Comment by f30e3dfed1c9
20 days ago
"I often experience this. I saw that a co worker had written something about God in their Twitter bio. 'Are you a Christian?' 'I'm a Catholic' they replied. Any other denomination would say 'yes I'm a Christian'"
I'm going to suggest that if you would find it surprising to have your question answered with "Yes, Greek Orthodox," or "Yes, Southern Baptist," or "Yes, United Methodist," or some similar variation, your personal experience may not be as broad or definitive as you seem to think it is.
Well it's a common question I've asked of people during my life, and only catholics ever make that distinction, almost a correction. And there's a reason why - because they think it's the one true church. I'm not in the USA btw.
OK. I'm curious, roughly where are you? And if non-denominational, sort of generic "Christians" are common there now, what was the situation historically?
I'm in the UK. Normal conversation: what did you do on Sunday? I was in church. "Oh are you a Christian" "yes". Now, if the first person is not a Christian , that's often the end of the conversation. If first person is also a Christian they would say "oh me too! What sort of church do you go to". They might then answer, oh I got to st Luke's, have you heard of it. Or I go to so and so in the town. The baptist church? Yeah that one" It's very unusual for a non Catholic to go straight to denominations in answer to the "are you a Christian", because that's not the question, and due to the appeal to unity, because of the belief that we're all part of god's family, rather than go straight for dividing lines. And never would anyone identify as "I'm a protestant", that would be odd.
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