As of early 2026, there are over 2.67 billion Christians globally, representing roughly 32% of the world's population. This population is divided between the 1.422 billion members of the Roman Catholic Church and approximately 1.25 billion non-Catholic Christians. Subtract from that figure about 300,000 Eastern Orthodox Catholics who do not consider the Pope an authority.
Thus the reformation remains the event that created the non-Catholic world. That being said, much of Protestant theology has many little but super powerful popes. These are people, due to the popularity of their theology, personality and dogmas, have gained followers as intensely and as faithfully as Roman Catholics follow the leadership of their Pope. Names like Martin Luter, John Calvin, Jacobus Arminius, John Westley, Huldrych Zwingli, Philipp Melanchthon, Thomas Cranmer, Jonathan Edwards, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Karl Barth, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Most, not all perspectives about non-Roman Catholic theology that are expressed in this forum are the theological and dogmatic children of these and other men. The growth of these little popes, we call them religious leaders, in the last 50 yrs are almost too numerous to name.
Each championed a methodology and or a perspective of biblical interpretation that those on this forum repeat with great passion but with little understanding of where our most deeply believed doctrines and dogmas come from. Few grow up "just reading the bible." We grow up in or later become adherents to the interpretive biblical lens invented by our theological forefathers and in one case, foremothers. We are taught that the bible must be accepted and interpreted through these ancient lens as only then can you "know the Truth." Thus we have a growing gulf between non-Catholic christians that gets wider over time. All in a quest to be true to the doctrines and interpretive lenses invented not so long ago that we claim as our own.
Our intuition is that we "discovered" our biblical interpretations, priorities, theologies and commitments by ourselves. It's like sitting down to a sumptuous meal and arguing about the taste of the food without realizing the number of chefs that developed the religious ingredients we so treasure as "our own."
This reality should give 21s Century Christianity a sense of grace for other Christian traditions that simply had different little popes defining their beliefs. Beliefs we defend as if we are defending God's truth. There is no doubt our little popes were just defending their unique take on the Truth of God, but of course according their unique take. What we inherit is the interpretive lens through which everything looks to us exactly like it did for those invented those lenses. Much of what passes for 21st century Christianity was invented after the 16fth century with big changes in the 18th, 20th and 21st centuries.
We live in age where anyone wanting perspective on what they believe and how we came to believe it can easily find that information. It can be liberating to explore the definition of Christianity coming to us from the 1st and 2nd centuries as Christianity began to create form after the death of those who knew Jesus personally died. The more we know about the diversity of accepted beliefs before Christianity was taken over by the State, the more we can see Christian diversity today through a more ancient and more accepting lens. That journey comes with a warning that what you find may illuminate our current Christian world uncomfortably.
