Evangelicals are associated with extremists -- could you explain why?

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God_s_Child

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I am new to your Forum. I am an Evangelical Christian - I am a Child of God.

I have been reading your forums for awhile now, and am confused. I was raised Catholic - strict Catholic! And since I have become an Evangelical Christian, I have spent much time studying my religion of birth, so that I could really understand where I had come from in terms of faith, and where I was heading. I tell you this only because I believe I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.

What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
 
God's Child:
What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
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Do you mean in society or here on these forums?
 
God's Child:
I am new to your Forum. I am an Evangelical Christian - I am a Child of God.

I have been reading your forums for awhile now, and am confused. I was raised Catholic - strict Catholic! And since I have become an Evangelical Christian, I have spent much time studying my religion of birth, so that I could really understand where I had come from in terms of faith, and where I was heading. I tell you this only because I believe I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.

What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
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Welcome and God bless you! 👋

Could you be more specific about the extremist part?
 
God's Child:
I am new to your Forum. I am an Evangelical Christian - I am a Child of God.

I have been reading your forums for awhile now, and am confused. I was raised Catholic - strict Catholic! And since I have become an Evangelical Christian, I have spent much time studying my religion of birth, so that I could really understand where I had come from in terms of faith, and where I was heading. I tell you this only because I believe I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.

What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
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Hi, and welcome. Maybe you could give specific examples of where Evangelicals were said to be of some kind of “strange” faith or extremist. It would really help to know what specifically you are referring to.

Just out of curiosity, when you say you are now studying your former faith, does that mean you are studying what the Catholic Church actually teaches (using Catholic materials), or are you studying what your current denomination tells you the Church teaches?

Again, welcome aboard! I hope you stick around.
 
Hello God’s Child!

Personally…I don’t think evangelicals are strange or extreme…
Welcome…
God Bless
 
I do not think it is the Evangelicals per se, but the Fundamentalists who come from the Evangelical and/or Baptists churches. The ones who are part of the strong movement of Fundamentalists or Dispensationalists tend to be very degrading to Catholics. They tend to refer to us as pagan and not Christian. Some of what you are seeing in venting, some frustration, and some search for how do I defend this.

Please do not take it as a personal affront to you, it is some memebers of your denomination that feel the need to harrass us. I have several friends who are not Evangelical but not Fundamentalists.

Welcome! Please use the forum to find the answers you seek! In Christ’s love, kp1 🙂
 
God's Child:
I tell you this only because I believe I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.
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I’d be interested to dialogue further with you as to why, knowing Catholic Church teachings, that you still chose evangelicalism. Most times, evangelicals misunderstand or mischaracterize Catholic beliefs, and at least from the people who post here, most evangelicals who properly understand Catholic beliefs end up converting to Catholicism. (As i said, this is only anecdotally from what i see on these boards).

I used to belong to the Evangelical Covenant Church, which is pretty similar to the Evangelical Free Church that you belong to. At one time, those denominations alomst joined, but didn’t over a disagrement of end times issues.
 
Welcome to the forums, many of us are converts or reverts from Evangelical Churches and may have had similar experiences to you. So you are in good company here.

We are always happy to answer questions as many of us had the same questions as you probably do.

God Bless
Scylla

So which church do you go to? I have experience with Calvary Chapel and Foursquare Gospel
 
DO you mean in political matters? I am not certain why but evangilicals seem to be mainly conservative and sometimes extremly so. This seems odd because among Catholics there is a variety of political expression in everything but abortion.

Perhaps you are referring to what I think is a growing movement of extreme Puritanicalness in some evangilical circles. There is nothing wrong in wearing long dresses, homeschooling your children, or abstaining from alcohol but when you begin to believe that a person can not be a Christian if they do not do these things then you are going to extremes.
 
God's Child:
I am new to your Forum. I am an Evangelical Christian - I am a Child of God.

I have been reading your forums for awhile now, and am confused. I was raised Catholic - strict Catholic! And since I have become an Evangelical Christian, I have spent much time studying my religion of birth, so that I could really understand where I had come from in terms of faith, and where I was heading. I tell you this only because I believe I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.

What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
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Can you explain what you’re referring to ? Thanks 🙂​

 
Hi! 👋
Welcome to the forums! You and I have traded places… I belonged to an Evangelical Free Church for years and after reading & understanding Jesus’ words in John 6 regarding the Eucharist, I felt God calling me to the Catholic Faith.

I never think of Evangelicals as extremists… in fact, I think both Churches are so similar in their views regarding the evils of abortion - homosexual marrage - etc.

I do think that most Evangelicals don’t think of Catholics as “Christians” though. My former Pastor’s wife from the E-Free Church used to ask for prayer all the time for her “very devout Catholic parents” whom she felt were not Christians. According to her, they went to church several times a week - prayed daily - were very good people and “claimed” to love Jesus but she said, “They are CATHOLIC so I’m just not sure they do.” How nutsy is that?

At any rate - I am happy you have taken it upon yourself to learn about the Catholic Faith. 🙂

Blessings to you,
CM
 
I am a joyful Catholic convert (March 30, 2002), and was raised in a very Calvinist, somewhat fundamentalist/legalistic Protestant Church. I have heard from several people who belong to Evangelical Churches that they believe that Catholics are NOT Christians. One woman friend of mine told me, when we were first getting to know each other a couple of years ago, that I am the first Catholic she has ever met that is a Christian. Since then, she has met 2 more Catholic women, and she said we 3 are different from any Catholics she has ever met (she’s 50 yrs old), because we are Christian. She is a very active Evangelical, and she is not very different in her beliefs (and prejudices) from many other Evangelicals in the area in which I live.

My brother is an Evangelical Pastor, and I asked him about this notion that Catholics aren’t Christians, and he said that the impression that many Cradle-Catholic-now-Evangelicals in his Church give is that you have to go through “too many layers” to get to Christ.

I am still puzzled by that statement. :confused:
 
God's Child:
…What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith – could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily!
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We’re always nice…it’s just some of us are nicer than others 😉

For me personally evangelical means fundamentalist…I know that may not be an accurate or fair description but that is what goes through my mind and fundamentalism implies an extreme rigidity of thought that seems not only dangerous but downright unchristian. Ignoring the Tradition and the Fathers and holding that every single word of the Bible is literally true despite the overwhelming evidence that it is not just seems downright willful.

(Please note I was raised in a big northeast city where we really didn’t see Protestants in the wild so I never learned much about them. Most everyone was Catholic or Jewish. Sure we had the occasional Lutheran or Episcopalian but heck…they’re almost just like regular people. 😉 )
Due to this lack of exposure, certain forms of Protestantism are literally “strange” to me

I’m sure that there are some places where Catholics are a rare as hens teeth and we seem just as strange.

True story: During the War My Dad served on a ship doing convoy escort duty in the Atlantic. For a lot of the crew that war was their first time that they had left their home towns much less their State. My Bronx born Dad met a farmer’s son from Georgia who told him that he never imagined that a Catholic could be such a nice person. 🙂
 
steveandersen said:
(Please note I was raised in a big northeast city where we really didn’t see Protestants in the wild so I never learned much about them. Most everyone was Catholic or Jewish. Sure we had the occasional Lutheran or Episcopalian but heck…they’re almost just like regular people. 😉 )
🙂
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I am in a silly mood. I now have a mental image of the crocodile hunter going to the south. And saying something along the lines of. “There’s a fundamentalist. He’s a big fellow. Ain’t he a beaut?”

Just as aside…I have a lot of wonderful fundamentalist people in my family.
 
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deb1:
I am in a silly mood. I now have a mental image of the crocodile hunter going to the south. And saying something along the lines of. “There’s a fundamentalist. He’s a big fellow. Ain’t he a beaut?”…
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[Elmer Fudd Voice} Be vewy quite, I’m hunting Pwotestants ah ahah aha! [/Elmer Fudd voice]

It is funny and it is sad the misconceptions that come from ignorance.

Sure there were Protestants where I grew up but they were largely the black people and, sad to say, despite all the bad press against the South, northern cities were (and might even still be) be just as segregated. :o Even the white neighborhoods were segregated along ethnic religious & lines.
The first thing kids would ask each other would be “what are you?” and they would shout out that they were Italian or Polish or Irish despite that fact that their great grand pappy left the Old Sod behind 100 years ago and that any self-respecting Italian, Pole, or Irishman would know them for a Yank a mile away.

The only Protestants we ever saw were TV preachers
That is no way to form a positive image
Those guys may have good hair and an 800 number but they’re not Fulton Sheen 😉
 
I think anyone who is very passionate about the Christian faith is painted as an extremist by the secular world. It means you’re on the right track. 🙂
 
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dafalax:
I think anyone who is very passionate about the Christian faith is painted as an extremist by the secular world. It means you’re on the right track. 🙂
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That might be true; however, why would one group of Christians call another “extremist,” or “not Christian?”
 
There are ‘evangelicals’ who use their ‘faith’ to push forward their own personal political agendas - some of which would no way be endorsed by Christ.

There are ‘evangelicals’ who want to legislate belief in Christ on all people, mostly because they are impatient waiting for people to respond favorably to their evangelism. Since they’ve been professing the faith so long and so far and people still are not turning to Christ, they are trying other ways to force it on them. At least that’s how I view it.

I imagine true evangelicals are quite patient, prayerful, vocal. The wealthy, powerful, influential evangelicals who don’t live what they preach are the ones I consider ‘extremists’. I also admit the ‘evangelical’ label comes from the media inundation of the term. They tend to identify people who speak out of the side of their mouths as evangelical or fundamentalists and it is their representation I take on. That’s why I don’t say ‘all’ evangelical Christians, and try to distinguish between those who claim to be, and those who truly are.

But that’s just me.
 
God's Child:
I am new to your Forum. I am an Evangelical Christian - I am a Child of God.

I have been reading your forums for awhile now, and am confused. I was raised Catholic - strict Catholic! And since I have become an Evangelical Christian, I have spent much time studying my religion of birth, so that I could really understand where I had come from in terms of faith, and where I was heading. I tell you this only because I believe
** (A) I know both the Catholic Church teachings as well as the Evangelical Free beliefs.**

What confuses me is that I notice that Evangelicals are associated with extremists and/or some kind of “strange” faith –
(B) could you explain why? And please be nice … because I bruise easily! :love:
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(A) If you really know the Catholic Church teachings…
What did Jesus place in the Catholic Church (His Church) for the forgiveness of sins ?

(B) WHY?
Evangelicals can’t help it. …they HAVE TO .
since they have turned away from the Truth,
they have to try extra hard to come across as “truthful”
and they end up coming across as “extreme”.

I hope that wasn’t too hurtful.

it sorta works like this;
"If I wander off the INTERSTATE onto a rabbit trail…
But if I talk loud enough and fast enough…
Maybe I can convince some that the rabbit trail
is actually the “interstate”.

if you “believe”

gusano
 
Most of the Christians in America are Protestant, and America has historically been Protestant. Protestant extremists would then be more visible than, say, Jewish, or Catholic extremists, simply because of Protestantism’s greater presence.
 
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