Thoughts of a Doubting Christian ✓

Yes, Catholics Are Christian

I was extremely confused the first time I heard someone say, "I'm Catholic, not Christian." I was even more baffled when I heard this sentiment echoed time and time again from Catholics and non-Catholics alike. It soon became clear to me that this is a common misconception that needs to be addressed in full: yes, Catholics are Christian!

There are three main branches of Christianity: Protestantism, Catholicism, and the Eastern Orthodoxy. In the United States, you're most likely to run into Protestants, since they make up over 70% of US Christians. But that leaves nearly 30% of Christians in the US who are Catholic, with a tiny percentage of Orthodox Christians and even smaller percentages of groups that most Christians reject as being truly Christian (for example, Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses).

Besides the US, other countries with large numbers of Protestants include Brazil, Nigeria, the UK, and the Republic of the Congo. Catholic-majority countries include Italy, Spain, Ireland, the Dominican Republic, and many Latin American countries. Orthodox Christians are found mostly in Russia, small countries in Eastern Europe, and Greece.

Part of the confusion on whether Catholics are Christian is because of what I talked about in the last chapter, i.e. the disagreements over what, exactly, a Christian is. For many Protestants, Catholics aren't "true" Christians because they don't subscribe to sola fide, the idea that you can't get to Heaven except through faith that Jesus died on the Cross for our sins. (Catholics believe that salvation is a mixture of faith and works.) Other reasons for why Protestants tend to reject Catholicism include veneration of the Virgin Mary and the Saints, confession of your sins to a priest instead of directly to God, and everything to do with the Pope.

The irony is that the Catholic Church classifies Protestants as not being "true" Christians in return! To the Church's benefit, Pope Benedict XVI acknowledged that "Protestantism has made an important contribution to the realization of Christian faith" and has often given rise to "a sincere and profound faith in the individual." However, the official stance of the Catholic Church is that Catholicism is the one True religion, so Protestants who reject this are not truly Christian.

However, I want to emphasis that Catholics ARE Christian just as much as Protestants and Eastern Orthodoxy followers are Christians. They are all followers of Christ, even if it manifests itself in wildly different ways. So please, the next time you hear somebody claim that Catholics aren't Christian, do your fellow Christians a favor and speak up, cuz they are. ;)