but salvation is a free gift of God and putting extra burdens on people in order for them to be saved contradicts the Gospel. So let’s not give Protestants who claim Catholics are ignorant of the Gospel any unnecessary ammunition for that false charge against us.
And when it comes to Church history a lot of Catholics like to quote Cardinal Henry Newman who said, “To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.” I think this really comes off as triumphalist to many Protestants and ignorant of how some Protestants have engaged the Church fathers.
It is true that Protestant apologists from two generations ago didn’t care much about the Fathers. They ended up getting steamrolled in debates with Karl Keating and Patrick Madrid. But now you have Protestant apologists who bring the fathers to bare as you can see in my responses to James White and Gavin Ortlund on the Fathers on several issues.
Although in many cases modern Protestants who cite the fathers often just follow what 19th century Protestant theologians said about them like Philipp Schaff and others, many of whom came from the Anglican tradition. So I would say Newman’s aphorism is more accurately rendered, “To be deep in history is to cease to be non-denominational” or “To be deep in history is to cease to be Evangelical”.
From their, you can engage Protestants who try to follow in the Reformer’s footsteps in trying to reclaim the Church fathers for themselves. John Calvin even said in a 1539 letter to Cardinal Sadoleto: “You know, Sadoleto, . . . not only that our agreement with antiquity is far closer than yours, but that all we have attempted has been to renew the ancient form of the Church.”
I don’t believe that’s true, but Catholics should at least acknowledge when Protestants try to harmonize their doctrine with historical Christian witness and then graciously point out the flaws in this kind of historical revisionism.
So let’s raise the level of discourse between Catholics and Protestants, which is why we have redesigned this studio to have in person dialogues on these important issues. And if you want to help us have these dialogues please support us at trenthornpodcast.com which will allow us to bring in all kinds of non-Catholic guests to have good conversations and avoid the five bad things you shouldn’t say to Protestants.
So thank you all so much for watching and I hope you have a very blessed day.