Lucas Banzoli is a very active Brazilian anti-Catholic polemicist, who holds to basically a Seventh-day Adventist theology, whereby there is no such thing as a soul that consciously exists outside of a body, and no hell (soul sleep and annihilationism). He has a Master’s degree in theology, a degree and postgraduate work in history, a license in letters, and is a history teacher, author of 27 self-published books, as well as blogmaster for six blogs. He has many videos on YouTube.

This is my 68th refutation of Banzoli’s writings. From 25 May until 12 November 2022 he wrote not one single word in reply, claiming that my articles were “without exception poor, superficial and weak” and that “only a severely cognitively impaired person” would take them “seriously.” Nevertheless, he found them so “entertaining” that after almost six months of inaction he resolved to “make a point of rebutting” them “one by one”; this effort being his “new favorite sport.” But apparently he changed his mind again, since he has replied to me only 16 times (the last one dated 2-20-23).

This is a reply to the controversial and relevant items of his list, in his article, “A Confession of Faith Common to all Protestants” [Uma Confissão de Fé comum a todos os protestantes] (10-29-24)

Lucas’ original Portugese was automatically translated into English on his blog by Google Translate. His words will be in blue.

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You have certainly seen a Catholic accuse Protestants of being divided into “40,000 sects with different doctrines” (which is humanly impossible, since there are not even 40,000 doctrines to have 40,000 doctrinal divergences), 

Yes; this is a dumb argument. I renounced it over twenty years ago in my article, 33,000 Protestant Denominations? No! [9-4-04], and have ever since said “hundreds” to describe the number of Protestant denominations. There are methodological difficulties with the usual figures. In any event, denominationalism itself is utterly unbiblical and anything beyond one Church is already a very serious unbiblical falsehood.

and many of them say that there is not even a common core of doctrines to be considered “Protestant”, as if “Protestant” could be anything.

That’s a stupid belief, too, but I immediately note that almost all of what Protestants have in common are beliefs that Catholics and Orthodox also hold; in other words, these are tenets that all Christians hold in common. I will demonstrate that in my reply.

First of all, it is important to highlight two things. First, unlike the scarecrow constantly present in Catholic apologetics, antitrinitarians are not “protestants,”

I’ve been a Catholic apologist for almost 35 years, and I haven’t observed this false view being “constantly present in Catholic apologetics.” One would have to be very ignorant to claim this, and as usual when sweeping statements about “Catholic apologists” are made by Protestants, not even a single example is provided. Speaking for myself, I have never ever stated that actual Protestants denied the Trinity.

Unfortunately, out of ignorance or bad faith, many of them say this because they believe that Jehovah’s Witnesses are Protestants, 

“Many”? I think not. It doesn’t take much knowledge at all to see that JWS are not Protestants or any other kind of Christians. They’re Arian heretics. I particularly object to this silly characterization, seeing that my first major apologetics project as a Protestant evangelical in 1981, was to do a massive refutation of the false belief of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I was part of an “anti-cult” ministry.

behind the secondary issues that divide us is a primary and much more important element that unites us.

And he thinks these are listed in his thirty points. But I will show that with regard to many of these so-called “central” or “primary” beliefs, Protestants in fact disagree with each other. Note that Lucas claims in his title that these points are “common to all Protestants.” So if I demonstrate that several of them aren’t, he is guilty of a misleading, only partially true title and would have to shorten his list to half as long in order to be intellectually honest.

Nineteen, or 63% of all his points are simply beliefs held in common with all Christians, and thus irrelevant. What Lucas needs to demonstrate are beliefs that are distinctive to Protestants and held by all of them. That list becomes a very short one indeed, under scrutiny (perhaps even nonexistent). Thus, we can exclude (in this scenario that I think is reasonable) from the discussion right off the bat (#1-2, 4-6, 8, 11, 13-17, 21-22, 25-29; #21 being somewhat unique, as I will explain).

The other eleven points, or 37% of the list (#3, 7, 9-10, 12, 18-20, 23-24, 30) are disputable, and I contend that there are Protestants — not infrequently, many — who disagree with what Lucas claims is unanimity. Thus, 100% of his points fail in their purpose, under scrutiny: being either irrelevant (19) or untrue as a matter of fact (11), leaving his claim a complete failure. Let’s take a look at the “duds.”

3) We believe that God is the only one we should pray to and the only one who answers our prayers.

Catholics agree that God ultimately answers our prayers, and that when saints are involved, they are functioning as intermediaries who can only “pass along” what God brings about. But there are some Protestants who believe that saints can be invoked. A post from St. Michael’s Anglican Church in Matthews, North Carolina states:

The practice of requesting the intercessions of the glorified Saints is no different in degree, nature, or kind from the necessary intercessory prayer that Christians offer for one another on earth. If I ask you to pray for me and for my intentions, I know that in Christian charity you will do so. If you ask prayers of me, I should be delighted and moved by the same charity to pray for you. Offering requests through God in the Communion of the Saints to those fellow Christians who reign with Christ beyond the veil is no different. We may ask for their prayers, just as we pray for them. . . .

Anglicans are not obliged to solicit the gracious prayers of the Saints on our behalf, but, just as they are not compelled to request the intercessory prayers of fellow Christians in heaven, so they are forbidden to say that such a practice is contrary to Scripture and Tradition. For Anglicans, the practice of the invocation of the Saints is limited in the main to private devotions and extraliturgical services which are not part of the usual public Liturgy. However, it is certainly to be encouraged and has never been rejected by the Anglican Church, , which counts herself a true Apostolic Church practicing the fullness of the Catholic Faith, of which the Communion of Saints is a supreme article. Please note that Article of Religion XXII does not condemn the ancient or patristic or biblical doctrine concerning the Invocation of Saints and other related truths, but only the Romish, that is, the popularly-believed late medieval and thus erroneous view of the same. The Anglican teaching is the reformed Catholic view, anchored in the Holy Scriptures and the Tradition of the Primitive Church.

Anglican apologist C. S. Lewis wrote:

I accept the authority of the Benedicite for the propriety of invoking . . . saints. . . . ( The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Vol. III: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy 1950-1963, edited by Walter Hooper, HarperSanFrancisco, 2007, To the Editor of the Church Times, 15 July 1949)

With approximately 85 – 110 million members, Anglicanism is the third-largest Christian communion after Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.

7) We believe in a worship free of graven images for purposes of worship and/or veneration, and that we should not bow down before any image.

Martin Luther believed in adoration of Jesus in the sacrament of the Eucharist, which includes bowing before the consecrated host and chalice. He even wrote a treatise about it in 1523, called, The Adoration of the Sacrament, which is included in Luther’s Works in English, in volume 36, pp. 268–305, where he proclaimed, “he who does believe, as sufficient demonstration has shown it ought to be believed, can surely not withhold his adoration of the body and blood of Christ without sinning . . . One should not withhold from him such worship and adoration either . . . one should not condemn and accuse of heresy people who do adore the sacrament.”

Luther was observed bowing before the consecrated host and chalice. It’s for this reason that John Calvin called Luther “half-papist” and that “he had raised up the idol in God’s temple.” See more on this. Some “high” Anglicans or Anglo-Catholics practice this, too. So, for example, the article, “What is Eucharistic Adoration?” from Church of the Good Shepherd, an Anglo-Catholic parish in South Carolina, affirmed:

The practice of Eucharistic Adoration is the spiritual exercise of adoring the Real Presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. The intention of such a devotion is to allow the faithful to be connected with an awareness of the gift of Christ’s sacramental presence and experience a spiritual communion with Him. . . .

In the Church of England, Father John Mason Neale (1818-1866) revived interest in Eucharistic Adoration among Anglicans when he made it a part of the devotional life of the nuns of the Society of Saint Margaret. Father Neale saw Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament and Eucharistic Exposition as the logical devotional expression of the Church Catholic’s understanding of the Real Presence.

9) We believe that Sacred Scripture is the highest authority for Christians, the highest and final authority that prevails over any tradition, teaching, denomination, council, confession of faith or religious leadership.

This is generally true of Protestantism, as one of its two pillars and its rule of faith, but again, there are exceptions (whereas Lucas ignores that). Anglicanism and its offshoot, Methodism, place a higher emphasis on tradition and the authority of the Church, and also accept the notion of apostolic succession, both of which are, strictly speaking, contradictory to sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone as the only infallible authority). Along these lines, John Wesley, the key figure at the beginning of Methodism, but himself a lifelong Anglican, stated:

If to baptize infants has been the general practice of the Christian Church in all places and in all ages, then this must have been the practice of the apostles, and, consequently, the mind of Christ. . . . The fact being thus cleared, that infant baptism has been the general practice of the Christian Church in all places and in all ages, that it has continued without interruption in the Church of God for above seventeen hundred years, we may safely conclude it was handed down from the apostles, who best knew the mind of Christ. (A Treatise on Baptism; in Coll. iii, 232-233; 11 Nov. 1756)

Martin Luther had made the exact same point over 200 years earlier:

Child baptism derives from the apostles and has been practised since the days of he apostles. . . .

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Were child baptism now wrong God would certainly not have permitted it to continue so long, nor let it become so universally and thoroughly established in all Christendom, but it would sometime have gone down in disgrace. The fact that the Anabaptists now dishonor it does not mean anything final or injurious to it. Just as God has established that Christians in all the world have accepted the Bible as Bible, the Lord’s Prayer as Lord’s Prayer, and faith of a child as faith, so also he has established child baptism and kept it from being rejected while all kinds of heresies have disappeared which are much more recent and later than child baptism. This miracle of God is an indication that child baptism must be right. . . .

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You say, this does not prove that child baptism is certain. For there is no passage in Scripture for it. My answer: that is true. From Scripture we cannot clearly conclude that you could establish child baptism as a practice among the first Christians after the apostles. But you can well conclude that in our day no one may reject or neglect the practice of child baptism which has so long a tradition, since God actually not only has permitted it, but from the beginning so ordered, that it has not yet disappeared.

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For where we see the work of God we should yield and believe in the same way as when we hear his Word, unless the plain Scripture tells us otherwise. . . .

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[I]f the first, or child, baptism were not right, it would follow that for more than a thousand years there was no baptism or any Christendom, which is impossible. . . . For over a thousand years there were hardly any other but child baptisms. . . .

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We . . . are certain enough, because it is nowhere contrary to Scripture, but is rather in accord with Scripture. (Concerning Rebaptism, January 1528; in Luther’s Works, 225-262; citation from 254-257)

No universal or absolute prohibition of the translation of scriptures into the vernacular was ever issued by a medieval pope or council, nor was any similar prohibition directed against the use of such translations by the laity.”  (The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation, 1987, p. 124)

For example, the school regulations of the duchy of Wurttemburg laid down that only the most able schoolchildren were to be allowed to study the New Testament in their final years — and even then, only if they studied it in Greek or Latin. The remainder — presumably the vast bulk — were required to read Luther’s Lesser Catechism instead. The direct interpretation of Scripture was thus effectively reserved for a small, privileged group of people.  . . . The principle of the “clarity of Scripture’ appears to have been quietly marginalized, in the light of the use made of the Bible by the more radical elements within the Reformation. Similarly, the idea that everyone had the right and the ability to interpret Scripture faithfully became the sole possession of the radicals. (Reformation Thought: An Introduction, 2nd edition from 1993, p. 155)

Within many denominations of Christianity, Christian perfection is the theological concept of the process or the event of achieving spiritual maturity or perfection. The ultimate goal of this process is union with God characterized by pure love of God and other people as well as personal holiness or sanctification. Other terms used for this or similar concepts include entire sanctification, holiness, perfect love, the baptism with the Holy Spirit, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, baptism by fire, the second blessing, and the second work of grace. . . .

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Traditional Quakerism uses the term perfection and teaches that it is the calling of a believer.

Perfection is a prominent doctrine within the Methodist tradition, . . . Methodists use the term Baptism of the Holy Spirit to refer to the second work of grace, entire sanctification.

Other denominations, such as the Lutheran Churches and Reformed Churches, reject the possibility of Christian perfection in this life as contrary to the doctrine of salvation by faith alone, . . .

The second form of confession and absolution is known as “Holy Absolution“, which is done privately to the pastor (commonly only upon request). Here the person confessing (known as the “penitent“) confesses his individual sins and makes an act of contrition as the pastor, acting in persona Christi, announces this following formula of absolution (or similar): “In the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus Christ I forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” In the Lutheran Church, the pastor is bound by the Seal of the Confessional (similar to the Roman Catholic tradition). Luther’s Small Catechism says “the pastor is pledged not to tell anyone else of sins told him in private confession, for those sins have been removed.”

In the Church of England and in the Anglican Communion in general, formal, sacramental absolution is given to penitents in the sacrament of penance now formally called the Reconciliation of a Penitent and colloquially called “confession.”

In the Methodist Church, penance is defined by the Articles of Religion as one of those “Commonly called Sacraments but not to be counted for Sacraments of the Gospel”, also known as the “five lesser sacraments“. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church, held “the validity of Anglican practice in his day as reflected in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer“, stating that “We grant confession to men to be in many cases of use: public, in case of public scandal; private, to a spiritual guide for disburdening of the conscience, and as a help to repentance.” The Book of Worship of The United Methodist Church contains the rite for private confession and absolution in A Service of Healing II, in which the minister pronounces the words “In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven!” . . .

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Lay confession is permitted, although this is not the norm. Near the time of death, many Methodists confess their sins and receive absolution from an ordained minister, in addition to being anointed.

As far as I know, there are only two Christian traditions who officially don’t celebrate the Eucharist: the Salvation Army and the Society of Friends (Quakers). A fellow student at Queen’s Theological Foundation, where I study Theology, who is a ‘Salvationist’, told me that there are many different reasons for the Salvation Army not celebrating the Eucharist, but these are two important ones: they have always regarded women as equal in ministry (and sacraments at the time were only distributable by men); and they believe that throughout history the sacraments have had a divisive influence on the church, and differing beliefs about them have led to abuse and controversy. . . .

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The Quakers have never celebrated the Eucharist or any sacraments. . . . because Quakers find that all ritual distracts and takes focus away from God. Also, Quakers believe that ministry is not only equal between men and women, but that it belongs to all people, not just a few ministers.