Would Christianity have survived if...... (page 2)

botchtowersociety

It would have survived. It has survived in lands that did not belong to Rome.

Mad Sweeney

This talk of Mithras makes me want to re-read Mary Stewart's Merlin trilogy again.

PSacramento

It survived almost 300 years of persecution BEFORE it became the national religion of Rome.

botchtowersociety

It survived almost 300 years of persecution BEFORE it became the national religion of Rome.

Good point...and it grew and spread throught that period--despite being banned.

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By the time Constantine legalized the practice of Christianity in 313, the empire

was already heavily Christianized. By the year 300 perhaps 10 percent of the

people were Christians, and by the middle of the century, Christians may well have

been a majority of the citizens, 33 million Christians in an empire of 60 million

people. So Constantine did not so much ensure Christianity’s success as

acknowledge it.

These were not 33 million “nominal” Christians. In the decade before

Constantine’s edict, the Church had suffered its most ruthless and systematic

persecution ever under the emperor Diocletian and his successors. The practice of

the faith was, in many places, punished by torture and death. In many places, to

live as a Christian meant, at the least, to accept social stigma and humiliation.

What is more, the Christian way itself was characterized by voluntarily engaging in

demanding disciplines in the life of prayer and in the moral life.

To be a Christian was not easy in the year 300. Christians were laying their lives

on the line every time they met to discuss the New Testament, and they continued

to do so through the course of every day.

Yet the rate of conversion throughout the empire — beginning with the first

Christians, long before Constantine — was most remarkable.

In the first Christian centuries there was an astonishing growth rate of 40 percent

per decade. Again, Constantine gets no credit for this growth. Most of it happened

in the years before he was born.

Most growth came from individual conversions, and not only from the poor, but

also from the merchant and upper classes. Most converts were women; women

benefited greatly from conversion; and some women were influential leaders. The

Christian population grew by 40 percent a decade, from about 1,000 Christians in

the year 40 to 7,530 in 100 to a little over six million in 300 and 33 million in 350

— growing, in the hundred years between 250 and 350, from about two percent of

the population to slightly over half.

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Christianity transformed the Roman culture:

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Epidemics were among the great terrors of life in the ancient world. The physicians

in those days knew that the diseases were communicable, but they knew nothing

about bacteria or viruses, never mind antibiotics or antisepsis. Once the diseases hit

your hometown, there was really no stopping them. Several major epidemics

ravaged the empire during the rise of Christianity, and each of them reduced the

empire’s population by about one-third.

How did that happen? Look at what ordinarily happened when an epidemic hit

your ancient hometown. The first people to leave were usually the doctors. They

knew what was coming, and they knew they could do little to prevent it. The

second-century pagan physician Galen admits that he fled, in his description of the

worldwide epidemic during the reign of Marcus Aurelius. The next ones to leave

were the pagan priests, because they had the means and the freedom to do so.

Ordinary pagan families were encouraged to abandon their homes when family

members contracted the plague. Again, they knew no other way to isolate the

disease than to leave the afflicted family member behind to die, perhaps slowly.

Christians were duty-bound not to abandon the sick. Jesus had said that, in caring

for the sick, Christians were caring for him. So, even though Christians knew little

more about medicine than the pagans did, they stayed with their family members,

friends, and neighbors who were suffering. Consider this account of the great

epidemic of the year 260, left to us by Dionysius of Alexandria:

Most of the Christians in our city showed unbounded love and loyalty, never

sparing themselves and thinking only of others. Heedless of danger, they took

charge of the sick, attending their every need, helping and comforting them — and

with them departed this life serenely happy; for they were infected by others with

the disease, drawing on themselves the sickness of their neighbors and cheerfully

accepting their pain.

We also possess pagan accounts of that epidemic, and all of them are characterized

by despair. Yet the Christians were “serenely happy.” Nor was this an

extraordinary event. Syrian Antioch, considered the second city of the empire,

experienced 41 natural and social catastrophes of this order during the years when

Christianity was on the rise. That is an average of one cataclysmic disaster every

fifteen years.

Christianity had the same effect in other ways. It offered cities filled with

strangers, orphans, widows, the homeless, and the poor a new family and

community and a new way of life that freed them from many of the fears that

tortured their pagan neighbors.

Amid the havoc, Christian charity brought church growth. Christians were much

more likely to survive epidemics because they cared for one another. Mere comfort

care cut the Christian mortality rate by two-thirds when compared with the pagans.

What is more, the Christian families cared for their pagan neighbors as well. Thus,

the pagans who received Christian care were more likely to survive and, in turn, to

become Christians themselves. Thus, in times of epidemic, when populations as a

whole plummeted, church growth soared, even when Roman soldiers were

executed Christians by the thousands.

The pagans tended only to take care of those in their group. While pagans would

only help their brothers, Christians treated all men as their brothers. And the

pagans took notice. The emperor Julian, who despised all Christians and led the

charge to re-paganize the empire, still had to grudgingly admire their charity: “The

impious Galileans support not only their poor, but ours as well. Everyone can see

that our poor lack aid from us.”

A document of the early second century, the Letter to Diognetus, describes the

process. The writer points out that Christians are not distinguished from other

people by anything external: not their country or language, not their food or

clothing, but by what he calls the Christians “way of life.”

They marry, as do all others; they have children; but they do not commit

infanticide. They invite strangers to their table, but not into their bed … they obey

the prescribed laws, and at the same time surpass the laws by their lives. They love

all men, and are persecuted by all. They are unknown and condemned; they are

put to death … to sum it up: As the soul is in the body, so Christians are in the

world. The soul is dispersed through all the members of the body, and Christians

are scattered through all the cities of the world … the invisible soul is guarded by

the visible body, and Christians are known indeed to be in the world, but their

godliness remains invisible.

Gradually, invisibly, but inexorably, Christian doctrine, hope, and charity

transformed the Roman Empire. Christianity transformed the way neighbors

treated the sick, the way parents treated their children, and the way husbands and

wives loved each other. It was this lifestyle, in addition to the promise of freely

given eternal salvation, which attracted so many new believers.

Christianity addressed people’s needs, both in this life, and in the next life, in

contrast to paganism, which didn’t satisfactorily address the next life, and in

contrast to Egyptian mythology, which didn’t offer practical guidance for this life.

http://huron2.aaps.k12.mi.us/smitha/HUM/PDF/Growth-of-Chr.pdf

THE GLADIATOR

Before Rome adopted Christianity it had more than three hundred gods and goddesses. Now it has one god split into three.

Gladiators were not consulted about the change over. Oh, the sorry trade!

cantleave

I'm sorry BTS, how could there have been 33 million christians?

We know from our studies that between the death of Christ and 1935, there were only 144,000 of them.

Unbeknowst to most, Jesus was really a Shaolin Monk, trained in the ancient art of Tang Lang Gung Fu ( Praying mantis for those that don't habla), He taught this most ancient and dealy art to his followers who became reknown for their MA prowess !!

The most famed were:

Peter "Iron Crotch" Simon and the Brothers James "thunder kick" Zebedee and John "Bitch Slap" Zebedee !

It was widely rumoured that two others were taught the ancient art via mystic revelation from Christ ( Christ means Mantis in Ancient gibberish) and they were Paul "The Gentile crusher" Taurus and James "Crotch snipper" Son of Joesph ( rumoured to be the brother of Jesus).

Jesus was put to death for saying that his kung fu was stronger than the kung fu of the locals - supposedly the Roman authorites were mislead by Hebrew Ninjas into believing the Christ was thinking of an open reblion using this more deadly of arts !

Many centuries past and the art spread through out the area, its practioners we reknown for their lack of fear, their ability to use a staff called "the cross" and the use of flat bread as a projectile weapon ! ( inner teachings of this sect say that Christs chi endows this flat bread with mystical qualities !).

While thet did their best to keep this secret art hidden, eventually the Romans found out and after using 12 masters of the inner circle to defeat an army on the battlefield, the emperor Contstantine made this system of hand-to-hand combat the national fighting system in the Roman Empire !!

Much to the sorrow of the obsolete gladiator class !

Would Christianity have survived if......

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