If there is no denomination for rr1213, he should start his own. If it’s not right in his case, why was it right in the case of Martin Luther, or John Calvin, or John Wesley, or Alexander Campbell, or any of the other founders of denominations?
None of the four people you mention “started their own denomination” because they wanted a church that fit their views. This is a silly stereotype indulged in by Catholics without historical basis. (OK, it does have a basis in America in the last century or two, but not before that. The proliferation of denominations founded for serious reasons gave rise to the idea that it was OK to start denominations, not the other way round.)
Luther thought that the Church had been taken over by Antichrist, and began preaching what he believed to be the true Gospel. Regional sections of the Church reformed faith and practice in accord with his ideas. This is not the sort of thing you are talking about.
Calvin didn’t start anything. He joined an existing Protestant movement because, again, he thought Word and Sacrament were radically corrupted in the Catholic Church.
Wesley died a faithful member of the Church of England. He did authorize the founding of a Methodist Church in America because it looked as if Anglicanism had collapsed there, and because at any rate it wasn’t doing a good job of evangelizing the frontier, leaving thousands of people unchurched. This is actually your best bet, and it’s noteworthy that it was in America that this happened (Wesley did not found Methodism as a separate “denomination” in England–the separation happened only after his death). “Founding your own denomination” is a product of American sociology more than anything else.
Campbell’s followers (except for the Disciples of Christ, who have gone mainline) still don’t admit to being a denomination. They claim to be a restoration of the NT Church.
Of course you can say that all these people did in fact start their own denomination, whether they intended to or not. But intentions do matter. rr is being cynically advised to “start his own denomination” *deliberately. *None of the people you have mentioned did this, except perhaps Wesley in America in what he regarded as emergency circumstances.
Most traditions of Christianity originated in one or more of the following circumstances:
a) the founders thought existing Christianity was apostate; or
b) the founders were kicked out of existing churches; or
c) unchurched people were not being reached by existing churches in a particular place and time.
Even c is mostly an American phenomenon.
The idea that you can just start your own denomination in the way someone would start a new business to cater to consumer needs is a modern American phenomenon. It is not the product of Protestant theology but of capitalist idolatry (and, to some extent, of the mentality produced by the proliferation of Protestant churches; hence it is *indirectly, *but not directly, the result of Protestant theology).
Edwin
Why not? A guy’s gotta go to church
somewhere. If none exist that cater to his theology, why shouldn’t he make a new one? If he’s going to have to accept doctrinal disagreement with (and implicitly, then, refuse the authority of) his chosen church, what reason does he have to pick one over another?
Clearly, that’s why God gave them the Church, and told them to obey their leaders. But some Christians just won’t have leaders.
I was only pointing out the logical conclusion to his dilemma. No real judgment involved; his conscience can (hopefully) do that job.
Jeremy
) Catholic apologists. I’m pretty sure he was ready for some modicum of harassment