What is the rift between Protestants and Roman Catholics?

Question

What is the misunderstanding Protestants have with Roman Catholics? How serious is this problem? How is it related to the Virigin Mary? Has it got to do with evolution?

Answer 1

-is a Catholic convert from Protestantism-

Answers in Order

1. Depends greatly on the type of Protestant. Most Protestants don't actually have a clue as to what the Catholic Church teaches and rely instead on bad information (some of it is purposely specious). Often at a core level there is a metaphysical disagreement. For example most Protestants, especially the "Born Again" are very Aristotelian/Kantian in their metaphysics and believe in a complete separation between the material and spiritual spheres so that only God's grace and affect anything in the material sphere. Thus you get doctrines such as the Calvinistic double predestination and the "once saved always saved-ism" where by your activity in the material sphere doesn't affect what happens to you when you get to the spiritual sphere because it cannot cross over. Catholics do not follow Aristotle in this regard as their metaphysics is Jewish/Platonic in origin. There is an interconnection between the material and spiritual spheres so that God will not save anyone who does not co-operate with grace. What one does in the material sphere does impact their future life and those in the spiritual sphere are still connected and may interact with those in the material sphere. Thus you have dogmas such as the need for "faith and works", redemptive suffering, and the intercession of the Saints.

2. Hugely serious. As you should be able to tell by the above. Metaphysical truth hangs in the balance..

3. Not much is related to Mary. Her name comes up a lot but she is not the root cause of the problem. The accusation of paganism assumes that paganism is wholly evil because it lacks any truth as it is not connected to the spiritual plain (again due to Aristotle). Catholicism looks at pagan practices and says, there is truth in this, how can it be pulled out? Catholicism also believes in typology where by everything in this world is a type of the Christian message. That is why there are similarities between Catholic things and pagan things. Not because we copied, but because they are shadows of the truth.

4. No. Protestants have the hangup about evolution, not Catholics. St. Augustine taught a form of evolution. The main problem is that Protestants since the 18th century have believed that Faith is opposed to Reason/Science or that their spheres are totally separate (again Aristotle/Kant and you can thrown in Kierkegaard here). Catholics believe that Faith and Reason/Science are two forms of Knowledge and that though different spheres, they are complementary, cannot contradict each other, and can inform the other. So Catholics doe not have a problem with certain theories of evolution.

Answer 2

Many Protestants hate us Catholics. That's a fact. Yet, they fail to realize if Catholics have never existed the neither would they. After all, Protestants broke away from the Catholic Church during the Reformation. So, in essence, you could say that Catholicism is the "mother" of Protestantism.

The Virgin Mary plays a small part in this. Protestants broke away from the Chruch for other reasons as well. The Pope, the fact we ask saints to pray for us, Purgatory, among others all played a vital role in why they initially broke away from the Catholic Church.

Answer 3

It goes back to when Protestants broke from the Catholic Church because Catholicism had turned away from what Christ taught.

Nowadays there are equally Catholics and Protestants who are following Christ.

The late Pope John Paul II opened dialogue with Protestants and I think more Catholics and Protestants ought to do the same since both believe in Jesus.

Answer 4

Roman Catholics worship liturgy, Protestants worship themselves.

Answer 5

The Protestant Reformation was the answer to corruption within the Catholic Church. It all started about 500 years ago.