This sermon delves into the historical divisions within Christianity, exploring the origins of Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Protestantism. It discusses key differences such as the role of the Pope, views on Mary, saints, and the Eucharist. The sermon emphasizes the importance of staying grounded in the Word of God amidst these theological differences and traditions.

You've heard of, you've heard of Catholic, right, that word means, I'm not going to go into big rabbit trail, don't worry, people got upset last time I did this, but that's okay. Catholic means universal church, that's all it means, the word Catholic means universal church. Now when Catholicism, Catholic, and the power of Rome became, came together, that's where Roman Catholicism comes from, the Roman Catholic Church comes from Rome. So that is in the east, Protestant in the middle, and then, oh I'm sorry, let's go west, we're heading west, that would be easier to remember, Catholicism, Catholic was western, Protestant in the middle, and then eastern, you ever heard of Coptic Christians? There's 50, 60, 70 million just in Egypt, there's some that live here, many of them are beheaded by ISIS. So you have this interesting division, what happened is we were all one church, okay, first century, second century, third century, fourth century, you start hearing people like Augustine, Constantine, who was an emperor who made everybody be Christians, and there was a church, it was a church, and then the church started to kind of bring in some power, Rome, you could buy positions of authority, and different things, and then there was a, I think it was actually called the Great Schism, the Great Schism in 1050, 1050, where the eastern and western churches split, so the western churches became Roman Catholicism, the eastern churches became, you'll hear the Greek Orthodox, have you heard that term before, you see churches around here, Greek Orthodox, they were the eastern church, now they held a lot of the same things as the Catholic church, but they didn't have the Pope being the primary rule giver, and actually could supersede the Bible, they had bishops in charge, and they didn't look at Mary without sin, they saw sin in Mary, but they held on, they still recognized the saints, you'll see some of the churches are called by the name of saints, and I actually ran into a Coptic priest at the park, believe it or not, and he's got his big brown, you know, robe on, and big cross, like this big, my kids were like, mom, why is dad talking to him, and it was interesting, we didn't, we didn't, it was like, it was intimidating, like why don't I wear that stuff, right, so we had a good talk though, and I didn't argue as much as I wanted to, I didn't, but because they're more, they're more grounded in biblical, don't see Mary in sin, they had, Mary wasn't sin, immaculate conception, she wasn't always a virgin, and I said, why do you pray to the saints, they said, well, we believe like Hebrews 12, you know, the cloud of witnesses, I said, well, true, but I don't know how that gives me context to pray to the saints, well, they, you know, kind of interceding, and we pray, and I, so, you know, there's still this little bit of, you know, kind of friction there between, and then, to the middle, Protestantism started probably the 12, 13, 14 hundreds, people like John Hus, William Tyndale, John Wycliffe started to translate the Bible, so people could read it, and that's bad, bad, bad, bad, right, they got killed, many of them got killed because of that, so they were coming out, so Protestant actually came back to the middle, however, I don't want to highlight Protestantism, because if you look at many churches, big, you know, big, you know, they get this idea of what you see on TV, and you lose that, that, one of the good things about, say, the Greek churches, that reverence, and that, that tradition, and that rich heritage, it's not just, you know, loud worship, and smoke, and a quick little sermon, boy, and get you going, it's, there's a reverence, and a respect for God, now, the big thing, the big divide was mainly over the Mass, over the Mass, they also divide over the Mass, Protestants definitely also divide over the Mass, Roman Catholicism, here's where it gets in, sometimes in trouble, is they believe that the Eucharist, when they take communion, actually becomes the actual body and blood of Jesus Christ, and you are putting it again on the altar as another sacrifice, and this monstrance, this thing that looks like, you'll see the Pope have it, this big gold thing, is actually Jesus right there, so you'll see the reflect, right, or this, and it's this, and John Knox, if you want to read his life story, he, he went against Mary, Queen of Scots, and that was interesting, Roman Catholicism was in Scotland, Parliament actually voted to get it out, break Protestantism, and John Knox's words were always against the Mass, as a form of idolatry, and, and putting, putting that sacrifice out there again, but I want to read an excerpt from the book, Rome Sweet Rome, it's our journey to Catholicism, from Scott and his wife Kimberly, why they started to look at the Eucharist and communion differently, they said, one evening we had opportunity to be at a Mass where there was a Eucharist procession at the end, I'd never seen this before, and as I watched row after row, grown men and women kneeled down and bowed when the monstrance was passed by, it's that big gold thing that has the communion in it, she thought, these people believe that this is the Lord, and not just bread and wine, if this is Jesus, that is the only appropriate response, if one should kneel before a king today, how much more before the King of kings, and the Lord of lords, is it safe to kneel or not, that's the question she was asking, but I cannot continue to ruminate, what if it's not, if that is not Jesus in the monstrance, then what we are doing is gross idolatry, so is it safe to kneel, and see, so that's where you see these divisions, and that's why Roman Catholicism gets so upset, because you're challenging them on this, and grief, so nobody, you know, I don't want people say, oh Protestants have the perfect, no, we miss it too, but we try to get back to the, this is our guide, not the papacy, this is our guide, this is where we pray to, and where we learn how to pray, and who to pray to, this is our guide, our governing, our governing document, so that's why there's a division, I could stay there for a little while, but that's why the church is split up, Eastern, Western, Protestantism, and the Protestants wanted to bring everything back to the centrality of Scripture, now the danger in that is, communion then becomes nothing hardly, it's like, well we'll fit it in once a month, really quick at the end, and really if you look throughout the Gospels, it's an important part, whenever you come together, do this in remembrance of me, so if Catholics exalt Mary, we sometimes don't even, don't even remember she lived, and they take communion far more than where it should have gone, sometimes we don't do anything with it, so you have to be careful, even in what we believe, is to make sure that we're looking to Scripture, stay grounded, stay grounded in the word, that's how you stay encouraged, is to stay grounded in the word.