In Ephesians 4:4-5, St. Paul writes, “There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call,one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all”
With so many references to being one, why is it that there are so many thousands of different religious denominations in the world? Some sources say that there are upwards of 40,000 different denominations since the Reformation, yet Catholicism has been there since Jesus Christ, the Catholic Church is the Church Jesus Christ established His Church here on earth.
For hundreds of years the Catholic Church was one, just as Christ wished it to be.
“And I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd” (John 10:16).
Jesus didn’t establish the Church so that there could be tens of thousands of fractures. He created the Church to be one flock under one shepherd.
Jesus goes on to pray in John 17:21 “that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.”
For 2,000 years there has been one Catholic Church that Jesus Christ himself proclaimed would not be overcome by the gates of hell itself (Matthew 16:18).