One of my heart Changes is reeveluating whether I consider myself a protestant or not any more (I will explain why in a minute). One of the positives of taking off the protestant label is rediscovering the existence of Catholics (joke).
Many Protestants do not consider Catholics real Christians and at best lower quality Christians because of what we consider 'inappropriate' practices. Since becoming more
inappropriate myself I have a new found respect for them. I still remember my neighbors as a child in Tokoroa. They were a large passionate Catholic Family who were constantly bringing waifs and strays through there home. We could often here them next door praying and singing, often in tongues. I remember their three and four year old praying in tongues and people getting healed in their home (more then anything I saw in 12 years in the pentecostal tradition). One of there sons Michael is now a Catholic Priest in
Hamilton and he tells me that when he went to a Ministers Meeting for Impact World Tour in Hamilton and sat down. The other ministers sitting next to him stood up and sat elsewhere!

The basic difference from what I understand it between Catholic and Protestant is that the Catholics consider the foundation of there faith is the 'Church' and Protestants consider the foundation the 'Bible'.

I am no longer so sure that the Bible should be placed in the position Protestants have placed it. These are the points Im pondering (empasise pondering).

1. 500 years after the protestant reformation the Catholic Church is still one (diverse)church. The Protestant Church using the Bible as there guide have around 70000 denominations who have all read the Bible in a different way. I wonder if we are kidding ourselves that using the Bible as our base brings unity. Only the Spirit of Jesus Christ can do that.

2. The reality is that for the first 1500 years the Bible was basicly out of reach for most laymen and Clergy alike. Even in the last 500 years the Bible was still quite unobtainable. Upto World War 2 a Bible would have been far more expensive then most people
could afford readily. Yet the Message of Jesus Christ changed the world like nothing before it or since.

3. The fact is that during the fastest time of growth in the church (first 300 years)there was no New Testement Canon, and the gentile believers had no real awareness of Hebrew Scripture (and that was'nt canonised by the Jews to after the Christians Canonised there Scriptures). The Jewish people interestingly were never bothered to define what was scripture and what was not. Different groups held to different convictions on that matter. Some held only to the teachings of Moses, some to that and the Prophets, and other groupsto what we think as the Old Testement plus other writtings etc. It was only when they felt threatened by the explosive growth of Christianity that they got together to set out what they considered the Jewish Bible.

4. I wonder what Paul would say to us if he discovered his letters that he wrote were now read with the same weight as the five books of Moses? I think he would be horrified and shocked. And then he would send us one of his letters with a fair amount of abuse in it. Jesus said all scripture is God breathed, but the New Testement was not in existence then. Also Jesus quoted scripture that is not in the Bible, what do we do with that?

5. I am a great lover of creeds as my Children have discovered. It's interesting that they over and over again emphasise Jesus Christ and his divinity but they never mention the Bible much (if at all?) including the Apostles creed which really defines Christian orthodoxy.

6. I remember my father telling me about going to my Aunts funeral in the Brethren Church. Throughout they hear about how she was a great women of the word. But Jesus was never mentioned. As Protestants have we started worshipping the Bible? Is it now,
Father, Son, Holy Spirit and Bible? I wonder if it has become a new God?

Some people say to me well in the end you either believe it or not. And when I was in I.C I would say the same. Yes I love and believe the Bible is inspired by God but I am questioning (not carrying conviction) its role and how it is used. Okay so have I stood on a few toes here. Have I become worse than a Satanist, a liberal perhaps? I don't think so, perhaps just a bit more balanced and reasoned?