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The history of Christianity concerns the history of the Christian religion and the Church, from the Apostles to contemporary times. Christianity is the monotheistic religion which considers itself based on the revelation of Jesus Christ. "The Church" is understood theologically as the institution founded by Jesus for the salvation of mankind.

Christianity began in the 1st century AD as a Jewish sect. It quickly began to spread outside Judaism throughout the Greco-Roman world. Although it was originally persecuted by the Roman authorities, it would ultimately become the official religion of the Roman empire. In the Middle Ages it would spread beyond the old borders of the Western Roman Empire to Northern Europe and Russia. During the Age of Exploration, Christianity would spread to all parts of the world until today, when it is the world's largest religion.^[1]

Throughout its history, the religion weathered schisms and theological disputes that have resulted in the development of three main branches: Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Protestantism.

Life of Jesus (8–2 BC to AD 29–36)

Though the life of Jesus is a matter of academic debate, biblical scholars and historians generally agree on the following basic points: Jesus was born circa 4 BC and grew up in Nazareth in Galilee; his ministry attracted disciples, who regarded him as a wonderworker, exorcist, and healer; and he was executed by crucifixion in Jerusalem on orders of the Roman Governor of Iudaea Province, Pontius Pilate.^[2] After his crucifixion,^[3] Jesus was buried in a tomb,^[4] which was later found empty;^[5] subsequently, many of Jesus' followers reported encountering Jesus risen from the dead, a claim which formed the basis and impetus of the Christian faith.^[6]

The main sources of information regarding Jesus' life and teachings are the four canonical Gospels and to a lesser extent the writings of Paul.

Early Christianity (33 – 312)

Early Christianity refers to the period when the religion spread in the Greco-Roman world, from its beginnings as a 1st century Jewish sect,^[7] to the end of imperial persecution of Christians after the ascension of Constantine the Great in 313 AD. It may be divided into two distinct phases, the apostolic period, when the first apostles were alive and organizing the Church, and the post-apostolic period, when an early episcopal structure developed, whereby bishoprics were governed by bishops (overseers) via apostolic succession.

Apostolic Church

The Apostolic Church, or Primitive Church, was the community lead by Jesus' apostles and his relatives.^[8] According to the Great Commission, the resurrected Jesus commanded the apostles to spread his teachings to all the world. The principal source of information for this period is the Acts of the Apostles, which gives a history of the Church from Pentecost and the establishment of the Jerusalem Church to the spread of the religion among the gentiles and St. Paul's imprisonment in Rome in the mid-first century.

The first Christians were essentially all ethnically Jewish or Jewish Proselytes. An early difficulty arose concerning the matter of Gentile (non-Jewish) converts as to whether they had to "become Jewish" (i.e. be circumcised and adhere to dietary law) before becoming Christian. The decision of St. Peter, as evidenced by conversion of the Centurion Cornelius, was that they did not, and the matter was further resolved with the Council of Jerusalem.

The doctrines of the apostles brought the Early Church into conflict with some Jewish religious authorities, and this eventually led to the martyrdom of SS. Stephen and James the Great and the expulsion from the synagogues. Thus, Christianity acquired an identity distinct from Judaism. The name "Christian" (Greek [Χριστιανός] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)) was first applied to the disciples in Antioch, as recorded in 11:26 Acts 11:26,^[9] and was a form of derision.

Worship of Jesus

The sources for the beliefs of the apostolic community include the Gospels and New Testament Epistles. The very earliest accounts are contained in these texts, such as early Christian creeds and hymns, as well as accounts of the Passion, the empty tomb, and Resurrection appearances; often these are dated to within a few years of the crucifixion of Jesus, originating within the Jerusalem Church.^[10]

The earliest Christian creeds and hymns express belief in the physically risen Jesus, e.g. that preserved in 1Corinthians 15:3–4 quoted by Paul: "For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."^[11] The antiquity of the creed has been located by many scholars to less than a decade after Jesus' death, originating from the Jerusalem apostolic community,^[12] and no scholar dates it later than the 40s.^[13] Other relevant and very early creeds include 1John 4:2,^[14] 2Timothy 2:8,^[15] Romans 1:3–4,^[16] and 1Timothy 3:16, an early creedal hymn.^[17]

Jewish Continuity

Christianity retained a great many practices from its ancestral religion. Christianity considered the Jewish scriptures to be authoritative and sacred, employing mostly the Septuagint edition and translation as the Old Testament, and added other texts as the New Testament canon developed. Christians professed Jesus to be the One God, the God of Israel, and considered Jesus to be the expected Messiah (Christ). Christianity also continued other Judaic practices: liturgical worship, including the use of incense, an altar, a set of scriptural readings adapted from synagogue practice, use of sacred music in hymns and prayer, and a religious calendar, as well as other distinctive features such as an exclusively male priesthood, and ascetic practices (fasting etc.).

Post-Apostolic Church

St. Lawrence before Emperor Valerianus (martyred 258) by Fra Angelico

The post-apostolic period concerns the time roughly after the death of the apostles (for they died at different times, of course) when bishops emerged as overseers of urban Christian populations, and continues during the time of persecutions until the legalization of Christian worship with the advent of Constantine the Great. The earliest recorded use of the term Christianity (Greek [Χριστιανισμός] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)) dates to this period, attributed to Ignatius of Antioch c. 107.^[18]

Persecutions

From the beginning, Christians were subject to various persecutions. This involved even death for Christians such as Stephen (Acts 7:59) and James, son of Zebedee (12:2). Larger-scale persecutions followed at the hands of the authorities of the Roman Empire, beginning with the year 64, when, as reported by the Roman historian Tacitus, the Emperor Nero blamed them for that year's great Fire of Rome.

According to Church tradition, it was under Nero's persecution that SS. Peter and Paul were each martyred in Rome. Similarly, several of the New Testament writings mention persecutions and stress endurance through them. For 250 years Christians suffered from sporadic persecutions for their refusal to worship the Roman emperor, considered treasonous and punishable by execution. In spite of these at-times intense persecutions, the Christian religion continued its spread throughout the Mediterranean Basin.

Ecclesiastical Structure

By the late first and early second century, a hierarchical and episcopal structure becomes clearly visible; early bishops of importance are SS. Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna, and Irenaeus of Lyons. This structure was based on the doctrine of Apostolic Succession where, by the ritual of the laying on of hands, a bishop becomes the spiritual successor of the previous bishop in a line tracing back to the apostles themselves. Each Christian community also had presbyters, as was the case with Jewish communities, who were also ordained and assisted the bishop; as Christianity spread, especially in rural areas, the presbyters exercised more responsibilities and took distinctive shape as priests. Lastly, deacons also performed certain duties, such as tending to the poor and sick.

Early Christian writings

As Christianity spread, it acquired certain members from well-educated circles of the Hellenistic world; they sometimes became bishops but not always. They produced two sorts of works: theological and "apologetic", the latter being works aimed at defending the faith by using reason to refute arguments against the veracity of Christianity. These authors are known as the Church Fathers, and study of them is called Patristics. Notable early Fathers include Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, etc.

Early Heresies

One of the roles of bishops, and the purpose of many Christian writings, was to refute heresies. The earliest of these were generally Christological in nature, that is, they denied either Christ's (eternal) divinity or humanity. For example, Docetism held that Jesus' humanity was merely an illusion, thus denying the incarnation; whereas Arianism held that Jesus was not eternally divine. Most of these groups were dualistic, maintaining that reality was composed into two radically opposing parts: matter, usually seen as evil, and spirit, seen as good. Orthodox Christianity, on the other hand, held that both the material and spiritual worlds were created by God and were therefore both good, and that this was represented in the unified divine and human natures of Christ.^[19]

The New Testament itself speaks of the importance of maintaining orthodox doctrine and refuting heresies, showing the antiquity of the concern.^[20] The development of doctrine, the position of orthodoxy, and the relationship between the early Church and early heretical groups is a matter of academic debate. Some scholars, drawing upon distinctions between Jewish Christians, Gentile Christians, and other groups such as Gnostics, see Early Christianity as fragmented and with contemporaneous competing orthodoxies.

Biblical Canon

A folio from P46, early 3rd c. New Testament manuscript useful in discerning the early Christian canon.

The Biblical canon is the set of books Christians regard as divinely inspired and thus constituting the Christian Bible. Though the Early Church used the Old Testament according to the canon of the Septuagint (LXX), the apostles did not otherwise leave a defined set of new scriptures; instead the New Testament developed over time.

The writings attributed to the apostles circulated amongst the earliest Christian communities. The Pauline epistles were circulating in collected form by the end of the first century AD. The Bryennios list is an early Christian canon found in Codex Hierosolymitanus and dated to around 100.^[21] Justin Martyr, in the early second century, mentions the "memoirs of the apostles", but his references are not detailed. Around 160 Irenaeus of Lyons refers to the four Gospels (the Tetramorph), and argued that it would be illogical to reject Acts of the Apostles but accept the Gospel of Luke, as both were from the same author.^[22] By the early 200's, Origen may have been using the same 27 books as in the modern New Testament, though there were still disputes over the canonicity of Hebrews, James, II Peter, II and III John, and Revelation.^[23] Likewise by 200 the Muratorian fragment shows that there existed a set of Christian writings somewhat similar to what is now the New Testament.

In his Easter letter of 367, Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, gave a list exactly the same in number and order with what would become the New Testament canon and be accepted by the Greek church.^[24] The African Synod of Hippo, in 393, approved the New Testament, as it stands today, together with the Septuagint books, a decision that was repeated by Councils of Carthage in 397 and 419. Pope Damasus I's Council of Rome in 382, only if the Decretum Gelasianum is correctly associated with it, issued a biblical canon identical to that mentioned above.^[25] In 405, Pope Innocent I sent a list of the sacred books to a Gallic bishop, Exsuperius of Toulouse. Nonetheless, a full dogmatic articulation of the canon was not made until the Council of Trent in the sixteenth century.^[26]

Oral Tradition

Church of the Roman Empire (313 – 476)

Christianity in Late Antiquity begins with the ascension of Constantine to the Emperorship of Rome in the early fourth century, and continues until the advent of the Middle Ages. The terminus of this period is variable because the transformation to the sub-Roman period was gradual and occurred at different times in different areas. It may generally be dated as lasting to the late sixth century and the reconquests of Justinian, though a more traditional date is 476, the year the last western emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed.

Christianity legalized

Galerius issued an edict permitting the practice of the Christian religion under his rule in April of 311.^[27] In 313 Constantine I and Licinius announced toleration of Christianity in the Edict of Milan. Constantine would become the first Christian emperor. By 391, under the reign of Theodosius I, Christianity had become the state religion of Rome. Constantine I, the first emperor to embrace Christianity, was also the first emperor to openly promote the newly legalized religion.

Constantine the Great

The Emperor Constantine I was exposed to Christianity by his mother, Helena. There is scholarly controversy, however, as to whether Constantine adopted his mother's humble Christianity in his youth, or whether he adopted it gradually over the course of his life.^[28]

The Christian sources record that Constantine experienced a dramatic event in 312 at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, after which Constantine would claim the emperorship in the West. Before the battle, the sources say, Constantine looked up to the sun and saw a cross of light above it, and with it the Greek words "Εν Τουτω Νικα" ("by this, conquer!", often rendered in the Latin "in hoc signo vinces"); Constantine commanded his troops to adorn their shields with a Christian symbol (the Chi-Ro), and thereafter they were victorious.^[29] How much Christianity Constantine adopted at this point is difficult to discern; most influential people in the empire, especially high military officials, were still pagan, and Constantine's rule exhibited at least a willingness to appease these factions. The Roman coins minted up to eight years subsequent to the battle still bore the images of Roman gods.^[30] Nonetheless, the ascension of Constantine was a turning point for the Christian Church. After his victory, Constantine supported the Church financially, built various basilicas, granted privileges (e.g. exemption from certain taxes) to clergy, promoted Christians to high ranking offices, and returned property confiscated during the Great Persecution of Diocletian.^[31] Between 324 and 330, Constantine built, virtually from scratch, a new imperial capital at Byzantium on the Bosphorus (it came to be named for him: Constantinople) – the city employed overtly Christian architecture, contained churches within the city walls (unlike "old" Rome), and had no pagan temples.^[32] Lastly, Constantine was baptized on his death.

Constantine also had an active role in the activity of the Church. In 313, he issued the Edict of Milan, legalizing Christian worship. In 316, he acted as a judge in a North African dispute concerning the heresy of Donatism. More significantly, in 325 he summoned the Council of Nicaea, effectively the first Ecumenical Council (unless the Council of Jerusalem is so classified), to deal mostly with the heresy of Arianism. The reign of Constantine established a precedent for the position of the Christian Emperor in the Church. Emperors considered themselves responsible to God for the spiritual health of their subjects, and thus they had a duty of maintain orthodoxy.^[33] The emperor did not decide doctrine - that was the responsibility of the bishops - rather his role was to enforce doctrine, root out heresy, and uphold ecclesiastical unity.^[34] The emperor ensured that God was properly worshiped in his empire; what proper worship consisted of was for the Church to determine. This precedent would continue until certain emperors of the fifth and six centuries sought to alter doctrine by imperial edit without recourse to councils, though even after this Constantine's precedent generally remained the norm.^[35]

The reign of Constantine, nonetheless, does not represent a complete acceptance, or end of persecution, for Christianity in the empire. His successor in the East, Constantius II, was an Arian heretic; he kept Arian bishops at his court and installed them in various sees, expelling the orthodox bishops. Constantius's successor, Julian the Apostate, practiced a Neo-platonic and mystical form of paganism, and he sought to reinstitute paganism as the state religion, but modifying it by copying the Christian episcopal structure and adding an emphasis on public charity (hitherto unknown in Roman paganism). But his reign was short, and subsequently Christianity came to dominance; Theodosius I closed pagan temples, forbade pagan worship, and made Christianity the exclusive official state religion.^[36]

Diocesan Structure

After legalization, the Church adopted the same organizational boundaries as the Empire: geographical provinces, called dioceses, corresponding to imperial governmental territorial division. The bishops, who were located in major urban centers as per pre-legalization tradition, thus oversaw each diocese. The bishop's location was his "seat", or "see"; among the sees, five held special eminence: Rome, Constantinople, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria. The prestige of these sees depended in part on their apostolic founders, from whom the bishops were therefore the spiritual successors, e.g. St. Mark as founder of the See of Alexandria, St. Peter of the See of Rome, etc. There were other significant elements: Jerusalem was the location of Christ's death and resurrection, the site of a first century council, etc., Antioch was where Jesus' followers were first called Christians, Rome was where SS. Peter and Paul had been martyred, Constantinople was the "New Rome" where Constantine had moved his capital c. 330, and, lastly, all these cities had important relics.

Papacy and primacy

The Pope is the Bishop of Rome and the office is the "papacy". As a bishopric, its origin is consistent with the development of an episcopal structure in the first century. The papacy, however, also carries the notion of primacy: that the See of Rome is preeminent amongst all other sees. The origins of this concept are historically obscure; theologically, it is based on three ancient Christian traditions: (1) that the apostle Peter was preeminent among the apostles, (2) that Peter ordained his successors for the Roman See, and (3) that the bishops are the successors of the apostles (apostolic succession). As long as the Papal See also happened to be the capital of the Western Empire, the prestige of the Bishop of Rome could be taken for granted without the need of sophisticated theological argumentation beyond these points; after its shift to Milan and then Ravenna, however, more detailed arguments were developed based on Matthew 16:18–19 etc.^[37] Nonetheless, in antiquity the Petrine and Apostolic quality, as well as a "primacy of respect", concerning the Roman See went unchallenged by emperors, eastern patriarchs, and the Eastern Church alike.^[38] The Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in 381 affirmed the primacy of Rome.^[39] Though the appellate jurisdiction of the Pope, and the position of Constantinople, would require further doctrinal clarification, by the close of Antiquity the primacy of Rome and the sophisticated theological arguments supporting it were fully developed. Just what exactly was entailed in this primacy, and its being exercised, would become a matter of controversy at certain later times.

Ecumenical Councils

During this era, several Ecumenical Councils were convened. These were mostly concerned with Christological disputes. The two Councils of Niceaea (324, 382) condemned the Arian heresy and produced a creed (see Nicene Creed). The Council of Ephesus condemned Nestorianism and affirmed the Blessed Virgin Mary to be Theotokos ("God-bearer" or "Mother of God"). Perhaps the most significant council was the Council of Chalcedon that affirmed that Christ had two natures, fully God and fully man, distinct yet always in perfect union. This was based largely on Pope Leo the Great's Tome. Thus, it condemned Monophysitism and would be influential in refuting Monothelitism.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers

The early Church Fathers have already been mentioned above; however, Late Antique Christianity produced a great many renowned Fathers who wrote volumes of theological texts, including SS. Augustine, Gregory Nazianzus, Cyril of Jerusalem, Ambrose of Milan, Jerome, and others. What resulted was a golden age of literary and scholarly activity unmatched since the days of Virgil and Horace. Some of these fathers, such as John Chrysostom and Athanasius, suffered exile, persecution, or martyrdom from heretical Byzantine Emperors. Many of their writings are translated into English in the compilations of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.

Monasticism

Monasticism is a form of asceticism whereby one renounces worldly pursuits (in contempu mundi) and concentrates solely on heavenly and spiritual pursuits, especially by the virtues humility, poverty, and chastity. It is a family of similar traditions that began to develop early in the history of the Christian Church, modeled upon Scriptural examples and ideals and with roots in certain strands of Judaism; St. John the Baptist is seen as the archtypical monk and monasticism was also inspired by the organization of the Apostolic community as recorded in Acts of the Apostles.

There are two forms of monasticism: eremetic and cenobitic. Eremetic monks, or hermits, live in solitude, whereas cenobitic monks live in communities, generally in a monastery, under a rule (or code of practice) and are governed by an abbot. Originally, all Christian monks were hermits, following the example of Anthony the Great.

However, the need for some form of organized spiritual guidance lead Saint Pachomius in 318 to organize his many followers in what was to become the first monastery. Soon, similar institutions were established throughout the Egyptian desert as well as the rest of the eastern half of the Roman Empire. Central figures in the development of monasticism were, in the East, St. Basil the Great, and St. Benedict in the West, who created the famous Benedictine Rule, which would become the most common rule throughout the Middle Ages. The institution of monasticism would become a central part of the medieval world.^[40]

Church of the Early Middle Ages (476 – 800)

Mosaic of Justinian I in the church of San Vitale, Ravenna, Italy

The Church in the Early Middle Ages covers the time from the deposition of the last Western Emperor in 476 and his replacement with a barbarian king, Odoacer, to the coronation of Charlemagne as "Emperor of the Romans" by Pope Leo III in Rome on Christmas Day, 800. Historians of the period have observed that imperial political control in the West gradually declined, and thus the specific date of 476 is a very artificial division. In the East, Roman imperial rule continued under the Byzantine Empire. Even in the West, distinctly Roman culture continued long afterwards; thus historians today prefer to speak of a "transformation of the Roman world" rather than a "fall of the Roman Empire". The advent of the Early Middle Ages, therefore, is a gradual and often localized process whereby, in the West, rural areas became power centers whilst urban areas declined. With the advent of Muslim invasions, the Western (Latin) and Eastern (Greek) areas of Christianity began to take on distinctive shapes, and the Bishops of Rome shifted their attention to barbarian kings rather than Byzantine Emperors.

Conversion of Barbarian Hinterland

As the political boundaries of the Western Roman Empire diminished and then collapsed, Christianity spread beyond the old borders of the Empire and into lands that never been Romanized.

Ireland and Irish Missionaries

Beginning in the fifth century, a unique culture developed around the Irish Sea consisting of what today would be called Wales and Ireland. In this environment, Christianity spread from Britain to Ireland, especially aided by the missionary activity of St. Patrick. Patrick had been captured into slavery in Ireland and, following his escape and later consecration as bishop, he returned to the isle that had enslaved him so that he could bring them the Gospel. Soon, Irish missionaries such as SS. Columba and Columbanus spread this Christianity, with its distinctively Irish features, to Scotland and the Continent. One such feature was the system of private penitence, which replaced the former practice of penance as a public rite.^[41]

Anglo-Saxons (English)

Though Britain had been a Roman province, in 407 the imperial legions left the isle, and the Roman elite followed. Some time later that century, various barbarian tribes went from raiding and pillaging the island to settling / invading. These tribes are referred to as the "Anglo-Saxons", predecessors of the English. They were entirely pagan, having never been part of the Empire, and though they experienced Christian influence from the surround, they were converted by the mission of St. Augustine sent by Pope Gregory the Great, and later, under Archbishop Theodore, the Anglo-Saxons enjoyed a golden age of culture and scholarship. Soon, important English missionaries such as SS. Wilfrid, Willibrord, and Boniface would begin evangelizing their Saxon relatives in Germany.

Goths

The gothic peoples, the Ostrogoths and Visigoths, were converted largely be the missionary activity of Ulfilas. Ulfilas, or Wulfila, is best know for his invention of the Gothic alphabet / written language and his translation of the Bible to it.

Franks

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Early Medieval Papacy

The city of Rome was embroiled in the turmoil and devastation of Italian peninsular warfare during the Early Middle Ages. Emperor Justinian I attempted to reassert imperial dominion in Italy against the gothic aristocracy. The subsequent campaigns were more or less successful, and the Imperial Exarchate was established in Ravenna to oversee Italy, though actually imperial influence was often limited. However, the weakened peninsula then experienced the invasion of the Lombards, and the resulting warfare essentially left Rome to fend for itself. Thus the popes, out of necessity, found themselves feeding the city with grain from papal estates, negotiating treaties, paying protection money to Lombard warlords, and, failing that, hiring solders to defend the city.^[42] Eventually, the failure of the Empire to send aid resulted in the popes turning for support from other sources, most especially the Franks.

Islamic Jihad

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Carolingian Renaissance

The Carolingian Renaissance was a period of intellectual and cultural revival occurring in the late 8th and 9th centuries, with the peak of the activities occurring during the reigns of the Carolingian rulers Charlemagne and Louis the Pious. During this period there was an increase of literature, the arts, architecture, jurisprudence, liturgical and scriptural studies. The period also saw the development of Carolingian minuscule, the ancestor of modern lower-case script, and the standardization of Latin which had hitherto become varied and irregular (see Medieval Latin).

The lack of literate persons in 8th century western Europe caused problems for the Carolingian rulers by severely limiting the number of people capable of serving as court scribes. Of even greater concern to the very pious rulers was the fact that not all parish priests possessed the skill to read the Vulgate Bible. To address these problems, Charlemagne ordered the creation of schools, and his interest in cultivating scholarship attracted the most learned men from all of Europe to his court, such as Theodulf, Paul the Deacon, Angilbert, Paulinus of Aquileia, and Alcuin of York.

Church of the High Middle Ages (800 – 1499)

The High Middle Ages is the period from the coronation of Charlemagne in 800 to the close of the fifteenth century, which saw the fall of Constantinople (1453), the end of the Hundred Years War (1453), the discovery of the New World (1492), and thereafter the Protestant Reformation (1515).

Missions in the Eastern Europe

Though by 800 the Western Europe was entirely Christian, Eastern Europe remained an area of missionary activity. For example, in the ninth century SS. Cyril and Methodius had extensive missionary success in Eastern Europe among the Slavic peoples, translating the Bible and liturgy into Slavonic. The Baptism of Kiev in the 988 spread Christianity throughout Kievan Rus', establishing Christianity among the Ukraine, Belarus and Russia.

Investiture Controversy

Henry IV at the gate of Canossa, by August von Heyden

The Investiture Controversy, or Lay investiture controversy, was the most significant conflict between secular and religious powers in medieval Europe. It began as a dispute in the 11th century between the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, and Pope Gregory VII concerning who would appointment bishops (investiture). The end of lay investiture threatened to undercut royal power, for the benefit Church reform, as the pope intended, and for ambitious noblemen as well.

Bishops collected revenues from estates attached to their bishopric. Noblemen who held lands (fiefdoms) hereditarily passed those lands on within their family. However, because bishops had no legitimate children, when a bishop died it was the king's right to appoint a successor. So, while a king had little recourse in preventing noblemen from acquiring powerful domains via inheritance and dynastic marriages, a king could keep careful control of lands under the domain of his bishops. Kings would bestow bishoprics to members of noble families whose friendship he wished to secure. Furthermore, if a king left a bishopric vacant, then he collected the estates' revenues until a bishop was appointed, when in theory he was to repay the earnings. The infrequence of this repayment was an obvious source of dispute. The Church wanted to end this lay investiture because of the potential corruption, not only from vacant sees but also from other practices such as simony. Thus, the Investiture Contest was part of the Church's attempt to reform the episcopate and provide better pastoral care.

Pope Gregory VII issued the Dictatus Papae, which declared that the pope alone could appoint or depose bishops, or translate them to other sees. Henry VI's rejection of the decree lead to his excommunication and a ducal revolt; eventually Henry received absolution after dramatic public penance barefoot in Alpine snow and cloaked in a hairshirt (see Walk to Canossa), though the revolt and conflict of investiture continued. Likewise, a similar controversy occurred in England between King Henry I and St. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, over investiture and ecclesiastical revenues collected by the king during an episcopal vacancy. The English dispute was resolved by the Concordat of London, 1107, where the king renounced his claim to invest bishops but continued to require an oath of fealty from them upon their election. This was a partial model for the Concordat of Worms (Pactum Calixtinum), which resolved the Imperial investiture controversy with a compromise that allowed secular authorities some measure of control but granted the selection of bishops to their cathedral canons. As a symbol of the compromise, lay authorities invested bishops with their secular authority symbolized by the lance, and ecclesiastical authorities invested bishops with their spiritual authority symbolized by the ring and the staff.

Sanctification of Knighthood

File:Templars.jpg

Knights Templar, organized to defend the Christian Holy Land

The nobility of the Middle Ages was a military class; in the Early Medieval period a king (rex) attracted a band of loyal warriors (comes) and provided for them from his conquests. As the Middle Ages progressed, this system developed into a complex set of feudal ties and obligations. As Christianity had been accepted by barbarian nobility, the Church sought to prevent ecclesiastical land and clergymen, both of which came from the nobility, from embroilment in martial conflicts. By the early eleventh century, clergymen and peasants were granted immunity from violence - the Peace of God (Pax Dei). Soon the warrior elite itself became "sanctified", for example fighting was banned on holy days - the Truce of God (Treuga Dei). The concept of chivalry developed, emphasizing honor and loyalty amongst knights, and, with the advent of Crusades, holy orders of knights were established who perceived themselves as called by God to defend Christendom against Muslim advances in Spain, Italy, and the Holy Land, and pagan strongholds in Eastern Europe.

Crusades

The Crusades were a series of military conflicts conducted by Christian knights for the defense of Christians and for the expansion of Christian domains. Generally, the crusades refer to the campaigns in the Holy Land against Muslim forces sponsored by the Papacy. There were other crusades against Islamic forces in southern Spain, southern Italy, and Sicily, as well as the campaigns of Teutonic knights against pagan strongholds in Eastern Europe, and (to a much lesser extent) crusades within Christendom against heretical groups.

File:Punch1917-richardIandallenby.jpg

Richard the Lionheart overlooking Jerusalem. The caption reads "At last, my dream come true."

The Holy Land had been part of the Roman Empire, and thus Byzantine Empire, until the Islamic conquests of the seventh and eighth centuries. Nonetheless, Christians had generally been permitted to visit the sacred places in the Holy Land until 1071, when the Seljuk Turks closed Christian pilgrimages and assailed the Byzantines, defeating them at the Battle of Manzikert. Emperor Alexius I asked for aid from Pope Urban II (1088-1099) for help against Islamic aggression. He probably expected money from the pope for the hiring of mercenaries. Instead, Urban II called upon the knights of Christendom. On 27 November, 1095, Urban II made one of the most influential speeches in the Middle Ages at the Council of Clermont combining the ideas of making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with that of waging a holy war against infidels. He asked the Frenchmen to turn their swords in favour of God's service, and the assembly replied "Dieu le veult!" - "God wills it!"

The First Crusade captured Antioch in 1099 and then Jerusalem. The Second Crusade occured in 1145 when Edessa was retaken by Islamic forces. Jerusalem would be held until 1187 and the Third Crusade, famous for the battles between Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. The Fourth Crusade, begun by Innocent III in 1202, intended to retake the Holy Land but was soon subverted by Venetians who used the forces to sack the Christian city of Zara. Innocent excommunicated the Venetians and crusaders. Eventually the crusaders arrived in Constantinople, but due to strife which arose between them and the Byzantines, rather than proceed to the Hold Land the crusaders instead sacked Constantinople. This was effectively the last crusade sponsored by the papacy; later crusades were sponsored by individuals. Thus, though Jerusalem was held for nearly a century and other strongholds in the Near East would remain in Christian possession much longer, the crusades in the Holy Land ultimately failed to establish permanent Christian kingdoms. Islamic expansion into Europe would renew and remain a threat for centuries culminating in the campaigns of Suleiman the Magnificent in the sixteenth century. On the other hand, the crusades in southern Spain, southern Italy, and Sicily eventually lead to the demise of Islamic power in the regions; the Teutonic knights expanded Christian domains in Eastern Europe, and the much less frequent crusades within Christendom, such as the Albigensian Crusade, achieved their goal of maintaining doctrinal unity.^[43]

High Medieval Papacy

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Pope Boniface VIII, and Unam Sanctam

Medieval Inquisition

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Rise of Universities

Modern western universities have their origins directly in the Medieval Church. They began as cathedral schools, and all students were considered clerics. This was a benefit as it placed the students under ecclesiastical jurisdiction and thus imparted certain legal immunities and protections. The cathedral schools eventually became partially detached from the cathedrals and formed their own institutions, the earliest being the University of Paris (c. 1150), the University of Bologna (1088), and the University of Oxford (1096).

Mendicant Orders

Mendicant orders are religious communities that live under a monastic rule but, rather than residing in the seclusion of a monastery, they emphasize public evangelism and are thus known for preaching, missionary activity, and education, as well as rhe traditional vows of poverty chastity, poverty, etc.. Beginning in the twelfth century, the Franciscan order was instituted by the followers of St. Francis, and thereafter the Dominican order was begun by St. Dominic.

East-West Schism

The East-West Schism, or Great Schism, separated the Church into Western (Latin) and Eastern (Greek) branches, i.e. Western Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy. It was the first major division since certain groups in the East rejected the decrees of the Council of Chalcedon (see Oriental Orthodoxy), and was far more significant. Though normally dated to 1054, the East-West Schism was actually the result of an extended period of estrangement between Latin and Greek Christendom over the nature of papal primacy and certain doctrinal matters like the filioque, but intensified by cultural and linguistic differences.

The "official" schism in 1054 was the excommunication of Patriarch Michael Cerularius of Constantinople, followed by his excommunication of papal legates. Attempts at reconciliation were made in 1274 (by the Second Council of Lyon) and in 1439 (by the Council of Basel), but in each case the eastern hierarchs who consented to the unions were repudiated by the Orthodox as a whole, though reconciliation was achieved between the West and what are now called the "Eastern Rite Catholic Churches". More recently, in 1965 the mutual excommunications were rescinded by the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople, though schism remains.

Both groups are descended from the Early Church, both acknowledge the apostolic succession of each other's bishops, and the validity of each other's sacraments. Though both acknowledge the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, Eastern Orthodoxy understands this as a primacy of honor with limited or no ecclesiastical authority in other dioceses.

Western Schism

The Western Schism, or Papal Schism, was a prolonged period of crisis in Latin Christendom from 1378 to 1416, when there were two or more claimants to the See of Rome and thus it was difficult to discern who the true Pope was. The conflict was political, rather than doctrinal, in nature.

In 1309, Pope Clement V, due to political considerations, moved to Avignon in southern France and exercised his pontificate there. For sixty-nine years popes resided in Avignon rather than Rome. This was not only an obvious source of not only confusion but of political animosity as the prestige and influence of city of Rome waned without a resident pontiff. Though Pope Gregory XI, a Frenchman, returned to Rome in 1378, the strife between Italian and French factions intensified, especially following his subsequent death. In 1378 the conclave, elected an Italian from Naples, Pope Urban VI; his intransigence in office soon alienated the French cardinals, who withdrew to a conclave of their own, asserting the previous election was invalid since its decision had been made under the duress of a riotous mob. They elected one of their own, Robert of Geneva, who took the name Pope Clement VII. By 1379, he was back in the palace of popes in Avignon, while Urban VI remained in Rome.

For nearly forty years, there were two papal curias and two sets of cardinals, each electing a new pope for Rome or Avignon when death created a vacancy. Each pope lobbied for support among kings and princes who played them off against each other, changing allegiance according to political advantage. In 1409, a council was convened at Pisa to resolve the issue. The council declared both existing popes to be schismatic (Gregory XII from Rome, Benedict XIII from Avignon) and appointed a new one, Alexander V. But the existing popes refused to resign and thus there were three papal claimants. Another council was convened in 1414, the Council of Constance. In March 1415 the Pisan pope, John XXIII, fled from Constance in disguise; he was brought back a prisoner and deposed in May. The Roman pope, Gregory XII, resigned voluntarily in July. The Avignon pope, Benedict XIII, refused to come to Constance; nor would he consider resignation. The council finally deposed him in July 1417. The council in Constance, having finally cleared the field of popes and antipopes, elected Pope Martin V as pope in November.

Church and the Italian Renaissance (1399 – 1599)

The Renaissance was a period of great cultural change and achievement, marked in Italy by a classical orientation and an increase of wealth through mercantile trade. The City of Rome, the Papacy, and the Papal States were all affected by the Renaissance. On the one hand, it was a time of great artistic patronage and architectural magnificence, where the Church pardoned such artists as Michelangelo, Brunelleschi, Bramante, Raphael, Fra Angelico, Donatello, and da Vinci. On the other hand, wealthy Italian families often secured episcopal offices, including the papacy, for their own members, some of whom were known for immorality, such as Alexander VI and Sixtus IV.

In addition to being the head of the Church, the Pope became one of Italy's most important secular rulers, and pontiffs such as Julius II often waged campaigns to protect and expand their temporal domains. Furthermore, the popes, in a spirit of refined competition with other Italian lords, spent lavishly both on private luxuries but also on public works, repairing or building churches, bridges, and a magnificent system of aqueducts in Rome that still function today. It was during this time that St. Peter's Basilica, perhaps the most recognized Christian church, was built on the site of the old Constantinian basilica. It was also a time of increased contact with Greek culture, opening up new avenues of learning, especially in the fields of philosophy, poetry, classics, rhetoric, and political science, fostering a spirit of humanism – all of which would influence the Church.

Protestant Reformation (1521 – 1579)

In the early 16th century, movements were begun by two theologians, Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingli, that aimed to reform the Church; these reformers are distinguished from previous ones in that they considered the root of corruptions to be doctrinal (rather than simply a matter of moral weakness or lack of ecclesiastical discipline) and thus they aimed to change contemporary doctrines to accord with what they perceived to be the "true gospel". The Protestant Reformation is so called because the movement's leaders "protested" against the ecclesiastical hierarchy and the pope, essentially electing to institute their reforms separately from it. The term "protestant", however, was not originally used by these leaders; instead, they called themselves "evangelical", emphasizing the "return to the true gospel (Greek: euangelion)".^[44]

The beginning of the Protestant Reformation is generally identified with Martin Luther and the posting of the 95 Theses on the castle church in Wittenburg, Germany. Early protest was against corruptions such as simony, episcopal vacancies, and the sale of indulgences. The Protestant position, however, would come to incorporate doctrinal changes such as sola scriptura and sola fide. The three most important traditions to emerge directly from the Protestant Reformation were the Lutheran, Reformed (Calvinist, Presbyterian, etc.), and Anglican traditions, though the latter group identifies as both "Reformed" and "Catholic", and some subgroups reject the classification as "Protestant".

The Protestant Reformation may be divided into two distinct but basically simultaneous movements, the Magisterial Reformation and the Radical Reformation. The Magisterial Reformation involved the alliance of certain theological teachers (Latin: magistri) such as Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Cramner, etc. with secular magistrates who cooperated in the reformation of Christendom. Radical Reformers, besides forming communities outside state sanction, often employed more extreme doctrinal change, such as the rejection of tenants of the Councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon. Often the division between magisterial and radical reformers was as or more violent than the general Catholic and Protestant hostilities.

The Protestant Reformation spread almost entirely within the confines of Northern Europe, but did not take hold in certain northern areas such as Ireland and parts of Germany. By far the magisterial reformers were more successful and their changes more widespread than the radical reformers. The Catholic response to the Protestant Reformation is known as the Counter Reformation, or Catholic Reformation, which resulted in a reassertion of traditional doctrines and the emergence of new religious orders aimed at both moral reform and new missionary activity. The Counter Reformation reconvered approximately 33% of Northern Europe to Catholicism and initiated missions in South and Central America, Africa, Asia, and even China and Japan. Protestant expansion outside of Europe occured on a smaller scale through colonization of North America and areas of Africa.

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was an Augustinian friar and professor at the University of Wittenberg. In 1517, he published a list of 95 Theses, or points to be debated, concerning the illicitness of selling indulgences. Luther had a particular distain for Aristotelian philosophy, and as he began developing his own theology, he increasingly came into conflict with Thomistic scholars, most notably Cardinal Cajetan.^[45] Soon, Luther had begun to develop his theology of justification, or process by which one is "made right" (righteous) in the eyes of God. In Catholic theology, one is made righteous by a progressive infusion of grace accepted through faith and cooperated with through good works. Luther's doctrine of justification differed from Catholic theology in that justification rather meant "the declaring of one to be righteous", where God imputes the merits of Christ upon one who remains without inherent merit.^[46] In this process, good works are more of an unessential byproduct that contribute nothing to one's own state of righteousness. Conflict between Luther and leading theologians lead to his gradual rejection of authority of the Church hierarchy. In 1520, he was condemned for heresy by the papal bull Exsurge Domine, which he burned at Wittenburg along with books of canon law.^[47]

Ulrich Zwingli

Ulrich Zwingli was a Swiss scholar and parish priest who was likewise influential in the beginnings of the Protestant Reformation. Zwingli claimed that his theology owed nothing to Luther, and that he had developed it in 1516, before Luther's famous protest, though his doctrine of justification was remarkably similar to that of the German friar.^[48] In 1518, Zwingli was given a post at the wealthy collegiate church of the Grossmünster in Zürich, where he would remain until his death at a relatively young age. Soon he had risen to prominence in the city, and when political tension developed between most of Switzerland and the Habsburg Emperor Charles V, with whom the pope had allied. In this environment, Zwingli began preaching his version of reform, with certain points as the aforementioned doctrine of justification, but others (with which Luther vehemently disagreed) such as the position that veneration of icons was actually idolatry and thus a violation of the first commandment, and the denial of the real presence in the Eucharist.^[49] Soon the city council had accepted Zwingli's doctrines and Zürich became a focal point of more radical reforming movements, and certain admires and followers of Zwingli pushed his message and reforms far further than even he had intended, such as rejecting infant baptism.^[50] This split between Luther and Zwingli formed the essence of the Protestant division between Lutheran and Reformed theology. Meanwhile, political tensions increased; Zwingli and the Zürich leadership imposed an economic blockade on the inner Catholic states of Switzerland, which lead to a battle in which Zwingli, in full armor, was slain along with his troops.

Schmalkaldic League and Wars

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John Calvin

John Calvin was a French cleric and doctor of law turned Protestant reformer. He belonged to the second generation of the Reformation, publishing his theological tome, the Institutes of the Christian Religion, in 1536 (later revised), and establishing himself as a leader of the Reformed church in Geneva, which became an "unofficial capital" of Reformed Christianity in the second half of the sixteenth century. He exerted a remarkable amount of authority in the city and over the city council, such that he has (rather ignominiously) been called a "protestant pope". Calvin established an eldership together with a "consistory", where pastors and the elders established matters of religious discipline for the Genevan population.^[51] Calvin's theology is best known for his doctrine of (double) predestination, which held that God had, from all eternity, providentially foreordained who would be saved (the elect) and likewise who would be damned (the reprobate). Predestination was not the dominant idea in Calvin's works, but it would seemingly become so for many of his Reformed successors.^[52]

John Knox

John Knox was a Scottish priest turned Protestant Reformer who worked to reform the Scottish church (the "Kirk") in the mold of Calvin's model, which he learned first hand during his residence in Geneva in the 1550s. Knox helped lead Scotland's national revolution in the 1560s and eventually established Reformed (Presbyterian) practice throughout the country.

English Reformation

Unlike other reform movements, the English Reformation began by royal influence. Henry VIII considered himself a thoroughly Catholic King, and in 1521 he defended the papacy against Luther in a book he commissioned entitled, The Defense of the Seven Sacraments, for which Pope Leo X awarded him the title Fidei Defensor (Defender of the Faith). However, the king came into conflict with the papacy when he wished to annul his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, for which he needed papal sanction. Catherine, among many other noble relations, was the aunt of Emperor Charles V, the papacy's most significant secular supporter. The ensuing dispute eventually lead to a break from Rome and the declaration of the King of England as head of the English (Anglican) Church. England then experienced a period of frenetic and eclectic reforms, some more radical and others more traditonal, under monarchs such as Edward VI and Elizabeth I, and Archbishops of Canterbury such as Thomas Cranmer and William Laud. What emerged was a state church that considered itself both "Reformed" and "Catholic" but not "Roman" (and hesitated from the title "Protestant"), and other "unofficial" more radical movements such as the Puritans.

Counter-Reformation

The Counter-Reformation, or Catholic Reformation, was the response of the Catholic Church to the Protestant Reformation. The essence of the Counter-Reformation was a renewed conviction in traditional practices and the upholding of Catholic doctrine as the source of ecclesiastic and moral reform, and the answer to halting the spread of Protestantism. Thus it experienced the founding of new religious orders, such as the Jesuits, the establishment of seminaries for the proper training of priests, renewed worldwide missionary activity, and the development of new yet orthodox forms of spirituality, such as that of the Spanish mystics and the French school of spirituality. The entire process was spearheaded by the Council of Trent, which clarified and reasserted doctrine, issued dogmatic definitions, and produced the Roman Catechism.

Though Ireland, Spain, France, and elsewhere featured significantly in the Counter-Reformation, its heart was Italy and the various popes of the time, who established the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, or simply the "Index", a list of prohibited books, and the Roman Inquisition, a system of juridical tribunals that prosecuted heresy and related offences. The Papacy of St. Pius V (1566-1572) was known not only for its focus on halting heresy and worldly abuses within the Church, but also for its focus on improving popular piety in a determined effort to stem the appeal of Protestantism. Pius began his pontificate by giving large alms to the poor, charity, and hospitals, and the pontiff was known for consoling the poor and sick, and supporting missionaries. The activities of these pontiffs coincided with a rediscovery of the ancient Christian catacombs in Rome. As MacCulloch stated, "Just as these ancient martyrs were revealed once more, Catholics were beginning to be martyred afresh, both in mission fields overseas and in the struggle to win back protestant northern Europe: the catacombs proved to be an inspiration for many to action and to heroism."^[53]

The Council of Trent

The Council of Trent (1545-1563), initiated by Pope Paul III (1534-1549) addressed issues of certain ecclesiastical corruptions such as simony, absenteeism, nepotism, and other abuses, as well as the reassertion of traditional practices and the dogmatic articulation of the traditional doctrines of the Church, such as the episcopal structure, clerical celebacy, the seven Sacraments, transubstantiation (the belief that during mass the consecrated bread and wine truly become the body and blood of Christ), the veneration of relics, icons, and saints (especially the Blessed Virgin Mary), the necessity of both faith and good works for salvation, the existence of purgatory and the issuance (but not the sale) of indulgences, etc. In other words, all Protestant doctrinal objections and changes were uncompromisingly rejected. The Council also fostered an interest in education for perish priests to increase pastoral care. Milan's Archbishop St. Carlo Borromeo (1538-1584) set an example by visiting the remotest parishes and instilling high standards.

Age of Discovery (1492 – 1769)

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Inter caetera

The discovery in 1492 of supposedly Asiatic lands by Christopher Columbus threatened the unstable relations between the kingdoms of Portugal and Castile, which had been jockeying for position and possession of colonial territories along the African coast for many years. The king of Portugal asserted that the discovery was within the bounds set forth in Papal bulls of 1455, 1456, and 1479. The king and queen of Castile disputed this and sought a new Papal Bull on the subject. Pope Alexander VI, a native of Valencia and a friend of the Castilian king, responded with three bulls, dated May 3 and 4, which were highly favorable to Castile. The third of these bulls was titled "Inter caetera", awarded Spain the sole right to colonize most of the New World.

Christian missionaries

Catholic missions

During the Age of Discovery, the Roman Catholic Church established a number of Missions in the Americas and other colonies through the Augustinians, Franciscans and Dominicans in order to spread Christianity in the New World and to convert the Native Americans and other indigenous people. At the same time, missionaries such as Francis Xavier as well as other Jesuits, Augustinians, Franciscans and Dominicans were moving into Asia and the far East. The Portuguese sent missions into Africa. These are some of the most well-known missions in history. While some of these missions were associated with imperialism and oppression, others (notably Matteo Ricci's Jesuit mission to China) were relatively peaceful and focused on integration rather than cultural imperialism.

Protestant missions

The Danish government included Lutheran missionaries among the colonists in many of its colonies, Ziegenbalg in Tranquebar India in the late 17th Century. But the first organized Protestant mission work was carried out beginning in 1732 by the Moravian Brethren of Herrnhut in Saxony Germany(die evangelische Brüdergemeine).

The first missionaries landed in St. Thomas in December, 1732. Work soon was started in another Danish colony, Greenland. Within 30 years there were Moravian missionaries active on every continent, and this at a time when there were fewer than 300 people in Herrnhut. They are famous for their selfless work, living as slaves among the slaves and together with the native Americans, the Delaware and Cherokee Indian tribes. The Moravian work in South Africa inspired William Carey and the founders of the British Baptist missions.

The London Missionary Society was an extensive Anglican and Nonconformist missionary society formed in England in 1795 with missions in the islands of the South Pacific and Africa. It now forms part of the Council for World Mission. The Anglican Church Missionary Society was also founded in England in 1799, and continues its work today. These organisations spread through the extensive 18th and 19th century colonial British Empire, establishing the network of churches that largely became the modern Anglican Communion.

Emigration to America

The most famous and well-known emigration to America was the migration of the Puritan separatists from the Anglican Church of England, who fled first to Holland, and then later to America, to establish the English colonies of New England, which later became the United States.

These Puritan separatists and Anglicans were also known as "the pilgrims". After establishing the first successful English colony at Jamestown, Virginia (named after King James), the Puritan pilgrims received a charter from the King of England which legitimized their colony, allowing them to do trade and commerce with merchants in England, in accordance with the principles of mercantilism. This successful, though initially quite difficult, colony marked the beginning of the Protestant presence in America (the earlier French, Spanish and Portuguese settlements had been Catholic), and became a kind of oasis of spiritual and economic freedom, to which persecuted Protestants and other minorities from the British Isles and Europe (and later, from all over the world) fled to for peace, freedom and opportunity.

The original intent of the colonists was to establish spiritual "Puritanism", which had been denied to them in England and the rest of Europe to engage in peaceful commerce with England and the native American "Indians" (which Christopher Columbus had mistakenly named the inhabitants of the land) and to Christianize the "Indians".

Church and the Enlightenment (1580 – 1800)

Key dates

February 24, 1582: Pope Gregory XIII issues the Bull Inter gravissimas reforming the Julian Calendar.
October 4, 1582: The Gregorian Calendar is first adopted by Italy, Spain, and Portugal. October 4 is followed by October 15 - thus removing ten days.
1588: Philip II of Spain's plan to conquer England fails with the defeat of the Spanish Armada.
1598: Papal role in Peace of Vervins.
April 19, 1622: Pope Gregory XV makes Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu a cardinal upon the nomination of King Louis XIII — becoming Cardinal Richelieu. His influence and policies greatly impact the course of European art, culture, politics, religion and war.

1633: Trial of Galileo.
1638: Shimabara Rebellion leads to a repression of Catholics, and all Christians, in Japan.
1655: Queen Christina of Sweden confirmed in baptism by Pope Alexander VII.
September 12, 1683: Battle of Vienna. Decisive victory of the army of the Holy League, under King John III Sobieski of Poland, over the Ottoman Turks, under Grand Vizier Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha.
1685: Louis XIV revokes the Edict of Nantes in hopes of currying Papal favor.
1691: Pope Innocent XII declares against nepotism and simony.
1713: Encyclical Unigenitus condemns Jansenism.
1715: Clement XI rules against the Jesuits in the Chinese Rites controversy.
1721: Kangxi Emperor bans Christian missions in China.
April 28, 1738: Pope Clement XII publishes the Bull In Eminenti forbidding Catholics from joining, aiding, socializing or otherwise helping in any way shape or form the organizations of Freemasonry and Freemasons under pain of excommunication.
1773: Suppression of the Jesuits.
1789: John Carroll becomes the Bishop of Baltimore, the first Roman Catholic bishop in the United States.
1793: French Republican Calendar and anti-clerical measures.
1798: Pope Pius VI taken prisoner by French revolutionaries.

Revivalism (1720 – 1906)

Holiness movement in the U.S. and Higher Life movement in Britain

The Calvinist and Wesleyan revival, called the Great Awakening, established the Congregationalist, Presbyterian, Baptist, and new Methodist churches on competitive footing for social influence in North America. However, as that great "revival of religion" began to wane, a new era of secularism began to overwhelm the social gains that had been experienced by Evangelical churches. Furthermore, that revival had popularized the strong opinion that Evangelical religions were weakened and divided, primarily due to unreasonable loyalty to creeds and doctrines which made salvation, and Christian unity, seem unattainable. This sentiment gave rise to Restorationism.

First Great Awakening

The First Great Awakening was a wave of religious enthusiasm among Protestants that swept the American colonies in the 1730s and 1740s, leaving a permanent impact on American religion. It resulted from powerful preaching that deeply affected listeners (already church members) with a deep sense of personal guilt and salvation by Christ. Pulling away from ritual and ceremony, the Great Awakening made religion intensely personal to the average person by creating a deep sense of spiritual guilt and redemption. Historian Sydney E. Ahlstrom sees it as part of a "great international Protestant upheaval" that also created Pietism in Germany, the Evangelical Revival and Methodism in England.^[54] It brought Christianity to the slaves and was an apocalyptic event in New England that challenged established authority. It incited rancor and division between the old traditionalists who insisted on ritual and doctrine and the new revivalists. It had a major impact in reshaping the Congregational, Presbyterian, Dutch Reformed, and German Reformed denominations, and strengthened the small Baptist and Methodist denominations. It had little impact on Anglicans and Quakers. Unlike the Second Great Awakening that began about 1800 and which reached out to the unchurched, the First Great Awakening focused on people who were already church members. It changed their rituals, their piety, and their self awareness.

The new style of sermons and the way people practiced their faith breathed new life into religion in America. People became passionately and emotionally involved in their religion, rather than passively listening to intellectual discourse in a detached manner. Ministers who used this new style of preaching were generally called "new lights", while the preachers of old were called "old lights". People began to study the Bible at home, which effectively decentralized the means of informing the public on religious manners and was akin to the individualistic trends present in Europe during the Protestant Reformation.

Second Great Awakening

The Second Great Awakening (1800–1830s) was the second great religious revival in United States history and consisted of renewed personal salvation experienced in revival meetings. Major leaders included Charles Grandison Finney, Lyman Beecher, Barton Stone. Peter Cartwright and James B. Finley.

In New England, the renewed interest in religion inspired a wave of social activism. In western New York, the spirit of revival encouraged the emergence of new Restorationist and other denominations, especially the Mormons and the Holiness movement. In the west especially—at Cane Ridge, Kentucky and in Tennessee—the revival strengthened the Methodists and the Baptists and introduced into America a new form of religious expression—the Scottish camp meeting.

Resurgence

The third Awakening or maybe "resurgence", from 1830, was largely influential in America and many countries worldwide including India and Ceylon. The Plymouth Brethren started with John Nelson Darby at this time, a result of disillusionment with denominationalism and clerical hierarchy.

Third Great Awakening

The next Great Awakening (sometimes called the Third Great Awakening) began from 1857 onwards in Canada and spread throughout the world including America and Australia. Significant names include Dwight L. Moody, Ira D. Sankey, William Booth and Catherine Booth (founders of the Salvation Army), Charles Spurgeon and James Caughey. Hudson Taylor began the China Inland Mission and Thomas John Barnardo founded his famous orphanages. The Keswick Convention movement began out of the British Holiness movement, encouraging a lifestyle of holiness, unity and prayer.

Further resurgence

The next Awakening (1880 - 1903) has been described as "a period of unusual evangelistic effort and success", and again sometimes more of a "resurgence" of the previous wave. Moody, Sankey and Spurgeon are again notable names. Others included Sam Jones, J. Wilber Chapman and Billy Sunday in North America, Andrew Murray in South Africa, and John McNeil in Australia. The Faith Mission began in 1886.

Welsh and Pentecostal revivals

The final Great Awakening (1904 onwards) had its roots in the Holiness movement which had developed in the late 19C. The Pentecostal revival movement began, out of a passion for more power and a greater outpouring of the Spirit. In 1902, the American evangelists Reuben Archer Torrey and Charles M. Alexander conducted meetings in Melbourne, Australia, resulting in over 8,000 converts. News of this revival travelled fast, igniting a passion for prayer and an expectation that God would work in similar ways elsewhere.

Torrey and Alexander were involved in the beginnings of the great Welsh revival (1904) which led Jessie Penn-Lewis to witness the working of Satan during times of revival, and write her book "War on the Saints". In 1906 the modern Pentecostal Movement was born in Azusa Street, in Los Angeles.

Restorationism

See also: Dispensationalism, Restoration Movement, and Restoration

Campbellites or Stone-Campbell Churches
- The Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
- The Church of Christ Movement in Britain and the US
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Millerites
- Seventh-day Adventist Church
Jehovah's Witnesses

Restorationism refers to unaffiliated religious movements that attempted to transcend Protestant denominationalism and orthodox Christian creeds to restore Christianity to its original form. The term applies particularly to movements that arose in the eastern United States and Canada in the early and mid 19th century in the wake of the Second Great Awakening. The Second Great Awakening made its way across the frontier territories, fed by intense longing for a prominent place for God in the life of the new nation, a new liberal attitude toward fresh interpretations of the Bible, and a contagious experience of zeal for authentic spirituality. As these revivals spread, they gathered converts to Protestant sects of the time. However, the revivals eventually moved freely across denominational lines, with practically identical results, and went farther than ever toward breaking down the allegiances which kept adherents to these denominations loyal to their own. Consequently, the revivals were accompanied by a growing dissatisfaction with Evangelical churches and especially with the doctrine of Calvinism, which was nominally accepted or at least tolerated in most Evangelical churches at the time.

Restorationism is historically connected to the Protestant Reformation.^[55]

Although Restorationists have some basic similarities, their doctrine and practices vary significantly. Restorationists do not usually describe themselves as "reforming" a Christian Church continuously existing from the time of Jesus, but as restoring the Church that they believe was lost at some point. Restorationists include Churches of Christ with 2.6 million members, Disciples of Christ with 800,000 members,^[56] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with 12 million members,^[57] and Jehovah’s Witnesses with 6.6 million members.^[58] Restorationist beliefs are sometimes referred to as Christian primitivism (cf. "originalism") which describes a number of movements attempting to return to Early Christianity, including the Baptists, Quakers and before them, the Anabaptists. The newer term has special application to the Restoration Movement, and by comparison it is applied to other contemporary groups that are similarly motivated but founded separately. The name Restoration is also used to describe the Latter Day Saint movement. These two movements have a briefly overlapping history. Other groups are also called restorationists because of their comparable goal to re-establish Christianity in its original form, such as some anti-denominational "Restorationists" who arose in the 1970s, in Britain,^[59] and others.

19th century

Catholic Resurgence in Romantic Europe
Anglo-Catholic or Oxford Movement in the Church of England
Neo-Lutheranism in Germany
Missionaries and Colonialism
Friedrich Schleiermacher and Liberal Christianity

Key dates

July 16, 1802: French Concordat of 1801. The Catholic Church re-established in France.
December 2, 1804: Napoleon crowns himself Emperor of the French in the Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, in the presence of Pope Pius VII.
August 6, 1806: The Holy Roman Empire is formally dissolved when its last emperor, Francis II, (from 1804, Emperor Francis I of Austria) abdicated, following a military defeat by the French Army under Napoleon.
1847: The Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem resumes residence in Jerusalem.
1850: The Archdiocese of Westminster and twelve other dioceses are erected, reestablishing a hierarchy in the United Kingdom.
1852: The First Plenary Council of Baltimore was held in the United States.
December 8, 1869: Pope Pius IX opens the First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican.
July 18, 1870 - The Dogmatic Constitution of the Church of Christ from the fourth session of Vatican I, "Pastor Aeternus", issues the dogma of papal infallibility among other issues before the fall of Rome in the Franco-Prussian War causes it to end prematurely and brings an end to the Papal States. Controversy over several issues leads to the formation of the Old Catholic Church. This council was not formally closed until 1960 by Pope John XXIII in preparation for the Second Vatican Council.
May 15, 1891: Pope Leo XIII issues encyclical Rerum Novarum (translation: Of New Things).
November 30, 1894: Pope Leo XIII publishes the Apostolic Letter Orientalium Dignitas (On the Churches of the East) safeguarding the importance and continuance of the Eastern traditions for the whole Church.

Anti-clericalism and atheistic communism

In many revolutionary movements the church was associated with the established repressive regimes. Thus, for example, after the French Revolution and the Mexican Revolution there was a distinct anti-clerical tone in those countries that exists to this day. In some cases, opposition to the clergy turned into opposition to religion itself; thus, for example, Karl Marx condemned religion as the "opium of the people" [2] as he considered it a false sense of hope in an afterlife withholding the people from facing their worldly situation. Based on a similar quote ("opium for the people"), Lenin believed religion was being used by ruling classes as tool of suppression of the people. The Marxist-Leninist governments of the twentieth century were generally atheistic. All of them restricted the exercise of religion to a greater or lesser degree, but only Albania actually banned religion and officially declared itself to be an atheistic state.

20th century

Christianity in the 20th century was characterized by accelerating fragmentation. The century saw the rise of both liberal and conservative splinter groups, as well as a general secularization of Western society. The Roman Catholic Church instituted many reforms in order to modernize. Missionaries also made inroads in the Far East, establishing further followings in China, Taiwan, and Japan. At the same time, state-promoted atheism in Communist Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union brought many Eastern Orthodox Christians to Western Europe and the United States, leading to greatly increased contact between Western and Eastern Christianity. Nevertheless, church attendance declined more in Western Europe than it did in the East. Christian ecumenism grew in importance, beginning at the Edinburgh Missionary Conference in 1910. Liturgical Movement became significant in both Catholic and Protestant Christianity.

Key dates

February 11, 1929: The Lateran treaties are signed by Benito Mussolini and Cardinal Gasparri establishing the independent State of the Vatican City and resolving the Roman Question between Italy and the Holy See since the seizure of the Papal States in 1870.
July 20, 1933: Concordat Between the Holy See and the German Reich signed by Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli and Franz von Papen on behalf of Pope Pius XI and President Paul von Hindenburg, respectively.
September 1, 1939: Germany invades Poland. Start of the Second World War. The Vatican declares neutrality to avoid being drawn into the conflict and also to avoid occupation by the Italian military.
1944: The German Army occupies Rome. Adolf Hitler proclaims he will respect Vatican neutrality; however several incidents, such as giving aid to downed Allied airmen, nearly cause Nazi Germany to invade the Vatican. Rome is liberated by the Allies after only a few weeks of occupation.
January 20, 1961: John F. Kennedy is sworn in as the 35th president of the United States. He becomes the first Roman Catholic and youngest president to be elected.
October 11, 1962: Pope John XXIII opens the Second Ecumenical Vatican Council. The 21st ecumenical council of the Catholic church emphasized the universal call to holiness and brought many changes in practices, including an increased emphasis on ecumenism; fewer rules on penances, fasting and other devotional practices; and initiating a revision of the services, which were to be slightly simplified and made supposedly more accessible by allowing the use of native languages instead of Latin. Opposition to changes inspired by the Council gave rise to the movement of Traditionalist Catholics who disagree with changing the old forms of worship.
December 7, 1965: Joint Catholic-Orthodox Declaration of His Holiness Pope Paul VI and the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I. Mutual excommunication of the Great Schism of 1054 against Catholic and Orthodox is lifted by both parties.
December 8, 1965: Pope Paul VI solemnly closes the Second Vatican Council.
1970: Revision of the Roman Missal, following on gradual introduction of vernacular languages in celebration of Mass.
October 16, 1978: Pope John Paul II becomes the first non-Italian pope in 450 years; influential in overthrowing communism in Europe.
December 31, 1991: The Soviet Union is officially dissolved. Persecuted Church re-emerges out of hiding.

Ecumenism

Most churches have long expressed ideals of being reconciled with each other, and in the 20th Century Christian ecumenism advanced in two ways. One way was greater cooperation between groups, such as the Edinburgh Missionary Conference of Protestants in 1910, the Justice, Peace and Creation Commission of the World Council of Churches founded in 1948 by Protestant and Orthodox churches, and similar national councils like the National Council of Churches in Australia which also includes Roman Catholics.

The other way was institutional union with new United and uniting churches. Congregationalist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches united in 1925 to form the United Church of Canada and in 1977 to form the Uniting Church in Australia. The Church of South India was formed in 1947 by the union of Anglican, Methodist, Congregationalist, Presbyterian, and Reformed churches.

Steps towards union on a global level have also been taken in 1965 by the Catholic and Orthodox churches mutually revoking the excommunications that marked their Great Schism in 1054; the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) working towards full communion between those churches since 1970; and the Lutheran and Catholic churches signing The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification in 1999 to address conflicts at the root of the Protestant Reformation. In 2006 the Methodist church also adopted the declaration.

Catholic reforms

The continuing strength of the forces within the church favoring theological innovation and energetic reform became unmistakably evident at the Second Vatican Council, convened by Pope John XXIII (1958 - 1063), and found expression especially in its decrees on ecumenism, religious liberty, the liturgy, and the nature of the church. The ambivalence of some of those decrees, however, and the disciplinary turmoil and doctrinal dissension following the ending of the council, brought about new challenges to papal authority.

On October 11, 1962, Pope John XXIII opened the Second Ecumenical Vatican Council. The 21st ecumenical council of the Catholic church emphasized the universal call to holiness and brought many changes in practices, including an increased emphasis on ecumenism; fewer rules on penances, fasting and other devotional practices; and initiating a revision of the services, which were to be slightly simplified and made supposedly more accessible by allowing the use of native languages instead of Latin. Opposition to changes inspired by the Council gave rise to the movement of Traditionalist Catholics who disagree with changing the old forms of worship.

On December 7, 1965, a Joint Catholic-Orthodox Declaration of His Holiness Pope Paul VI and the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I lifted the mutual excommunication against Catholic and Orthodox which had been in force since the Great Schism of 1054.

During the Second Vatican Council, Catholic bishops drew back a bit from the doctrine of papal primacy. They opted instead for a vision of church administration which looked a bit more like the church during the first millennium: collegial, communal, and a joint operation among a group of equals rather than an absolute monarchy under a single ruler.

The bishops didn’t go so far as to say that the pope didn’t exercise supreme authority over the church, but they did insist that all bishops share in this authority. In essence, the idea is that the Christian community is one that consists of communion of local churches which do not entirely give up their authority as a result of membership in a larger organization. In this view, the pope serves as a symbol of unity and works to ensure the continuation of that unity.

Second Vatican Council
Ecumenical initiatives
- Anathemas (excommunications) from the Great Schism mutually revoked by the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople
- Pope John Paul II

Protestant developments

Another movement which has grown up over the 20th century has been Christian anarchism which rejects the church, state or any power other than God. They also believe in absolute Christian nonviolence. Leo Tolstoy's book The Kingdom of God is Within You [3] published in 1894 is believed to be the catalyst for this movement.

The 1950s saw a boom in the Evangelical church in America. The post–World War II prosperity experienced in the U.S. also had its effects on the church. Although simplistically referred to as "morphological fundamentalism", the phrase nonetheless does accurately describe the physical developments experienced. Church buildings were erected in large numbers, and the Evangelical church's activities grew along with this expansive physical growth.

Pentecostal movement

Another noteworthy development in 20th-century Christianity was the rise of the modern Pentecostal movement. Although its roots predate the year 1900, its actual birth is commonly attributed to the 20th century. Sprung from Methodist and Wesleyan roots, it arose out of the meetings at an urban mission on Azusa Street in Los Angeles. From there it spread around the world, carried by those who experienced what they believed to be miraculous moves of God there. These Pentecost-like manifestations have steadily been in evidence throughout the history of Christianity—such as seen in the two Great Awakenings that started in the United States. However, Azusa Street is widely accepted as the fount of the modern Pentecostal movement. Pentecostalism, which in turn birthed the Charismatic movement within already established denominations, continues to be an important force in western Christianity.

Modernism and the fundamentalist reaction

As the more radical implications of the scientific and cultural influences of the Enlightenment began to be felt in the Protestant churches, especially in the 19th century, Liberal Christianity sought to bring the churches alongside of the broad revolution that Modernism represented. In doing so, new critical approaches to the Bible were developed, new attitudes became evident about the role of religion in society, and a new openness to questioning the nearly universally accepted definitions of Christian orthodoxy began to become obvious.

In reaction to these developments, Christian fundamentalism was a movement to reject the radical influences of philosophical humanism, as this was affecting the Christian religion. Especially targeting critical approaches to the interpretation of the Bible, and trying to blockade the inroads made into their churches by atheistic scientific assumptions, the fundamentalists began to appear in various denominations as numerous independent movements of resistance to the drift away from historic Christianity. Over time, the Fundamentalist Evangelical movement has divided into two main wings, with the label Fundamentalist following one branch, while Evangelical has become the preferred banner of the more moderate movement. Although both movements primarily originated in the English speaking world, the majority of Evangelicals are now elsewhere.

Evangelicalism

In the U.S. and elsewhere in the world, there has been a marked rise in the evangelical wing of Protestant denominations, especially those that are more exclusively evangelical, and a corresponding decline in the mainstream liberal churches. In the post–World War I era, Liberalism was the faster growing sector of the American church. Liberal wings of denominations were on the rise, and a considerable number of seminaries held and taught from a liberal perspective as well. In the post–World war II era, the trend began to swing back towards the conservative camp in America's seminaries and church structures. Those entering seminaries and other postgraduate theologically related programs have shown more conservative leanings than their average predecessors.

The neo-Evangelical push of the 1940s and 1950s produced a movement that continues to have wide influence. In the southern U.S., the more moderate neo-Evangelicals, represented by leaders such as Billy Graham, have experienced a notable surge displacing the caricature of the pulpit pounding country preachers of fundamentalism. The stereotypes have gradually shifted. Some, such as Jerry Falwell, have managed to maintain credibility in the eyes of many fundamentalists, as well as to gain stature as a more moderate Evangelical.

Evangelicalism is not a single, monolithic entity. The Evangelical churches and their adherents cannot be easily stereotyped. Most are not fundamentalist, in the narrow sense that this term has come to represent; though many still refer to themselves as such. There have always been diverse views on issues, such as openness to cooperation with non-Evangelicals, the applicability of the Bible to political choices and social or scientific issues, and even the limited inerrancy of the Bible.

However, the movement has managed in an informal way, to reserve the name Evangelical for those who adhere to an historic Christian faith, a paleo-orthodoxy, as some have put it. Those who call themselves "moderate evangelicals"(although considered conservative in relation to society as a whole) still hold fast to the fundamentals of the historic Christian faith. Even "Liberal" Evangelicals label themselves as such not so much in terms of their theology, but rather to advertise that they are progressive in their civic, social, or scientific perspective.

There is some debate as to whether Pentecostals are considered to be Evangelical. Their roots in Pietism and the Holiness movement are undisputedly Evangelical, but their doctrinal distinctives differ from the more traditional Evangelicals, who are less likely to have an expectation of private revelations from God, and differ from the Pentecostal perspective on miracles, angels and demons. Typically, those who include the Pentecostals in the Evangelical camp are labeled neo-evangelical by those who do not. The National Association of Evangelicals and the Evangelical Alliance have numerous Trinitarian Pentecostal denominations among their membership.^[60] Another relatively late entrant to wide acceptance within the Evangelical fold is the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Evangelicals are as diverse as the names that appear—Billy Graham, Chuck Colson, J. Vernon McGee, Benny Hinn, J.I. Packer, John R.W. Stott, Pat Robertson, Jimmy Carter, etc.—or even Evangelical institutions such as Dallas Theological Seminary (dispensationalist), Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (Boston), Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (Chicago), Wheaton College (Illinois), the Christian Coalition, The Christian Embassy (Jerusalem), etc. Although there exists a diversity in the Evangelical community worldwide, the ties that bind all Evangelicals are still apparent. A "high view" of Scripture, belief in the Deity of Christ, the Trinity, salvation by grace through faith, and the bodily resurrection of Christ, to mention a few.

10/40 Window

Evangelicals defined and prioritized efforts to reach the "unreached" in the late 20th and early 21st centuries to focus on countries roughly between 10 north and 40 degrees south latitude. This area is mostly dominated by Muslim nations, many who do not allow missionaries of other religions to enter their countries.

Spread of secularism

In Europe there has been a general move away from religious observance and belief in Christian teachings and a move towards secularism. The "secularization of society", attributed to the time of the Renaissance and its following years, is largely responsible for the spread of secularism. For example the Gallup International Millennium Survey[4] showed that only about one sixth of Europeans attend regular religious services, less than half gave God "high importance", and only about 40% believe in a "personal God". Nevertheless the large majority considered that they "belong" to a religious denomination. Numbers show that the "de-Christianization" of Europe has slowly begun to swing in the opposite direction. Renewal in certain quarters of the Anglican church, as well as in pockets of Protestantism on the continent attest to this initial reversal of the secularization of Europe, the continent in which Christianity originally took its strongest roots and world expansion.

In North America, South America and Australia, the other three continents where Christianity is the dominant professed religion, religious observance is much higher than in Europe. At the same time, these regions are often seen by other nations as being uptight and "Victorian", in their social mores^{[citation needed]}. In general, the United States leans toward the conservative in comparison to other western nations in its general culture, in part due to the Christian element found primarily in its Midwestern and southern states.

South America, historically Catholic, has experienced a large Evangelical and Pentecostal infusion in the 20th century due to the influx of Christian missionaries from abroad. For example: Brazil, South America's largest country, is the largest Catholic country in the world, and at the same time is the largest Evangelical country in the world (based on population). Some of the largest Christian congregations in the world are found in Brazil.

Australia has seen renewal in different parts of her Anglican Church, as well as a growing presence of an Evangelical community. Although more "traditional" in its Anglican roots, the nation has seen growth in its religious sector. Some of its religious programming is even exported via satellite.

Postmodern Christianity

Postmodern Christianity is an understanding of Christianity that is closely associated with the body of writings known as postmodern philosophy. Although it is a relatively recent development in the Christian religion, many Christian postmodernists are quick to assert that their style of thought has an affinity with foundational Christian thinkers such as Augustine of Hippo and Thomas Aquinas and famed Christian mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Angelus Silesius.

In addition to Christian theology, postmodern Christianity has its roots in post-Heideggerian continental philosophy, particularly the thought of Jacques Derrida. Postmodern Christianity first emerged in the early 1980s with the publication of major books about Derrida and theology authored by Carl Raschke, Mark C. Taylor, and Charles Winquist. Many people prefer to eschew the label "postmodern Christianity" because the idea of postmodernity has almost no determinate meaning and, in the United States, serves largely to symbolize an emotionally charged battle of ideologies. Moreover, such alleged postmodern heavyweights as Jacques Derrida and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe have refused to operate under a so-called postmodern rubric, preferring instead to specifically embrace a single project stemming from the European Enlightenment and its precursors. Nevertheless, postmodern Christianity and its constituent schools of thought continue to be relevant.

Liberal Christianity

Liberal Christianity -- sometimes called liberal theology -- has an affinity with certain current forms of postmodern Christianity, although postmodern thought was originally a reaction against mainstream Protestant liberalism. Liberal Christianity is an umbrella term covering diverse, philosophically informed movements and moods within 19th and 20th century Christianity.

Despite its name, liberal Christianity has always been thoroughly protean. The word "liberal" in liberal Christianity does not refer to a leftist political agenda but rather to insights developed during the Enlightenment. Generally speaking, Enlightenment-era liberalism held that man is a political creature and that liberty of thought and expression should be his highest value. The development of liberal Christianity owes a lot to the works of philosophers Immanuel Kant and Friedrich Schleiermacher. As a whole, liberal Christianity is a product of a continuing philosophical dialogue.

Many 20th century liberal Christians have been influenced by philosophers Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. Examples of important liberal Christian thinkers are Rudolf Bultmann and John A.T. Robinson.

Christian existentialism

Christian existentialism is a form of liberal Christianity that draws extensively from the writings of Søren Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard initiated the school of thought when he reacted against Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's claims of universal knowledge and what he deemed to be the empty formalities of the 19th century church. Christian existentialism places an emphasis on the undecidability of faith, individual passion, and the subjectivity of knowledge.

Although Kierkegaard's writings weren't initially embraced, they became widely known at the beginning of the 20th century. Later Christian existentialists synthesized Kierkegaardian themes with the works of thinkers such as Friedrich Nietzsche, Walter Benjamin, and Martin Buber.

Paul Tillich and Gabriel Marcel are examples of leading Christian existentialist writers.

Continental philosophical theology

Continental philosophical theology is the most recent form of postmodern Christianity. The movement was fueled heavily by the slew of notable post-Heideggerian philosophers that appeared on the continent in the 1970s and 1980s. Groundbreaking works such as Jean-Luc Marion's God Without Being and John D. Caputo's The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida ushered in the era of continental philosophical theology.

Radical orthodoxy

Radical orthodoxy is a form of continental philosophical theology that has been influenced by the phenomenological writings of Jean-Luc Marion.

Radical orthodoxy is a style of theology that seeks to examine classic Christian writings and related Neoplatonic texts from a contemporary, philosophically continental perspective. The movement finds in writers such as Augustine of Hippo and Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite valuable sources of insight and meaning relevant to modern society and Christianity at large.

John Milbank and James K.A. Smith are leading proponents of radical orthodoxy.

Hermeneutics of religion

The hermeneutics of religion is another form of continental philosophical theology. The system of hermeneutic interpretation developed by Paul Ricœur has heavily influenced the school of thought. A central theme in the hermeneutics of religion is that of a God who exists outside the confines of the human imagination.

Weak theology

Weak theology is a manner of thinking about theology from a deconstructive point of view. The style of thought owes a debt to Jacques Derrida, especially in light of his idea of a "weak force." Weak theology is weak because it takes a non-dogmatic, perspectival approach to theology. Proponents of weak theology believe that dominant contemporary explications of theology are inherently ideological, totalizing, and militant. In reponse, weak theology expresses itself through acts of interpretation.

Institutional effects

Although postmodern Christianity is inescapably political, postmodern Christianity does not necessarily represent a new ecclesiastical epoch. It is consonant with postmodern Christianity to work within existing institutions, interrupting business as usual in order to make room for marginalized voices. In such a case, the goal would not be revolution but rather a call to reform and transform existing social structures in the direction of love, hospitality, and openness.

Emerging church

Postmodern Christianity has influenced the emerging church movement. The emerging church movement seeks to revitalize the Christian church beyond what it sees as the confines of Christian fundamentalism so that it can effectively engage with people in contemporary society. Critics allege, however, that this movement's understanding of faith has led many of its adherents outside the bounds of traditional Christianity. Brian McLaren is a well-known author and spokesperson for the emerging church movement.

21st century

Christianity continues to decline in the west, but is increasing in the east. Christianity is growing annually by 1.25 percent, roughly in line with the population growth of 1.22 percent. [5]

The Roman Catholic Church suffered a major scandal in the United States of America when, in 2002, widespread reports began to circulate of several priests who had been involved in molesting teenagers and in child abuse.

In the spring of 2005, the Catholic Church was placed in the centre of world attention following the death of Pope John Paul II. In the age of modern media, the Pope's death and funeral were broadcast for the world, while millions of Catholic pilgrims journeyed to Rome to pay final respects.

Key dates

April 2, 2005: Pope John Paul II dies at the age of 84. His funeral is broadcast to every corner of the globe through the modern media. Millions of Catholic pilgrims journey to Rome, Italy to pay final respects.
April 19, 2005: German-born Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is elected by the College of Cardinals as Pope Benedict XVI, thus becoming the first Pope elected during the 21st century and the 3rd millennium.
September 12, 2006: Pope Benedict XVI delivers address "Faith, Reason and the University Memories and Reflections" in University of Regensburg. Quoting Emperor Manuel II Paleologus: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." constituting a minimal part of the speech about faith and reason, the irrationality of violence, and the program of de-Hellenization sparks violent and deadly reactions among Muslims all over the world.^[61]^[62]^[63]^[64]^[65]

Historiography

Noted historians of Christianity include:

Philip Schaff

Notes

^ Adherents.com, Religions by Adherents
^ R. E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave (New York: Doubleday, Anchor Bible Reference Library, 1994), p. 964; S. J. D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Westminster Press, 1987, p. 78, 93, 105, 108; M.Grant, Jesus, An Historian's View of the Gospels (New York: Scribner's 1977) pp. 34-35, 78, 166, 200; P. Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews (Alfred A. Knopf, 1999) pp. 6-7, 105-110, 232-234, 266; John P. Meier, A Marginal Jew (Doubleday, 1991) vol. 1 pp. 68, 146, 199, 278, 386, and vol. 2 p. 726; G. Vermes, Jesus the Jew (Philadelphia: Fortress Press 1973), p. 37.; P. L. Maier, In the Fullness of Time (Kregel, 1991) pp. 1, 99, 121, 171; N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions (HarperCollins, 1998) pp. 32, 83, 100-102, 222; E. P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus (Penguin Books, 1993); J. A. H. Moran Cruz and R. Gerberding, Medieval Worlds: An Introduction to European History (Houghton Mifflin Company 2004), pp. 44-45; J. D. Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant (HarperCollins, 1991) p. xi-xiii; L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996), p. 123; Rudolf Bultmann, Jesus (Berlin: Deutsche Bibliothek, 1926), p. 159
^ on death by crucifixion, see L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996); John P. Meier, "The Circle of the Twelve: Did It Exist during Jesus' Public Ministry?", in Journal of Biblical Literature 116 (1997) pp. 664–665
^ R. E. Brown, Death of the Messiah vol. 2 (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1994) pp. 1240-1241; J. A. T. Robinson, The Human Face of God (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1973) p. 131 and also J. Kremer, Die Osterevangelien-Geschichten um Geschichte (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977) pp. 49-50; B. Ehrman, From Jesus to Constantine: A History of Early Christianity, lecture 4, "Oral and Written Traditions About Jesus" (The Teaching Company, 2003); M. J. Borg and N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus (San Fransisco: Harper Collins, 1999), p. 12; G. Habermas, The Historical Jesus, (College Press, 1996) p. 128
^ M. Grant, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels (New York: Scribner's 1977) p. 176; P. L. Maier, "The Empty Tomb as History" in Christianity Today (March 1975) p. 5; D. H. Van Daalen, The Real Resurrection (London: Collins, 1972), p. 41; Jakob Kremer, Die Osterevangelien--Geschichten um Geschichte (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977), pp. 49-50; W. Craig, "The Disciples' Inspection of the Empty Tomb (Luke 24, 12.24; John 20, 1–10)," in John and the Synoptics, ed. A. Denaux, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 101 (Louvain: University Press, 1992), pp. 614–619; W. Craig, "The Guard at the Tomb", in New Testament Studies 30 (1984) pp. 273–281; W. Craig, "The Historicity of the Empty Tomb of Jesus," in New Testament Studies 31 (1985): 39-67
^ L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco, Harper San Francisco, 1996) p. 136; Gerd Ludemann, What Really Happened to Jesus? trans. J. Bowden (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995) p. 8; N. T. Wright, "The New Unimproved Jesus", in Christianity Today (13 September 1993) p. 26; Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus?, trans. John Bowden (Louisville, Kent.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), p. 80; James Orr, The Resurrection of Jesus (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1909) p. 39; Jindrich Mánek, "The Apostle Paul and the Empty Tomb", in NT 2 (1957) pp. 277-278; C. F. D. Moule, ed., "The Significance of the Message of the Resurrection for Faith in Jesus Christ", in SBT 8 (London: SCM, 1968); Jacob Kremer, "Zur Diskussion über "das leere Grab", in Resurrexit, ed. Edouard Dhanis (Rome: Libreria Editrice Vatica, 1974) pp. 143-144
^ 3:1 Acts 3:1; 5:27 – 42 Acts 5:27–42; 21:18 – 26 Acts 21:18–26; 24:5 Acts 24:5; 24:14 Acts 24:14; 28:22 Acts 28:22; 1:16 Romans 1:16; Tacitus, Annales xv 44; Josephus Antiquities xviii 3; Mortimer Chambers, The Western Experience Volume II chapter 5; The Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion page 158.
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 51
^ E. Peterson, "Christianus" pp. 353-72
^ On the Creeds, see Oscar Cullmann, The Earliest Christian Confessions, trans. J. K. S. Reid (London: Lutterworth, 1949); on the Passion, see Rudolf Pesch, Das Markusevangelium, 2 vols., Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament 2 (Freiburg: Herder, 1976-77), 2: 519-20
^ Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) p. 47; Reginald Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives (New York: Macmillan, 1971) p. 10; Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Earlychurch: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 64; Hans Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, translated James W. Leitch (Philadelphia: Fortress 1969) p. 251; Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol. 1 pp. 45, 80-82, 293; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81, 92
^ see Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968)p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Early church: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 66-66; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81; Thomas Sheehan, First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity (New York: Random House, 1986 pp. 110, 118; Ulrich Wilckens, Resurrection translated A. M. Stewart (Edinburgh: Saint Andrew, 1977) p. 2; Hans Grass, Ostergeschen und Osterberichte, Second Edition (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1962) p96; Grass favors the origin in Damascus.
^ Gerald O' Collins, What are They Saying About the Resurrection? (New York: Paulist Press, 1978) p. 112; on historical importance, cf. Hans von Campenhausen, "The Events of Easter and the Empty Tomb," in Tradition and Life in the Church (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968) p. 44; and also Archibald Hunter, Works and Words of Jesus (1973) p. 100
^ Cullmann, Confessions p. 32
^ Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol 1, pp. 49, 81; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102
^ Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) pp. 118, 283, 367; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 50; C. H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching and its Developments (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980) p. 14
^ Reginald Fuller, The Foundations of New Testament Christology (New York: Scriner's, 1965) pp. 214, 216, 227, 239; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 9, 128
^ Walter Bauer, Greek-English Lexicon; Ignatius of Antioch Letter to the Magnesians 10, Letter to the Romans (Roberts-Donaldson tr., Lightfoot tr., Greek text). However, an edition presented on some websites, one that otherwise corresponds exactly with the Roberts-Donaldson translation, renders this passage to the interpolated inauthentic longer recension of Ignatius's letters, which does not contain the word "Christianity".
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 58
^ e.g. 11:13–15; 2:1–17; 7–11; 4–13, and the Epistle of James in general.
^ published by J.-P. Audet in JTS [1] 1950, v1, pp 135-154; see also The Council of Jamnia and the Old Testament Canon, Robert C. Newman, 1983.
^ Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 3.11.8
^ Both points taken from Mark A. Noll's Turning Points, (Baker Academic, 1997) pp 36-37
^ Lindberg, Carter (2006). A Brief History of Christianity. Blackwell Publishing. p. 15. ISBN 1405110783.
^ Lindberg, Carter (2006). A Brief History of Christianity. Blackwell Publishing. p. 15. ISBN 1405110783.
^ According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council."
^ Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum ("On the Deaths of the Persecutors")ch. 35-34
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55; cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) pp. 55-56
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 56
^ Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) pp. 14-15
^ Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 15
^ Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 16
^ R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 57
^ cf. Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 9
^ Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) pp. 10 and 12
^ see J. D. Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova et Amplissima Collectio 3, p. 559
^ Jo Ann H. Moran Cruze and Richard Gerberding, Medieval Worlds pp. 118-119
^ On the development of penitential practice, see McNeill & Gamer, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, (Columba University Press, 1938) pp. 9-54
^ Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 36
^ For such an analysis, see Brian Tierney and Sidney Painter, Western Europe in the Middle Ages 300-1475. 6th ed. (McGraw-Hill 1998)
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. xx
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 124-125
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 119
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 128
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 137-138
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 146-148
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 148-149
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 238
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 243
^ MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 404
^ Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1972) p. 263
^ Ahlstrom's summary is as follows: Restorationism has its genesis with Thomas and Alexander Campbell, whose movement is connected to the German Reformed Church through Otterbein, Albright, and Winebrenner (p. 212). American Millennialism and Adventism, which arose from Evangelical Protestantism, produced certain groups such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (p. 387, 501-9), the Jehovah's Witness movement (p. 807), and, as a reaction specifically to William Miller, Seventh Day Adventism (p. 381).
^ Statistical Report: Annual Council of the General Conference Committee Silver Spring, Marlyand, October 6—11, 2006]
^ Cite error: The named reference Adherents was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ JW-Media.org Membership 2005
^ Evangelicalism in modern Britain: a history from the 1730s to the 1980s, David W. Bebbington, pub 1995, Routledge (UK), ISBN 0415104645, pg 230,231; 245-249
^ http://www.eauk.org/churchsearch/
^ Faith, Reason and the University Memories and Reflections from official Vatican website, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006
^ "Three Stages in the Program of De-Hellenization" by Pope Benedict XVI, Zenit News Agency, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006
^ Pope Is Regretful That His Speech Angered Muslims, Sep. 17, 2006, L.A. Times, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006
^ Al Qaeda threat over pope speech, Sep. 18, 2006, CNN.com retrieved Oct. 18, 2006
^ Qaeda-led group vows "jihad" over Pope's speech, Sep. 18, 2006, Reuters, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

Print resources

Fuller, Reginald H. (1965). The Foundations of New Testament Christology. New York: Scribners. ISBN 0-684-15532-X.
González, Justo L. (1984). The Story of Christianity: Vol. 1: The Early Church to the Reformation. San Francisco: Harper. ISBN 0-06-063315-8.
González, Justo L. (1985). The Story of Christianity, Vol. 2: The Reformation to the Present Day. San Francisco: Harper. ISBN 0-06-063316-6.
Latorette, Kenneth Scott (1975). A History of Christianity, Volume 1: Beginnings to 1500 (Revised). San Francisco: Harper. ISBN 0-06-064952-6 (paperback).
Latorette, Kenneth Scott (1975). A History of Christianity, Volume 2. San Francisco: Harper. ISBN 0-06-064953-4 (paperback).
Shelley, Bruce L. (1996). Church History in Plain Language (2nd edition ed.). ISBN 0-8499-3861-9. {{cite book}}: |edition= has extra text (help)
Hastings, Adrian (1999). A World History of Christianity. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. ISBN 0802848753.

External links

The following links give an overview of the history of Christianity:

Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Christianity in History
Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Church as an Institution
Church history at WikiChristian
Church History in the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica

The following link provides quantitative data related to Christianity and other major religions, including rates of adherence at different points in time:

American Religion Data Archive
Early Stages of the Establishment of Christianity
Theandros, a journal of Orthodox theology and philosophy, containing articles on early Christianity and patristic studies.
Historical Christianity, A time line with references to the descendants of the early church.

Template:Link FA

[1] Adherents.com, Religions by Adherents

[2] R. E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave (New York: Doubleday, Anchor Bible Reference Library, 1994), p. 964; S. J. D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Westminster Press, 1987, p. 78, 93, 105, 108; M.Grant, Jesus, An Historian's View of the Gospels (New York: Scribner's 1977) pp. 34-35, 78, 166, 200; P. Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews (Alfred A. Knopf, 1999) pp. 6-7, 105-110, 232-234, 266; John P. Meier, A Marginal Jew (Doubleday, 1991) vol. 1 pp. 68, 146, 199, 278, 386, and vol. 2 p. 726; G. Vermes, Jesus the Jew (Philadelphia: Fortress Press 1973), p. 37.; P. L. Maier, In the Fullness of Time (Kregel, 1991) pp. 1, 99, 121, 171; N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions (HarperCollins, 1998) pp. 32, 83, 100-102, 222; E. P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus (Penguin Books, 1993); J. A. H. Moran Cruz and R. Gerberding, Medieval Worlds: An Introduction to European History (Houghton Mifflin Company 2004), pp. 44-45; J. D. Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant (HarperCollins, 1991) p. xi-xiii; L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996), p. 123; Rudolf Bultmann, Jesus (Berlin: Deutsche Bibliothek, 1926), p. 159

[3] th by crucifixion, see L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996); John P. Meier, "The Circle of the Twelve: Did It Exist during Jesus' Public Ministry?", in Journal of Biblical Literature 116 (1997) pp. 664–665

[4] R. E. Brown, Death of the Messiah vol. 2 (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1994) pp. 1240-1241; J. A. T. Robinson, The Human Face of God (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1973) p. 131 and also J. Kremer, Die Osterevangelien-Geschichten um Geschichte (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977) pp. 49-50; B. Ehrman, From Jesus to Constantine: A History of Early Christianity, lecture 4, "Oral and Written Traditions About Jesus" (The Teaching Company, 2003); M. J. Borg and N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus (San Fransisco: Harper Collins, 1999), p. 12; G. Habermas, The Historical Jesus, (College Press, 1996) p. 128

[5] M. Grant, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels (New York: Scribner's 1977) p. 176; P. L. Maier, "The Empty Tomb as History" in Christianity Today (March 1975) p. 5; D. H. Van Daalen, The Real Resurrection (London: Collins, 1972), p. 41; Jakob Kremer, Die Osterevangelien--Geschichten um Geschichte (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977), pp. 49-50; W. Craig, "The Disciples' Inspection of the Empty Tomb (Luke 24, 12.24; John 20, 1–10)," in John and the Synoptics, ed. A. Denaux, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 101 (Louvain: University Press, 1992), pp. 614–619; W. Craig, "The Guard at the Tomb", in New Testament Studies 30 (1984) pp. 273–281; W. Craig, "The Historicity of the Empty Tomb of Jesus," in New Testament Studies 31 (1985): 39-67

[6] L. T. Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco, Harper San Francisco, 1996) p. 136; Gerd Ludemann, What Really Happened to Jesus? trans. J. Bowden (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995) p. 8; N. T. Wright, "The New Unimproved Jesus", in Christianity Today (13 September 1993) p. 26; Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus?, trans. John Bowden (Louisville, Kent.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), p. 80; James Orr, The Resurrection of Jesus (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1909) p. 39; Jindrich Mánek, "The Apostle Paul and the Empty Tomb", in NT 2 (1957) pp. 277-278; C. F. D. Moule, ed., "The Significance of the Message of the Resurrection for Faith in Jesus Christ", in SBT 8 (London: SCM, 1968); Jacob Kremer, "Zur Diskussion über "das leere Grab", in Resurrexit, ed. Edouard Dhanis (Rome: Libreria Editrice Vatica, 1974) pp. 143-144

[7] 3:1 Acts 3:1; 5:27 – 42 Acts 5:27–42; 21:18 – 26 Acts 21:18–26; 24:5 Acts 24:5; 24:14 Acts 24:14; 28:22 Acts 28:22; 1:16 Romans 1:16; Tacitus, Annales xv 44; Josephus Antiquities xviii 3; Mortimer Chambers, The Western Experience Volume II chapter 5; The Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion page 158.

[8] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 51

[9] E. Peterson, "Christianus" pp. 353-72

[10] On the Creeds, see Oscar Cullmann, The Earliest Christian Confessions, trans. J. K. S. Reid (London: Lutterworth, 1949); on the Passion, see Rudolf Pesch, Das Markusevangelium, 2 vols., Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament 2 (Freiburg: Herder, 1976-77), 2: 519-20

[11] Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) p. 47; Reginald Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives (New York: Macmillan, 1971) p. 10; Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Earlychurch: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 64; Hans Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, translated James W. Leitch (Philadelphia: Fortress 1969) p. 251; Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol. 1 pp. 45, 80-82, 293; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81, 92

[12] see Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968)p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Early church: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 66-66; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81; Thomas Sheehan, First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity (New York: Random House, 1986 pp. 110, 118; Ulrich Wilckens, Resurrection translated A. M. Stewart (Edinburgh: Saint Andrew, 1977) p. 2; Hans Grass, Ostergeschen und Osterberichte, Second Edition (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1962) p96; Grass favors the origin in Damascus.

[13] Gerald O' Collins, What are They Saying About the Resurrection? (New York: Paulist Press, 1978) p. 112; on historical importance, cf. Hans von Campenhausen, "The Events of Easter and the Empty Tomb," in Tradition and Life in the Church (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968) p. 44; and also Archibald Hunter, Works and Words of Jesus (1973) p. 100

[14] Cullmann, Confessions p. 32

[15] Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol 1, pp. 49, 81; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102

[16] Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) pp. 118, 283, 367; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 50; C. H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching and its Developments (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980) p. 14

[17] Reginald Fuller, The Foundations of New Testament Christology (New York: Scriner's, 1965) pp. 214, 216, 227, 239; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 9, 128

[18] Walter Bauer, Greek-English Lexicon; Ignatius of Antioch Letter to the Magnesians 10, Letter to the Romans (Roberts-Donaldson tr., Lightfoot tr., Greek text). However, an edition presented on some websites, one that otherwise corresponds exactly with the Roberts-Donaldson translation, renders this passage to the interpolated inauthentic longer recension of Ignatius's letters, which does not contain the word "Christianity".

[19] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 58

[20] .g. 11:13–15; 2:1–17; 7–11; 4–13, and the Epistle of James in general.

[21] ublished by J.-P. Audet in JTS [1] 1950, v1, pp 135-154; see also The Council of Jamnia and the Old Testament Canon, Robert C. Newman, 1983.

[22] Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 3.11.8

[23] Both points taken from Mark A. Noll's Turning Points, (Baker Academic, 1997) pp 36-37

[24] Lindberg, Carter (2006). A Brief History of Christianity. Blackwell Publishing. p. 15. ISBN 1405110783.

[25] Lindberg, Carter (2006). A Brief History of Christianity. Blackwell Publishing. p. 15. ISBN 1405110783.

[26] According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Canon of the New Testament: "The idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning, that is from Apostolic times, has no foundation in history. The Canon of the New Testament, like that of the Old, is the result of a development, of a process at once stimulated by disputes with doubters, both within and without the Church, and retarded by certain obscurities and natural hesitations, and which did not reach its final term until the dogmatic definition of the Tridentine Council."

[27] Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum ("On the Deaths of the Persecutors")ch. 35-34

[28] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55

[29] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55; cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine

[30] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 55

[31] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) pp. 55-56

[32] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 56

[33] Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) pp. 14-15

[34] Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 15

[35] Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 16

[36] R. Gerberding and J. H. Moran Cruz, Medieval Worlds (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004) p. 57

[37] . Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 9

[38] Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) pp. 10 and 12

[39] see J. D. Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova et Amplissima Collectio 3, p. 559

[40] Jo Ann H. Moran Cruze and Richard Gerberding, Medieval Worlds pp. 118-119

[41] On the development of penitential practice, see McNeill & Gamer, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, (Columba University Press, 1938) pp. 9-54

[42] Richards, Jeffrey. The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476-752 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979) p. 36

[43] For such an analysis, see Brian Tierney and Sidney Painter, Western Europe in the Middle Ages 300-1475. 6th ed. (McGraw-Hill 1998)

[44] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. xx

[45] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 124-125

[46] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 119

[47] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 128

[48] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 137-138

[49] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 146-148

[50] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) pp. 148-149

[51] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 238

[52] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 243

[53] MacCulloch, Diarmaid, The Reformation: A History (New York: Penguin Books, 2004) p. 404

[54] Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1972) p. 263

[55] Ahlstrom's summary is as follows: Restorationism has its genesis with Thomas and Alexander Campbell, whose movement is connected to the German Reformed Church through Otterbein, Albright, and Winebrenner (p. 212). American Millennialism and Adventism, which arose from Evangelical Protestantism, produced certain groups such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (p. 387, 501-9), the Jehovah's Witness movement (p. 807), and, as a reaction specifically to William Miller, Seventh Day Adventism (p. 381).

[56] Statistical Report: Annual Council of the General Conference Committee Silver Spring, Marlyand, October 6—11, 2006]

[Adherents-57] Cite error: The named reference Adherents was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[58] JW-Media.org Membership 2005

[59] Evangelicalism in modern Britain: a history from the 1730s to the 1980s, David W. Bebbington, pub 1995, Routledge (UK), ISBN 0415104645, pg 230,231; 245-249

[60] ttp://www.eauk.org/churchsearch/

[61] Faith, Reason and the University Memories and Reflections from official Vatican website, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

[62] "Three Stages in the Program of De-Hellenization" by Pope Benedict XVI, Zenit News Agency, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

[63] Pope Is Regretful That His Speech Angered Muslims, Sep. 17, 2006, L.A. Times, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

[64] Al Qaeda threat over pope speech, Sep. 18, 2006, CNN.com retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

[65] Qaeda-led group vows "jihad" over Pope's speech, Sep. 18, 2006, Reuters, retrieved Oct. 18, 2006

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@@ Line 504: / Line 504: @@
 Australia has seen renewal in different parts of her Anglican Church, as well as a growing presence of an Evangelical community.  Although more "traditional" in its Anglican roots, the nation has seen growth in its religious sector. Some of its religious programming is even exported via satellite.
+==Postmodern Christianity==
+{{main|Postmodern Christianity}}
+[[Postmodern Christianity]] is an understanding of Christianity that is closely associated with the body of writings known as [[postmodern philosophy]]. Although it is a relatively recent development in the [[Christian]] [[religion]], many Christian postmodernists are quick to assert that their style of thought has an affinity with foundational Christian thinkers such as [[Augustine of Hippo]] and [[Thomas Aquinas]] and famed Christian [[mystics]] such as [[Meister Eckhart]] and [[Angelus Silesius]].
+In addition to [[Christian theology]], postmodern Christianity has its roots in post-Heideggerian [[continental philosophy]], particularly the thought of Jacques Derrida. Postmodern Christianity first emerged in the early 1980s with the publication of major books about Derrida and theology authored by Carl Raschke, Mark C. Taylor, and Charles Winquist. Many people prefer to eschew the label "postmodern Christianity" because the idea of postmodernity has almost no determinate meaning and, in the [[United States]], serves largely to symbolize an emotionally charged battle of [[ideologies]]. Moreover, such alleged postmodern heavyweights as [[Jacques Derrida]] and [[Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe]] have refused to operate under a so-called postmodern rubric, preferring instead to specifically embrace a single project stemming from the [[European]] [[Enlightenment]] and its precursors. Nevertheless, postmodern Christianity and its constituent schools of thought continue to be relevant.
+====Liberal Christianity====
+{{Main|Liberal Christianity}}
+[[Liberal Christianity]] -- sometimes called '''liberal theology''' -- has an affinity with certain current forms of postmodern Christianity, although postmodern thought was originally a reaction against mainstream Protestant liberalism.  [[Liberal Christianity]] is an umbrella term covering diverse, philosophically informed movements and moods within [[19th century|19th]] and [[20th century]] Christianity.
+Despite its name, liberal Christianity has always been thoroughly [[protean]]. The word "liberal" in liberal Christianity does not refer to a [[leftist]] political agenda but rather to insights developed during the [[Enlightenment]]. Generally speaking, [[Enlightenment]]-era [[liberalism]] held that man is a political creature and that [[liberty]] of thought and expression should be his highest value. The development of liberal Christianity owes a lot to the works of philosophers [[Immanuel Kant]] and [[Friedrich Schleiermacher]]. As a whole, liberal Christianity is a product of a continuing philosophical dialogue.
+Many [[20th century]] liberal Christians have been influenced by philosophers [[Edmund Husserl]] and [[Martin Heidegger]]. Examples of important liberal Christian thinkers are [[Rudolf Bultmann]] and [[John A.T. Robinson]].
+====Christian existentialism====
+[[Image:Kierkegaard.jpg|thumb|160px|Søren Kierkegaard]]
+{{Main|Christian existentialism}}
+[[Christian existentialism]] is a form of liberal Christianity that draws extensively from the writings of [[Søren Kierkegaard]]. Kierkegaard initiated the school of thought when he reacted against [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel]]'s claims of universal knowledge and what he deemed to be the empty formalities of the [[19th century]] church. [[Christian existentialism]] places an emphasis on the undecidability of faith, individual passion, and the subjectivity of knowledge.
+Although Kierkegaard's writings weren't initially embraced, they became widely known at the beginning of the [[20th century]]. Later Christian existentialists synthesized Kierkegaardian themes with the works of thinkers such as [[Friedrich Nietzsche]], [[Walter Benjamin]], and [[Martin Buber]].
+[[Paul Tillich]] and [[Gabriel Marcel]] are examples of leading Christian existentialist writers.
+====Continental philosophical theology====
+'''Continental philosophical theology''' is the most recent form of postmodern Christianity. The movement was fueled heavily by the slew of notable post-[[Heidegger]]ian philosophers that appeared on the continent in the 1970s and 1980s. Groundbreaking works such as [[Jean-Luc Marion]]'s ''God Without Being'' and [[John D. Caputo]]'s ''The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida'' ushered in the era of continental philosophical theology.
+====Radical orthodoxy====
+{{Main|Radical orthodoxy}}
+[[Radical orthodoxy]] is a form of continental philosophical theology that has been influenced by the [[phenomenological]] writings of [[Jean-Luc Marion]].
+Radical orthodoxy is a style of theology that seeks to examine classic Christian writings and related [[Neoplatonic]] texts from a contemporary, [[continental philosophy|philosophically continental]] perspective. The movement finds in writers such as [[Augustine of Hippo]] and [[Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite]] valuable sources of insight and meaning relevant to modern society and Christianity at large.
+[[John Milbank]] and [[James K.A. Smith]] are leading proponents of radical orthodoxy.
+====Hermeneutics of religion====
+The '''hermeneutics of religion''' is another form of continental philosophical theology. The system of [[hermeneutic]] interpretation developed by [[Paul Ricœur]] has heavily influenced the school of thought. A central theme in the hermeneutics of religion is that of a [[God]] who exists outside the confines of the human imagination.
+====Weak theology====
+{{main|Weak theology}}
+'''Weak theology''' is a manner of thinking about theology from a [[deconstructive]] point of view. The style of thought owes a debt to [[Jacques Derrida]], especially in light of his idea of a "weak force." Weak theology is weak because it takes a non-dogmatic, perspectival approach to theology. Proponents of weak theology believe that dominant contemporary explications of theology are inherently ideological, totalizing, and militant. In reponse, weak theology expresses itself through acts of interpretation.
+===Institutional effects===
+Although postmodern Christianity is inescapably political, postmodern Christianity does not necessarily represent a new [[ecclesiastical]] [[epoch]]. It is consonant with postmodern Christianity to work within existing institutions, interrupting business as usual in order to make room for marginalized voices. In such a case, the goal would not be revolution but rather a call to reform and transform existing social structures in the direction of love, hospitality, and openness.
+===Emerging church===
+{{Main|Emerging church}}
+Postmodern Christianity has influenced the [[emerging church]] movement. The [[emerging church]] movement seeks to revitalize the Christian church beyond what it sees as the confines of Christian [[fundamentalism]] so that it can effectively engage with people in contemporary society.  Critics allege, however, that this movement's understanding of faith has led many of its adherents outside the bounds of traditional Christianity. [[Brian McLaren]] is a well-known author and spokesperson for the emerging church movement.
 == 21st century ==