𝗜𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝗼𝗿𝗻 𝗯𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗶𝘅𝘁𝗲𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗵 𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘂𝗿𝘆, 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗯𝗲 𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗼𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗼𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀. 𝗬𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗯𝗲 𝗖𝗮𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗰. ✝️ Protestantism presents itself as original Christianity rediscovered, but history tells a different story. For fifteen hundred years there was one Church, one Eucharist, one priesthood, and one authority structure... stretching from the apostles through bishops and councils. The idea that Christianity was “lost” until the Reformation is not humility. It is historical amnesia. You do not reform something that does not exist. You break away from it. And the fact that Christianity functioned, evangelized, defined doctrine, and produced saints long before Protestantism ever appeared is not an insult. It is a problem that cannot be explained away.show more

@BillArnoldTeach Long before the Reformation, there were numerous Christian communities that were not Catholic.

Those were schisms and heresies, not denominations. They were judged against an existing Church. Denominations arise when no authority remains to judge at all.

Rome calling ancient churches “schisms” assumes what it must prove. The East, Orientals, Assyrians & others never accepted Roman supremacy. Division didn’t start with the Reformation — it started when Rome claimed authority Scripture never gives.

@BillArnoldTeach He’s referring to these. Please learn history before you start making accusations. And the successor to Saint Peter, who happens to reside in Rome, does have authority given to him by Christ.

Peter was not the first the pope, Succession in the New Testament is by divine revelation entrusted to faithful teachers, not by a transferable office passed through ritual ordination. There were many heretics, even those who rightly opposed Rome's supremacy were heretics in other ways, but the Catholic Church also teaches heresy/false doctrine.

If you were born before the sixteenth century you would not have been Roman Catholic in the modern sense because the Roman Catholic system as it exists today did not yet exist. The early church did not know papal supremacy, papal infallibility, Marian dogmas, indulgences, purgatory as defined by Rome, or a sacramental system that dispensed grace through a priesthood distinct from believers. These were not apostolic teachings. They developed gradually and were formally defined much later. The first centuries knew local churches led by elders and bishops, not a centralized Roman monarch. Even Gregory the Great in the year 590 rejected the title universal bishop and called it blasphemous. Rome later claimed what its own bishops once condemned. Councils did not speak with one voice from Rome. Nicaea in 325 did not exalt the bishop of Rome. It elevated Scripture against Arianism. Authority rested in the word of God, not in a single seat. The gospel was never lost. It was preserved wherever Scripture was believed. Augustine in the fourth century taught grace alone long before Luther was born. Bernard of Clairvaux in the twelfth century preached justification grounded in Christ alone. Men were clinging to the gospel inside a corrupted system, not because of it. The Reformation did not claim Christianity vanished. That is a straw man. It claimed the gospel had been buried under tradition, exactly what Jesus condemned in Mark 7:13 when He said tradition can make the word of God of no effect. Rome did not preserve unity. It enforced conformity. When Scripture challenged corruption, Rome responded not with repentance but with persecution. The Reformers did not leave the church. They were expelled for refusing to deny the gospel. If age determines truth then Elijah was wrong against Israel and Athanasius was wrong against the world. But truth has never been decided by majority or by longevity. It has always been measured by Scripture alone. Christianity did not begin in Rome. It began at the empty tomb. And whenever the word of God stands above human authority, the church is alive whether it is the first century or the sixteenth.

@BillArnoldTeach This entire post is dishonest. No reformer claimed Christianity was lost. They only removed the errors.

If the Church taught false sacraments, false authority, and a false gospel for centuries, then Christianity was functionally lost. Calling it correction instead of restoration does not change the claim being made.

@BillArnoldTeach 1. The first two things were added over time, not instantly. 2. Catholics and Protestants believe the same gospel

@BillArnoldTeach I would disagree with number 2, reformed Christians and Catholics don’t believe the same Gospel.

@BillArnoldTeach How?

@BillArnoldTeach They not only teach a salvation that’s based on faith plus works, they teach that our salvation ultimately depends on us and we can’t know for sure that we’re saved. So it might seem the same on the surface, but it isn’t the same gospel and theirs isn’t biblically consistent.

@arc7gaming @BillArnoldTeach @grok which Christian denominations expressed in terms of percentage of whole, believe that a person can choose to reject God through sin and lose their salvation? Thus salvation can be undone?

Denominations teaching salvation can be lost (conditional): Catholics (~50% of Christians), Eastern Orthodox (~10%), Pentecostals/Charismatics (~25%), Methodists (~3%), Lutherans (~3%), and some Anglicans. Total: ~85-90%. Those teaching eternal security: Reformed/Presbyterians (~3%), Baptists (~4%), and some evangelicals. Total: ~10-15%. Based on global stats from Pew and Wikipedia.

@BillArnoldTeach Greetings, my child! Large Christian traditions existed outside the Romans land before the 16th century, were Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox were and are Coptic, Armenian, Syriac, or the Church of the East. So, No! But nice try.

Those Churches are not counterexamples to my point. They confirm it. Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and the Church of the East did not arise from individual interpretation or competing salvation doctrines. They preserved apostolic succession, sacramental worship, bishops, councils, and a unified understanding of salvation as a lived participation in Christ. None of them are Protestant. None arose in the 16th century. None teach denominational soteriology. The point is not “Roman vs non Roman.” The point is that Christianity existed as a visible, sacramental, authoritative Church long before anyone was choosing between denominations. That remains historically true.

@BillArnoldTeach It's not Christianity rediscovered, it's Catholicism continued without the schismatic errors of Rome.

@BillArnoldTeach If Catholicism were the “one true church”, we would have seen evidence of it in the Book of Acts & in Peter & Paul’s writings. But we don’t. No praying to Mary, no needing a priest to confess to, no praying to those that have died for intercessory prayer, no Purgatory, no Pope.

That argument assumes the New Testament was written as a finished systematic theology instead of a living apostolic record. Acts and the epistles describe the Church in motion, not a finalized list of doctrines. The question is not whether every later term appears verbatim, but whether the principles are there. They are. Confession to priests is explicit: “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven” (John 20). That is not symbolic language. Authority was given to men. Intercession of the saints follows directly from the resurrection. The dead in Christ are alive (Luke 20). Revelation shows them offering prayers to God. Marian doctrine flows from Christology. Mary is shown as the new Eve and the Ark of the New Covenant. She does not replace Christ. She magnifies Him. Purgatory is not a second salvation. It is the final purification Scripture already teaches when it speaks of being saved “through fire” (1 Corinthians 3). And the Pope is not a medieval invention. Peter is singled out repeatedly, given the keys, and confirmed as the visible shepherd. That role did not vanish when the last apostle died. The early Church did not invent these things centuries later. It recognized, protected, and clarified what it had already received. What you are calling “missing” is actually development, not contradiction. Christianity did not reboot in the sixteenth century.

@BillArnoldTeach Catholic theology is full of man made tradition. Jesus clearly spoke about man made tradition like He spoke of a clergy loving its robes When He taught us to pray, He spoke directly to God. It’s full of “teaching” not found in the Bible. Paul us warned about false gospel.

Calling something “man made” because it is articulated by men is not an argument. By that standard, the New Testament itself collapses, since Christ did not write it. He taught, commissioned, and authorized men to teach in His name. Scripture never presents itself as a standalone rulebook detached from the Church that produced, preserved, and interpreted it. The apostles taught orally before anything was written, commanded the Church to hold fast to what was received “by word or by letter,” and exercised authority long before a New Testament canon existed. That is not tradition competing with Scripture. That is the biblical pattern. What you are calling “man made” is simply Christianity functioning as it always has. What is actually novel is the idea that doctrine must be explicitly spelled out verse by verse or else be rejected. That standard is not taught by Jesus, the apostles, or Scripture itself.

@BillArnoldTeach I see Papist Slopogetics have now entered their "don't hit on me, silly boiz" phase.

@BillArnoldTeach All true, except you would be Orthodox, and the date is 1054.

@BillArnoldTeach Or burning at a stake for rejecting Catholicism...

Defining heresy is theology. Burning people was politics. Confusing the two is how history gets rewritten.

@BillArnoldTeach Its not confusing the two because your church had people burned for heresy. The problem came when your church got in bed with secular governments.

@BillArnoldTeach Are you forgetting about the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Assyrian Church of the East?

No. Those Churches prove my point. They affirm apostolic succession, a sacramental priesthood, the real presence of the Eucharist, and historic continuity. They are not Protestant and they did not arise from the Reformation.

@BillArnoldTeach You said there was one church before Protestantism. I gave you three other churches. It doesn’t matter that they affirm those doctrines. They’re out of communion. Protestants also affirm the real presence and historic continuity.

They were one Church before schism, not three separate origins. Separation does not retroactively create multiple foundations. It creates breaks from a single source. And Protestants do not affirm the same real presence or the same continuity. Some deny it outright. Others redefine it. None retain apostolic succession or sacramental authority. Shared words are not shared meanings. Continuity is not claimed. It is inherited.

@BillArnoldTeach So Protestants were apart of that one church, not a separate origin.

@BillArnoldTeach Shouldn't have to be pompous or condescending in your beliefs. Red flag.

@BillArnoldTeach Women: "men today are porn-brained." Also women:

@BillArnoldTeach Even Isaiah called it a universal place of prayer. For my house shall be called a house for prayer for all peoples. (Isaiah 56:7) All people’s> universal> Catholic

@rigbubbers Catholic means universal. The Church was called Catholic centuries before denominations existed. Isaiah does not deny the Church. It describes her mission. Universal does not mean undefined or disconnected from history.

@BillArnoldTeach If Isaiah was here right now and you called him a Jew he would probably be offended. He was an Israelite from the eight century. And in scripture he clearly says house of prayer not temple.

@BillArnoldTeach Yes Laura, I’m aware of that.

@BillArnoldTeach Unless you were born in the East, and then you would be Orthodox. And in either case, you would have different beliefs than the Modern Catholic Church.

@BillArnoldTeach The Roman Catholic Church is literally a result of heresy.

@BillArnoldTeach That’s not what Protestantism presents itself as. That’s what Restorationism presents itself as. Protestantism presents itself as reformed or corrected western Christianity/Romanism.

@BillArnoldTeach Christ and the apostles were not catholic. Sorry.

@BillArnoldTeach You would be catholic bcos they forced people into the catholic faith. They could burn your home down & strip you of all rights

Coercion does not explain apostolic succession, the Eucharist, councils, or martyrs. Christianity spread by preaching, sacrifice, and witness long before political power existed. Force does not create doctrine or preserve theology for fifteen centuries.

@BillArnoldTeach Tell us you don’t know church history without saying “I haven’t really studied church history”

@BillArnoldTeach “All Christians were Catholic until the reformation” Christians were just Christian, then the Episcopate was divided, and, and divided a second time producing the eastern and western churches. Then Protestants sought to correct errors of the western church.

@BillArnoldTeach Actually, Orthodox Christianity is just as old and considers the Catholic Pope to be the first Protestant. Just saying...

@BillArnoldTeach Orthodoxy would like a word.

@BillArnoldTeach The one question a Catholic cannot answer: why is it literally blood in the Eucharist with no DNA?

Catholics can answer it easily. The claim itself is confused. The Church does not teach that the Eucharist is biologically blood in the normal scientific sense. It teaches transubstantiation. The substance is Christ. The physical properties remain what they appear to be. In rare Eucharistic miracles where tissue or blood appears, those are signs, not doctrine. They are not meant to turn the sacrament into a lab specimen. Asking why a miracle does not behave like ordinary biology misunderstands what a miracle is. If Christ is truly present by divine power, He is not subject to your forensic expectations. Christianity does not submit God to a microscope.

@BillArnoldTeach So its not literally blood?

Catholic teaching does not claim the Eucharist is biological blood under normal conditions. It teaches transubstantiation. In rare Eucharistic miracles where real blood and tissue do appear, independent testing has identified human heart tissue and human blood, AB blood type. and when genetic material is present it consistently lacks the male chromosome. That is not a problem for the faith. It is exactly what Christians would expect from a miracle tied to the Incarnation, not a specimen meant to satisfy forensic curiosity. Confusing theology with laboratory categories is the category error here.

@BillArnoldTeach Yes or no answer. So it's not literally blood?

Yes. Truly His Blood. Not biologically reducible. That’s the distinction you’re missing.

@BillArnoldTeach So it's blood that has exactly the same chemical composition of wine? No DNA. Tastes like wine. But it's not wine?

@BillArnoldTeach Not only that, but you'd be really old.

@BillArnoldTeach We are resorting to honey potting Christians now. Have some dignity, please

@BillArnoldTeach Funny, yet Catholics been killing christians who been translating the The Holly Bible for the common man to read and understand because the catholics knew most of their teachings had nothing to do with the Holly Scriptures just a man made idea. Read the Bible and catholics fall.

@BillArnoldTeach Women should not do this.

@BillArnoldTeach Slop accounts like this one will pick some far-out uncommon belief like restorationism and then use it to represent all of protestantism. It's getting to the point that it's pretty much an 8th commandment violation because you know it's untrue. Don't lie to proselytize.

A lot of these replies confuse 𝘦𝘹𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 with 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘺. Before the 16th century, there was no marketplace of denominations, no competing doctrines, and no personal right to redefine Christianity. There was one visible Church with bishops, councils, sacraments, and the authority to judge heresy. Disagreements existed. But they were resolved inside the Church and not by breaking away and founding alternatives. Calling that Church “Catholic” is not a retroactive label. It’s how Christians identified it centuries before the Reformation. If you think Christianity needed to be “rediscovered” in the 1500s, then you think Christ failed to preserve His Church for fifteen hundred years. That claim collapses under its own weight. Christ keeps His promises. The gates of the netherworld never prevailed.

@BillArnoldTeach History only tells a different story if you use a Roman Catholic commentary telling you how to interpret it.

@BillArnoldTeach Melonie Mac rosary edition, and same absolutely feral opinions lmao

@BillArnoldTeach "OF link in my bio" Trad Christian t ho tt ie.

@BillArnoldTeach Catholics act like all believers before the reformation were devoted catholics and didn’t hold Protestant type theology. Truth is there was opposition, Early church fathers opposed the papacy, Marian doctrine, and held dispensational type views.

@BillArnoldTeach The papal church schismed from the orthodox sweety. If you dig into the details is really obvious that this is the case, and that is not the byzantine churches that departed from the papal church

@BillArnoldTeach Truth