Personal Narrative: The Spread Of Christianity

Christianity began its succession into the most dominant worldwide religion after Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days build another made without hands.” Upon Jesus’ death and resurrection, he completed this task setting forth the development of Christianity. Since Jesus left no formal authoritative power, organization, or agreed upon scriptures, a wide variety of sects gained popularity in the development of Christianity. Most of these sects were later deemed as heretic, one of the most notable being Gnosticism. Gnosticism was a dualist religion believing the material world evil and the invisible spirit realm good. This belief obligated Gnosticism to follow Docetic interpretations. Docetism is the belief that Jesus was never truly man but rather a divine from the spirit world. All forms of Christianity, however, believe Jesus is son of God sent as humanity’s savior from damnation. Docetism, along with other aspects of Gnosticism, drove other Christians condemn Gnosticism as heresy. Gnosticism, however, is more comparable to Canonical Christians than realized. Specifically, the distinction between Docetism and strict Canonical belief is not only insignificant but also justifiable due to Canonical contradictions surrounding Jesus’ existence.

Several factors contributing to the rapid spread of Christianity from the period ca. 50 to 500 CE but, among the more influential were political and social conflict, missionary work, word of mouth, and women in leadership. Starting as a Jewish sect, Christianity gradually began to attract those outside of the Jewish heritage. Though the first few centuries of this movement were anything but glamorous, both Jewish and Gentile Christians remained steadfast. The ecclesiastical works of the early Church Fathers offer solace to such who were continually persecuted, a people of lower society status or even slaves. During this era, the dissimilation of subversive ministries advanced the appeal of Christianity by challenging previously established social order and its structures of power, authority, and hierarchy. By late 300 CE, Christianity had revolutionized and was adopted as the universal religion of the Roman Empire as a result of the conversion of its emperor. Thus the strength behind Christian communities lead to the discovery and conversion of indigenous cultures around the world using force, wealth, missionary work, and the gospel.

Christianity was born and flourished in an empire where the common language was Latin and Greek. Two important people like Paul and Constantine further influenced and were a major part of the development of Christianity. The history of the Jews leading up to the time of Jesus had a major impact on the development of Christianity. “When Christianity was clearly identified as a distant religion, the new religion was considered by its members to be the fulfillment of Judaism rather than a new religion.” “Since Jesus was a Jew and preached to the Jews, Christianity was closely linked to Judaism.” The development of Christianity was due to several historical, political, and social circumstances.

Christianity and the Roman Empire shared an important bond. Christianity offered the Roman Empire joy, hope, a shift in their world view, and a monotheistic God. Rome offered Christianity a more efficient way of spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Factors Which Led to the Spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire Christianity was not born in a vacumn. There were many social, geographical, historical and religious issues prevailing at the time of Christ and all of which were favorable to the spread of Christianity. Geograpicly, Christianity came into being in the Meditation world, the largest of the various centers of civilization at that time. Israel stands almost central to the five continents, dividing the east and west.

Christianity is the most practiced religion in the world. There's many ways to believe in or practice the religion. There's also multiple categories like catholic, baptist, lutheran, and christian.

Through out history, there have been numerous executions of religious groups. One being the Christians. In the Roman Empire, they refused to acknowledge this new rising and developing religion, Christianity. The followers of this new group did not succumb, but were determined to spread the message of this new profound religion. Using nonviolent ways to receive peace, The Christians were able to uphold through the teachings of Jesus, the evangelism of apostles, such as Paul, and through their belief that everyone is treated equally.

I became a Christian in 1982 while in high school. I had never attended church prior to Easter 1982. I found something interesting in the whole of the service and decided to read a Bible. The Bible made some sense to me. I had a few questions about some of the stuff that had happened and was given Evidence that Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell. Well that answered most of my questions. I was also given Mere Christianity which answered more questions. I felt convicted by the Holy Spirit and asked G-d to come into my life and forgive me of my sins.

After close examination of the historical article provided, this document appears to be a letter containing a firsthand account relating the procedures of the interrogation and persecution of Christians during the spread of early Christianity. The author addresses the recipient of the letter by proclaiming, “my lord” and further referring to his lord as his authority throughout the remaining four paragraphs through the use of second person such as “you,” “your name,” and “your instructions” (1, 3-5).

Christianity is a monotheistic religion that is based on the Life, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, who they believe is their Messiah. Christianity, which was formed in the 1st Century, was based off of Judaism, a religion that also believes in Jesus but does not believe that he was the Messiah. Followers of Jesus call themselves Christians and have devoted their lives to the word of their God and live the way He has asked them to. Christians believe that Jesus was put to death in order to save them from their sins. Their sacred text is called the Bible and it contains two parts, the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament is written about the time before Jesus was born. The New Testament was written about Jesus’ life, death, and

The diversity of religions in the world is almost as wide-ranging as the diversity of culture itself (Macionis, 526). Christianity seems to be the largest religion, with 2 billion followers, one-third of the world’s population. In the 1st century C.E, Christianity evolved out from Judaism. It is based on the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and those who follow him are called “Christians.” Christianity is a monotheistic faith, which refers to only believing in one god. It is predominant in the Western World (North America, Europe and Oceania).

I spent from kindergarten to eighth grade at a Catholic school. I learned about both the Bible and the Catholic faith and never saw them at odds with each other. After eighth grade I attended Wayne Christian. I was shocked at how uneducated these Christians were on their fellow believers, claiming that the Catholics were not Christians. I try to dispel their ignorance with education such as explaining the Catholic perspective on Saint Mary, sainthood, and certain rites of the Church. Day after day I corrected them on Catholic beliefs, me against a whole school of people. I eventually had to leave the school because the people were to set in their ways. That is when I challenge something that outraged me.

Throughout history, Christianity always had a reputation, or a “name” following it. Different perspectives approached the reputation that was attached to Christianity in different manners. Justin Martyr and Porphyry had objectives when defining whether this “name” really defined Christianity and the past. They wondered whether the past really represented Christianity. Additionally they honed in on the question of was the past that people represented as Christianity really the roots of Christianity? All around Porphyry and Justin was perceptions of what Christianity rooted from and stood for.

The single most important aspect of European empires, beginning just prior to the fall of Rome, is the spread of Christianity to all areas of the continent in as little as a few hundred years. Many theologians state that Christianities spread is the indirect influence of God and the adoration of people to one true faith. Though it is true that Christianity has brought about people that even atheists could call saints, it is unquestionable that Christianity was so monumental because it united larger groups of people and its spread is contributed to adherence to local customs and its lack of new ideas in comparison to other religions of the day.

One influential cult was based upon a mystical interpretation of Plato. Neo-Platonism was like a rational science that attempted to break down and describe every aspect of the divine essence and its relationship with the human soul. An Alexandrian Jew named Philo tried using Greek philosophy to interpret the Jewish scriptures. He wanted to unite the two traditions by suggesting that the Greek philosophers had been inspired by the same God who had revealed himself to the Jews.