Protestant Says the Catholic Church Is "Man Made" — Priest Responds

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]The reason to accept Protestantism is not if you just dislike rituals or you want less rituals. The reason is it has the correct rituals, the ones that are founded in scripture, founded upon divine revelation. I I'm always thinking in the back of my mind of responses, and I know probably the most common one will be, "But Protestantism has a lot of man-made rituals, too." And granted, that is true to differing degrees in different Protestant contexts. The difference is that we don't claim infallibility and so there is the possibility of reform. What becomes the deepest problem and a real deal breakaker is when you have a man-made ritual that is mandated as if it had divine backing, but in fact it doesn't.

[00:00:42]>> This is where Gavin Oakland's argument gets interesting. He says the reason to accept Protestantism is not because Protestants dislike rituals or want less ritual. He says, "The reason is that Protestantism has the correct rituals, the ones founded in scripture and divine revelation." That sounds clean. That sounds simple. But it immediately raises the question, who decides which rituals are correct? Because Protestants do not agree among themselves on baptism, communion, liturgy, church government, ordination, the Lord's supper, the role of confession, altar calls, worship structure, or even what counts as a sacrament. Martin Luther didn't like the Catholic Church and founded the Lutheran Church. Calvin didn't like the Lutheran church and founded the Reformed or Calvinist Church. Henry VIII didn't like being denied Catholic marriage and founded the Anglican Church. John Smith disliked the Anglican Church and founded the Baptist Church. William Miller didn't like the Baptist Church and founded the Adventist. Ellen G. White really liked what William Miller said and founded the 7th Day Adventist Church. Charles T. Russell didn't like the Adventist Church and founded Jehovah's Witnesses. Joseph Smith disliked the Methodist Church and founded the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormons. John Wesley disliked the Anglican Church and founded the Methodist Church. Some pastors didn't like the Methodist Church and founded the Pentecostal Church. Many did not like the Pentecostal Church and founded thousands of churches like Stop Suffering, Assemblies of God, Light of the World, etc. The evangelical movement came from the Baptist church while the different bornagain movement came from the evangelical churches. The bornagain faith emerged in the late 1930s from the US and it gained popularity in the 1970s and 1980s, its golden age. There are now 35,000 different so-called Christian religions who claims their interpretation of the Bible is the right one.

[00:02:52]One Protestant church baptizes babies.

[00:02:55]Another says infant baptism is unbiblical. One says communion is just symbolic. Another says Christ is truly present in some way. One uses a lurggical calendar. Another calls that too Catholic. One has bishops. Another says bishops are man-made. One has altter calls. Another has no altter calls. One has praise bands. Another has chanting and robes. So when someone says Protestantism has the correct rituals, the obvious Catholic reply is which Protestantism because that word is carrying a lot of disagreement. Then Gavin says yes, Protestantism has man-made rituals too. But the difference is we do not claim infallibility. So there is the possibility of reform, but that is not the strength he thinks it is. That sounds humble, but it creates a different problem. If your system can always reform because it does not claim infallibility, then how does the ordinary Christian know when the reform is correct? How do you know yesterday's reform was right? How do you know today's reform is right? How do you know tomorrow's reform will not undo both of them? At some point, we can always reform can become a religious way of saying we are never quite sure. In this episode, we're going to respond to the charge that Catholic rituals and traditions nullify the word of God. And we're going to show why the real issue is not ritual versus scripture. The real issue is authority.

[00:04:24]>> Do not believe the foolish skepticism of our Protestant brothers and sisters, those whose faith extends to the 16th century. No, do not believe in that nonsense. You need to believe in the true faith of Jesus Christ that begun with the son of God himself that has a tradition in the old testament and the patriarchs that is present in the first pontiff when Jesus says to Peter on this rock I will build my church that has apostolic succession from the first apostles and the apostolic fathers and the first bishops. That is the real faith. The faith that has received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. That is the real faith. We need to be authentic Catholics. We need to all the time as Catholics. I'm not going to follow manmade. Manmade. Manmade. No. God made.

[00:05:26]God made. The church isn't man-made. It is Godmade.

[00:05:31]Um Jesus passed his authority to the apostles and um and then he passed it on to the future bishops and priests. This is all the acts of the apostles. This is not the church making it up. And so this is why sacred apostolic tradition, not manmade tradition, sacred means of God. Okay? not man-made tradition is in the Bible and it's why St. Paul said to hold fast to the traditions that he teaches you both oral and written. This is 2 Thessalonians 2:15. Let's keep going because this is where the whole man-made church argument starts to fall apart. A lot of Protestants will say the Catholic Church added rituals, traditions, offices, titles, and doctrines that Jesus never gave. And that sounds powerful if you imagine Christianity started as a plain Bible study in someone's living room and then Rome came along later with incense, bishops, sacraments, altars, councils, and authority. But that is not what happened. The earliest Christians were not walking around with leatherbound New Testaments, highlighters, and a Bible alone system. They had the apostles.

[00:06:50]They had preaching. They had baptism.

[00:06:52]They had the breaking of bread. They had bishops and elders. They had worship.

[00:06:56]They had authority. They had a visible church. So when someone says the Catholic Church is man-made, the first response should be compared to what?

[00:07:06]Compared to a church with no visible authority. Compared to a Christianity where every group can split, rename itself, and claim the Holy Spirit led them there. Compared to a system where two sincere Christians can read the same Bible, reach opposite conclusions, and both says scripture is clear.

[00:07:25]That is not clarity. That is confusion with a Bible verse attached. And this is the Catholic point. Jesus did not leave behind a vague spiritual movement. He founded a church. He gave authority. He sent apostles. He commanded them to teach. He promised the Holy Spirit would guide them. He did not say, "Go therefore and hand everyone a Bible and let them figure it out alone." He said, "Go therefore and make disciples, teaching them to observe all that he commanded." That means Christianity was never meant to be detached from living authority. Ever been in a conversation about your faith and suddenly you don't know what to say? You believe, you care, but in that moment, you freeze. You're not alone. Most Catholics were never taught how to clearly explain or defend what they believe. And that's exactly why we created something to help. Our newsletter breaks things down simply.

[00:08:20]Real questions, real objections, and clear responses you can actually use in everyday conversations. No fluff, no confusion, just truth you can understand and share with confidence. If you're tired of second-guessing yourself, if you want to stop staying silent, this is for you. Click the link in the comments or description to join the Catholic Explained newsletter and start getting equipped today. Now, let's get back. We need to take no shame in our Catholic theology and spirituality.

[00:08:51]No shame because of what the enemy wants to bring with these distorted perspectives that do not recognize the dignity of the sacred tradition that Christ himself has bestowed upon us. Now people hear authority and immediately get nervous. They think Catholics are saying don't read the Bible, just obey the church. No, that is lazy. Catholics love scripture. The mass is soaked in scripture. Catholic prayers are filled with scripture. The church preserved scripture, copied scripture, preached scripture, defended scripture, and gave the world the biblical cannon. So, the Catholic Church is not afraid of the Bible. The Catholic Church is the reason your Bible did not disappear into history. The real issue is not whether scripture matters. Of course, it matters. The issue is whether scripture was meant to be interpreted apart from the church that received it and guarded it. That is where Protestantism runs into its biggest problem. If the final authority is the Bible as I understand it, then the real final authority becomes the individual interpreter. Now people may not like hearing that, but that is what happens. Someone can say, "I'm just following scripture." But what they often mean is I'm following my interpretation of scripture. And when there is no final visible authority to settle disputes, division becomes almost guaranteed. That is why you end up with endless disagreements. Baptism saves.

[00:10:20]Baptism does not save. Babies should be baptized. Babies should not be baptized.

[00:10:26]Communion is symbolic. Communion is spiritual. Communion is real presence.

[00:10:32]Once saved, always saved. Salvation can be lost. Pastors can be women. Pastors cannot be women. Church should be lurggical. Church should be casual.

[00:10:43]Tradition is bad. Except the traditions we like. At some point, Catholics are allowed to ask the obvious question, if this is supposed to be the simpler, clearer system, why does it produce so many competing answers? And no, saying Catholics disagree too, does not solve the problem. Individual Catholics can be confused, disobedient, poorly catechized, or flatout wrong. But Catholic teaching does not change because Kevin in a Facebook comment section has bad theology. The church has an actual teaching office. Protestantism has thousands of competing teaching offices, many of them claiming the same Bible against each other. Now, let's talk about tradition. Critics often use the word tradition like it automatically means corruption. But that is not how the Bible speaks. There are bad traditions. Yes, Jesus condemned traditions that made void the commandments of God. Catholics agree with that. If a human custom contradicts God, throw it out. But scripture also speaks of tradition positively. St. Paul tells Christians to hold fast to what was handed down, whether by word of mouth or by letter. That means apostolic teaching was not limited to written pages only. The faith was preached, practiced, worshiped and handed on. So the Catholic position is not tradition over Bible. The Catholic position is that the word of God was handed down in written form and in apostolic tradition and the church serves as the guardian of that deposit. That is not an attack on scripture. That is how scripture itself says the faith was transmitted. And let's be honest, every Christian tradition has tradition. Every single one. The question is not whether you have tradition. The question is whether your tradition comes from the apostles or from a later reaction against Catholicism. Because some Protestant practices are not exactly ancient either. The altar call as a standard conversion moment. Later development, the sinner's prayer as the normal entry point into salvation. Later development, symbolic only communion as the dominant view, not the early Christian consensus.

[00:12:51]A church service centered almost entirely around a sermon with communion pushed to the side once a month or once a quarter. That is not exactly Acts 2 either. So if we are going to talk about man-made traditions, let's talk honestly. The Catholic Church looks ancient because it is ancient. It has rituals because biblical worship had rituals. It has bishops because the early church had bishops. It has sacraments because Christ gave visible signs of invisible grace. It has authority because Jesus gave authority.

[00:13:22]It has tradition because the apostles handed on a faith, not just a document.

[00:13:27]the accusation that Catholicism is man-made usually depends on ignoring this living continuity. Now, does that mean Catholics believe every custom, devotion or discipline is equal to doctrine? No. That is another misunderstanding. There is a difference between doctrine, discipline, devotion and custom. Not everything Catholics do has the same weight. A Catholic can love the rosary, but the rosary is not the same level as the Trinity. A priest wearing certain vestments is not the same as the real presence. A fasting discipline can change, but the truth of the Eucharist does not. Catholics make distinctions. Critics often do not. They lump everything together and say, "See, man-made tradition." But that is not serious argument. That is theological junk drawth thinking. The Catholic Church has always had reform. But Catholic reform means correcting abuses and deepening faithfulness, not reinventing Christianity every generation. That is a key difference.

[00:14:28]The church can reform discipline. It can correct corruption. It can renew worship. It can clarify doctrine. But it cannot reverse the faith handed down from the apostles. That is why Catholicism is stable. Did Jesus establish a visible church with authority to teach? Did he send apostles? Did he promise guidance? Did he give Peter keys? Did he command the church to teach all nations? Did the early Christians worship sacramentally and visibly? Catholics say yes. And if that is true, then Catholic tradition is not the enemy of the Bible. It is the living memory of the church that gave us the Bible. Empires fell, kings died, heresies came and went, cultures changed, nations disappeared. But the church is still here, still preaching Christ, still baptizing, still celebrating the eukarist, still reading scripture, still teaching the creed, still calling sinners to repentance, still saying what the apostles handed down. That is the church living the faith scripture reveals.