Why Equate Protestantism with "Born Again" Fundamentalism?

[Contarini]

Edwin:

I was talking about their positions with respect to Catholicism, not with respect to politics / social issues. Wallis might be more to the left of Colson / Graham politically, socially, and theologically, but I doubt whether his position in respect to Catholicism is that much different than Colson / Graham (of course maybe it is and I will learn something). If anything, I would think that the Orthodox Catholics here would relate to Colson and Graham more than Wallis on the basis of pro-life.

Wallis is prolife, though I wish he emphasized it more. His politics are pretty similar to those promoted by the American bishops, though well to the left of the views that dominate this forum.

Of course spectrums the basis of politics, social issues, and theology would have different end points (and it would be an interesting debate on what these endpoints are).

I am not familiar with any online debate between Colson and Wallis, but to the extent they disagreed, I am almost certain I would have sided with Colson.

On second thought, I too would put Bob Jones on the other end of the spectrum as opposed to Jack Chick (who I don’t consider as representative of anything). I actually visited a friend at Bob Jones many years ago. Wierd place.

Sorry. I was referring to the “born-again liberals” remark. My point was that the folks who think Graham is a liberal would think Wallis is downright apostate! Well, they think Graham is apostate too. They’re fairly black-and-white about these things!

Edwin

 

[ralphinal]

For the record, Graham had zero record of speaking out pro-life. He is a life-long democrate (his words) and did not want to work against the party. His personal beliefs not withstanding

 

[dandn5000]

A huge part of the problem is that those very born-again fundamentalists are the ones we tend to spend the most time on trying to correct. I know that I recently had a religious discussion with a Methodist friend, and I had assumed many things about her faith based on my experiences with the fundamentalist varieties. I was trying to explain Communion, for example, and why it was that Methodists couldn’t receive at a Catholic church, and I assumed that their theology on that was similar to many other Protestants of the fundamentalist variety. So I started going on and on about it, and she’s like, “We believe the same thing!” and I had to switch to a completely different explanation.

It’s actually not an entirely bad thing in my mind that we have these issues with many Catholics equating all Protestants with the fundamentalists, for no other reason than that it proves we have more in common than it seems we do sometimes.

 

[rtconstant]

Good post OP. You’re absolutely right we as Catholics do often lump all of the Protestant world into one Fudamentalist bucket. It isn’t right to do so since many Protestant denominations are probably more like us than like the Fundamentalists.

Fundamentalism is a tough bird to target sometimes though. First it isn’t in and of itself a denomination but a modern movement within the Protestant world based on the a series of essays known as the “The Fundamentals”. It spread itself throughout many denominations around WWI. Its lack of denominational homepoint makes it seem like it covers much more ground than it actually does.

As others have mentioned it doesn’t help that Fundamentalists tend to view their beliefs as default or assumed Christianity. They tend to see their ideaology as the primative and correct belief structure of their given denominations and so they have no problem speaking for all members of their sect or even Protestantism as whole.

It should also be pointed out that not all Protestants are Calvinists. This I think is important as often the theologies that arise to challenge Catholicism is usually based on Calvinist thought. I don’t know for sure but I’d venture that probably most Protestant denominations are actually pretty close to a Catholic understanding of soterology, predestination and even the place of Sacred Tradition (even if we disagree on the specifics of Tradition).

 

[emeraldisle]

My point is I think we Catholics should me more particular in referring to Fundamentalist beliefs than projecting them all to Protestantism as a whole. Your thoughts?

A fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

Do Catholics not believe in the fundamentals of their faith?

What is wrong with believing in the fundamentals of your faith?

.

 

[Contarini]

A fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

That’s the etymology of the word, but historically it means people who have a very specific idea of what the fundamentals are. It has come to be associated with a doctrine of “secondary separation” in which there can be no cooperation with people with whom you disagree theologically, and with a highly anti-intellectual stance based on a radical doctrine of sola scriptura.

Edwin

 

[mercygate]

A fundamentalist is someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

Do Catholics not believe in the fundamentals of their faith?

What is wrong with believing in the fundamentals of your faith?

.

As rtconstant pointed out, the term “fundamentalism” derives from those booklets published about 100 years ago from Princeton Theological seminary.

The five “main” fundamentals are all believed by Catholics as well as “fundamentalists”: The bodily resurrection of Jesus, the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, the virgin birth, the Second Coming, and the atoning Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross.

 

[emeraldisle]

That’s the etymology of the word, but historically it means people who have a very specific idea of what the fundamentals are. It has come to be associated with a doctrine of “secondary separation” in which there can be no cooperation with people with whom you disagree theologically, and with a highly anti-intellectual stance based on a radical doctrine of sola scriptura.

Edwin

Do you believe in the fundamentals of your faith?

If you do then you are a fundamentalist.

The question isn’t about the fundamentals of your faith but whether you believe in them or not.

.

 

[emeraldisle]

The five “main” fundamentals are all believed by Catholics as well as “fundamentalists”: The bodily resurrection of Jesus, the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, the virgin birth, the Second Coming, and the atoning Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross.

So you are a “fundamentalist” because you believe in the fundamentals of your faith.

.

.

 

[mercygate]

So you are a “fundamentalist” because you believe in the fundamentals of your faith.

.

.

I am proud to be a fundamentalist – but not because of the fundamentals of “my” faith. I am a fundamentalist because I believe the fundamentals of “the” faith.

The fundamentalist movement began on much more substantial ground than it now occupies. It emerged on the Protestant side in parallel with Pope Pius X’s 1097 Encyclical, Pascendi Dominici Grecis, as a response against the erosions of the faith brought about by the Modernism of the 19th Century.

 

[ibkc]

Do you believe in the fundamentals of your faith?

If you do then you are a fundamentalist.

Unfortunately for your argument, emeraldisle, the term “fundamentalist” has long had a specific meaning beyond the simple literal interpretation you put forth here. That is because a group of Christians with certain attitudes and opinions not shared by the rest of Christianity began calling themselves “fundamentalists”. If we are using our language precisely, we will not call ourselves fundamentalists unless we want people to associate us with the Christians who use the term to describe their particular form of Protestant Christianity.

To go on a small tangent, this is why I get annoyed when certain types of non-denoms refuse to identify themselves among the spectrum of Christian belief, preferring instead to cryptically refer to themselves as “just Christian.” The fundamentalists have already ruined a perfectly good word for the rest of us; I’ll be dog-goned if I’ll sit by and let some non-denoms take over the definition of the word “Christian” in the same way.

 

[emeraldisle]

I am proud to be a fundamentalist – but not because of the fundamentals of “my” faith. I am a fundamentalist because I believe the fundamentals of “the” faith.

Welcome to the “fundamentalist” club, I hope you feel at home there

.

 

[emeraldisle]

Unfortunately for your argument, emeraldisle, the term “fundamentalist” has long had a specific meaning beyond the simple literal interpretation you put forth here.

Imo one of the problems with people re communication is that they misuse words, i.e. using the word “fundamentalist” for reasons other than that a person believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

.

 

[ibkc]

Imo one of the problems with people re communication is that they misuse words, i.e. using the word “fundamentalist” for reasons other than that a person believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

What is your suggestion for an alternate term, if “fundamentalist” is unacceptable to you?

 

[emeraldisle]

What is your suggestion for an alternate term, if “fundamentalist” is unacceptable to you?

The word “fundamentalist” is acceptable to me because as I’ve already stated it just describes someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith. Nothing wrong with that.

What puzzles me is that there are people who believe in the fundamentals of their faith but don’t consider themselves as fundamentalists and even use this word to mock other people.

.

 

[ibkc]

The word “fundamentalist” is acceptable to me because as I’ve already stated it just describes someone who believes in the fundamentals of their faith. Nothing wrong with that.

What puzzles me is that there are people who believe in the fundamentals of their faith but don’t consider themselves as fundamentalists and even use this word to mock other people.

I’m sorry you are puzzled. Words can have more than one meaning, and all languages evolve and change over the years. In this case, there is the literal meaning, and then there is the meaning which describes a certain type of Protestant Christian. To quote Contarini earlier in the thread,It has come to be associated with a doctrine of “secondary separation” in which there can be no cooperation with people with whom you disagree theologically, and with a highly anti-intellectual stance based on a radical doctrine of sola scriptura.

While I personally do not believe that these things are part of the fundamentals of Christianity, I believe the association with this specific type of Protestant Christianity has become the more common understanding. Again, I am sorry you are puzzled about it. That’s just a darned shame.

 

[Huguenot]

Absolutely liberals.

To the true fundamentalists, Billy Graham and James Dobson are almost as apostate as you papists.

all the more as Billy Graham had a good relationship with Pope John Paul II …

 

[mercygate]

all the more as Billy Graham had a good relationship with Pope John Paul II …

Hi, Huguenot! Haven’t seen you around in a while.

Yup. Billy Graham and JP-2 got on very well. And DID Billy EVER take heat for THAT!

 

[Contarini]

Imo one of the problems with people re communication is that they misuse words, i.e. using the word “fundamentalist” for reasons other than that a person believes in the fundamentals of their faith.

.

But the word “fundamentalist” originally was coined to express a very particular set of fundamentals. You are the one giving it a new meaning. Giving words a new meaning is not always bad, if the old meanings aren’t useful. But it’s odd to claim that people using the more standard meaning are the ones “misusing words.”

Your meaning would make the word useless. Everyone thinks they believe in the fundamentals of their faith. The word is only useful if it refers to things that some people think are fundamentals and others don’t.

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

What puzzles me is that there are people who believe in the fundamentals of their faith but don’t consider themselves as fundamentalists and even use this word to mock other people.

.

Who doesn’t believe in the fundamentals of their faith? What people don’t believe in are the fundamentals of some other group’s version of the faith!

Edwin