Are "cults" dying?

churches that decide to have their own theology instead of toeing the line of the original faction's theology are truly cults. But they've simply become more acceptable now.

That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

The Church of Christ, which I am a member of, could not exist without the Protestant Reformation. The reformation was brought about by the desire to end corruption within the Catholic church (And there was a lot of it).

The Catholic church may have been the original faction, or so they claim, but they are NOT now, nor have they ever been, the true church.

[edit on 9-9-2008 by the_watcher]

Originally posted by moocowman
reply to post by silent thunder

 

Christianity is a cult that seems to be dying out
thank god for that then

Seems other statistics show it to be outpacing Islam and Hinduism.

"Using data from the period 2000-2005 the 2006 Christian World Database estimated that by number of new adherents, Christianity was the fastest growing religion in the world with 30,360,000 new adherents in 2006. This was followed by Islam with 23,920,000 and Hinduism with 13,224,000 estimated new adherents in the same period."

en.wikipedia.org...

*Remember, one is Islamic by birth, they count their stats by birth rates. Christianity does not, they count their stats by affirmative acceptances by believers*

Originally posted by the_watcher

churches that decide to have their own theology instead of toeing the line of the original faction's theology are truly cults. But they've simply become more acceptable now.

That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

The Church of Christ, which I am a member of, could not exist without the Protestant Reformation. The reformation was brought about by the desire to end corruption within the Catholic church (And there was a lot of it).

The Catholic church may have been the original faction, or so they claim, but they are NOT now, nor have they ever been, the true church.

Exactly right, the Bible tells us where the first church was.. Antioch in Syria.

Read Acts.

I think cults are alive and well. I think they do a better job of keeping a lower profile due to government trying to make every cult look bad. Especially if they don't share the same view as government.



NOTurTypical, care to contribute to this thread

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I can when I get home and have a chance to do some research into it. I don't know much about that thread's topic to be honest just yet.

Originally posted by the_watcher


That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

The Church of Christ, which I am a member of, could not exist without the Protestant Reformation. The reformation was brought about by the desire to end corruption within the Catholic church (And there was a lot of it).

The Catholic church may have been the original faction, or so they claim, but they are NOT now, nor have they ever been, the true church.

[edit on 9-9-2008 by the_watcher]

That is the dumbest thing that I have ever heard. You belong to a church that MAN made to get away from the corruption in another church that MAN made. Neither one of you sound very true to the original christianity by that statement.

That is the dumbest thing that I have ever heard. You belong to a church that MAN made to get away from the corruption in another church that MAN made. Neither one of you sound very true to the original christianity by that statement.

It would appear as if man made the Church of Christ, but in reality that is not so. I am guessing you don't really know much about the church.

The Church of Christ's teachings and services are all based upon the teachings and practices of Jesus Christ and the early churches in the Bible. One example of this would be Communion, which was instituted by Jesus (a.k.a God), and was also commanded to be done in His memory.

Any sermon preached, as long as the church is a true Church of Christ, is always based upon the teachings and letters of Paul, and other deciples/apostles, who were taught by Jesus/God himself.

The "traditions" we follow in our church (if you can even call them traditions) were not started by man, they're pretty much taken right out of the early Christian churches written about in Acts. Those churches were established by Peter and Paul, who were Aposltes of Jesus, who is God.

So, as you can see, there isn't anything that wasn't established by God within the Church of Christ. I will admit we like to occasionally have potlucks, but they're not part of the doctorine and are strictly for the purpose of fellowship with our borthers and sisters in Christ.

[edit on 9-9-2008 by the_watcher]

Do you guys baptize by immersion or sprinkling?

reply to post by the_watcher



Apparently then you did not understand what you said when you said

The Church of Christ, which I am a member of, could not exist without the Protestant Reformation. The reformation was brought about by the desire to end corruption within the Catholic church (And there was a lot of it).

If it is directly from christ, as you say, it would never have evolved from any restoration, it would have always been as it was, as it is, and as it will be. That is not case, according to you.

Oh, and anyone who can claim that anything that evolved from catholicism is in anyway faithful to jesus' teachings has done very little searching outside their own church.



[edit on 9-9-2008 by Azrael75]

Originally posted by Azrael75
reply to post by the_watcher

 

Apparently then you did not understand what you said when you said

The Church of Christ, which I am a member of, could not exist without the Protestant Reformation. The reformation was brought about by the desire to end corruption within the Catholic church (And there was a lot of it).

If it is directly from christ, as you say, it would never have evolved from any restoration, it would have always been as it was, as it is, and as it will be. That is not case, according to you.

Oh, and anyone who can claim that anything that evolved from catholicism is in anyway faithful to jesus' teachings has done very little searching outside their own church.
[edit on 9-9-2008 by Azrael75]

Ah. See, again, this all looks perfectly fine from an outsider's perspective. As much as I hate to admit it the Catholic church had a choke-hold on religion. I mean have you studied up on the Crusades? So many people were senselessly killed simply because they refused to accept Catholocism. The Catholic church would not even let people read the bible for crying out loud. Only the elect few who held respected positions in the church could read it. In a lot of ways Martin Luther was responsible for finally breaking down the walls, errected by the Catholic church, to keep people from hearing the true word of God.

Could the Church of Christ come about if the reformation never happened? I'm sure it could... eventually. But when Martin Luther started the reformation he pretty much allowed anyone who cared to a chance to finally study the bible for themselves. A lot of the new denominations didn't get it right, and I think the king even created one simply for selfish gain. I can't hold that against anyone... they simply did not know better. At the time braking away from Catholcism was entirely new.

Today we are able to study the bible without any hinderence and see that in Acts, in the original churches, things were done very much like they are now. One simply needs to look up Acts, compare the way those churches were run to how the Church of Christ is run and they will see for themselves that it's the same idea.

Now I'm not saying the Church of Christ is the one true church. That would be stupid. I'm just saying that the corrupt Catholic church was absolutely wrong (Which is a bold statement and I know people will diagree). I just can't accept the corruption that still goes on today as truth. I just can't. So let people disagree with me.

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
Do you guys baptize by immersion or sprinkling?

Full immersion of course.

reply to post by the_watcher


You do realize that there we 3 sects? The catholics, the Byzantines and the Greek Orthodox?

Originally posted by the_watcher

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
Do you guys baptize by immersion or sprinkling?

Full immersion of course.

I agree with immersion, but don't say "of course", many people, especially Reformed Presbyterian do sprinkling.

And infant baptism.

reply to post by silent thunder


All those tiny cults, I've rarely even heard a them, and last I heard, there are thousands of them. Nobody rarely talks about them except the most popular ones. I used to be in Scientology years ago, but most people didn't know about it until just recently. I don't think that one's every going to die. It's just gonna reform itself and change up, but it'll always be around, and all it's splinter groups.

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by the_watcher

 

You do realize that there we 3 sects? The catholics, the Byzantines and the Greek Orthodox?

Oh! Why yes I do! And I've heard each one will try and claim they were the original church as well, though I've never heard it from them directly.

I am aware of the different sects I'm not exactly sure they were as big as Catholicism. I can't recall any major impact on History so I didn't mention them... I suppose I should go look them up now and see what effect they actually had on things.

Thank you for pointing that out to me!

[edit on 10-9-2008 by the_watcher]

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
Full immersion of course.

I agree with immersion, but don't say "of course", many people, especially Reformed Presbyterian do sprinkling.

And infant baptism.

Yes I know many people do sprinkling, but the debate is... well... from what I know from scripture full immersion is the way to go. I've heard arguments the other way around. I don't know for sure that I agree.

And no we don't do infant baptism. A person has to make the conscious decision to be baptized. It's really not up to your parents... as mush they may wish it were...

[edit on 10-9-2008 by the_watcher]

Originally posted by the_watcher

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by the_watcher

 

You do realize that there we 3 sects? The catholics, the Byzantines and the Greek Orthodox?

Oh! Why yes I do! And I've heard each one will try and claim they were the original church as well, though I've never heard it from them directly.

I am aware of the different sects I'm not exactly sure they were as big as Catholicism. I can't recall any major impact on History so I didn't mention them... I suppose I should go look them up now and see what effect they actually had on things.

Thank you for pointing that out to me!

Oh. no problem. Be mindful though to look at the sect that came from the church at Antioch, Syria.

That church is called the first Christian church in the book of Acts.

reply to post by the_watcher


I agree with the COC doctrine on Baptism.