Why do so many Protestants say Catholics are damned to Hell?

I think that might be a bit of a generalization. I am Lutheran, and I believe that if they (or anyone else) believes that Christ is the only way to salvation and that He died to save us from our sins, then everything else is really a moot point. Yeah, we worship in VERY different styles. It doesn't mean that we can't worship the same God.

Agreed. I don't think Protestants are damned, and all of my Protestant friends don't think I'm damned. It is wrong, however, to pass judgement on groups of people. That is His job.

[This message has been edited by FastTruck (edited 5/16/2006 1:15p).]

I am protestant, and I do not feel that way.

aledo i feel you are completly correct. my current issue that i am wrestling with is, dont Mormon's confess the same thing? therefor don't they get a ticket on the bus also? Which is fine with me, its not my job to even think about judging. It is just my understanding that the Mormon philsophy is not in line with Christianity.

Mormons appear to believe in a multiplicity of gods and that they can one day become gods themselves. ibmagg has basically stated that here on this forum. I do not think they worship any gods but Jesus and the Heavenly Father.

I am not one to suggest who goes to hell and who doesn't, but I think Mormons are pretty far out of the path of Christian belief.

I don't think many do but there is an extreme few just like I'm sure there are some extreme Catholics that think anyone else is going to hell, which isn't in line with Church doctrine.
I don't think too hard about who is going to heaven or who thinks I'm going to heaven. I leave that up to God.

gmf -

It may be what they think. I have to admit that I really don't know alot about what Mormons believe and what they don't believe.

It seems to me that if they believe that the only way to get into heaven is to accept Jesus Christ alone as your savior then they will be saved. I don't know that they believe that though.

As for the original issue, it really irks me when I see or hear one Christian group really condemn or talk down about another Christian group, when the very core of being a Christian is simply faith in Christ

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I don't think too hard about who is going to heaven or who thinks I'm going to heaven. I leave that up to God.

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Then you're in a bit of a pickle because God left that up to us.

I think some protestants do it out of ignorance. They believe all of the lies they have been told about Catholics worshipping statues, and Mary being a goddess worthy of worship, and the pope is the antichrist BS. Once they start to investigate it for themselves, and see that all of the early church fathers like Jerome and Augustine and Thomas Aquinas were all Catholics, they begin to come around.

In our own time, we can look at all of the holiness of Pope John Paul II and Poland's Catholic Church knocking down the once mighty Soviet Union. And Mother Teresa with her saintliness picking up and feeding and nursing the least of Jesus brothers and sisters, all because of her faith in Christ.

There is a lot of anti-Catholic instruction, both direct and subtle, in many protestant churches. I grew up Baptist, and I definitely had some grevious misconceptions about the Catholic Church....

I think much of it is unintentional... mostly out of lack of knowledge of what the Catholic Church actually teaches and what Catholics really believe. For the longest time I thought Catholic worshipped on Saturdays and got drunk in church.

Fictional pieces like the Davinci Code don't help. They provide subtle doubts and heresies that people often see as possibly containing some element of truth, even if they contain no truth whatsoever.

As a protestant, I watched the movies Stigmata and Dogma (one a drama, one a comedy), and took many of the attitudes and ideas about the Church to be true, even though I knew them to be fictional movies.

Studies of Church history and a genuine search of objective truth lead me to convert to Catholicism in 2005. It didn't take long to find that the churches I belonged to were less than a decade old, and the "denominations" I belonged to and the beliefs that they subscribed to (the rapture, symbolic-only communion, etc.) are only about 200 years old... As a firm believer in the teachings of Jesus Christ, I could not bring myself to believe that the Church had been wrong for 1500-1800 years and then suddenly protestants in the southern United States suddenly figured out the REAL truth.... No, the truth was always there.... it didn't disappear after 100AD.

However, all that being said, the Catholic Church also does NOT teach that protestants are 'going to hell.' For one thing, the Church doesn't purport to have ANY authority or knowledge of hell or who goes there.. rather, the infinite mercy of God is trusted in all things...and ALL Christians are considered to be a part of the Church, if in some cases imperfectly so. We are all brethren.

God bless,

Michael

SHSU Class of '06 (M.Ed.)
UHCL Class of '99 (B.A.)
TAMU '95-96 (no degree)

Welcome to the board Zero, I hope you stick around.

I also grew up Protestant (Southern Baptist) and converted not too long ago.

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For one thing, the Church doesn't purport to have ANY authority or knowledge of hell or who goes there.. rather, the infinite mercy of God is trusted in all things

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Correct me if I am wrong (and I definitely could be), but can't a priest forgive sins according to RCC theology? Wouldn't that be some authority of where someone goes? Can't the Church "bind and loose" as I've seen stated before according to the RCC?

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can't a priest forgive sins according to RCC theology?

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Yes, and that's straight out of the Bible.

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Wouldn't that be some authority of where someone goes?

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No. A person must finish their race in the Graces of Christ.

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Can't the Church "bind and loose" as I've seen stated before according to the RCC?

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Yes, by the Apostolic spiritual authority of Christ.

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Studies of Church history and a genuine search of objective truth lead me to convert to Catholicism in 2005. It didn't take long to find that the churches I belonged to were less than a decade old, and the "denominations" I belonged to and the beliefs that they subscribed to (the rapture, symbolic-only communion, etc.) are only about 200 years old... As a firm believer in the teachings of Jesus Christ, I could not bring myself to believe that the Church had been wrong for 1500-1800 years and then suddenly protestants in the southern United States suddenly figured out the REAL truth.... No, the truth was always there.... it didn't disappear after 100AD.

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ZeroTex - You have packed so much truth into one paragraph....Good for you to finally see the light...

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ZeroTex - You have packed so much truth into one paragraph....Good for you to finally see the light...

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It always amazes me about how Roman Catholics, rather than claiming any kind of spiritual conversion or experience to the truth, have a testimony the relies on human logic and reason, where they have studied history, and based on the mere historicity of the Roman Catholic church, deduce that it must be the true church. Well, the scriptures simply don’t teach those things as true. , God’s true children are never based on a lineage, or earthly line of priests, or historical organizations but it is a spiritual thread, and those who believe the truth that are known as His children. Also, conversions of Christ are about being given eyes to see, a heart that repents of self righteousness, yet the claims I hear are always again about an intellectual reasoning, and then talk of human merit, and works justification follows. Clearly the typical RC conversion experience is at odds with biblical Christianity.

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Clearly the typical RC conversion experience is at odds with biblical Christianity.

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Oh, well, of course.

Thanks for enlightening all of us, given your ample first-hand experiences with these conversions.

No Catholicism, No Bible.

Know Catholicism, Know the Bible...

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This exciting book shows that, far from straying from the Bible, Catholicism is eminently and thoroughly biblical. Indeed, Catholicism is the only Christian religion that is in full conformity with what the Bible clearly teaches.
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[This message has been edited by texasag73 (edited 5/20/2006 2:58p).]

I don't want to speak for Mormons, but I've read most of their books because I have friends who are of that persuasion. I think that Joseph Smith had a revelation at one point about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit being three different gods but totally united in one. None have answered me what the book of Morman (as well as the Bible) means when it states many times over that there is only one god, even though they both discuss the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit with different characteristics and as different persons.

Don't forget that also.....

No Mary, No Jesus
Know Mary, Know Jesus

Vetter -I'm sorry none of your Mormon friends have not answered this question for you. If you asked me, it slipped by.

In Alma 11:28-29 it states that there is only one God but it is important to understand the context of these verses. "Now Zeezrom said: Is the more than one God? And he answered, No."

Zeezrom is a crafty individual who is trying to trick Amulek. Their discussion is referring to one person who Amulek is preaching; that person is Jesus Christ. In essence Zeezrom is asking, "Is there more than one Jesus Christ?" The answer is obviously no. For to us there, is only one Jesus Christ. Isaiah said the same thing in Isa. 43:11 "I, even I am the Lord; and beside me there is no saviour." Of course we know that Jesus is the God of the Old Testament (Ex. 6:3; Heb. 1:1-4; John 1:1-5). Thus in the Old Testament when it says God appeared to Moses it was Jesus or Jehovah who appeared to Moses.

Jesus is a God and there is only one Jesus. It is important to understand that Jesus is BOTH a God and the Son of God, and this God (Jesus) is the only one who atoned for our sins. The fact still remains that there is more than one God in the universe.

In 1 Cor. 8:5-6 we learn that "as there be gods many and lords many, but to us there is but ONE God. Moses was told essentially the same thing in the Book of Exodus 20:2, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me". But, again this does not deny the fact that there is more than one God.

The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost -three separate and distinct personages are one Godhead. They are one in purpose -to bring about the immortality and eternal Life of man. In John 17:21 it even compares the apostles to being one with God but it is more than obvious that the apostles are not our God. They are simply one in purpose with God.

I hope this explains it for you.

If one disagrees with some RC doctrine and/or practices, does that make him a "hater?"