In the first part, we disclosed
that the true Church can be only one. She must, uninterruptedly, emanate from
the apostolic Church, cherishing the purity of its faith, and apostolic
succession of benevolent spirituality in the clergy. The faithful receive
spiritual blessings in the sacraments of the Church, especially in Holy
Communion which is, indeed, the Body and Blood of Christ. The Orthodox Church
supports these teachings and always has. We briefly examined the foundational
apostolic teachings which have remained unchanged in the Orthodox Church, and
we examined the various spiritual delusions, born of pride, that have led many
to depart from the true Church in a continuous process of fragmentation and
increasing error.
Later, we will acquaint the reader with the history of the spread of the
Roman Catholic Church, which was, at first, the western branch of the one Church
of Christ. The advance of the
power-hungry Roman bishops in the 11th century brought about the division
between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. Convinced of their
infallibility, the Roman bishops gradually permitted new and alien ideas into
their church’s teaching and the administration of the Sacraments. The retreat
of the Roman Catholic Church from the purity of the apostolic faith gave birth
in its turn the Protestant movement, which consists in our time of a multitude
of sects. We discussed the origins and beliefs of a few of them, namely,
Lutheranism, the Reformed Church, Calvinism, and Anglicanism.
In the second part of this series, we will examine the Baptists, Quakers,
Pentecostals, the contemporary "gift of tongues," Methodists,
Mennonites, Mormons, Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Christian
Science sect, "Contemporary Humanism," the pseudo-religious
communities and cults, heretics and sects in Russia, Unitarians and
"Eastern Rite Catholics," Judaism, Muslims, Buddhism and atheism. In
conclusion, we will examine the present research on those groups.
