The Problem of the Burden of Proof to Demonstrate the Authority of the Protestant Reformers to Legitimately Oppose the Roman Catholic Church with Many Novel Doctrines and Practices not Previously Found in Church History.

The Protestant Reformers taught the Roman Catholic Church had become corrupt and no longer taught the gospel once delivered to the saints. The Reformers made claims and demanded to be taken seriously by European Christian society. Yet the Reformers had a burden of proof to bear to demonstrate their claims that they were teaching the only true gospel of justification by faith alone that had been lost. The Reformers had to -

1) Explain how church history up until the Protestant Reformation was dominated by Roman Catholic doctrine and practice, along with the similar doctrines and practices of the Orthodox churches that can trace their origin back to Christ and the apostles through the schism that occurred in 1054. The Reformers invented new doctrines and practices in contradiction to the 1500 year Roman Catholic tradition. Such a large divergence of doctrine and practice from church history must be taken into account and shown to have a greater truth value than Church history. 

Such a burden has never been seriously undertaken by the Reformers, nor the subsequent reformed churches. For such a burden is too difficult to bear. At every stage of the Reformed defence of their burden, they are confronted with the Roman Catholic accusation of the Reformers having made a human invention of a multitude of new doctrines and practices not previously found in church history.

2) The Reformers had to explain how they had authority greater than that of the Roman Catholic church when the Reformers had no authority to invent any new doctrines and practices. Yet the Romand Catholic church and the Orthodox churches have the authority of apostolic succession to continue the traditions handed to them from Christ and the apostles, through the Popes and the bishops. The Reformers have the burden of proof to show they have more, or the only authority to change doctrines and practices found in church history, when in fact there is no authority granted to any group of men outside the church as found in scripture, or tradition. 

Such a burden has never been seriously undertaken by the Reformers, nor the subsequent reformed churches. For such a burden is too difficult to bear. At every stage of the Reformed defence of their burden, they are confronted with the Roman Catholic accusation of the Reformers having made a human invention of their own authority to teach and govern in Christ's name when no such authority exists within Protestantism. 

3) The Reformers had to explain where the principle of private interpretation came from when the Reformers had no mandate to privately interpret the scriptural texts to arrive at their novel doctrines and practices. In fact, private interpretation is against the nature of public revelation that demands a public institution be set up to teach and guard the entire deposit of faith including all practices found in tradition. 

As the principle of private interpretation is not found within divine revelation, the reformers used a method alien to divine revelation. Also because private interpretation is not found in church history as the means by which doctrines are taught and defended against heretics, the Reformers have only an invented, false principle used to arrive at new and false doctrines and practices.

4) The Reformers had to explain how the Reformers disagreed with each other on many doctrines and practices when they taught the new gospel, and yet Christendom was meant to take them seriously. After all, if the reformers and their Protestant descendants could not agree with each other over many doctrines, what confidence can anyone have that any of the so-called Reformers were, in fact, reforming anything, rather than only inventing their own doctrines and practices? There is no confidence in such a scenario, for widespread confusion and diversity of Reformation doctrines and practices is only explainable through Protestant errors and not the God of truth and infinite power.

5) The Reformers had to explain how their differences of doctrines and practices logically conclude to a practical atheism, and simultaneously hold to the claim that they were teaching the true gospel. For real differences in doctrine and practice between the Reformers and later Protestants infers God has not revealed doctrines and practices, but only men have come to diverse opinions concerning the content and meaning of divine revelation. Such a real difference means God knew those difference would occur but chose to make a revelation that would end in mass confusion, error and unbelief. 

The god of Protestant revelation is then the god of an implied agnosticism, confusion and unbelief. Such a god is a false god, which infers the Reformers and later Protestantism promotes which logically concludes to a practical atheism. Therefore the Reformers gospel is really not the gospel of Christ, but the gospel of practical agnosticism, which infers atheism. The Protestant god is only a human invention as a partial imitation of the true God of church history, whilst denying the authority of the church and church history caused by the true God of history.

6) The Reformers had to explain why anyone would want to take them seriously when the early Reformers were men of deep moral flaws. For example, Martin Luther rebelled against church doctrine, church history, and removed seven biblical books from the Old and New Testaments. He also broke his vows made as an Augustinian monk, married an ex-nun, and invented at least fifty doctrines different to Catholic doctrines whilst claiming to have a scrupulous conscience. Other Reformers also had moral flaws. The deep moral flaws of the Reformers is difficult to defend when they opposed the Catholic church based upon deep morals flaws that caused corruption in the Catholic church at the time.

Conclusion - The Reformers made claims about their own authority and about their gospel which are claims they must bear. As the burden confronted by the Reformers and later Protestant churches is enormous, such a burden will never be met with any convincing arguments. Therefore there is no compelling reasons to take the Protestant Reformation seriously as a movement from God, but rather only an errant movement of men without any authority from God, made in opposition to the corruption within the Catholic Church. 

The Catholic church had corruption within it, but the solution to the corruption was not a revolt against the true church instituted by Christ, but a reform from within using the bishops and Popes given to the church and humanity by the Holy Spirit.