Christianity Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 2

Christianity - Essay Example There are numerous differences and similarities between the Catholics and Pentecostals. Some are complicated and others are simple. In this paper, we are going to try to simplify those that are complicated for the sake of the understanding of those who have no Christian background. To begin with, we will look at the differences between the two Christian denominations (Peterson, para1). The first difference is that the Catholic Church (the Roman Catholic), the most popular catholic church in the world, apply the infallibility and the leadership of the Pope as their link with God. The Pope is the voice of God to the congregation. However, in the case of Pentecostals they do not have a specific person they look upon as their voice from God. Instead each group has a pastor as a spiritual leader and every member of the small group can be used as a voice of God to the rest of the members (Edwards, para4-6). The Catholics teach salvation through works and faith and they occasionally have to make confession to the priest who advices them on what to do to obtain mercy and forgiveness from God. None of Pentecostal groups requires its members to make any sort of confession, though some require confession of some kinds of sins before the congregation. In addition, Pentecostals do not believe that works are part of salvation but to them, salvation is through grace (Emberson, para1). Furthermore, Catholic worship style is very formal and highly structured. Nevertheless, for Pentecostals, worshipping is usually informal with a lot of dancing in the spirit, shouting, clapping of hands and various forms of enthusiastic displays. Another difference lies in the partaking of the Holy Communion. Roman Catholics believe in transubstantiation, whereby the elements of the unleavened bread and the wine miraculously become the body and blood of Jesus Christ and only the priest takes the cup. In the case of Pentecostals, they believe that bread and vine tree juice