Protestants, what truths must you hold to be considered one of you?
Itâs changed over time. Itâs probably gotten a little too broad.
Can you believe in the Immaculate Conception and still be a Protestant?
You can, but I wouldnât.
Generally, yes. Thereâs a sense in which theyâre all tied together, some more closely than others. Sola Fide and Sola Gratia, for example, kind of have to be taken together as a package deal.
Be confessional and hold to the Augsburg Confession as well or is that non-essential?
Thatâs more specific to Lutherans. Most of its content is pretty essential, though.
I ask this because Catholics are sometimes told that they have less freedom of thought in comparison to the Protestant churches.
Some people say that.
Iâm curious about the intellectual freedom in the Protestant realm, if thereâs some overarching dogma/doctrine that unites everybody together.
There is an Evangelical Manifesto that was put together fairly recently. Itâs not the kind of authoritative thing that Catholic leadership puts out there, though, and thereâs been quite a bit of controversy concerning the circumstances under which people can call themselves Evangelicals. Thereâs some talk of opening it up to Catholics. Thereâs also talk of closing some loopholes that allow for certain heretical doctrines. (Iâm talking about âheresyâ in the sense of âactual heresy,â not in the sense of "everything non-Catholic).
The Evangelical Manifesto can be readâŚhere.
anevangelicalmanifesto.com/docs/Evangelical_Manifesto.pdf
There are some documents that unite certain groups of Protestants, like the Augsburg Confession that you brought up earlier. I bring up the Evangelical Manifesto because itâs a good example of something thatâs inter-denominational that covers a significant portion of the Protestant spectrum while excluding people who call themselves Protestants but also hold to a liberal theology that does things like denying the deity of Christ, the Trinity, divine inspiration of Godâs Word, etc.
As for âintellectual freedom,â thereâs a book called âThe Scandal of the Evangelical Mindâ by Mark Noll. It doesnât exactly praise the intellectual freedom of Evangelicals over the course of the last few centuries. Itâs really more of a rebuke. I wouldnât go as far as calling it âscathing,â but itâs certainly not a pat on the back. Itâs probably in the top 5 among the most influential and important books of the last century, and it happens to deal with this topic in a pretty direct way. Unfortunately, itâs not available online. It mainly deals with the relationship between the theological mindset of Evangelicalism and how that should interact with intellectual pursuits, and then it relates the ways in which Evangelicals in America havenât succeeded in doing this. This book was well received, though, and weâre working on it.
Next time youâre hanging out at a bookstore, maybe you can find it and flip through it. Btw, Mark Noll is currently a professor at Notre Dame. He teaches history to people who are going for their doctorates. So next time youâre hanging out at Notre Dame, maybe you can schedule a meeting with him.
This is the preview from Google Books.
books.google.com/books?id=J2fmHHqc-vIC&dq=google+books+mark+noll+scandal+of+the+evangelical+mind&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=8tGzS8r4EozUMo7T4PMJ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CBEQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=&f=false
You can actuallyâŚwow, you might not have to hang out at a bookstore after all. I think you can get all you need right there. Hooray for Google Books!
I ask this question out of curiosity so that I can see the world better from your point of view.
It sometimes depends on which Protestant you ask, but this is some of the material that I think of as significant.
Edit about the word âProtestantâ- itâs a word whose meaning has changed in the course of the evolution of the English language. Historically, âto protestâ meant âto declare.â Some of Lutherâs predecessors- men who did not break from the Catholic Church in any way- used it in the same way Luther did. They would say âThis I protestâ in order to communicate that they were asserting a belief. Its original intent was not to say âThis is what I am against,â but just the opposite- âThis is what I profess to be true.â Except they would say âThis is what I protest to be true.â
This is one of the first things thatâs addressed in the Evangelical Manifesto- although itâs not really done in the process of upholding the use of the term. Itâs become a little bit of a dinosaur. Its original intent has been almost entirely divorced from its current meaning. Again, itâs explained more in-depth in the Manifesto.
âŚyouâre far too convicted, impassioned, and dogmatic for me to assume such folly about you. And I believe that many Lutherans, Calvinists, Methodists, and other Protestants are no doubt convicted that they know the whole truth and certainly donât mean to be relativists by any stretch. Iâm simply saying that if I sit you down with a Calvinist, a Methodist, an Anglican, and some other Protestants, chances are extremely high you guys will not agree on much of anything. Lutherâs pounding his fists and barking at Zwingli about the Eucharist showed how they agreed on much until the Eucharist came along. There was bad blood there. Protestants in their own churches believe they have the entirety of truth, of course, never implied otherwise. But as a whole, Protestantism is so wide-open, diverse, vast, and chaotic that itâs about impossible to believe you all could come to agreement about THE total truth about Scripture, church polity, and theology any day of the week. Does that make sense? Protestantism is a big tent, man! Donât worry, I never mistook you for a Calvnist or Anglican LOLâŚAs carefully, precisely, and voluminously as you enumerate your beliefs and theology, Matt, I know exactly where you stand! 
