Quora Answer: If I Consider Myself a Non-Denominational Christian, Does That Make Me Protestant?

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ 

The following is my answer to a Quora question: “I am a former Catholic, but I consider myself a non-denominational Christian.  Does that make me a Protestant?” 

Modern Christianity is broken up into three main groups of denominations: Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant.  That are, of course, churches that do not fall into these groups, and there are churches that straddle them; such as the Eastern Catholics between Orthodoxy and Catholicism; and the Anglicans, between Catholicism and Protestantism. 

A Catholic church, of which the majority are Roman Catholic, upholds the majority of practices and doctrines of historical Western Christianity.  A Protestant would be a member of the Western Churches that separated from the Catholic Church, being either in schism or heresy, and adhere to the principles of the Reformation. 

Merely separating from the Roman Catholic church does not make you a Protestant.  The term “non-denominational”, from a theological perspective, is essentially meaningless.  It would imply that such a church either ignores theological differences, or is ignorant of it.



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