Two possibilities...

[Drich]

The problem with your argument is that there were no other kinds of Christians between the ascension of Catholicism and the Protestant Reformation. Yet (see chart I posted) we see persecution of the Jews going back to practically the beginning of Christianity.

If your time line says Christians were persecuting people as soon as they got organized or shortly their after then it's wrong. In the beginning the Jews persecuted Christians/Christ, otherwise they would not have killed Him or stoned so many believers. then the Romans followed suit for nearly 300 years till Constantine put an end to it in 324 AD when all of roman fell under his authority. Then we lived in relative peace till the fall of the Roman Empire.

You can't ignore ~1500 years of Christian history and say that the Christians acting throughout that time were not following the God of the Bible, that they weren't TrueChristians™.

Oh, but I can.. It's you can't say that just because someone calls themselves a Christian, makes them One. Christ Himself says in Mat 7 that not everyone claiming to know Him will He acknoweledge. He also says 'you will know them by their fruit.' Meaning we will know a Christian by their actions. So we can indeed look at the behavior of those who persecute others and determine if this is a 'Christian/Christ like Behaivor.' Therefore that 'History' can be dismissed as Worship NOT sanctioned by the God of the bible. Because Again nothing in the bible supports that behavior.

Does that mean this is not the history of the christian religion? No. The difference being Christianity is defined by Christ. the christian Religion is defined by man. Being a member of the religion does not in no way make you a Christian by the standard of Christ. How can one say that? Because again, Unlike the no true scots man fallacy their are rules that define a Christian by the standards of Christ in the bible. If one does not follow said rules we are told Christ will not acknoweledge them as 'Christian.'

There is a clear pattern of systematic abuse of Jews until fairly recently in time, based on people's perception of what the Bible demanded of them

If their is 'perception' without a written command in the bible that perception then becomes delusion. For how can one perceive any such thing if we in fact have commands and passages that would have us honor the jews?
(romans 11)

(through their leaders, as happens today with the anti-gay rhetoric, despite being only a few obscure verses, some of which are of questionable value and none of which have anything to do with the teachings of Jesus, who mentions divorce but not gays).

In your opinion, why would Christ need to mention a prohibition of Homosexuality when He explicitly states that all sex outside the confines of a sanctified marriage is a sin? The obvious point being their isn't a context scripturally in the new or old testament in which a homosexual can enter into a sanctified marriage covenant with God, thus making all homosexual activity sinful.

Yours is a argument from silence that wants to be permissive of something the Law and Christ clearly says is not allowed even IF the sin is not identified by name. Even if you can, in your own mind explain away all the different verses that outright says homosexuality is a sin (romans 1 for example) at best all you have done is make the bible silent about that specific topic.

Even so The bible says a lot about sex and the only context in which it is permitted. to which Homosexuality has NEVER been honored by God in such away as to have access to the marriage covenant under His blessing. Which again makes homosexuality a sexual sin, just like all other sexual sin. Meaning it is not an unforgivable sin, nor is it any worse than any other sexual sin. However as far as sin goes sexual sin is all considered to be pretty bad stuff. even so, their is forgiveness available if one turns from wanting this sin in his heart, even if they are a slave to it physically and mentally.

That is the difference between the persecution of a people and the identification and being held accountable to sin. As people we are all the same under God. as a unrepentant sinner we are outside of God's Grace and mercy. To identify sin is to help and restore our brother. If we accept and justify our sin then we will never have any hope of redemption.

You're willing to swallow a weird prejudice based on a few verses and a lot of church culture, but then want to turn around and say "but those verses they used to justify hatred of the Jews for the past 1900 years aren't really proper doctrine, it was just a twisting of false leadership". It's more than a bit strange to me to read such an argument, given that factor.

Again it's Really Really simple. Man's identification of Church in all forms be damned. Just because we say something is for and of God means nothing. Which mean that our religions and religious practices in of themselves have and hold no intrinsic value. It is only through the word of God can we ever truly hope to know who God is and what He wants and expects from us. If what we do is not authorized by God or commanded by God in the bible it means we are working in religion, and not true exegetically sound (God identified and prescribed) worship/Actions then what we 'do' whatever it is will be judged by God/Christ for merit. He does this by looking at several factors, but bottom line if it is not in the Spirit of Christianity or it Goes against key apsects of Exegetically backed doctrine, then it can not be called a "Christian" act. Yes it can be identified as a work of religion or even the 'christian church', but even so is not a God of the bible sponcered or sanctioned action.

(As an aside, I'm curious: if Peter was not really the first Pope, then how did the second one become Pope? I happen to agree with you--though I have no evidence and freely admit that it's just conjecture on my part--that, at some point, somebody in power in the early orthodox church made it up and assigned Peter the role after-the-fact, so they'd have an authoritative lineage traceable to Jesus, but I'm curious to hear your explanation.)

Ironically we only have Catholic church history that tells us this, but the gospel writer Mark was Peter's primary understudy, and the Gospel of Mark is actually Peter's account of the Gospel. That said, Mark after Peter's death went on to Africa and started the church efforts there. He did not head up the whole church. The first few centuries of the church worked far differently, meaning Each church was under the supervision of a given apostle all operated differently. In essence each Church was it's own denomination. Their wasn't one set of rules or one church as with the R/C church. That is why their are so many different letters dealing with so many different topics, and why their is not one centralized set of rules that govern everything.. like a NT version of the 10 commandments. Think about it, coming out of the Age of the Jews the church would have been very easily established if we like the jews were given a central charter and made to follow a given rule set. But, rather we have nearly 2 dozen letters covering a whole range of issues the various first century churches dealt with.

Peter was indeed incharge of a set of churches and we can see his works in the gospel of Mark and the books named after Him, but that's it. Peter and Paul at one time were at odds with one another and this is spelled out in the book of Acts and even in some of Paul's writtings to His churches, where Peter wanted Paul to change some of the things he taught to align with what He (Peter) taught, and Paul keeps on with what He taught. Bottom line Peter did not have the Papal authority that the pope has now. However He was respected and revered by His churches and followers, as was Paul, and were the rest on Equal footing, not one over another. This means the first man with the title Pope in the 6th century was indeed the first pope, and as you said just tied himself to peter, and made a bigger deal about his ties to peter than he should have.

Which in of itself is not an action supported by the bible/God. Look at all the Harm and persecution that came from that one act of selfishness. Perhaps at the time the church because it was initially set off in so many different directions Needed this form of unity to protect itself from a civial war of sorts, or perhaps this is an example of absolute power corrupting absolutely... We are not in a position to judge that man's heart. Only His actions and whether or not they are consistant with Scripture. It is Jesus' job to judge that particular man by looking at all that he did and the reasons why to determine whether or not his action would be deem righteous or sinful.