[Nikas777]

Protestants who make this argument have to understand that this makes Christianity into a joke/false religion because if this assertion was correct then there was no true Christian from the time of the death of the Apostles till whoever founded said Protestant faction. That means Jesus is made into a liar when he said his church would continue unbroken till his return.

Of course to get around this Protestants who make the claim this article does - and not all do so let us be clear - state that the real church was underground for all these centuries until such and such re-founded the original church. That is why they tend to make heroes of Christian heretical movements and see them as proto-Protestants etc - even though doctrinally those earlier heretical movements don't match Protestantism much at all. I probably over simplified the response of mine but I think I got the gist of it out.

[Kolokotronis]

“That is why they tend to make heroes of Christian heretical movements and see them as proto-Protestants etc - even though doctrinally those earlier heretical movements don’t match Protestantism much at all.”

After you’ve spent some time on these FR Religion threads, you will see all sorts of ancient heresies embraced by our protestant friends, not just Waldensianism and Novatianism. One of the heresies most widely embraced is Nestorianism, which the author of this article apparently espouses.

[wagglebee]

Protestants who make this argument have to understand that this makes Christianity into a joke/false religion because if this assertion was correct then there was no true Christian from the time of the death of the Apostles till whoever founded said Protestant faction.

No, they seem to believe that there were groups practicing YOPIOS and rejecting Church teaching from the very beginning. Unfortunately, they have never been able to produce a single shread of evidence that any such groups existed. It's actually a lot like Mormonism.

[Claud]

That is why they tend to make heroes of Christian heretical movements and see them as proto-Protestants etc - even though doctrinally those earlier heretical movements don't match Protestantism much at all.

Exactly. The author needs to have a Trail-of-blood type explanation, or else he's confronted with the strange task of accusing the entire first centuries of the Church to be heterodox.