Question from Tim and some other guy:
Hey, we are two students at an international school in Hong Kong. We have a project dealing with all the different denominations of Christianity. Would it be possible to answer a few questions regarding the existance of the thousands of denominations? Thank you.
1. What are the basic tenets of Christianity (the inclusive beliefs of all Christianity)?
2. Why is it that Christianity has broken up into countless numbers of denominations?
a. What caused this split?
3. Wouldn’t God want one, universal denomination of Christianity, instead of what it is now, split into thousands of sects?
4. Wouldn’t one inclusive group be more influential and attractive than split factions?
Answer by SmartLX:
A Christian would immediately ask why you didn’t submit these questions to a Christian website to hear the answers from the horse’s mouth. I simply assume you’re after an external perspective which doesn’t favour one Christian denomination over another, and you’ll certainly get that here.
1. All Christians believe that the “God of Abraham” exists, that He created the universe and that He designed human beings deliberately and specifically. They believe that Jesus Christ was God’s son, and/or a human incarnation of God himself, and that after he was crucified he rose from the dead. If you can find a self-proclaimed Christian who doesn’t believe even one element of the above, I can show you a lot of other Christians who wouldn’t regard that person as a Christian.
2. When a religion splits into two denominations, it’s called a schism (pronounced “SKIZZ-um”). People in the same denomination may argue a great deal, but when a particular dispute over religious practice, doctrine or dogma spreads far enough the two factions officially declare each other to be wrong in the eyes of their deity. That moment is when the schism happens, and afterwards the two groups are referred to using different names.
Christianity gets a lot of schisms because its doctrines are so extensive. There’s a mountain of individual points on which people can disagree. Another reason is that there are no real Christian theocracies left, and no denomination is able to force dissenters into line the way the Church once could. People are free to argue for their own interpretations of Scripture, which isn’t helpful when you want to keep two billion people unified.
3/4. If the Christian God exists, He probably would want Christians to unite under a single banner, and Christians of all denominations likely realise this. However, they reason, if the wrong denomination wins out and all Christians embrace the wrong doctrine, then nobody will really be doing God’s will at all. Those of each denomination think they’ve got the right one, and most often decide that Christian unity ultimately isn’t worth abandoning the “true” faith. It’s their way or nothing. Of course, this leaves all Christians at a gigantic impasse.
Christian Denominations
“A Christian would immediately ask why you didn’t submit these questions to a Christian website to hear the answers from the horse’s mouth. I simply assume you’re after an external perspective which doesn’t favour one Christian denomination over another, and you’ll certainly get that here.”
Welcome to our new visitors from the Christian online publication WORLD Magazine. I’m “The Atheist” as referred to in Anthony Bradley’s article.
WORLD has my thanks for linking to the article it references, and the new readers have a measure of my respect and appreciation for following the link to see for themselves what I actually wrote.
For the first question:Christians are supposed to be believing in a spiritual,not carnal form of unity and representation of Christ.Which means that Christians are united by the blood of Christ and grace of God which simply means that no other basis for unity is required.It is disgraceful to Christ for us to be split up like this.
Second question:The reason it is like this is because through the free will that God gave to men has been abused by so called Christians.Some self proclaimed Christians still live in the vanity of this worldly thinking therefore devising new plans and new structures on top of what Christ built.Blind people have unknowingly followed such people and as a result Christ has turned into a mocking subject of everyone in the world.Christians have completely missed the point of Christs message.
Second question A:It is simply just the carnal mind of blind so called believers trying to lead true seeking Christians astray in their attempt to capitalize on Christ for their own self glory.True Christians will have their eyes opened and are responsible for preaching against this blasphemy against Christ.
Third Question:You seem to be more knowledgeable about God then some professing believing Christians for making this statement.Yes God wants one unified church and thats exactly what He created in Christ!Theres no reason for MAN to build his own building and call it church thats complete faithlessness in what Christ has said.Thats even on the hint of pure BLASPHEMY because Christ made it clear how the church is spiritual and not carnal.
Question 4:Correct again!Even though it nots meant to be more fashionable but it is meant to represent God and Christ in the utmost way.By having true believing faith and knowing what Christ means when he says something will allow Him to be magnified through how he treats the believer because of the believers belief.Thats the point of the whole thing.If one does not believe in God then how can God be magnified or even glorified or even recognized by that person.God sees it as if one of His creation is not willing to do what it was designed to do then it is useless,which is completely logical,If you make something that wont do the job you intended it to do then it is worthless.