What are the differences between Catholic Churches and Protestant Churches?

Answer 1

Protestants do not have a "canonisation" procedure, as a result all of the Protestant Saints are generally either Old Testament personages, people from the New Testament, or people from the early church. There is no specific "line in the sand" where protestants stop using church approved saints. Protestants also refer to living people as "saints" following the example of the new testament epistles (i.e. "To the saints at Corinth").

The Catholic Church has a method in which a person is declared saintly. Meaning that there is no chance that they are not in heaven and therefore are able to be publically venerated. These people must have lived exceptional lives, been worthy of example, and a few other things with the inclusion of at least 2 post mortem miracles obtained through their intercession. Catholics believe in the communion of the saints, by which they mean that all the saints, both the faithful on earth and those in Heaven, adore God together and can be asked to pray for the needs of those on earth.

The Orthodox Church also has no canonisation procedure, Saints in the orthodox church are created by public acclaim.

Actually, the Protestant churches, other than the saints that The Bible talks about, also believe that every single person who is a born again Christian, is, PRESENTLY, a saint. Protestants do not believe one can be made a saint by the declaration of the church. In the Bible, the word saint meant every single Christian, not some who were better than others or had been declared to be saints by the church. Protestants do not believe in worshipping or venerating saints.

Answer 2

There is more in common betwen the Catholic Church and most Protestant churches than there is different, especially in the most important things, like our faith in God as Trinity, faith in Christ, the Resurrection, baptism, the importance of the Bible, etc.

There are many different Protestant churches and communities, each is different from the other, and so each is different from the Catholic Church in different ways.

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Catholic AnswerThe Catholic Church was established by Jesus Christ, it was born from His side on the Cross and announced to the world fifty days later at Pentecost when He sent the Holy Spirit to be with It always. He guaranteed that It would be One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic and that He would keep It from all error until the end of the age. It is one under the Vicar appointed by Christ, originally Peter, and currently Pope Benedict XVI in Rome.

The various protestant ecclesial communities were established by various individuals starting in the sixteenth century (over fifteen centuries after Christ ascended into heaven) in protest against one or more doctrines of the Catholic Church and practices of Its clergy. Since that time, they have split into over 30,000 denominations having little to nothing in common among them.

Protestant AnswerTo balance the Roman Catholic answer above (as this question was placed in the Protestant category as well as the RC category) there are several differences of doctrine between Roman Catholics and the vast majority of Protestants.

The One, Universal Church ('catholic' simply means universal) was instituted by Our Lord and expanded throughout the Roman Empire by Paul and the other Apostles, including others. The universal Church spread across the world by evangelism (Peter, Paul in Rome, Thomas in Indi, Philip in Africa etc).

However, by the Middle Ages many regarded the Church has having grown corrupt and therefore protested against what they saw as heresy, thus forming the various Protestant denominations. Some claimed apostolic succession (eg the Anglican Church) whilst others emphasised the teaching and revelation of the Holy Spirit (eg Pentecostals) or of the importance of the expounding of scripture over and above sacramental worship (eg Methodists). But as far as scriptural doctrine was concerned there was, and still is, little difference between them.

Contrary to the claim above, most Protestant Churches have a great deal in common with each other. The vast majority regard the Nicene Creed or Apostolic Creed (as used by the modern Roman Catholic Church) as laid down by the early Church, as the basis of faith, and in this belief there is little difference between most Protestant denominations.

However, the Creeds aside, there are major peripheral doctrinal differences between Protestants and Catholics as most Protestants regard scripture and reason as more important than sacrament, tradition or rules of the Church, and reject what they see as heretical additions to doctrine especially with regard to Mary, purgatory and the infallibility of the pope.

Catholic AnswerThe Catholic Church was founded by Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit in the first century to bring God to the people and the people to God. The Protestant "churches" were founded by individuals sixteenth centuries after Christ according to their own personal beliefs.

Catholics believe that God the Son became incarnate in a human body through the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin Mary to save mankind from their sins. He established His Church and appointed Apostles (Bishops) and Peter (Pope) to guide that Church on earth and He guaranteed to be with It until the end of time. Catholics believe that you only have one choice in life: to love and serve the Lord, or to reject Him and be separated from Him forever in Hell. Every other choice you have in life comes down to that, is this following Jesus or rejecting Him.

Protestants reject Christ because they reject His Body: the Church (see Ephesians 1:22). They believe that they are their own little Pope and that they can decide how to follow Jesus themselves. Thus they fragment into many "denominations" as they decide how they want to follow God, ignoring what He, Himself has said, and interpreting for themselves what is right or wrong. Thus they believe that they have more choices than following God or not, they believe that they have the choice to decide HOW they are going to follow God.

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Answer

Catholics pray to Mary, as well as celebrate the Eucharist every sunday. Catholics believe one must eat the Eucharist and believe in what it is to make it to heaven while protestants believe that if one believes that Christ rose from the dead he will be saved and go to heaven.

Answer 3

One of the main differences is that Catholics believe in transubstantiation, which is that during the Eucharist (sometimes known as Communion) Catholics believe that the bread and wine turns into the actual body and blood of Christ- it's not symbolic.

Another differences is that Catholics believe in the veneration of saints- this is NOT worship of saints, veneration only means that Catholics recognize the saints for what they've done in the past and ask the saints for help in terms of understanding God and Jesus' decisions. Catholics also pray to saints to ask for help.

Also, if you go to a Catholic mass you're going to see a HUGE different than the way protestants worship in church. Catholics are more ritualistic- we say a lot of the same prayers each week, etc. But protestants are more about the singing and they really get into it.

Obviously, all of the above depends on which specific community you go to and the specific family traditions or personal beliefs.

Most of the differences aren't huge- both believe in God and Jesus, the commandments, etc. there are just smaller differences that mean a lot but in the grand scheme of things, these two should get along just fine.