re: History/Religion question for those interested

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I've always considered the position of pope as inherently sinful. Peter was the leader of the church, yes, but was never put up as more important spiritually than any other person.

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Agree. Except for the fact that I don't think Peter nor the early church even considered him to be the leader. God was leading the early church, and I think everyone saw it that way. Peter, Paul, and others went around making sure many of the early churches did not go astray in their thinking, but never did anyone declare a human to be the "leader" of the church.

The Catholic church is literally what happened when Christianity was made the state religion of pagan Rome. Pagan practices were literally intertwined with church doctrine to produce all kinds of rituals that have no origin in the Bible.... including the position of pope itself.

While much of this was corrected under Martin Luther in the Protestant Reformation, still much persists today. While a modern day "pastor" doesn't distort church doctrine near to the same level as the position of "pope" in the Catholic church, many of the pastoral duties of protestant churches have gone down the same path. The word "Pastor" is only mentioned one time in the bible, and the biblical role of a pastor is to be simply a lead elder. No where does the Bible say that pastors get to be the sole decision maker and the sole person responsible for all teachings within a church. Like it or not, the role of a "pastor" has often evolved into being of little difference as the "pope" in the catholic church, only at a much smaller scale.

Go read the book "Pagan Christianity." It explains with detail how a lot of what people today consider to be normal everyday practices in the church actually have their roots in paganism. It's not a condescending book at all... and it was written by a Christian. It's not even really a criticism of modern church, just more of a historical account of where we got a lot of things in the church today.