Dr. David Anders claims that Evangelicals EITHER need to make a clean break from the Reformation fathers and admit that their religion doesn’t go back more than a couple hundred years and was invented in America OR truly embrace what the Reformation fathers actually stood for and taught.  In this essay, he lays out what that might look like for a self described calvinist:

http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/

The greatest irony in my historical research was realizing that Evangelicalism, far from being the direct descendant of Calvin, actually represents the failure of Calvinism. Whereas Calvin spent his life in the quest for doctrinal unity, modern Evangelicalism is rooted in the rejection of that quest. Historian Alister McGrath notes that the term “Evangelical,” which has circulated in Christianity for centuries, took on its peculiar modern sense only in the twentieth century, with the founding of the National Association of Evangelicals (1942). This society was formed to allow coordinated public action on the part of disparate groups that agreed on “the new birth,” but disagreed on just about everything else.

Interestingly enough, Dr. Anders was on Fr. Mitch Pacwa’s show the other night discussing exactly this topic:
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Also, if you’re wondering why we Catholics should care to learn about protestantism, it is because I believe that there are many cradle-protestants and cradle-catholics-turned-protestants to be brought into the One, True, Church right here in Rochester. I am totally blown away by the number of resources available today. If you have friends and family who are protestant and you think might be open to learning their roots and possibly investigating Catholicism (even if only to prove that you need to stop being Catholic), try to point them to the Internet, get them some books, get them listening to Catholic Radio, or have them email me benanderson@cleansingfire.org. The Truth has never been more accessible than it is today. Our humble collection of protestant related posts can be found through our tags here:
http://cleansingfire.org/tag/protestant/

Tags: Protestant

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