IN ESSENTIALS UNITY, IN NON-ESSENTIALS LIBERTY, IN ALL THINGS CHARITY
Believe it or not, there is a definition for being a Christian. A Christian can be defined as someone who holds to the Primary Essential Doctrines of the Christian faith. One of the greatest things that I have learned throughout my studies and experiences is that there is a problem within the church. Believers, new and old, mature and immature in the faith, seem to be ignorant of the concept of Essential Doctrines. I discovered this when hearing the criticisms and arguments from a group of people who said they were once Christian but are no longer: the Deconstructionists. Many of these people claim to have been believers for years but they knew nothing about the Essential Doctrines of the Christian faith. Ignorance of the Essentials is an epidemic now and needs to be addressed.
In summary, this is what is meant by Essential Doctrines of the Christian Faith
If we go back to the history of the church, to the basic theological structure of Christianity, there is an irreducible minimum orthodoxy of theology to which the Roman Church, the Protestant Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church and all the rest have subscribed. This is known in theological circles and historical theology as the Christian doctrines or the church dogmas throughout the ages. This is the Biblical position which the church has always maintained. In Roman Catholic theology, in Eastern Orthodox theology and all of the historic theology of the church we are in consistent agreement on the following: