16 Facts About Protestantism

Protestantism is a form of Christianity that follows the tenets of the Protestant Reformation: a movement within Western Christianity that began in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to be errors, abuses, innovations, discrepancies, and theological novums within the Catholic Church.

Protestantism is diverse, being divided into various denominations on the basis of theology and ecclesiology, not forming a single structure as with the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy.

Protestantism maintained that this principle recognizes Christ as prophet, priest, and king and that his priesthood is shared with his people.

Protestantism attacked monasticism, ascetism and believed that a saved believer can never be overcome by Satan.

Protestantism advocated an interpretation of the Gospel that led to conflicts with the Catholic Church.

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Protestantism rejected papal authority over secular power, translated the Bible into vernacular English, and preached anticlerical and biblically centred reforms.

Protestantism was excommunicated and burned at the stake in Constance, Bishopric of Constance, in 1415 by secular authorities for unrepentant and persistent heresy.

Protestantism spread from the German lands into France, where the Protestants were nicknamed Huguenots.

French Protestantism came to acquire a distinctly political character, made all the more obvious by the conversions of nobles during the 1550s.

Evangelicalism, or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide, transdenominational movement which maintains that the essence of the gospel consists in the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ's atonement.

Protestantism's teachings held to the five solae of the Reformation, but they were distinct from particular teachings of Martin Luther, Huldrych Zwingli, John Calvin, and other Protestant Reformers.

Protestantism explained that the connection between religious affiliation and interest in science was the result of a significant synergy between the ascetic Protestant values and those of modern science.

Protestantism appreciated the advantages of democracy: "It is an invaluable gift, if God allows a people to freely elect its own authorities and overlords.

Democracy, social-contract theory, separation of powers, religious freedom, separation of church and state—these achievements of the Reformation and early Protestantism were elaborated on and popularized by Enlightenment thinkers.

Since 1900, Protestantism has spread rapidly in Africa, Asia, Oceania and Latin America.

Protestantism is growing in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Oceania, while declining in Anglo America and Europe, with some exceptions such as France, where it was eradicated after the abolition of the Edict of Nantes by the Edict of Fontainebleau and the following persecution of Huguenots, but now is claimed to be stable in number or even growing slightly.