Template talk:Comparison among Protestants

Cell padding

I can't seem to get any cell padding (space between the text and the cell wall) with this version. Maybe we need technical help. – Confession0791 ^talk 04:54, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it's beyond my technical know-how. StAnselm (talk) 04:55, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Calvinism

The Calvinist view of free will is not represented accurately, when the article says that people are prevented from having free will by the sovereignty of God (the Reformed Confessions teach exactly the opposite). I'll grant that there's a variety of views, but by far the majority of Calvinists and the Calvinist confessional documents teach that man's will was made free and that we make our choices for ourselves. For example, the Westminster Shorter Catechism:

Q. 13. Did our first parents continue in the estate wherein they were created?

A. Our first parents, being left to the freedom of their own will, fell from the estate wherein they were created, by sinning against God.

The Belgic Confession says that mankind was created:

" able by their will to conform in all things to the will of God."

Like the Lutherans, Calvinists teach that because of sin people are not "able by their will" to do the will of God, believe by God's grace. Calvinists teach that also Christians continue to be affected by our own remaining rebelliousness, lack of knowledge, bad motives and misunderstanding, and also by that of others. We may want to do the right thing; but we cannot: we come short of what we want, because of sin.

In addition, Calvinists lay special emphasis on the creatureliness of human choices. We are limited in countless ways because we are created; and God is not similarly limited. And so, God knows from himself what he will do, not from learning. Some will expand on this distinction between the Creator and the Creature, to speculate widely about the nature of time and so forth; but these speculations are not Calvinism per se. Reformed theology is formally defined by Reformed Confessions which teach that human choices are real because God creates them; they are not an illusion, as in materialistic determinism, or fatalism. — Mark (Mkmcconn) ** 04:37, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Arminianism

The Arminian view of free will is not represented accurately, either. Arminianism teaches Total Depravity; but also teaches universal pre-venient grace. In other words, no person has freedom out of himself; every person has enough freedom to make a right choice not from himself but by the grace of God. — Mark (Mkmcconn) ** 04:37, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

A major question during the Reformation and prior was whether what we now call depravity and what was then termed "original sin" also pertained to the Will. The Schola Antiqua (for example, Aquinas) unanimously said "yes." By the 1500s, the Schola Moderna (for example, Occam) was replacing the underlying philosophical and theological outlook in certain places across Europe. In contrast, they held that the will (prior to any conversion) could in fact choose God and that this ability was not removed by original sin. As for Prevenient_grace#In_Roman_Catholic_theology, this was included in the Council of Trent, which tried to strike a balance between the two.

Martin Luther was highly alarmed at the spread of Schola Moderna influenced views on conversion and salvation, though in many places he follows the thinking of the Schola Moderna and made some positive (along with negative comments) about Occam. As the Schola Moderna (which he was trained in) continued to sweep across Europe, Luther considered that soon everyone would place the will in the intellectual framework of conversion. Although no Pope had ever spoken in favor or against either school of thought, Luther considered papal silence acceptance of the new, advancing thought. This became a major component of his warning about "justification by works"--as a choice of the will being a human good work.

In contrast, his companion, Philip Melancthon, after Luther's death, when considering how people are saved, listed the will, the Holy Spirit, Word of God as being simultaneous causes of conversion. By the end of the 1500s, Lutherans eventually came to reject the inclusion of the will as a cause of conversion, terming it "synergism"--but it was popular among humanists and other reformers and contributed to the origin of Arminianism.

Even if one allows for the will to play a concurrent role in conversion along with other entities (such as prevenient grace, means of grace, etc., this indicates that the will is not completely depraved. Hence Calvinists insist on Total in terms of Total Depravity. Lutherans typically do not use the term, but have similar beliefs to Calvinists on this issue.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 03:31, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Reversion to 09:09, 30 August 2014‎ version

I reverted the table to the 09:09, 30 August 2014‎ version. The reason for the reversion is that the changes include contradictions to the original source of the table, which I found in Lange, Lyle W. God So Loved the World: A Study of Christian Doctrine. Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 2006. p. 448. and added to Wikipedia some years back.

Reading the commenter's postings, I understand where he is coming from. My response is that the Calvinism column is not intended to be a summary of every single Reformed denomination. Not all Calvinists today adhere to all five points--there are 4 and 3 point Calvinists, along with the new Federal Vision advocates. Additionally, many Evangelicals adhere to at least some aspects of Calvinism (for example, Osteen comes to mind, or Schuller with his concept of faith in action), even if they do not emphasize or even necessarily teach the sin-grace dynamic.

While a FV adherent would (in my opinion) fit the reverted changes better than the original column, most Calvinists do not adhere to the Federal Vision framework, so I think it is premature to list the reverted comments as the description of Calvinism.

Perhaps one solution to this problem is to make additional columns for specific variants of Calvinism, particularly for Federal Vision. However, partly due to the 2006 date of the book, FV is not covered in the original textbook, so other sources should be used.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 03:45, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Well if the column is called "Calvinism", it should fairly characterize the majority of the tradition. Double predestination and limited atonement have always been controverted within the tradition, and may even represent minority opinions. For double predestination, see this. My edits have nothing to do with FV, which is a tiny minority. The suggestion that Calvinists believe grace is communicated without means is also wrong, just see any reformed confession. --JFH (talk) 14:51, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Well, common grace is communicated through the means of grace, but special grace is internal. In Calvinism, conversion only happens with special grace. The subject heading says "conversion." FV results may vary, of course. Double predestination and limited atonement have always been part of Calvinist doctrine.

See Predestination_(Calvinism)#Double_predestination and Limited_atonement#Confessional_positions

As to your comment to "just see any reformed confession," my response is "What do the Calvinist Reformed Confessions state? "Just any reformed confession" is not the same as Calvinist. What do the Westminster Standards and the Canons of the Synod of Dort state? What did Calvin himself write? As for the many other Reformed confessions of faith, I should note that they are not all Calvinist in tradition. There were and still are many non-Calvinist Reformed whose faith hybridized with other groups, including Calvinists. For example, Swiss Reformed, German Union Churches, and Mennonites come to mind.

If you come from a particular Reformed tradition which differs from traditional, confessionally defined Calvinism, feel free to make your own column in the chart. I ask you to change the table back to my last edit, because their is sufficient evidence to show that the limited atonement and reprobation are Calvinist ideas.

I understand that there are later scholars who disagreed with Calvin, but still come from Reformed churches and identify with a general Calvinist tradition. Karl Barth comes to mind. But people also usually term him "neo-orthodox" because his thoughts are from a particular theological movement.

The man who authored the table in the book from which the table is derived intended to relate each group by the traditional confessions of the denomination. So Lutheranism is Augsburg Confession, Arminianism is the Five Articles of Remonstrance, taken in context with the statements of Arminius, and Calvinism is the Canons of the Synod of Dort.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 05:09, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

Here's Louis Berkhof under the heading "The Reformed View": "God has appointed [the means of grace] as the ordinary means through which He works His grace in the hearts of sinners, and their wilful neglect can only result in spiritual loss." The Westminster Shorter Catechism says "The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption are his ordinances, especially the Word, sacraments, and prayer, all which are made effectual to the elect alone." The only reason I use these is because the former is in front of me and I've memorized the latter. Dort doesn't say much about it because it was just a condemnation of Arminianism, not a systematic presentation of the faith. The idea that Dort, or anything else, operates in the Reformed tradition like Augsburg does for Lutheranism is wrong. Reformed churches wrote their own confessions rather than subscribing to a single one (almost all the churches subscribing to Dort are Dutch).

On limited atonement and double predestination, the chart was perhaps less egregious in that someone like Berkhof would probably agree that the Reformed view is as was stated. However, on double predestination there is debate as to whether theologians like Heinrich Bullinger (arguably the most influential early Calvinist) taught something that can be called "double predestination". For limited atonement, it really depends on what you mean by it. I wrote much of the history section of Limited atonement so you can read that if you like. Further, from an NPOV we cannot cut off Barth and more importantly the many present-day Barthians who are regularly called Reformed in mainstream academic theology. We have reliable sources calling them Reformed, and so on Wikipedia we need to treat them as such. I already pointed out Guthrie. --JFH (talk) 03:39, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

The heading at the top of the table says Calvinist, which is more specificly defined than Reformed. How about adding a Karl_Barth#Theology based fourth column? Or even "3-Point Reformed," Mennonite, New Calvinism, or FV, etc. etc.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 04:30, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

Universal Justification & Objective Justification

No hard feelings. There's no reason to remove the (Lutheran) "Justification of all" entry from the table simply because it sounds like universalism. Note that Lyle W. Lange's “God So Loved the World", on which the table is based, does teach this, on p343:

“ When we speak of objective justification, we mean that justification is complete. It does not need to be completed by faith or any other work. It is finished, perfect. God has declared the world righteous for Jesus’ sake. This is an objective reality, whether anyone believes it or not… On the other hand, the term universal justification stresses that Christ’s work of redemption atoned for the sins of all people…God justified the world on the basis of Christ’s substitutionary life, death, and resurrection. Therefore, God tells us to announce to all people that their sins are forgiven. ”

MainBody (talk) 17:05, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Collapseble table

I've changed the table into a collapseble table; more handsome. See Salvation in Christianity#Protestantism. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:52, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan: And not so handsome here: Lutheranism#Comparison among Protestants – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:09, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Why not? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 15:22, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Use of "Sfn" in this template

@Waynejayes: I don't think you can use sfn to call references in this template, because at this time it is used in 5 articles (Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Comparison_among_Protestants) that don't have in their bodies the sources called by sfn in the template. Even if you put all the necessary sources in each existing articles, you can't guarantee in which article in the future this model will be used. So I suggest that you revert all your sfn modifications, and keep all the sources inside the template. ----Telikalive (talk) 21:28, 25 August 2019 (UTC) @Waynejayes: Again, can you please revert your "sfn" last changes, that forbid to see the sources on articles like Salvation in Christianity----Telikalive (talk) 12:53, 27 August 2019 (UTC)