Isn't that exactly what Luther and Calvin were all about?
Sort of. Other Protestants too... and most especially even the unorthodox/heterodox sect my grandfather was part of
I grew up with the idea that the Catholic and Orthodox ideas had drifted far from the truth
Which may be no worse than what Catholic and Orthodox theologians said to one another and to Protestants
Somewhere later I read that Quakers were almost "ritualistically a-ritualistic" whatever that means, I took it to mean they were so opposed to ritual and images that they called attention to it somehow.
Being too caught up in proving how different you are from other denominations perhaps became its own idol, invisible and abstract though it may be.
Somehow growing up I got the idea that identifying oneself with a denomination and being proud of it and defiantly announcing how you were different from other denominations was what religion was all about.
It wasn't just from the Armstrong churches either, it was every little thing I read or picked up on about religion, around me, or on TV or books, or whatever, that made me conclude that. Acquaintances, kids at school evangelizing (YES!) people my mom knew with their interdenominational rivalries, people my grandma knew, what grandma described of her upbringing in what must have been a Pentecostal church, etc.
That other denominations were not good enough, if not wrong or bad.
That other religions, as fascinating as they may be, were somehow wrong or bad or demonic or something.
But it's that kind of thinking that leads people down dark paths, not having fantasy art portraits. I would think.
