‍Letter to an Anti-Catholic

‍A letter to Dr. Ed DeVries regarding his webpage “Are We Being Led to Rome?”

  Gary Hoge  ·  October 1, 2026

‍Dr. DeVries’ webpage “Are We Being Led to Rome?” is no longer available online.

‍Dear Dr. DeVries,

‍I read your webpage, “Are We Being Led to Rome?”, and I felt I needed to respond. I am a convert to Catholicism from evangelical Protestantism—I was a Baptist myself—and many of the objections you raise are ones I once would have found persuasive.

‍The problem is that the seven differences you identify between Catholicism and what you call “Bible Christianity” do not accurately represent what the Catholic Church actually teaches. In several cases, you attribute to Catholics beliefs that the Church explicitly rejects.

‍Whether Catholic teaching is *true* is, of course, a separate question. But before we can have that discussion, we first have to establish what Catholicism actually teaches. A doctrine cannot be refuted by attributing to the Catholic Church something it does not believe.

‍So rather than asking you to take my word for what Catholics believe, I will compare your claims with the Catholic Church’s own authoritative teaching, particularly the *Catechism of the Catholic Church*. Then we can consider whether the doctrines the Church actually teaches are consistent with Scripture and historic Christianity.

‍1. Catholics Preach a False Gospel

‍You wrote that the Bible teaches that we are saved by grace through faith and not by works, but that Catholicism denies this. That is not what the Catholic Church teaches.

‍The Catechism of the Catholic Church says:

‍“Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy and pleasing to God, and whose blood has become the instrument of atonement for the sins of all men” (CCC 1992).

‍It goes on to say that “our justification comes from the grace of God” (CCC 1996), that our vocation to eternal life “depends entirely on God’s gratuitous initiative” (CCC 1998), and that “no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification” (CCC 2010).

‍The Council of Trent, convened in response to the Protestant Reformation, taught the same thing:

‍“We are therefore said to be justified freely, because that none of those things which precede justification—whether faith or works—merit the grace itself of justification. For, if it be a grace, it is not now by works, otherwise, as the same Apostle says, grace is no more grace” (Decree on Justification, January 13, 1547).

‍Catholics and Protestants certainly have important disagreements about justification, faith, works, merit, and the possibility of losing salvation. But the Catholic position cannot accurately be summarized as “we earn our salvation by good works.” Catholicism explicitly teaches that even the beginning of our justification is an unmerited gift of God's grace.

‍2. Catholics Grant Salvation Before Repentance

‍You state that the Bible stands in “firm opposition to the doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration.” But baptismal regeneration is hardly a peculiarly Catholic doctrine. It has historically been taught not only by Catholics but also by Eastern Orthodox Christians and, in various forms, by Lutherans, Anglicans, and other Protestant Christians.

‍More importantly, the doctrine has a substantial biblical basis. On the day of Pentecost, when the people asked Peter what they should do, he answered:

‍“Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins” (Acts 2:38).

‍Ananias similarly told Paul:

‍“Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name” (Acts 22:16).

‍Paul describes baptism as participation in Christ's death and resurrection (Romans 6:3–4), refers to salvation through “the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5), and Peter says explicitly that “baptism now saves you” (1 Peter 3:21).

‍Obviously, none of this means that the water itself possesses some magical power or that an adult can deliberately reject Christ, undergo a ceremony, and thereby force God to save him. Catholicism teaches that baptism saves because Christ acts through it and gives the grace that baptism signifies.

‍The case of infants is different because infants are incapable of making a personal profession of faith or repentance. But that does not mean that God is incapable of giving grace to them. The real question, therefore, is not whether an infant can make an adult profession of faith, but whether God's grace can be given to an infant through baptism. Christians were baptizing infants long before the Protestant Reformation, and the practice cannot simply be dismissed as a later Catholic corruption.

‍3. Catholics Belittle Our Lord Jesus Christ

‍You cite Paul's statement that “there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 2:5) as an argument against Catholic prayers asking the saints to intercede for us.

‍But look at the verses immediately preceding the one you quoted:

‍“I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone—for kings and all those in authority” (1 Timothy 2:1–2).

‍Paul commands Christians to intercede for other people immediately before declaring that Christ is the “one mediator between God and men.” Evidently, then, Christ's unique mediation does not prevent Christians from interceding for one another.

‍And that makes sense. Jesus is the unique mediator between God and humanity because it is through his incarnation, death, and resurrection that we are reconciled to God. No Christian—living or departed—can compete with or replace that mediation. On the contrary, every Christian prayer of intercession depends entirely upon it.

‍The Catholic question is therefore not whether there is another mediator alongside Christ. There isn't. The question is whether members of Christ's body can pray for one another through the one mediation of Christ. Paul clearly believed that they could.

‍You also write that every time the Mass is celebrated Catholics “ceremonially re-crucify our Savior.” Again, that is not what the Catholic Church teaches. The Church explicitly teaches that Christ's sacrifice on Calvary occurred “once for all.” The Mass does not crucify Christ again; rather, the one sacrifice of Calvary is sacramentally made present to the Church (CCC 1366–1367).

‍Nor does Catholic belief in the Eucharist amount to “religious cannibalism.” Christians were accused of cannibalism in antiquity precisely because of what they said about the Eucharist. Around the beginning of the second century, Ignatius of Antioch criticized certain heretics because:

‍“They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in his goodness, raised up again” (Letter to the Smyrnaeans 7).

‍Whatever terminology later Christians would use to explain the Eucharist philosophically, Ignatius's language is difficult to reconcile with the idea that the earliest Christians regarded the Eucharist as nothing more than a symbolic memorial.

‍4. Catholics View the Pope as Equal with God

‍The Catholic Church does not teach that the pope is equal with God. In fact, such a belief would directly contradict Catholic teaching.

‍The Catechism says:

‍“Christian faith differs from our faith in any human person. It is right and just to entrust oneself wholly to God and to believe absolutely what he says. It would be futile and false to place such faith in a creature” (CCC 150).

‍Nor does the doctrine of papal infallibility mean that the pope is sinless. Infallibility and impeccability are two entirely different concepts.

‍Catholics believe that popes are sinners who, like every other Christian, depend upon God's grace and Christ's redemption. Papal infallibility does not mean that everything a pope says is correct, that he cannot make bad decisions, that he cannot misunderstand Scripture, or that he cannot commit serious sins. It concerns narrowly defined circumstances in which the pope definitively teaches the universal Church on a matter of faith or morals.

‍You are certainly free to argue that the Catholic doctrine of the papacy is wrong. But the claim that Catholics regard the pope as equal with God or believe that he is personally sinless is simply not Catholic doctrine.

‍5. Catholics Worship Idols

‍Catholics worship the triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—and him alone.

‍Catholic theology distinguishes between the worship that belongs to God alone and the honor that may properly be given to God's creatures. It also distinguishes between an image and the person represented by that image.

‍Consider a photograph of someone you love. You might kiss it, display it prominently, or treat it with special care. No reasonable person would conclude that you believe the paper and ink are actually the person you love. Your actions toward the image express your affection for the person represented by it.

‍Something similar occurs with sacred images. A statue of Jesus is plaster, wood, stone, or some other material. Catholics do not believe that the material object is God. Any honor shown toward the image is directed ultimately toward the person represented by it.

‍Whether sacred images should be used in Christian devotion is a legitimate subject for discussion. But before that question can be discussed profitably, we have to distinguish the Catholic practice from the worship of a physical object as a god. Catholicism explicitly condemns the latter as idolatry.

‍6. The Catholic Church Is a Church of Bondage and Butchery

‍You wrote, “The Catholic Church has always discouraged its members from reading their Bibles.”

‍The history is more complicated than that. The Church has at various times regulated particular translations and restricted unauthorized versions of Scripture. But that is very different from saying that Catholicism has always opposed Christians reading the Bible.

‍In fact, Catholic teachers throughout Christian history repeatedly encouraged the faithful to read and meditate upon Scripture.

‍St. John Chrysostom rebuked lay Christians who thought Bible reading was only for monks:

‍“This is what has ruined everything, your thinking that the reading of Scripture is for monks only, when you need it more than they do.”

‍Pope St. Gregory the Great urged Christians:

‍“Study them, I beg you, and meditate daily on the words of your Creator. Learn the heart of God in the words of God.”

‍St. Bernard of Clairvaux similarly wrote that the person who thirsts for God “eagerly studies and meditates on the inspired Word.”

‍And Pope St. Pius X wrote:

‍“Nothing would please us more than to see our beloved children form the habit of reading the Gospels—not merely from time to time, but every day.”

‍The modern Catechism could hardly be clearer:

‍“The Church forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful … to learn ‘the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ,’ by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. ‘Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ’” (CCC 133).

‍So it is perfectly legitimate to examine particular episodes in Catholic history involving restrictions on vernacular translations or access to particular editions of Scripture. But the sweeping claim that Catholicism has simply opposed Christians reading the Bible cannot account for the Church's own historical record.

‍You also claim that during the Middle Ages the Catholic Church killed more than 68 million Baptists in an effort to keep the Bible from ordinary Christians. That is an extraordinary historical claim and requires extraordinary evidence.

‍Who were these 68 million people? Where and when were they killed? What contemporary records document their deaths? And what evidence identifies them as Baptists?

‍The numerical claim itself should raise immediate questions. One widely cited estimate puts the combined population of Greece and the Balkans, Italy, Spain and Portugal, France and the Low Countries, the British Isles, Germany, and Scandinavia at only about 60.5 million in 1340.¹ So, we are being asked to believe that all of these people were Baptists, and that the Catholic Church killed every one of them—and then some—without leaving a trace of that massacre in the historical record.

‍There is an even more fundamental problem: historians ordinarily trace the Baptist movement as a distinct Christian tradition to the early seventeenth century. Calling tens of millions of medieval Europeans “Baptists” therefore requires substantial historical evidence; it cannot simply be assumed.

‍7. Catholicism Denies the Inspiration and Authority of Scripture

‍You claim that Catholicism denies the inspiration and authority of Scripture. Once again, we can settle the question of what Catholicism actually teaches simply by consulting the Catholic Church's own authoritative documents.

‍The Catechism says:

‍“The inspired books teach the truth. Since therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures” (CCC 107).

‍Catholics and Protestants disagree about the relationship between Scripture, Tradition, and the teaching authority of the Church. Those disagreements are real and important. But disagreement over whether Scripture is the sole infallible rule of faith is not the same thing as disagreement over whether Scripture is inspired and authoritative. Catholicism unequivocally affirms the divine inspiration and authority of Scripture.

‍You also wrote, “In 300 AD, our Baptist forefathers decided to live in caves rather than surrender their churches to Rome.”

‍What historical evidence supports that statement?

‍Who were these Baptists? What were their names? Where were their congregations? What did they believe about baptism, the Eucharist, church government, salvation, and the other doctrines that distinguish Baptists from other Christians? Where are the contemporary documents identifying them as a recognizable Baptist movement?

‍Historians ordinarily trace the Baptist movement as a distinct Christian tradition to the early seventeenth century, particularly to John Smyth and Thomas Helwys. That does not by itself prove every Baptist doctrine wrong, of course. A doctrine stands or falls on its truth, not merely on the date at which a particular denomination arose. But if someone claims that Baptist churches existed in A.D. 300, that is a historical claim, and historical claims require historical evidence.

‍And that brings me to the fundamental problem with your webpage.

‍You wrote that you “could write an entire book that will explain that Catholicism is not Christianity.” But before Catholicism can be shown to be unchristian, Catholic teaching first has to be accurately represented.

‍The Catholic Church does not teach that we earn our initial justification by good works. It does not teach that the pope is equal with God or personally sinless. It does not teach Catholics to worship statues. It does not teach that Christ is crucified again at every Mass. And it certainly does not deny the inspiration and authority of Scripture.

‍Whether the doctrines Catholicism actually teaches are biblical is a legitimate question, and one worth discussing. But that discussion cannot begin with doctrines Catholicism does not teach.

‍I know from my own experience how easy it is to misunderstand Catholicism. I was once an evangelical Protestant and a Baptist myself. I eventually discovered that many of the things I had assumed Catholics believed were not what the Catholic Church actually taught. Once I began comparing those assumptions with Catholic sources—and then comparing Catholic teaching with Scripture and the writings of the early Christians—I was forced to reconsider what I believed.

‍I assume that you sincerely want to lead people to the truth. I simply ask that, before telling them why Catholicism is wrong, you first make certain that the Catholicism you are criticizing is the Catholicism that Catholics actually believe.

‍God bless you!

‍Gary

‍__________

^‍1 Josiah C. Russell, “Population in Europe,” in Carlo M. Cipolla, ed., The Fontana Economic History of Europe, Vol. I: The Middle Ages, (Glasgow: Collins/Fontana, 1972), 25-71.