40,000 denominations...?

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I have never heard 40,000 denominations.
I have heard 30,000 denominations.
When I lived in a large city there were many different churches on almost every corner in certain areas of town. Some names were in English and some names
were in Spanish. One was called The End Is Near Church. Many were evangelical or pentecostal and I would call each church a denomination as it is up to the pastor of each of these individual churches as to what they believe and how they worship.
In that city in the southwest and surrounding suburbs I believe there are probably between 6,000-8,000 churches including Catholic, Episcopalian, Anglican,
Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist and the Evangelical and Pentecostal churches. I know 2 people, husband and wife, who were taken to Las Vegas and ordained as ministers. They have an 8th grade and high school education. No studies about Christianity were required or theology or any training. The head of this group of ministers visited their home church one Sunday and proclaimed they had the Holy Spirit and he wanted to ordain them. The husband does funerals and weddings. They have had their home church for 8 years. How many home churches are there? I have no problem with the 30,000 denominations when you think globally. I think we could have that many in the U.S. alone!
 
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adamhovey1988 said:
I think a better argument, against Protestantism, isn’t the number of denominations, but the lack of unity amongst the denominations.
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Yeah… there are 42 Baptist churches here in New Orleans and all of them different.
 
Within a few miles of me, in Rural South Carolina, there are Episcopalian churches, Independent Baptist churches, Southern Baptist churches, Non denominational churches, Methodist churches, Pentecostal churches, Lutheran churches, amongst others
 
Some Protestants do admit there’s a problem with division though. Some are over major issues and others aren’t that major. In fact, this is from a magazine founded by Billy Graham that cites the 33,000 figure:

Denominations Archives - Christianity Today

www.christianitytoday.com www.christianitytoday.com

I find it odd how there can be so many confessional Lutheran bodies in the US. The LCMS and WELS are the largest but there are smaller ones too. I suppose for an outsider the reasons to the divisions are minor.
 
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Christ founded one church, and even if there were only one other denomination it would be one to many.
Just my two cents on the matter.
 
Quoting a certain number of denominations is worse than useless, it tends to make Protestants ignore anything you say or write after that, even if it is quite intelligent. Everybody knows there is no agreed-on method of counting denominations. One might say every single Baptist congregation is a separate denomination; or one might say Baptists in general, along with similar groups, constitute a single denomination called “Evangelicals”.

The reality is that Protestants know there is plurality to the point of division within Protestantism. They know this is not in full conformity to Scripture. Whether there are 12 different denominations, or a million, does not matter. Do you really think the committed Protestant will say in response, “Oh my! 40 thousand did you say? I thought there were only 20,000, at the most! In light of this crucial insight, I am now forced to reexamine the sacramental and traditional nature of religion, in view of the God-created Magisterium”.

If you stoop to bringing up this meaningless number of denominations, they will assume all the other arguments for Catholicism are also worthless.
 
Protestants are resigned to church hopping until they can find a church they feel comfortable in or that agrees with their beliefs or interpretation of the Bible.
 
Milt said:
Christ founded one church, and even if there were only one other denomination it would be one to many.

Just my two cents on the matter.
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MichaelP3 said:
But this thinking also doesn’t make sense.

From the top of my head you have Old Catholics, the Polish National Catholic Church the Orientals and the E Orthodox. These are not considered Protestant but still split.

So yes there have been many splits on the Protestant side which would be more than two. But how does one reconcile these when they also split? That’s also more than two.

Honestly the absolute number difference would be a better argument.
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Was wondering if you read my post before you posted that?
 
That is a big assumption in this regard. It is something to take note of.
 
Not really a big assumption for modern Christians in America IMHO.
There are so many churches to choose from.
 
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Yes I believe you have a point. Here church hopping is actually frowned upon.
 
njmah16 said:
I do not know how many of you on here have used this or believe this, but can we stop the lie that there are 40,000 protestant denominations? It is fairly well known that it is not true, but there are still some people that use it trying to disprove protestantism. I am a catholic, and using the false statistic does more harm than good. It comes from World Christian Encyclopedia, and according to this source, the Catholic church has 242 denominations. We all know this is not true.
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Good luck. I know that when I hear this nonsense, there’s no use engaging, as the person is more interested in demonizing Christians than he is in learning what we believe.
 
It’s not a false statistic but rather is different from what most define as denomination and requires justification to be used, and many don’t state the various justifications of the thing.
 
MichaelP3 said:
Yes I believe you have a point. Here church hopping is actually frowned upon.
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It might be frowned on upon here, but some people are looking for a feel good church where they can believe whatever they want to. Others might be looking for a more pentecostal church with clapping and singing and speaking in tongues, others might want a more serious or strict church with lots of rules and discipline.
There are so many different types of churches with so many denominations and all it takes will be for the pastor to say the wrong thing that rubs someone the wrong way and out the door they go looking for a church that will cater to them.
Granted, not everyone is like that in America, but a lot are.
 
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