What is the life span of Christianity?

[MorkandMindy]

What is Christianity and what are it's boundaries?

Is modern day liberal American Christianity the same religion as the Roman Catholic Church of Feudal times which burned witches, homosexuals and heretics alive?

If the whole Early Church in Jerusalem was Jewish and was destroyed in 70 AD and the small branch in Alexandria had vanished by 150 AD, how can any of modern Christianity claim continuity with Jesus?

Can Arian or Athanasian Christianity claim any connection with the Early Church?

As Christianity develops at what point does it cease to be the same religion?

 

[DailyBlessings]

What is Christianity and what are it's boundaries?

Is modern day liberal American Christianity the same religion as the Roman Catholic Church of Feudal times which burned witches, homosexuals and heretics alive?

If the whole Early Church in Jerusalem was Jewish and was destroyed in 70 AD and the small branch in Alexandria had vanished by 150 AD, how can any of modern Christianity claim continuity with Jesus?

Can Arian or Athanasian Christianity claim any connection with the Early Church?

As Christianity develops at what point does it cease to be the same religion?

Why is it important? I think it's pretty clear that there is some sort of connection between early and later Christianity, and also that no cultural institution remains identical from one temporal-spatial context to the next. Trying to assign categorical boundaries to things is a useless exercise, unless you have some particular reason for doing so.

 

[MorkandMindy]

Are you saying you have a connection with the Medieval Church which burnt many people alive? The screams of pain followed by the moans of dying helped the faith of the hundreds of good church-going spectators called to these events.

About 100,000 were burnt in total including William Tyndale. Some were burnt 6 miles from where I am sitting right now.

 

[DailyBlessings]

Are you saying you have a connection with the Medieval Church which burnt many people alive? The screams of pain followed by the moans of dying helped the faith of the hundreds of good church-going spectators called to these events.

Yes, I do. So do you, for that matter. That hardly constitutes a wholehearted agreement on our part.

 

[uberd00b]

I think so long as Christianity restricts itself to the supernatural and unprovable it may last a while longer. That is what I call an "untouchable faith".

Whenever it roams into the realm of the physical it has a habit of being disproven, creationists are a fine example. They seem to be doing their best to kill Christianity. There is also a danger in making moral pronouncements as morality moves onwards. If a moral statement is made they risk making themselves irrelevant. Rather like loudly announcing the "mixed races should not marry" in a party, people will just shuffle off to the other side of the room.

I think Christianity must adapt to survive. The more conservative denominations are not equipped to do this, their claim to "absolute Truth™" prevents them from modernising. Or at least obviously modernising.

 

[MorkandMindy]

I think so long as Christianity restricts itself to the supernatural and unprovable it may last a while longer. That is what I call an "untouchable faith".

Hello way up there! (Aalreet way up there!)
You are among the furthest North of any of us.

One good example of the risks of becoming empirical would be the US President's statements about relying on God for his decisions. Suddenly statements made on an aircraft carrier to all the World which prove to be entirely incorrect reflect on the inability of Christianity to even see the present, let alone the future. My own suspicion is 2003 was the high water mark of American Fundamentalist Christianity.

 

[MorkandMindy]

... Trying to assign categorical boundaries to things is a useless exercise, unless you have some particular reason for doing so.

Words are labels for categories, I'm not sure how to do without them.

 

[DailyBlessings]

Words are labels for categories, I'm not sure how to do without them.

My point is that the categories here are not accomplishing anything. Any two people or two groups will have a certain degree of similarity and a certain degree of difference. Because of some shared history and central doctrine, both I and a member of the medieval church identify as Christian. Yet, in philosophy, society, and even most religious beliefs, we are quite dissimilar. Congruity along the planes that generate identity doe snot constitute evidence of congruity on all planes. So trying to assign boundaries to "Christianity" will not answer your latter question which seems to be something along the lines of: "Is the temporal and spatial diversity of the church a challenge to it's authenticity?"

 

[MorkandMindy]

I think I see the problem.

My personality type is appreciative rather than judgemental, so to me a category is a property, an aspect of something, and just one of a multitude of descriptions that could be applied, rather than a pigeon hole something is stuffed into.


To take a simple example, a category 1 hurricane can go up or down, so it can't be stuck in a pigeon hole, and it is just the wind speed so is just one aspect of the storm.

Other aspects of a cat. 1 hurricane would be where it is at what time, what direction it is heading and at what speed. Needless to say in real life there would be as many pigeon holes as storms if someone tried to play the pigeon hole game, so the pigeon holes would be a total waste of time.


Same with people. There is no such thing as an IQ 110 person, any more than there is such a thing as a 'Floridan'. All people are unique and change with time as well. It's even difficult to get two apparently identical pigeons in the same pigeon hole. Only institutions are cruel enough to jam people into pigeon holes.

 

[MorkandMindy]

I think Christianity must adapt to survive. The more conservative denominations are not equipped to do this, their claim to "absolute Truth™" prevents them from modernising. Or at least obviously modernising.

Christianity is adapting that is why it is surviving

The church I can see out the window next to me was built around 1300 and has a big grave yard with big memorial markers on two sides and some inside. The church on the other side of this house was built just after WW2 and has small memorial markers on one side. Newer churches often don't have any graves.

Fear of death used to get them in, but now the church isn't the only guide to life here. People want to enjoy life and to succeed at it in many different ways.

Dead people outside the church reminds them of something they don't need to be reminded about, so to continue to get people in the churches are changing and therefore the religion is changing.

There are vines growing on the fence cutting off the view of the graveyard and bright banners over the church entrance. The whole focus has moved from death to life. And as for burning people alive, they've stopped that completely.

 

[Sojourner<><]

What is Christianity and what are it's boundaries?

Is modern day liberal American Christianity the same religion as the Roman Catholic Church of Feudal times which burned witches, homosexuals and heretics alive?

If the whole Early Church in Jerusalem was Jewish and was destroyed in 70 AD and the small branch in Alexandria had vanished by 150 AD, how can any of modern Christianity claim continuity with Jesus?

Can Arian or Athanasian Christianity claim any connection with the Early Church?

As Christianity develops at what point does it cease to be the same religion?

What exactly are we talking about here? Are you referring to the philosophy and theology of Christianity, or the cultures that developed out of it?

 

[Sojourner<><]

It sounds like there is a lot of confusion about what Christianity is exactly. From the outside, to those who don't share in its system of beliefs, I can understand why it might appear to be nothing more than an institution or a particular group of people. But from the inside, from a Christian's view point, Christianity should be much more than that. From my perspective it's an all-encompassing world view, so your question about when Christianity ceases to be Christianity sounds alot like somebody asking when mathematics ceases to be mathematics, and it doesn't make much sense.

 

[Sojourner<><]

Hello way up there! (Aalreet way up there!)
You are among the furthest North of any of us.

One good example of the risks of becoming empirical would be the US President's statements about relying on God for his decisions. Suddenly statements made on an aircraft carrier to all the World which prove to be entirely incorrect reflect on the inability of Christianity to even see the present, let alone the future. My own suspicion is 2003 was the high water mark of American Fundamentalist Christianity.

Ok, but, Christians don't exactly think in unison as if we all have the same political agendas, but sometimes we're encouraged to think we're supposed to. The truth is that the pulpit can be a very powerful platform for political control, and it's my opinion that it has been exploited from time to time to suit the selfish purposes of those that figure this out.

 

[MorkandMindy]

What exactly are we talking about here? Are you referring to the philosophy and theology of Christianity, or the cultures that developed out of it?

This may depend on our respective starting points.

I generally think of Christianity as infecting existing cultures such as infecting and destroying the Roman Empire as it did around 400 AD. Eventually the Dark Ages were destroyed by the Enlightenment and finally Christianity has pretty much died out in Europe, only to take over the Americas and now it is going into Africa. It goes into existing civilisations, often ones that have a problem but most likely would recover from it, and takes over.

Another opinion might be that European culture is built on Christianity and now Christianity has got into US politics and is rebuilding that country from a soft liberal nation into a proud powerful one.

Nobody should just assume one of these World views is correct but should investigate and decide which is correct or which applies in which situation.

A fatal mistake in politics or religion is to investigate one situation and find for example a Democrat Mayor was corrupt and then conclude all Democrats are corrupt and therefore all Republicans are not... I get tons of emails of that sort and they do nothing but make fools of the people who send them. Apply either World view as you find suits the case. Guilty is not intended to be the outcome of every trial any more than not guilty is. Be as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves.

 

[MorkandMindy]

... your question about when Christianity ceases to be Christianity sounds a lot like somebody asking when mathematics ceases to be mathematics, and it doesn't make much sense.

Mathematics is a whole field, religion is a whole field, so the equivalent question would be: 'When does Christianity cease to be a religion?'.


I asked 'As Christianity develops at what point does it cease to be the same religion?'


That is a question about a specific part of a field and would be analogous to asking when a mathematics course has moved out of trigonometry and onto topology. And yes it is still mathematics just a different part, much as some modern faith may finally be declared to have left the roots of Christianity and now be a different religion.

When I was an Evangelical I thought the Universalist Unitarian Church had evolved out of Christianity into something else.

But Universalists have claimed that since most of the earliest theologies were Universalist, it is the mainstream Churches that have left the Christian roots. And Unitarians that since the Trinity was formulated in the last couple of decades of his life by Athanasius, that the Early Church was clearly not Trinitarian, and so overall the U-U s are the only ones with the original faith.

The same is claimed by just about every part of Christendom.

Sometimes it makes me think about the Big Bang where every part is as much the centre as every other part...

 

[Sojourner<><]

This may depend on our respective starting points.

I generally think of Christianity as infecting existing cultures such as infecting and destroying the Roman Empire as it did around 400 AD. Eventually the Dark Ages were destroyed by the Enlightenment and finally Christianity has pretty much died out in Europe, only to take over the Americas and now it is going into Africa. It goes into existing civilisations, often ones that have a problem but most likely would recover from it, and takes over.

Another opinion might be that European culture is built on Christianity and now Christianity has got into US politics and is rebuilding that country from a soft liberal nation into a proud powerful one.

Nobody should just assume one of these World views is correct but should investigate and decide which is correct or which applies in which situation.

A fatal mistake in politics or religion is to investigate one situation and find for example a Democrat Mayor was corrupt and then conclude all Democrats are corrupt and therefore all Republicans are not... I get tons of emails of that sort and they do nothing but make fools of the people who send them. Apply either World view as you find suits the case. Guilty is not intended to be the outcome of every trial any more than not guilty is. Be as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves.

You're certainly entitled to your own opinion, but I for one think it's a bit unfair to blame the whole of Christianity for bad behavior. Closed mindedness, dogmatism, and coerced conformity aren't inherent in Christian teachings.

 

[MorkandMindy]

You're certainly entitled to your own opinion, but I for one think it's a bit unfair to blame the whole of Christianity for bad behavior. Closed mindedness, dogmatism, and coerced conformity aren't inherent in Christian teachings.

What is inherent in Christian teachings?

 

[Sojourner<><]

What is inherent in Christian teachings?

The scriptures clearly endorse "crying out at the gates for wisdom and understanding", respecting the ways of God over the ways of men and loving your neighbor as yourself, so I would say the complete opposite. Whether or not Christians actually follow what the scriptures teach is a completely different matter.

 

[MorkandMindy]

The scriptures clearly endorse "crying out at the gates for wisdom and understanding", respecting the ways of God over the ways of men and loving your neighbor as yourself, so I would not say the complete opposite. Whether or not Christians actually follow what the scriptures teach is a completely different matter.

I inserted a 'not', I hope that fits in with your original message and was a typo.


This is that old chestnut, the recurring General Apologetics question of 'what is Christianity?'. Your response agrees that not all Christians follow the principles you stated or follow what the scriptures teach.


For better or for worse I have to agree with you on that. It makes life difficult for any atheists who want to disprove Christianity because Christians have little if indeed any common ground other than the central character of the faith, a person rather than any set of axioms.

I think many atheists are not out to disprove Christianity so much as to disprove the parts they find most troublesome, and this also applies to Islam. You won't find many atheists attacking the good deeds of Christianity or the good deeds required by Islam.

 

[Sojourner<><]

Granted, the different sects of Christianity can sometimes have vast differences in the ways that they carry out their faith, but because most sects have a common origin, the majority holds to the vary same set of scriptures. Take the Roman Catholics for instance. IMHO, their major problem is their belief in an 'unbroken apostolic line' that has a higher authority than the original teachings. Even though they still have the original teachings, if any one of their popes is in error, the entire church can be led away from the original precepts.