Quotation: “Now I beseech you…that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.” Paul, 1 Corinthians 1:10, The Christian Scriptures (New Testament), KJV.

Divisions within Christianity: In its earliest years, the Christian religion was divided into three main religious movements: the Gnostics, Jewish Christians, and Pauline Christians. The first almost disappeared, but is experiencing a period of rapid growth today. The second were wiped out. Almost all current Christian groups trace their lineage back to the Pauline Christian movement.

Today, there are many ways of classifying the over 1,000 Christian faith groups in North America:

By denomination

Into three or four meta-groups (e.g. Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, Anglican),

By theological belief system (Calvinism, Arminianism, etc.)

By religious family, (Baptist, Lutheran, Pentecostal, etc.), and

By “wing.” The conservative, mainline, and liberal wings of Protestantism are listed below.

Divided Christianity: According to David Barrett et al, editors of the “World Christian Encyclopedia: A comparative survey of churches and religions – AD 30 to 2200,” there are 34,000 separate Christian groups in the world. “Over half of them are independent churches that are not interested in linking with the big denominations.” 1

Differences among Christian faith groups are so great that some observers have suggested that a useful way of classifying Christian groups is to view them as a number of separate religions with different beliefs and practices, who share:

1.. The name “Christianity,” 2.. The text of the Bible, and 3.. Not a great deal else. They take various conflicting positions on such topics as abortion, homosexuality, physician assisted suicide, therapeutic cloning, etc.

This section describes how people have attempted to classify individual Protestant Christians and Protestant Christian denominations into liberal and conservative –or liberal, mainline and conservative — wings. It also describes some of the conflicts both within and among Protestant denominations. These divisions and conflicts are largely traceable to different approaches to of the Bible. Ranging from the most conservative to the most liberal Christians we see the following three belief systems:

The Bible is the actual Word of God. Its authors were directly inspired by God. Since God cannot be in error, their writings are also inerrant — without error — in their original autograph version. All passages are useful for the believer. The Bible contains the Word of God. However, it also contains material that we must reject because it has always been opposed to the will of God. This includes passages which condone slavery, exhibit religious intolerance, involve the torturing prisoners, treat women as property, and which advocate genocide, sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. The Bible is a wide-ranging human document, written by very human and fallible people. They incorporated a lot of material from nearby Pagan religions, like the creation stories and the great flood of Noah as described in the Book of Genesis. Some of its content is profoundly immoral by today’s religious and secular criteria, and must be ignored. The Bible’s calls for justice and decent treatment of all people are vitally important today. The authors’ intent was to promote their own personal beliefs, beliefs of their groups, including their concepts of God. The Bible records the authors’ evolution in spiritual and religious belief over a period of about 1,000 years.

Obviously, by starting with such diverse beliefs about the Bible, conservative and liberal Protestants come to totally different conclusions about its contents.

We will deal mainly with the over 1,000 Protestant and Anglican denominations in this section. However, the conservative/liberal split is seen also in Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, etc.

More… http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_divi.htm

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