The World's Religions: Christianity

Christianity is a religion that started over two-thousand years ago and for all these centuries, it has experienced many changes and continuity. It all started with a Jewish carpenter named Jesus. Jesus was crucified, but the next morning, Easter Sunday, there were many signs of him coming back from the dead in a new form. Disciples believed that Christ’s physical body came back from the dead while others believed it was a rebirth of the spirit and soul of Christ. After his followers were convinced Jesus was resurrected, they started to preach the gospel of their Risen Lord.The faith in Jesus’ resurrection produced the Church and its Christology.
After Christ's resurrection, His disciples continued to remain within the fold of Judaism. The small community of believers was later called a sect by the Jews, but it was still purely Jewish. Although their teachings were highly unpopular, day after day Christians went to the Temple to worship and to preach the Gospel. Christianity spread initially from Jerusalem throughout the Near East, into places such as Syria, Assyria, Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, Asia Minor, Jordan and Egypt. In 380 A.D., Christianity became the official religion in the Roman Empire. It became common to all of Europe in the Middle Ages. By the 20th century, Christianity had spread onto every continent and now is the world’s largest religion with around 2.2 billion believers and it’s continued spreading ever since.
In the beginning, the church was substantially one institution. There were no denominations for the first thousand years of Christian history. Not all Christians believed with all that has been said. In 1054, there was a great division between the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church in the West. The next division occurred in the sixteenth century in the Western Church with the Protestant Reformation. The reasons for these breaks were complex. The dominant language of the West was Latin, while that of the East was Greek. With linguistic unity gone, cultural unity began to crumble as well. There was also disunion in the Roman Empire that may have contributed to the separation of the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church. Protestantism is aimed at reforming the beliefs and practices of Roman Catholicism. Now there are over 40,000 denominations in Christianity.
Many of the beliefs still remain the same today, but Christianity has modernized into our world. In the fast pace of today’s society we find that things change very rapidly. In the Bible, it is taught to have a heterosexual lifestyle, but nowadays being homosexual is accepted. Also, the unity of the church has suffered because of denominationalism. These are only a few examples, but, as you can see, there have been many changes in Christianity between early Christians and modern Christians. Also, there have been many things that have stayed the same. God and his word have stayed the same for over 2000 years. Christians still believe in Jesus’ resurrection and how he atoned for all of our sins (Smith, 330). We still have the same bible. Christians regularly pray and usually go to Sunday worship services. Christians get baptized and regularly participate in communions. Most Christian practices and beliefs have continued on to this day.
Thus, Christianity has become one of the most accepted religions in the world. The spread of Christianity has made it to become the world’s largest religion with 30% of all the world’s population followers. Additionally, the Christian church has been divided up into three branches and has been growing with over 40,000 denominations. Furthermore, Christianity has been modernized to fit into our world today, but many rituals and practices of Christianity have carried on to the modern world. Christianity has lasted for over 2000 years and it is still continually growing to this day.