>>602183
I'll give you a brief summary of points. When the reformers in the West ultimately left the RCC, to start their own churches, they originally had in mind the idea of bringing everyone into and under their own state church heirarchy. They had wanted to reform "the Church" to their liking, not to start their own. It wasn't until 1529, after the Diet of Speyer, when six princes and 14 imperial cities in the HRE protested the rollbacks of previous concessions to their reforms in the Diet of Speyer that the term "Protestant" came into use.
So you see, the term Protestant originally refers to a political protest rather than a theological one, as the named "protest" was occurring due to a political faction of Europe. Although today the term is frequently given to encompass a far wider range of theological doctrines than were encompassed in 1529, where the term originated with those six princes and 14 imperial city rulers whose actual intentions were to reform "the Church." Many branches of state church have since proceeded from these general ideas of "reformation," and it would therefore be fitting to refer to them as Protestant; however, meanwhile, those Christians who have never intended to take part in such a state church or in the act of reforming such an entity (as though it were legitimate), would not have found common cause with these princes and rulers.