Looking for a new church

[mtr1979]

Looking for a new church to attend. I grew up Roman Catholic did confirmation and all that other stuff, but I have no desire to attend mass ever again.

I also spent a few years as an atheist from 2010 to 2018.

In the last couple of weeks I started checking out a couple of churches. The people were nice, but it felt weird. People would randomly shout things like praise Jesus or they had their hands up in the air. This type of stuff never happened in Catholic mass.

The thing that bothered me the most it seems like all they were doing was asking for money. I understand money is needed to keep the lights on and other expenses. They were talking about how they needed money to "plant" other churches and to pay off their mortgage. I understand they want to spread the message, but wouldn't the money be better spent on mission work and not construction of state of the art facilities? I have no authority to tell these people how to structure their churches it is just an observation.

I also wasn't blown away by the sermons. Everything was on a PowerPoint. Then there was the cliches bad jokes everyone laughed at.

When I go to Church I don't want to be entertained. I don't want a motivation speaker. I want the Biblical principles to be talked about in depth.

Other things I have issues with: why would someone spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a theology degree so they could then be a preacher? I always thought if someone went into the ministry they accepted and embraced a life of poverty?

I'm sure they exist, but I want to find a church where the preacher has a day job and has been touched by the world and come out the other side.

[ClaytonB]

Looking for a new church to attend. I grew up Roman Catholic did confirmation and all that other stuff, but I have no desire to attend mass ever again.

I also spent a few years as an atheist from 2010 to 2018.

In the last couple of weeks I started checking out a couple of churches. The people were nice, but it felt weird. People would randomly shout things like praise Jesus or they had their hands up in the air. This type of stuff never happened in Catholic mass.

The thing that bothered me the most it seems like all they were doing was asking for money. I understand money is needed to keep the lights on and other expenses. They were talking about how they needed money to "plant" other churches and to pay off their mortgage. I understand they want to spread the message, but wouldn't the money be better spent on mission work and not construction of state of the art facilities? I have no authority to tell these people how to structure their churches it is just an observation.

I also wasn't blown away by the sermons. Everything was on a PowerPoint. Then there was the cliches bad jokes everyone laughed at.

When I go to Church I don't want to be entertained. I don't want a motivation speaker. I want the Biblical principles to be talked about in depth.

Other things I have issues with: why would someone spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a theology degree so they could then be a preacher? I always thought if someone went into the ministry they accepted and embraced a life of poverty?

I'm sure they exist, but I want to find a church where the preacher has a day job and has been touched by the world and come out the other side.

This is the reply that you didn't ask for, but I'll give it anyway.

1) The church in America is very, very spiritually ill. That's not just RCC, it's across-the-board. All the major denominations, and most Roman Catholic churches, are in horrific spiritual condition. This is one of the primary causes of atheism and the general secular malaise in modern America.

2) As an ex-Catholic (?), you're going to find the shift to a Protestant church to be challenging on an increasing scale as follows: Anglican, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist/Non-denom. I'm massively generalizing, and skipping enormous amounts of detail, but this is the general pattern. Anglican will feel the least weird to you. Lutheran a little more weird, but still somewhat recognizable. Presbyterian even more weird. Baptist will feel like you're in the wilderness. And non-denom/Pentecostal/etc. will feel like you're in church with aliens. (I kid, I kid).

3) I would encourage you to spend some time understanding ecclesiology (the doctrine of the church) overall. In the church of Rome, ecclesiology is simple enough that even a small child can understand it: the Pope is in charge of everything and whatever he says, goes; the end. In Orthodoxy (the oldest branch of the church, a whole topic to itself), there is no Pope. Rather, the authority structure goes from the bottom-up: churches have bishops and nearby churches form a territorial body and they choose one of their bishops to run that. And then those territories glom together and form a bigger unit which has a leader chosen from one of the appointed bishops, and so on up the chain. There are a handful of "patriarchs" at the top of Orthodoxy and they generally align with lingual/socio-political boundaries. The important point for understanding Protestantism (as a Catholic or ex-Catholic) is that the East has never agreed that the Pope has top-down power over the church, as Rome imagines. The Orthodox say "we no longer honor the Pope as first among equals" which means that their patriarchs no longer recognize the Pope as a peer patriarch, as they once did. Understanding this is key to understanding the Protestant view of Rome... basically, Protestantism is a branch of Western Christianity (formerly under Rome) that adopted an view of Rome similar to the Orthodox view of Rome (that Rome is an out-of-control church that needs to be corrected by the Holy Spirit in his time). Orthodoxy, however, does not recognize Protestant denominations because they do not have what is called "apostolic succession" (although the Anglicans claim to be an exception to this). Anyway, that's a whole other topic and I don't want to drag you through 2,000 years of church history in one post (impossible anyway).

4) The Baptists have a pretty different ecclesiology not only from Rome but also most other Protestants. In Baptist doctrine, each church is usually viewed as its own congregation and these congregations can form associations from the bottom-up, similar to Orthodoxy, but without apostolic succession (and other things). It's important to understand the basic concepts of Baptist ecclesiology because, even if you don't attend a Baptist church, most Protestant denominations (even if they're not Baptist) are actually influenced by Baptist thinking because it is historically the single biggest bloc of denominations in the US. Most Protestant denominations have churches within them that have a "Baptistic flavor", even though those denominations may officially disagree with Baptist ecclesiology.

5) I am glad to see that you're interested in getting to the real meat of Christianity and I would encourage you to press even further in this direction because, ultimately, Christianity is not about churches (even though the church is the central core of Christian life), it's about God's relationship with you. Some people (especially former RCC) can find this concept extremely daunting -- how can an infinite being want to relate directly to a mudball like me? Nevertheless, this is a core central part of the mystery of the Gospel... the teachings of Jesus aren't merely given to "us", they're given to you and me. And God's long-term purpose in all of this is to completey unify all who believe in and obey the Lord Jesus into a single body. Read John 17 and, for the full context for that prayer, John 14-17. In John 17, God's "strategic war objectives" are outlined by Jesus, as he prays to the Father. See particularly v. 23. The proof that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah of prophecy is that the church is ONE. I agree with Rome that far, but the Papacy is contrary to the word of God for a bunch of reasons, most obviously that it is not leadership-through-service (Luke 22:25-27), as proved by the excommunication of Rome by the churches of Orthodoxy so many centuries ago.

6) There are churches that take the Bible seriously in all of the major Protestant denominations. I would feel comfortable attending almost any of the churches precisely because they actually teach the Gospel and, in my view, that is the core thing that a church must do in respect to its teaching. I think some churches are more obedient to Christ in respect to form of worship than others but of the churches I would feel comfortable attending, I'm pretty flexible in that respect. I have attended everything from Calvary Chapel (this would feel to you like going to church with Martians) to Episcopal/Anglican (this would feel to you basically like Catholic-lite). As a general rule, you want to look for a sub-denomination that broke away from the mainline denomination because it was becoming too liberal OR you want to look for a mainline denomination church that just refused to go along with the liberalization and remained true to the older teachings of their denomination. Both types exist, and the "egg-hunt" of looking for a good church in America is greatly simplified by looking for a conservative sub-denomination, or a specific church that has remained conservative despite their denomination's general liberalization over the decades. Also note that "conservative" and "liberal" don't mean exactly the same thing in the church context versus political context. Correlated, but still distinct.

OK, that's a short wall-of-text you didn't ask for, now let's get to the good stuff -- most of what I've explained above is explained somewhere or other in these brief explainer videos which I highly recommend (these channels give highly reliable info). In roughly increasing order of detail:











This video is information-packed but be aware that the channel author is non-believing Jewish (practicing but not believing):

[mtr1979]

This is the reply that you didn't ask for, but I'll give it anyway.

I appreciate your post it is very informative. I like reading walls of text if the information is put forth in a correrent fashion.

In the past in the height of my atheisism. I read a book explaining all the various denominations. I don't recall the name. So I know the history of most religious sects. I still watched your videos all except the one that is three hours long.

I am limited in my selections for a new church. My location is a big factor. I don't live in an area with a large population. I'm also looking for a church that is bilingual or one that speaks Spanish. The bible also must be the center piece of the Church not some Catechism they made up. It would be nice to find a church where biblical scholarship is very important. This would be a 180 from the Catholic Church because no one knows the Bible.

I honestly have no desire to attend church. I'm perfectly happy reading my Bible and praying alone. I'm only looking for a church because of my future wife. She comes from an Evangelical background.

I'm not trying to dump on anyone, but Evangelicals always rubbed me the wrong way. Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort are two individuals who whenever I see them I get negative reaction in my gut. They have the same set of talking points when they do their "street ministries" they are trying to be the cool kids and it comes off as cringe. They are always quoting John and talking about being born again. Then they start talking about young earth creationism and the rapture. These are the types of people who turned me away from christianity years ago.

This brings up the question: why can't Christians be "normal"? Whenever I meet someone who is a self proclaimed Christian. My radar starts going off like there is something off about this person. Instead of acting holy and pretending to speak in tongues. How about they carry themselves in the "world" in a way that I and others respect. And if I do have a question instead of preaching they say something like, check out this one bible verse.

[Intrepid]

Have you considered checking out other religions? Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, etc?

The most important reason to attend and be active in a church, in my opinion, is the fellowship. Humans are social creatures and we thrive when we have a sense of belonging with other humans. It's good to have a fellowship to lean on in tough times. And be there for others to lean on you.

The doctrine is less important. People approach God in their own ways. If your general belief system aligns with theirs, I suggest you can ignore the details.

Do they pray to a God of love? Are they trying to live life based on spiritual principles? That's about all I need to know.

Take what you want and leave the rest.

[ClaytonB]

I appreciate your post it is very informative. I like reading walls of text if the information is put forth in a correrent fashion.

In the past in the height of my atheisism. I read a book explaining all the various denominations. I don't recall the name. So I know the history of most religious sects. I still watched your videos all except the one that is three hours long.

I am limited in my selections for a new church. My location is a big factor. I don't live in an area with a large population. I'm also looking for a church that is bilingual or one that speaks Spanish. The bible also must be the center piece of the Church not some Catechism they made up. It would be nice to find a church where biblical scholarship is very important. This would be a 180 from the Catholic Church because no one knows the Bible.

I honestly have no desire to attend church. I'm perfectly happy reading my Bible and praying alone. I'm only looking for a church because of my future wife. She comes from an Evangelical background.

So, I was raised in church from about 10 years old (my family life before that was pretty wild, separate story). It took me until just a few years ago to realize why all the boring/weird trappings of religion really do matter. The metaphor I would use is that the main Sunday church service (what the Catholics refer to as mass) is something like an honor guard assembling for review by the General (who, for us, is Jesus). There's no explicit rule requiring you to shine your shoes before you assemble for parade, but do you really want to be the one guy who didn't shine his shoes (and it shows)?? Of course not.

Assembling for parade is a core part of the army's morale and esprit d'corps. At any given time, there may be a lot of operational activity, or very little operational activity, but the one constant that keeps the heart and soul of the army bound together as a single body is assembly. This is why Hebrews 10:25 says, "Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching."

Does assembly have a "purpose"? In itself, it seems not to have a purpose. But yet, it's actually the single most important thing in respect to the unity of the body itself. The church is not merely an army -- but it is an army. We are not called to metaphorical warfare, we are called to literal warfare, which is spiritual in nature rather than carnal. This means that most of the war we are fighting is internal and has to do with sanctification (yielding ourselves to being made holy by the Holy Spirit).

I encourage you to press even further on the path you are on. Your future wife has motivated you to turn towards spiritual things within the body of Christ, as an active member. Press hard into that, I would encourage you to think of it as God's own call to come to assembly. It's not about the trappings of Churchianity, it's about believers re-invading and re-capturing a church in America that has nearly become dead. The church now is almost nothing but the trappings. The trappings (mostly) aren't the issue, but the emptiness certainly is. And how will the emptiness ever be fixed if actual believers in Jesus never go back into the church (even if they originally fled for good reasons)?

I'm not trying to dump on anyone, but Evangelicals always rubbed me the wrong way. Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort are two individuals who whenever I see them I get negative reaction in my gut. They have the same set of talking points when they do their "street ministries" they are trying to be the cool kids and it comes off as cringe. They are always quoting John and talking about being born again. Then they start talking about young earth creationism and the rapture. These are the types of people who turned me away from christianity years ago.

I find Comfort's "street ministry" videos to be literally unwatchable. These people are the most visible but they are least representative of the body of Christ. What's absolutely mystifying is that his doctrine is not that bad but when it comes to application, as I said, it's unwatchable.

Spiritual warfare.

This brings up the question: why can't Christians be "normal"? Whenever I meet someone who is a self proclaimed Christian. My radar starts going off like there is something off about this person. Instead of acting holy and pretending to speak in tongues. How about they carry themselves in the "world" in a way that I and others respect. And if I do have a question instead of preaching they say something like, check out this one bible verse.

Absolutely. The word "normal" is where the Bible makes the biggest possible challenge to the individual. You are right that the believer is called to be normal in the sense of not being a Koresh-like wackjob. We are to be normal in substance (2 Tim. 1:7, "we have received... a spirit of a sound mind"), however, we are not to be normal in any of the superficial senses in which the world defines normalcy -- obsession with social status, obsession with appearance, obsession with political goings-on (insofar as they are avoidable), obsession with material belongings, obsession with entertainments, and so on and so forth. Obviously, most of these things can be enjoyed in a healthy way, in moderation, but "the world", as the New Testament uses that term, is inherently immoderate.

If you want to understand the actual spiritual war that the New Testament calls the believer into, you have to zoom out a bit and recalbirate your perspective. It's much bigger than you think (Luke 13:18,19). I am reminded of the scene from The Matrix where Agent Smith has captured Morpheus and has him cuffed in the chair and Smith goes on a monologue:

Agent Smith: Have you ever stood and stared at it, marveled at it's
beauty, it's genius? Billions of people just living out their lives,
oblivious. Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a
perfect human world. Where none suffered. Where everyone would be
happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops
were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to
describe your perfect world. But I believe that as a species, human
beings define their reality through misery and suffering. The perfect
world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up
from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your
civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started
thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course
what this is all about. Evolution, Morpheus, evolution, like the
dinosaur. Look out that window. You had your time. The future is our
world, Morpheus. The future is our time.

Now, change the first world to "Eden" and the second world to "the wilderness" and go re-read Genesis 3. And who is the "our" that Smith is speaking of? I assert that what the script is describing here is a gnat's eyebrow from a perfect description of the demonic realm. And so the fact that Jesus came to earth casting out demons (and authorizing the church to do the same) shows the actual war we are involved in. We are essentially a rag-tag group of Improbables, called to fight... basically everything. The deck is stacked so far against us, it's almost beyond words. So, "normalcy" in this situation has nothing to do with preserving a white-picket fence Hobbit Shire realm, it has everything to do with resisting evil no matter how it disguises itself.

To help get you up to speed on the latest fronts in the spiritual war, I would recommend watching as many videos by Jonathan Pageau as you can, he's an excellent social commentator and addresses modern issues in a tone that I think will resonate with someone coming out of skepticism and back to faith. Start with these two brief videos, where he covers the topics of the current paganization (or, re-paganization) that has been going on for the last 7 decades or so, and also what he calls re-enchantment, which is a taking back of the living vibrancy of our world from the clutches of dead, dry, empty, meaningless materialism and paganism...

[wizardwatson]

I appreciate your post it is very informative. I like reading walls of text if the information is put forth in a correrent fashion.

In the past in the height of my atheisism. I read a book explaining all the various denominations. I don't recall the name. So I know the history of most religious sects. I still watched your videos all except the one that is three hours long.

I am limited in my selections for a new church. My location is a big factor. I don't live in an area with a large population. I'm also looking for a church that is bilingual or one that speaks Spanish. The bible also must be the center piece of the Church not some Catechism they made up. It would be nice to find a church where biblical scholarship is very important. This would be a 180 from the Catholic Church because no one knows the Bible.

I honestly have no desire to attend church. I'm perfectly happy reading my Bible and praying alone. I'm only looking for a church because of my future wife. She comes from an Evangelical background.

I'm not trying to dump on anyone, but Evangelicals always rubbed me the wrong way. Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort are two individuals who whenever I see them I get negative reaction in my gut. They have the same set of talking points when they do their "street ministries" they are trying to be the cool kids and it comes off as cringe. They are always quoting John and talking about being born again. Then they start talking about young earth creationism and the rapture. These are the types of people who turned me away from christianity years ago.

This brings up the question: why can't Christians be "normal"? Whenever I meet someone who is a self proclaimed Christian. My radar starts going off like there is something off about this person. Instead of acting holy and pretending to speak in tongues. How about they carry themselves in the "world" in a way that I and others respect. And if I do have a question instead of preaching they say something like, check out this one bible verse.

If you want to nerd out and read the word....

www.cogwriter.com

That is the website of the "Continuing Church of God" (CCOG) led by Bob Thiel. It is the most pure successor to the old Herbert Armstrong Church of God. I'm not a big believer in his pushing adherence to Sabbath observance and Hebrew Holy days (but I am somewhat a believer), but I do believe his scriptural and prophetic interpretations are the best I've seen anywhere.

His scriptural research is amazing. You can probably type any religious question and add "cogwriter" to the search query and find pages of material he's written. He has in-depth knowledge of the Catholic Encyclopedia and constantly references it (sometimes to contradict it, sometimes to show their beliefs used to be different).

The most fundamental point on which CCOG differs from both Catholics and Protestants/reformed theology, is the understanding of the 1st and 2nd resurrections and also the rejection of trinitarianism (in favor of Binitarianism). For the subject of the hell/resurrection, highly recommend free book "Fire of God's Anger" by Lewis Carter Baker.

Anyway, I've been reading cogwriter for over a decade. It's my religious encyclopedia. His youtube's are very lo-fi, and you won't get none of the cringey praise and worship stuff, nor will you get weird sermons. He's total nerd.

Anyway, good luck. I also tried joining a Baptist/Pentecostal type church. Did not go well. I believe people with sincere faith are very rare in America which makes a functional church basically impossible in this country.

[Invisible Man]

Looking for a new church to attend. I grew up Roman Catholic did confirmation and all that other stuff, but I have no desire to attend mass ever again.

I also spent a few years as an atheist from 2010 to 2018.

In the last couple of weeks I started checking out a couple of churches. The people were nice, but it felt weird. People would randomly shout things like praise Jesus or they had their hands up in the air. This type of stuff never happened in Catholic mass.

The thing that bothered me the most it seems like all they were doing was asking for money. I understand money is needed to keep the lights on and other expenses. They were talking about how they needed money to "plant" other churches and to pay off their mortgage. I understand they want to spread the message, but wouldn't the money be better spent on mission work and not construction of state of the art facilities? I have no authority to tell these people how to structure their churches it is just an observation.

I also wasn't blown away by the sermons. Everything was on a PowerPoint. Then there was the cliches bad jokes everyone laughed at.

When I go to Church I don't want to be entertained. I don't want a motivation speaker. I want the Biblical principles to be talked about in depth.

Other things I have issues with: why would someone spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a theology degree so they could then be a preacher? I always thought if someone went into the ministry they accepted and embraced a life of poverty?

I'm sure they exist, but I want to find a church where the preacher has a day job and has been touched by the world and come out the other side.

I am not sure just what kind of church you're looking for, but churches that show up in one of these pages are the likely ones that I would check out if I were seeking a new church, and based on what you've said, I think these kinds of churches may be closer to what you're looking for than the one you visited.

https://www.9marks.org/church-search/

https://tms.edu/find-a-church/

https://www.ifca.org/what-is-ifca/find-an-ifca-church

[mtr1979]

Post error

[mtr1979]

Have you considered checking out other religions? Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, etc?

The most important reason to attend and be active in a church, in my opinion, is the fellowship. Humans are social creatures and we thrive when we have a sense of belonging with other humans. It's good to have a fellowship to lean on in tough times. And be there for others to lean on you.

The doctrine is less important. People approach God in their own ways. If your general belief system aligns with theirs, I suggest you can ignore the details.

Do they pray to a God of love? Are they trying to live life based on spiritual principles? That's about all I need to know.

Take what you want and leave the rest.

I'm not looking for anything outside of Christianity. I spent years outside of Christianity and I never want to go back to that life

I agree fellowship is very important humans are indeed social creatures, but I have to actually believe what they are preaching. It also has to line up with what the bible says if not then it falls into the camp of people who talk about "my truth".

[mtr1979]

I encourage you to press even further on the path you are on. Your future wife has motivated you to turn towards spiritual things within the body of Christ, as an active member. Press hard into that, I would encourage you to think of it as God's own call to come to assembly. It's not about the trappings of Churchianity, it's about believers re-invading and re-capturing a church in America that has nearly become dead. The church now is almost nothing but the trappings. The trappings (mostly) aren't the issue, but the emptiness certainly is. And how will the emptiness ever be fixed if actual believers in Jesus never go back into the church (even if they originally fled for good reasons)?

This the difficult thing. Finding a church that is worth fighting for.

Part of me wants to go back to the Catholic Church, but there are some huge hurdles I can't get past. The sacrament of confess is a big one. I understand it is good to get your feeling out talking to another person, but is it biblical? Catholics will point to passages in John to justify it.

I also remember as a kid in youth group they tried to make us attend and march in a pro-life parade. Then they turn around vote for pro abortion candidates.

[Theocrat]

Looking for a new church to attend. I grew up Roman Catholic did confirmation and all that other stuff, but I have no desire to attend mass ever again.

I also spent a few years as an atheist from 2010 to 2018.

In the last couple of weeks I started checking out a couple of churches. The people were nice, but it felt weird. People would randomly shout things like praise Jesus or they had their hands up in the air. This type of stuff never happened in Catholic mass.

The thing that bothered me the most it seems like all they were doing was asking for money. I understand money is needed to keep the lights on and other expenses. They were talking about how they needed money to "plant" other churches and to pay off their mortgage. I understand they want to spread the message, but wouldn't the money be better spent on mission work and not construction of state of the art facilities? I have no authority to tell these people how to structure their churches it is just an observation.

I also wasn't blown away by the sermons. Everything was on a PowerPoint. Then there was the cliches bad jokes everyone laughed at.

When I go to Church I don't want to be entertained. I don't want a motivation speaker. I want the Biblical principles to be talked about in depth.

Other things I have issues with: why would someone spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a theology degree so they could then be a preacher? I always thought if someone went into the ministry they accepted and embraced a life of poverty?

I'm sure they exist, but I want to find a church where the preacher has a day job and has been touched by the world and come out the other side.

I'd highly recommend you search for a church within this Protestant denomination, if you're looking for a "based" congregation: Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC).

[Theocrat]

(Deleted)

[ClaytonB]

Part of me wants to go back to the Catholic Church, but there are some huge hurdles I can't get past. The sacrament of confess is a big one. I understand it is good to get your feeling out talking to another person, but is it biblical? Catholics will point to passages in John to justify it.

Allow me to show you the key that "unlocks" most of the biggest errors of the church of Rome: Take any "can" or "probably should" in Scripture and convert it to "must"; take any command to the church generally which cannot be proved to be universal (addressed to all believers without exception) and make it exclusive to the clergy.

We (all who believe in Jesus and follow him!) are a kingdom of priests (Rev. 1:6), a royal priesthood (1 Pet. 2:9). Rome basically reads the "we" in 1 Peter 2:9 to mean "we, the ordained clerics of the church of Rome". That's obviously silly and incorrect.

As a brotherhood of priests, everyone who believes in Jesus can perform the service of receiving confession. And yes, it is a service, because when somebody wants to bleed all over you, it can be a real emotional/social disaster. But it is one of the many ways that we in the church can serve one another. Rome, without any justification at all, simply interprets this ability that all believers in Jesus have -- whether "clergy" or "laity" -- to refer only to the clergy of the church of Rome. We are commanded to confess our sins to each another (James 5:16), meaning, to the ones we have offended (thus, public sins must be confessed to the whole church). Voluntary confession of private sins (e.g. sins of the heart, or other sins against God) is obviously also permitted -- sometimes, you just need to get something off your chest. But the way that Rome practices compulsory confession is just a breeding-ground for evil spiritual activity. We may or may not be answerable to a church or the state in any given case, but we will certainly answer to God. "Accountability" can be weaponized for evil purposes, such as for use by intelligence services.

In general, I would caution you away from looking for "the perfect church" because there is no such thing. Every church is full of sinners. What we are fighting for is not an ideal social network (many mistakenly view the church as this); rather, what we are fighting for is the kingdom of God. As I noted above, that's a much bigger concept than you think. The Lord Jesus and his 12 disciples were a mustard seed; that seed, when planted, has become a mighty tree, so large that the birds flock to its branches. We can already see the sketch outline of this mighty tree in the many branches of the Lord's worldwide church. None of that came about by accident... it was all overseen by Jesus, through the Holy Spirit. That doesn't mean every branch is good (John 15:1ff), but it does mean that the tree itself is far larger than the church of Rome or Orthodoxy, or the churches of apostolic succession, etc. And, most important of all, no mere mortal can tell God how big or small his church is, nor where it is centered on the earth. That is up to God. OK, I'll stop here or it will turn into another wall-of-text, LOL...

[Intrepid]

I'm not looking for anything outside of Christianity. I spent years outside of Christianity and I never want to go back to that life

I agree fellowship is very important humans are indeed social creatures, but I have to actually believe what they are preaching. It also has to line up with what the bible says if not then it falls into the camp of people who talk about "my truth".

All good. I'm just suggesting that it's fun to explore beyond the beaten path occasionally. I grew up in the Methodist church, and I've hung out quite a lot at a Hindu temple in town, and visited a couple of Buddhist temples and what warms me up is when I meet people trying to live life the way I am. It feels like we're all on the same path just walking in a different way. Not all that different, though. If they stumble I'm happy to give them a hand and I feel they would do the same for me.

Good luck!!

[donnay]

I learned long ago that Satan has pretty much taken over many religions to try and stray people away from the teachings of God. A good friend turned me on to this Bible teaching church https://shepherdschapel.com I have been studying with them for over 11 years. I do not agree with everything they say but teaching chapter by chapter, verse by verse helps open your eyes to the simplicity of God's Word, which is key.

https://shepherdschapel.com/livestream

2 Timothy 2:15 King James Version

15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

After studying for a while, you will understand that Traditions of Men have made void the Word of God--Man is fallible, God isn't. Especially when it comes to days of the week to be learning His Word. I learned more in a 11 years than I did my whole life sitting in a pew listening to a man telling his stories rather than teaching God's Word, chapter by chapter, verse by verse and discussing the subject, context and simplicity of God's Word.

[Anti Federalist]

I learned long ago that Satan has pretty much taken over many religions to try and stray people away from the teachings of God. A good friend turned me on to this Bible teaching church https://shepherdschapel.com I have been studying with them for over 11 years. I do not agree with everything they say but teaching chapter by chapter, verse by verse helps open your eyes to the simplicity of God's Word, which is key.

https://shepherdschapel.com/livestream

FWIW, that was almost precisely when our marriage fell apart, and has now devolved into nothing more than a hostile roommate situation.

I was cuckolded by a deceased preacher man...he is who my wife sees first thing in the morning, all day if she's home and the last thing she sees and hears at night.

@mtr1979 Take that with however many grains of salt you think you need, or take it not at all.

[donnay]

FWIW, that was almost precisely when our marriage fell apart, and has now devolved into nothing more than a hostile roommate situation.

I was cuckolded by a deceased preacher man...he is who my wife sees first thing in the morning, all day if she's home and the last thing she sees and hears at night.

@mtr1979 Take that with however many grains of salt you think you need, or take it not at all.

I am sorry you feel that way, I listen to him because he was a great Bible teacher and I am at peace when I learn God's Word. It is a shame you are so hostile about it, and have treated me thusly, ever since. I pray, one day, you would open your heart and learn with understanding, rather than be jealous, to the point, of exaggeration about a Bible teacher who helped me open my eyes to the Truth.

[Working Poor]

All good. I'm just suggesting that it's fun to explore beyond the beaten path occasionally.

I have started studying the Zohar. My great grandmother was a Jewish mystic but I grew up going to Presbyterian and baptist churches. I don't go to church any more I do participate in group prayer circles and talk about Jesus with anyone that wants to..

I feel that the Zohar is like quantum Jesus. It is really awesome.

[fisharmor]

3) I would encourage you to spend some time understanding ecclesiology (the doctrine of the church) overall. In the church of Rome, ecclesiology is simple enough that even a small child can understand it: the Pope is in charge of everything and whatever he says, goes; the end. In Orthodoxy (the oldest branch of the church, a whole topic to itself), there is no Pope. Rather, the authority structure goes from the bottom-up: churches have bishops and nearby churches form a territorial body and they choose one of their bishops to run that. And then those territories glom together and form a bigger unit which has a leader chosen from one of the appointed bishops, and so on up the chain. There are a handful of "patriarchs" at the top of Orthodoxy and they generally align with lingual/socio-political boundaries. The important point for understanding Protestantism (as a Catholic or ex-Catholic) is that the East has never agreed that the Pope has top-down power over the church, as Rome imagines. The Orthodox say "we no longer honor the Pope as first among equals" which means that their patriarchs no longer recognize the Pope as a peer patriarch, as they once did. Understanding this is key to understanding the Protestant view of Rome... basically, Protestantism is a branch of Western Christianity (formerly under Rome) that adopted an view of Rome similar to the Orthodox view of Rome (that Rome is an out-of-control church that needs to be corrected by the Holy Spirit in his time). Orthodoxy, however, does not recognize Protestant denominations because they do not have what is called "apostolic succession" (although the Anglicans claim to be an exception to this). Anyway, that's a whole other topic and I don't want to drag you through 2,000 years of church history in one post (impossible anyway).

I'll always argue that if you're looking for a new church, go to the Old Church.

So I always encourage everyone to look into Orthodoxy but with one caveat: it is not going to behave like Western faiths. There is no catechism. There's no elevator pitch. There are almost never answers that are only one paragraph, let alone one sentence.
I've been Orthodox for over 10 years now (after flirting on and off for 20 years prior to that) and I was a protestant for 40 years, so I know this is maddening for people looking for answers. But to paraphrase Lewis, it's no use looking for a simple answer when what you want is complicated, and it's no use complaining about it being complicated when that's what you get.

Orthodoxy is primarily an experiential religion. And you don't have enough time to get to the bottom of it. I don't have enough experience with the RCC to say whether their treatment of the saints is the same as ours (it's at least approximate) but one of the reasons we venerate saints is because we recognize that they developed a special relationship with God that we haven't, and in most cases we are pretty amazed that they were able to. The rest of us have bills and kids and jobs and responsibilities and it's all we can do to get to liturgy once a week. So one point of venerating the saints is to acknowledge that it's possible to get that good with God and that we're also not, and to encourage us to keep humble, keep coming back, and keep experiencing.

When I read Clayton's assessment above I'm thinking 'yeah that's great, it's like 90% dead on' but there's a ton of other context & stuff I'd add and I don't even know the half of it. I'm not trying to do it, really, but just for example: Orthodox would think 'ok why is apostolic succession even important?' and may come up with an answer like 'because we don't believe in a God who would just ascend into heaven and then leave the world in doubt for the 1500 years protestants essentially believe in'. But I'm aware that's not only in itself a simplification, it's also going to lead to a fight with the protestants here that I don't want to have, which brings me to another point.

Another reason to recommend Orthodoxy is its message about other Christian faiths. Well, the legitimate message. If you look into Orthodoxy I warn you to avoid the 'hyperdox' or 'ortho-bros' online. If you're talking to someone who is Orthodox and is clearly a zealot, well, we know about them and there's a bit of an argument about them these days. My bishop openly decries them. Orthodoxy is a package deal and the more you understand about the whole package the less likely you'll be a zealot. It's not about forcing other people to be Christian. It's about putting on your oxygen mask before you try to help others. So TL;DR - you're not going to get the same knowledge from online zealots that you'd get from experiencing it yourself. They are all gasping for air themselves.

The point being, the mainstream Orthodox message about other Christian faiths is generally in this order:
1) The true Church is in Orthodoxy
2) There's a lot of good stuff going on in those other Christian expressions (yes, we do recognize them as Christians, despite not having the favor returned most of the time)
3) If you want a guarantee that you've found the faith, look here
4) We will not force God into a box with respect to what happens in those other faiths, and thus tend not to talk about their salvation.

It's a refreshing 180 from what I grew up with, which was essentially 'this is the faith and everyone who doesn't subscribe to what this group of 1 million believers subscribes to on paper is going to hell' plus 'oh by the way we have a weekend retreat where you can learn our entire theology'. Orthodoxy is deep. Like I said, so deep that literally an entire lifetime is not enough. So we're supposed to not want to fight with other Christians. That's time better spent on our own relationship with Christ.

I'm sorry this is all over the place. I know you said you appreciate things being put in order. But this is how Orthodoxy works. It's the Holy Spirit reaching out to you constantly and not always respecting your need for organized information. Once you start looking seriously into Orthodoxy, you might spend a couple years getting used to the liturgics and the calendar and then have something really profound and frankly pretty frightening happen that sends you a message like 'you think you're getting a handle on this but you're still not in charge here'. So I apologize for the apparent lack of focus - after a while it gets to be like a half remembered pleasant dream that you can talk about with others who have had the same dream, but it's not going to make sense to those who haven't. And almost always doesn't come out sounding sensible. The overarching point is, you're not going to learn about it without jumping straight in. And then you're going to get stuck.

I honestly have no desire to attend church. I'm perfectly happy reading my Bible and praying alone. I'm only looking for a church because of my future wife. She comes from an Evangelical background.

Well, Orthodoxy can either appeal to evangelicals or really turn them off. The nice thing about Orthodoxy is that it has whatever you're looking for. Do you want philosophy? We have all the Greek theologians. Do you want structured liturgy? Nobody does it better. Do you want mountaintop experiences? We don't employ sound engineering looking for them, but they're absolutely there.
However, I would warn you, I've watched an abnormal number of divorces happen in the last few years over differing Christian faiths. I of course want you both to become Orthodox but first and foremost your marriage is the most important thing. Find something that you can both do and not fight about it. In time it'll work itself out.
I was lucky in that my wife and I were married for almost 10 years before any of this came up, and we had gotten our knock-down-drag-outs out of our systems beforehand.
Please don't fight about it. I mean don't let her push you around, and don't bully her, but find a way to deal with it that makes you stronger in the end.

This brings up the question: why can't Christians be "normal"? Whenever I meet someone who is a self proclaimed Christian. My radar starts going off like there is something off about this person. Instead of acting holy and pretending to speak in tongues. How about they carry themselves in the "world" in a way that I and others respect. And if I do have a question instead of preaching they say something like, check out this one bible verse.

I mean this is another feather in Orthodoxy's hat IMO. Last Friday I was having game night at my house with a bunch of people from the parish and was knocking back some beers and playing Magic the Gathering, and when someone's turn was taking too long I belted out "You know I miss the old days when you didn't get the bong until your turn was over. It sure sped this up."
One of my very good friends at my parish is a tattoo artist.
I have a friend who just turned 70 who quotes the seedier parts of Monty Python.

Everyone I know at Church is a real person. We all live in the world. But we all also strive not to be of the world.
Sometimes that manifests as something really simple but actually very profound. I have friends that I spend time with and I know that there's no simple misunderstanding that's going to fracture our relationship forever, like has happened with most of my secular friends. I know they're beholden to the same teachings about humility and repentance and forgiveness and I know if we did get in an argument we could work it out and stay friends.
That's not super-holiness. But it's not nothing. When you get through enough of your life, you realize it's actually quite a lot.

[fisharmor]

This the difficult thing. Finding a church that is worth fighting for.

Part of me wants to go back to the Catholic Church, but there are some huge hurdles I can't get past. The sacrament of confess is a big one. I understand it is good to get your feeling out talking to another person, but is it biblical? Catholics will point to passages in John to justify it.

I mentioned above I spent 20 years flirting with Orthodoxy and Sola Scriptura is the reason it took so long.
In the early 2000s my brother-in-law was attending Orthodox seminary.
I was arguing with one of the seminarians during a visit and I said proudly that if it's not in Scripture I don't believe it.
And Philip's answer was, so you're a Lutheran and you don't believe in Holy Tradition and you only believe in Scripture. But how can you believe in Sola Scriptura when Sola Scriptura is nothing more than a holy tradition of Lutheranism?

It took about a decade for that slow-motion bullet to finally pierce my skull.
I had heard RC's say 'Sola Scriptura is putting the cart before the horse'. But it wasn't until I got a couple more pieces of that argument before I realized the profound nature of what Philip had said. One of those pieces was a full description of what Holy Tradition is.

I encourage you to look it up for yourself because this is paraphrasing. But the point of Holy Tradition is absolutely not to say 'we have to have three candles here or else you're going to hell'. It's absolutely not to say 'if you don't pray to the saints you're damned'.
There are lowercase-t traditions and there is uppercase Holy Tradition.
Lowercase t traditions get changed all the time. Just like Luther said, they have important roles to play to order our worship and our times and movements and also remembering important theological points. But there isn't an Eastern Orthodox theologian in all of history who would look at the Copts and say 'you have different hats for your priests and that's why you're wrong'.

Holy Tradition is the glue that keeps it all together. How did the Apostles know what they were doing? They didn't have a New Testament. How did they know what to write down to make it? And after it was written down, how did everyone know how to keep the faith alive for 250 more years of persecution and getting fed to lions? It was the Holy Spirit driving things through Holy Tradition.

And the interesting thing about it is that all protestants believe in Holy Tradition, whether they want to admit it or not. What is the doctrine of the Trinity? How is it that every protestant all believes this and the second a Mormon shows up they all lock arms even with Rome and say "Not today Jedediah, we're Trinitarians and YOU ARE NOT"? I mean there are references to it inside Scripture but the theology of the trinity is absolutely not fleshed out within Scripture to the point that we all agree on.

Why do we all worship on Sunday? Why is this something that sparks no disagreement right up to the point where someone says "no ackshually it's supposed to be on Saturday and that's when we're holding sabbath" at which point everyone from Oriental Orthodox Indians to Tennessee rattlesnake handlers all band together and say "Nope, you are NOT one of us"?

The question isn't - CAN'T be - whether Holy Tradition is a valid thing. Everyone implicitly agrees on that - we just all define the parameters for what compromises Holy Tradition differently.

Rome defines its Holy Tradition more broadly, sure. So do the Orthodox. For me, once I realized this, the question had to stop being "who is the most Scriptural". Once I redefined the question, it became two questions "whose holy tradition is the most defensible" and its corollary "whose holy tradition has changed the least".

Scripture itself is a Holy Tradition. And the Holy Spirit doesn't fit inside a book.

[ClaytonB]

I'll always argue that if you're looking for a new church, go to the Old Church.

Between Orthodoxy and the RCC, I'd be less disappointed to see someone go to an Orthodox church. I can't personally recommend it because there are other issues that Orthodoxy has (they are actually wrong on the doctrine of the filioque, even though they are right to have separated with Rome over it), but God will have to deal with them on that, it's not my place to try to correct an entire branch of Jesus's church.

When I read Clayton's assessment above I'm thinking 'yeah that's great, it's like 90% dead on' but there's a ton of other context & stuff I'd add and I don't even know the half of it. I'm not trying to do it, really, but just for example: Orthodox would think 'ok why is apostolic succession even important?' and may come up with an answer like 'because we don't believe in a God who would just ascend into heaven and then leave the world in doubt for the 1500 years protestants essentially believe in'. But I'm aware that's not only in itself a simplification, it's also going to lead to a fight with the protestants here that I don't want to have, which brings me to another point.

No fighting here. It's a fair point and any Protestant theologian/pastor/etc. who doesn't take that seriously isn't worth paying attention to. The break in apostolic succession is a big deal. One response is to just go full-Mormon, "You guys were all wrong from the very beginning" but then you might as well be Mormon! But there is another response, which is to ask why did God himself arrange for the Reformation to occur in history, as it did? Because he is surely sovereign over all things. Major historical events in the church matter, even if they make us squirm in our seat. I would argue that the Reformation was essentially the beginning of God's judgment on the church of Rome itself. From the standpoint of succession, the Reformed churches can fairly argue that they were not dishonoring their spiritual father and mother, rather, their spiritual father and mother abandoned them. If the choice really is between obeying God or obeying men, then the prophetic voice, moved by the Holy Spirit, will always choose to obey God rather than men. "But even if he does not [deliver us from the flaming furnace], we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." (Dan. 3:18) The Orthodox long ago separated from Rome due to its prideful self-idolatry. It is kind of strange that the Orthodox expect the people of the West to remain in submission to a known and denounced group of prideful self-idolators.

[fisharmor]

Between Orthodoxy and the RCC, I'd be less disappointed to see someone go to an Orthodox church. I can't personally recommend it because there are other issues that Orthodoxy has (they are actually wrong on the doctrine of the filioque, even though they are right to have separated with Rome over it), but God will have to deal with them on that, it's not my place to try to correct an entire branch of Jesus's church.

Yeah I don't understand where you went with that. If someone gets down into the weeds about the filioque, great. The more theological hair-splitting that goes on, the more we're essentially in agreement.
All I'll say about it is the non-Western view on the Great Schism is different. Rome was one patriachate of five, and that's not counting the non-Chalcedonians who IIRC are on our side there, too. We didn't separate from Rome - we declared how Rome had separated from what we had all understood and unanimously decided in council 700 years earlier. At a certain point one has to recognize the pattern - when you change something because oh there's kind of an argument in favor of this and the full effects aren't really well understood and the people trying to present the counterargument aren't really listened to, it rarely ends up well.

No fighting here. It's a fair point and any Protestant theologian/pastor/etc. who doesn't take that seriously isn't worth paying attention to. The break in apostolic succession is a big deal. One response is to just go full-Mormon, "You guys were all wrong from the very beginning" but then you might as well be Mormon! But there is another response, which is to ask why did God himself arrange for the Reformation to occur in history, as it did? Because he is surely sovereign over all things. Major historical events in the church matter, even if they make us squirm in our seat. I would argue that the Reformation was essentially the beginning of God's judgment on the church of Rome itself. From the standpoint of succession, the Reformed churches can fairly argue that they were not dishonoring their spiritual father and mother, rather, their spiritual father and mother abandoned them. If the choice really is between obeying God or obeying men, then the prophetic voice, moved by the Holy Spirit, will always choose to obey God rather than men. "But even if he does not [deliver us from the flaming furnace], we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." (Dan. 3:18) The Orthodox long ago separated from Rome due to its prideful self-idolatry. It is kind of strange that the Orthodox expect the people of the West to remain in submission to a known and denounced group of prideful self-idolators.

One of my happiest moments in the last 2 years was knowing that Mike Pence had been pretty well clobbered out of the running. That guy openly admitted not knowing the first thing about what's going on in Ukraine right now with respect to the Church, and basically said the head of the Ukrainian church explained it all to him.
Of course, the head of the Ukrainian church he talked to is a puppet who was basically put into place through pressure from the US state department. The real Church in the Ukraine is supposed to be under the Moscow patriarchate, and that clearly wasn't going to do, so it was forcibly eliminated and there actually are priests and monks getting abused over it right now. There is a very real rift there that is affecting a lot of people.

This is just the most recent example. Every Lent we commemorate the Triumph of Orthodoxy which happened on the first Sunday of Lent in 843, when we finally put the long persecution of the use of icons to rest. And don't even get me started on the hagiography: we're constantly bombarded with stories of saints who had their skin peeled off or crushed with weights or lashed or blinded or any number of horrible things.

Not to mention our historical special relationship with Islam....

I have a good friend who is a bishop (and therefore also a monk), and when the Ukraine thing happened, and he was telling us about it, someone asked "so what can we do?" And his answer was "Pray. And that's about it. This is His Church, and it's His mess."

The same guy told me about being in Russia in 1993 - he went to go live in a monastery there for a while. He was just walking down the street - which was still pretty new to see a monk walking around openly in Russia in 1993. Well apparently some old guard communist saw him and walked right up to him and decked him in the face.
When he got back to the monastery and told the other monks what happened, all they told him was "Ah, you've been deemed worthy."

There is always going to be persecution for faith, and the closer you are to the real faith, the more Satan will work to get you to leave it.

I will admit, however, I don't know what you meant by " that the Orthodox expect the people of the West to remain in submission to a known and denounced group of prideful self-idolators".

[ClaytonB]

Yeah I don't understand where you went with that. If someone gets down into the weeds about the filioque, great. The more theological hair-splitting that goes on, the more we're essentially in agreement.

[NOTE: I'll use the word "Reformed" instead of "Protestant" from now on (the label "Protestant" is reductive IMO), but understand that I'm just using it as a synonym for the way most people use the word Protestant. "Reformed", in turn, is short for "Reformed Catholic", meaning, someone in the Western church who rejects the papacy as a legitimate apostolic seat.]

As a Reformed Christian, the filioque is a little bit like when your parents are fighting, and they're both wrong. Rome says, "The Scriptures teach the filioque!" and they're right. Orthodoxy says, "We don't agree. We still love you anyway, but you're being a jerk about it!" and they're right. So, Reformed tend to disagree with both sides, on different points. We disagree with Rome for being a jerk about the filioque. We disagree with Orthodoxy because their doctrine on this point is simply in error.

All I'll say about it is the non-Western view on the Great Schism is different. Rome was one patriachate of five, and that's not counting the non-Chalcedonians who IIRC are on our side there, too. We didn't separate from Rome - we declared how Rome had separated from what we had all understood and unanimously decided in council 700 years earlier. At a certain point one has to recognize the pattern - when you change something because oh there's kind of an argument in favor of this and the full effects aren't really well understood and the people trying to present the counterargument aren't really listened to, it rarely ends up well.

Yep, I'm familiar with the Orthodox view of the Schism and, again, if I had to choose between the two at gunpoint, I'd choose Orthodox because, "If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing." (1 Cor. 13:2) The Truth is of utmost importance, but it's still better to have love than to be right.

This is just the most recent example. Every Lent we commemorate the Triumph of Orthodoxy which happened on the first Sunday of Lent in 843, when we finally put the long persecution of the use of icons to rest. And don't even get me started on the hagiography: we're constantly bombarded with stories of saints who had their skin peeled off or crushed with weights or lashed or blinded or any number of horrible things.

Amen, Jesus is the Cornerstone, the Foundation than which none other can be laid, and the Martyrs are the first course of stones laid upon that foundation, upon which we all rest, to the glory of God alone.

The same guy told me about being in Russia in 1993 - he went to go live in a monastery there for a while. He was just walking down the street - which was still pretty new to see a monk walking around openly in Russia in 1993. Well apparently some old guard communist saw him and walked right up to him and decked him in the face.
When he got back to the monastery and told the other monks what happened, all they told him was "Ah, you've been deemed worthy."

There is always going to be persecution for faith, and the closer you are to the real faith, the more Satan will work to get you to leave it.

Amen again. Suffering is, in a paradoxical way, the ultimate proof of Truth. This is how we know that Jesus IS the Truth, because he went to the Cross. No one, absolutely no one will go to the Cross for a lie...

I will admit, however, I don't know what you meant by " that the Orthodox expect the people of the West to remain in submission to a known and denounced group of prideful self-idolators".

I'm referring to the apostolic succession. I find it ironic that Orthodoxy has always agreed with Rome that Reformed Christians of the West are schismatics/heretics. Why does a scepter, a mitre, a throne and papal robes make them (Rome) non-schismatic, and we schismatic? I never understood that. If the bishops descend into debauchery and blunt heresy, there is no "non-schismatic" solution except that they publicly repent of their sins and cleanse the church of the wickedness they have brought into it. Failing that, the only option is to leave, because the body of Christ cannot be joined to a prostitute. Luther had no intention of dividing the church of Rome, he sincerely believed that it could be reformed (hence, "the Reformation"). And when Rome dug its heels in and refused the correction of the Holy Spirit not only through Luther, but through a great assembly of witnesses to Rome's error and corruption, that is when the break occurred in the West. This is what I mean by comparing the Reformation to parental abandonment. Those who hold the Reformed to be schismatics are accusing the abandoned children of being disobedient and dishonoring their parents (Rome). We did not disobey or dishonor anyone, they simply abandoned the Faith. What makes the Orthodox position on the Reformation particularly puzzling to me is that Orthodoxy itself had already removed the bishop of Rome from communion, so Orthodoxy itself recognizes the very same problem in the church of Rome that the Reformers would later be forced into schism over! To quote one of the Reformers (can't remember which off the top of my head): "We did not leave Rome. Rome left us." I have often speculated that if the Reformers had been located on the border of the Eastern empire, they would have just joined Orthodoxy. There are some serious doctrinal differences, but those doctrinal differences happen to be exactly the same issues that Rome has with Orthodox, sans the papacy -- the filioque being one notable example. I hope that makes sense.

[ClaytonB]

Scripture itself is a Holy Tradition. And the Holy Spirit doesn't fit inside a book.

True, however, Scripture is still the highest authority because it is the word of God, full-stop. The Holy Spirit, being the author of Scripture, never contradicts himself, so his prophetic work is always consistent with the Scriptures. Human tradition is a safeguard against error, but it is not a greater authority than God's own Word. This is actually played out in the gospels themselves... a central point of contention between Jesus and the Jewish authorities is that they have tradition, so he cannot disagree with them. After all, they sit in Moses's seat (Matt. 23:1), so they are the final court of appeal (in their opinion). And how did Jesus prove them wrong? In two ways: (a) prophecy and (b) the crucifixion. Thus, the answer to the errors of tradition that have crept into the church over time (yes, there are errors in tradition) is (a) to prophesy against it (which is a work of the Holy Spirit, and no man) and (b) to suffer patiently as a witness to those within the church whose hearts have grown hard by whatever trick of the enemy, causing them to regard tradition above the Word of God himself, whose word is given to us in the holy Scriptures. The purpose of this patient witness is not to "win the argument", it's so that God will woo them back to his flock and the Holy Spirit will correct their errors in the perfect way that only he can do. Human pride and ego-contests over "whose tradition (or doctrine) is THE ONE TRUE tradition/doctrine" can only lead to schism between brothers (spiritual fratricide).

I think of the churches of apostolic succession (Rome, Orthodoxy) as battle-hardened veterans who easily fall into grumpy "get off my lawn" combativeness against younger churches (from the Reformation) who really are their allies, but whose approach is different not in order to be innovative, but because this is simply the work that the Holy Spirit is doing in the world, whether anybody likes it or not. So, the very thing that gives the churches of apostolic succession their honor and dignity (their war-scars) can also lead them to be overly defensive and to treat everybody as a heretic, even when they are really and truly on the same team. Arianism is one thing. Ecumenism is one thing. Eroding away the authority of the bishops is one thing. Tearing down traditions for the sake of novelty is one thing. But "you're not of the same stock as us" is another thing altogether. Where is the Holy Spirit in that? Where is the love in that? Where is the determination to know nothing but Jesus and him crucified, in that? Is it not partisanship and factionalism? I won't unify with a Mormon church, but I'm pretty sure there are individual Mormons out there who sincerely love Jesus and are on the narrow path that leads to life. To say otherwise is to attempt to place manacles on the wrists of the Holy Spirit, which is absurd. So, there is a way to unify without devolving into base ecumenism. It is possible to be discerning, without becoming institutionalized. PS: All of this is written in the spirit of unity and love, not argumentation...

[Invisible Man]

I'm all for holy traditions, as long as they go all the way back to the apostles. If something is a later accretion to the faith, it may well be a valuable and worthwhile thing for Christians and churches to practice, and I may well be won over to it, but it can never be an essential to the faith. And if a church treats any of these later accretions as essentials, saying, "If anyone does not join us in affirming and doing such-and-such and in condemning those who differ from us on this, let him be anathema." then while that tradition itself may have been of value, this extra step of calling it an essential, so as to disqualify the apostles themselves from what is declared to be the sole true catholic and orthodox Church cannot possibly be right. And this alone is proof that the Church that does it cannot be the sole true catholic and orthodox Church.

[fisharmor]

[NOTE: I'll use the word "Reformed" instead of "Protestant" from now on (the label "Protestant" is reductive IMO), but understand that I'm just using it as a synonym for the way most people use the word Protestant. "Reformed", in turn, is short for "Reformed Catholic", meaning, someone in the Western church who rejects the papacy as a legitimate apostolic seat.]

Fair enough - when I was a Lutheran I didn't like the term "protestant" either. That's what Henry was. As you said, Luther didn't want to break from Rome.

I'm all for holy traditions, as long as they go all the way back to the apostles. If something is a later accretion to the faith, it may well be a valuable and worthwhile thing for Christians and churches to practice, and I may well be won over to it, but it can never be an essential to the faith. And if a church treats any of these later accretions as essentials, saying, "If anyone does not join us in affirming and doing such-and-such and in condemning those who differ from us on this, let him be anathema." then while that tradition itself may have been of value, this extra step of calling it an essential, so as to disqualify the apostles themselves from what is declared to be the sole true catholic and orthodox Church cannot possibly be right. And this alone is proof that the Church that does it cannot be the sole true catholic and orthodox Church.

I think the most important division though, and the one I focus on, is that there are three entities that believe in the Church as a physical entity - the Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian Orthodox, and Rome. Scripture mentions the Church a lot. If you subscribe to a tradition that interprets that as something more than an invisible entity, you have those three choices. If you subscribe to a holy tradition that doesn't believe the Church is something concrete, then you have everybody else.
I never found evidence that the latter of those traditions existed prior to the 1500s.
For me that clearly puts this teaching into the category that the reformed Christians are constantly trying to shove the historic churches into.

As a Reformed Christian, the filioque is a little bit like when your parents are fighting, and they're both wrong. Rome says, "The Scriptures teach the filioque!" and they're right. Orthodoxy says, "We don't agree. We still love you anyway, but you're being a jerk about it!" and they're right. So, Reformed tend to disagree with both sides, on different points. We disagree with Rome for being a jerk about the filioque. We disagree with Orthodoxy because their doctrine on this point is simply in error.

I think if there was a competition to find a modern slogan for Orthodoxy it would be "Would you people please stop making me defend Rome". Our divorce was finalized a thousand years ago.

So, bearing in mind I'm not really arguing with you and moreso explaining how I got where I am FBO the OP...

There was a whole council about this. Councils are such a big deal that once you get into theological fine print, which councils you accept as valid becomes a yardstick for where a Christian entity is theologically. There is a point at which Christians start to disagree on what was decided in council - but what we're talking about is before that point. The Nicene Creed was written down with the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father. Period.

I'm not going to get into the Scriptural evidence of the Filioque for two reasons. First because it's above my pay grade, just as the split at Chalcedon is above my pay grade.
Second, because it's a waste of my time. For these reasons, and in this order.

1) The argument about the Filioque is to me similar to the argument about the American "Civil War". Ok, yeah, there's this main topic that everyone wants to talk about and the conversation just drives straight into it. But in both cases the thing everyone wants to talk about isn't the point: the point is you didn't have the authority to do that. People who came before us clearly and unanimously decided things and when they were changed they were just changed. No running it through anyone, no discussion.
318 bishops and as many as 1900 total attendees were in concert about the Nicene Creed. Some of them showed up in support of Arius but then backtracked when they heard the counterarguments.
In the end, the verbiage of the Nicene Creed was not something that was handed down from on top. It happened by discovery after everyone prayerfully hashed it out. It was only after that when the Filioque showed up and it was, for a second example in this post, exactly the thing that reformed Christians complain about: theological novelty that became a tradition that became a non-negotiable.

2) I judge these entities by their fruits. As I had children I realized that if there was one thing I would want for them, it would be not to go through what I went through as a child in my faith. I spent the first eight years of my life as a rock-solid confessional Lutheran, which I still commend to this day as better than most. The trouble is, the seeds for theological change were sewn prior to my birth - and so I got to grow up through the stages of Lutheranism when the trappings of confessional Lutheranism were being removed. It started with the music changing, and nobody noticed that the new music wasn't as good, and if they did, they were told it didn't matter. Then the words in the music started changing, and more people noticed, but they'd already been told the music didn't matter, so then of course the words didn't matter. Then when I was in high school, that's when they started monkeying with the creeds. It's when they got the artsy altar paraments that incorporated window screen as design elements. It's when they started having women serve as communion assistants.

And that's when some of the old timers finally piped up and said that was a bridge too far. They played right into the narrative - they got upset, and some of them yelled, and ultimately they didn't have an argument. Because the theological fight they were having was started before they were born. The 50+ crowd knew it wasn't right but they had never been told why. And I still clearly remember the 30-something who stood up in that assembly and said 'hey wait a second, there are people here who are clearly upset about this and it seems to me there's an alternate position that isn't getting adequately presented here. Everyone has 3 minutes to speak and it's not enough time to address this, so I don't think we should push forward with women lay assistants until we understand the issue.'
And he was summarily ignored, and the vote continued, and they democratically decided the theology of who serves communion that day.

And this was the 'conservative' bunch of Lutherans. And the 30-something who piped up against making the decision was a guy I sang in a contemporary choir with, so it's not like he was the old guard. But it was unequivocally pointed out that day that we were absolutely not to look into what the historic faith has to teach on topics of doctrine - we were to decide it ourselves under the guidance of a single clegyman who was clearly not allowing actual dissent.

Microcosm, macrocosm.

Several of these doctrinal problems cropped up and by the time I was 35 I was just done with it. The egalitarian theology method has serious problems. So does the hierarchical method. But the egalitarian method is a high speed motorcycle accident from 500 years ago and a billion people all think that hammering the bits of rider into the pavement is the answer.

I want my theological change to be absent. In cases where it might actually be required, I want it to be so slow as to not even notice and I want it to be deliberate.
If Orthodoxy has changed something that it doesn't openly admit, then I haven't noticed yet.
I do concede that there have been changes. For instance, the office of deaconess no longer exists. And Orthodoxy admits this - and responds that the only reason why it existed is because so many adults were being baptized and at the time baptisms were done nude, so they existed pretty much strictly to perform baptisms on adult women. In every instance of this I've seen it's similar - 'Yeah we did change that. This is why. Go work on yourself instead of worrying about this.' The problems with hierarchical theology are comparatively manageable.

It was a Lutheran pastor - Todd Wilken of Issues, Etc - who taught me that you can't divorce practice from doctrine. You do the things you do because of what you believe. Some people innately understand this. They don't get huffy about window screen paraments because they're just old timers who can't update their thinking. They get upset because doing that makes a public statement that bumps into the historic teachings of the Church specifically about respect. If you take advantage of their lack of theological training and skills in rhetoric to push a theological agenda, well, then, that's what you're doing.

Just yesterday my BIL showed me a photo of Zelensky giving a talk at a dinner. The dinner was quite obviously set up inside an Orthodox church. They had put up a big screen behind him so you couldn't see the altar, and there were round conference tables with diners all throughout the nave. There are tons of reformed Christians reading that and thinking "yeah, so what we do that all the time" but that's my point - this was a profound and intentional disrespect, and Christians of the East know this and feel this way.

I don't want to raise children who have to get embroiled in arguments about this sort of thing. I want my children to see the photo and think "ok, yeah, not even looking into what that guy had to say there. That's wrong and if he didn't know that then he can learn it's wrong and apologize and then I might listen." Life is too short and there's too much to learn to waste our time on such people's ideas, whether they are corrupt dictators, simple Lutheran pastors, or popes. I admit that the hierarchical method has many of the same problems. But I don't see it as often or as severely.

Apostolic Succession means different things to different people. This is what it means to me. It's the best shot I have at having children who will raise their children to believe the same things I do. I'm willing to budge on relics if that's what I'm getting for it, and particularly if the arguments in favor of them are at least present.

Yep, I'm familiar with the Orthodox view of the Schism and, again, if I had to choose between the two at gunpoint, I'd choose Orthodox because, "If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing." (1 Cor. 13:2) The Truth is of utmost importance, but it's still better to have love than to be right.

What is Truth?

"I am the way and the Truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me." John 14:6

This was another selling point for me. Western Christianity teaches that Jesus died for you. Oh yeah there was a resurrection but that really only happened to prove who he said he was. You need to believe in that. Here's a book. Good luck.

Orthodoxy's main point is that you can have a personal relationship with Christ. And though we're not going to say you can't have that relationship outside of the Church (in fact there are plenty of hagiographies that dissuade us of that notion) our position is "here is what works".
I mean, I get it. I've been that guy a lot in my life.
Forget the hello world nonsense, I want to know how to handle function pointers in Python.
Forget the plywood stitch and glue, I want to jump straight to a fiberglass monocoque boat.
Forget the barrel helm, I want to jump straight to making Maximillian harness.

Anyone who is recognized as doing those things well will say to the beginner "woah back up there and start simple, prove you can do that, learn what you don't know, and then continue". But when the topic shifts to Christianity everyone outside of those aforementioned 3 entities seems to agree that there's no need for basics and no need for shepherding.

If you go to confession, and you keep going, you might learn what it's for. You might get introduced to the idea of having a spiritual father - someone who will take you under his wing and guide you in how to grow in your relationship with Christ. You might get advice in other things that you can do that will help, too. And yes, almost none of it is going to be specifically prescribed in Scripture.

But the point is, it stands as good a chance of working as it always has. It's a practice that matches the belief. I can admit that there are exceptions where people didn't do it and turned out saved. I can also probably find someone who owned a car that drove for 200000 miles without changing the brake pads. That doesn't do anything to invalidate the axiom that you have to change your brake pads. It's the exception that proves the rule.

I'm referring to the apostolic succession. I find it ironic that Orthodoxy has always agreed with Rome that Reformed Christians of the West are schismatics/heretics. Why does a scepter, a mitre, a throne and papal robes make them (Rome) non-schismatic, and we schismatic? I never understood that.

See that's where you lost me. I don't know any Orthodox who consider Rome non-schismatic. I mean it's called "The Great Schism" for a reason.
I think of it this way. We consider Rome to be our estranged cousins. There's bad blood between us and we've openly fought more than once.
But they're still our cousins. That puts them on better footing with us than the reformed Christians are on. But they're still very much in error.
The best example I can think of is my vote I cast for Trump last month. I'm not with him, I don't agree with him, I can instantly enumerate several ways I vehemently oppose him, but if you force me to take sides, I gotta go with him.

If the bishops descend into debauchery and blunt heresy, there is no "non-schismatic" solution except that they publicly repent of their sins and cleanse the church of the wickedness they have brought into it.

You've inspired me to go watch Man of God again. Orthodox are constantly admonished to take the long view, and I think this film really elegantly and poignantly drove that home.

Failing that, the only option is to leave, because the body of Christ cannot be joined to a prostitute. Luther had no intention of dividing the church of Rome, he sincerely believed that it could be reformed (hence, "the Reformation"). And when Rome dug its heels in and refused the correction of the Holy Spirit not only through Luther, but through a great assembly of witnesses to Rome's error and corruption, that is when the break occurred in the West. This is what I mean by comparing the Reformation to parental abandonment. Those who hold the Reformed to be schismatics are accusing the abandoned children of being disobedient and dishonoring their parents (Rome). We did not disobey or dishonor anyone, they simply abandoned the Faith. What makes the Orthodox position on the Reformation particularly puzzling to me is that Orthodoxy itself had already removed the bishop of Rome from communion, so Orthodoxy itself recognizes the very same problem in the church of Rome that the Reformers would later be forced into schism over! To quote one of the Reformers (can't remember which off the top of my head): "We did not leave Rome. Rome left us." I have often speculated that if the Reformers had been located on the border of the Eastern empire, they would have just joined Orthodoxy. There are some serious doctrinal differences, but those doctrinal differences happen to be exactly the same issues that Rome has with Orthodox, sans the papacy -- the filioque being one notable example. I hope that makes sense.

So, I don't recommend people read this normally, but you brought it up.
http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/tca_luther.aspx

I ran into this prior to becoming Orthodox, and to be perfectly honest, it probably delayed my Chrismation by at least a year.
On first read I thought "hang on, the Lutheran reformers seemed like they were really interested in forming a relationship with the Church in the East and they basically got knocked back. That ain't right."

My view has evolved a lot since then. The TL;DR is that I don't subscribe to the same thought as you do, about parents and children.

Reading between the lines a bit, and knowing how things work in Orthodoxy, Patriarch Jeremias kinda went out of his way to lovingly illustrate the ways in which the Augsburg Confession would absolutely not be accepted in the East. Was he harsh by not bending a whole lot? I originally thought so.

But he wasn't treating them like children. He was treating them like adults, by taking a whole lot more time and words to basically say "here I stand, I can do no other".
How many times do you have to explain something to an adult before you expect it to sink in? After the third time, unless the person in question has a legitimate disability, the expectation is you either get it or we're done.
If you're addressing children then the amount of expected patience with misunderstanding is actually less. But with adults, there are going to be two dynamics, generally: one where the assumption is an authority is speaking to a non-authority, and one where the assumption is there are equals in discussion. And I think the problem with this discussion between the Lutherans and Patriarch Jeremias boils down to that the Lutherans assumed it was a discussion of equals, and Jeremias assumed he was the authority.

I haven't gone and read through the original correspondence, and it does seem like this was written from the Orthodox perspective without considering what the Lutheran perspective would have been - but I still believe there was more that could have been done and discussed in order to try to bring the Lutherans to a more Orthodox position. Especially since it hadn't been that long since they believed some of the things Jeremias was saying. But the thing I understand now like 14 years after reading this the first time, is that this kind of boils down to the same problem they had with the Filioque: some Franks invented some novel theology and weren't really interested in hearing the counterarguments.

To hopefully make an ounce of sense out of all of this, I've lived two Christian lives. One where I had to point to the Augsburg Confession and say "what we're doing 500 years later bears no resemblance to this", and one where I point to the same confession and say "Think of how much world history would have been completely different if Jeremias had sent a whole team to go try to humbly point out their errors". I can see the wrong on both sides. But the overarching point is, there's nothing Jeremias said in that exchange that I can't find still taught in Orthodox churches, and there's very little of the Augsburg Confession that I can find still taught in Lutheran churches. I know them by their fruits.

[ClaytonB]

I know them by their fruits.

I'll try to come back later and reply in detail, but I'll give a quick response here --

I agree that we must measure all branches of the church by the fruit they produce. The problem that I perceive in both Rome and Orthodoxy (as an outside observer), is there is a tendency to just assume "we are the people we are waiting for." As a Reformed Christian, my challenge to both of the main traditional branches of the church is this: What if God's plan includes something more? Something that you didn't think of? Something that is in the Word of God (not a novelty), but which Jesus chose, for his own reasons, not to fully explain to you? This question is not arbitrary, nor is it mere partisanship or apologetics for the Reformation -- it is the four gospels all over again. Who sits in "the seat of Moses" today? (Matt. 23:1 and context) If anyone could be described with that language it would be the Pope and I would include the Patriarchs of Orthodoxy, also. There is no equivalent in Reformed Christianity unless you want to mention the Archbishop of Canterbury, for Anglicans. There is a universal tendency among the leadership of church institutions to assume that God's plan is to make the whole world into church, and heaven is basically church forever. But what does Scripture say?:

"I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp." (Rev. 21:22,23)

"No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest," declares the LORD. "For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more." (Jer. 31:34)

"It is written in the Prophets: 'They will all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me." (John 6:45)

In addition, there is also a prophesied Great Apostasy coming. (Matt. 24, 2 Thess. 2:3 and context) The institutional church is in perpetual denial of this prophetic reality for the same reason we all live in low-key denial of our own impending bodily death. The church, as we know it, is going to end. This is prophecy. It will be replaced with the eternal church but the eternal church will be something different from what we have ever known, just as our resurrection body will be different from our earthly body. Most Reformed Christians will not mention these prophecies, either, because most of them are also institutionalized in their thinking. This is one of the biggest ecclesiological issues I see today.

I agree with you that the fruits of holding fast to the Gospel are essential. But we must add to those the fruits of rightly dividing the word of Truth and listening carefully to the the Holy Spirit's prophetic voice, because that is how the Good Shepherd speaks to his flock...

[fisharmor]

I'm really enjoying this discussion.

I just wanted to add something that touched me pretty deeply when I visited a Coptic church over the summer. There are already icons of the 21 martyrs of Libya from 2015.



The immediacy of the thing is what really hit me.

This happened less than 10 years ago. And all the icons I see of it are careful to have Matthew Ayariga from Ghana featured as prominently as they can. By some accounts he was not already a Christian and responded to the faith of the others and joined them in martyrdom. It would be far from the first report of this happening.

The Copts are also my estranged cousins - less so than Rome but there are distinct differences between us. But not here. We have no illusions about our impending death. Because this still happens to us - not here in America, but when it happens elsewhere, we hear about it. We read their account. We immortalize them in paint. We plea to retrieve their remains, and we build shrines around them.

I only wanted to bring it up because you basically described an icon-shaped hole in Western theology. I'm not the person to describe the first thing about the theology of icons. But I know enough to say I'm pretty sure you described some of the reason we do this.

[ClaytonB]

I'm really enjoying this discussion.

I just wanted to add something that touched me pretty deeply when I visited a Coptic church over the summer. There are already icons of the 21 martyrs of Libya from 2015.



The immediacy of the thing is what really hit me.

This happened less than 10 years ago. And all the icons I see of it are careful to have Matthew Ayariga from Ghana featured as prominently as they can. By some accounts he was not already a Christian and responded to the faith of the others and joined them in martyrdom. It would be far from the first report of this happening.

The Copts are also my estranged cousins - less so than Rome but there are distinct differences between us. But not here. We have no illusions about our impending death. Because this still happens to us - not here in America, but when it happens elsewhere, we hear about it. We read their account. We immortalize them in paint. We plea to retrieve their remains, and we build shrines around them.

I only wanted to bring it up because you basically described an icon-shaped hole in Western theology. I'm not the person to describe the first thing about the theology of icons. But I know enough to say I'm pretty sure you described some of the reason we do this.

Truly moving. Yes, all believers are united in the Lord Jesus Christ, whether that be through martyrdom or other suffering on the narrow path to Life.

Since you love icons, if you haven't heard of Jonathan Pageau, I'm sure you will enjoy his channel:

[mtr1979]

This is a great discussion.

I actually looked into joining an Orthodox Church a year ago. I couldn't bring myself to do it because the Orthodox Church also practices the sacrament of confession.

The last few weeks I have been attending an Assembly of God Church. It is okay, but at the back of my mind something doesn't feel right about it.