Heresies and Heretics: Difference between revisions

** [[Useful Notes/Gnosticism|Gnostic]] interpretation of Jesus' teachings were declared heretical (in fact, the very ''word'' "heresy" was popularized in the Christian world by Christian theologian Irenaeus and his anti-Gnostic tracts), and Gnosticism in general also counts for:

** [[Useful Notes/Christianity|Protestantism]]: You've probably heard something about a Reformation in the 16th century, in which thousands of Christians broke with the Catholic Church. Protestantism is not a specific doctrine or belief-set but rather an umbrella term for thousands of different theological divisions (which can generally be un-splintered into less than two dozen religious "traditions"), that share doctrines of ''Sola Scriptura'' (theology should be formed solely by consideration of scripture) and ''Sola Fide''<ref>Human beings are justified "by faith alone" -- centuries of poor definitions and raised tempers led this to be a major point of contention between Catholics and Protestants, who argue over what role "work" has in human entry into heaven; the assumption was that Catholic emphasis on placing "work" besides "faith" led to an overemphasis on the role of human action similar to Pelagianism, which was rejected long ago -- [[Not So Different|it turns out that]] in the Protestant definition of "faith", human participation in God's will is part and parcel of the consideration, whereas Catholics refer to "faith" as something along the lines of mere intellectual belief. In short, there's really not much of a difference along those lines, as exhibited when the Catholic Church and a number of Lutheran "bishops" signed a joint declaration of faith several years ago.</ref>. The great diversity of Protestantism has two primary roots: a general distrust for authority and the "doctrine" of private judgment, the latter of which denies the Church its claim to the infallible right to interpret Scripture, and indeed pits the Church ''against'' Scripture.