The Christian Church begins in with the Jewish Faith and the Old Testament prophets who for-told the coming of the Massiah. Abraham is seen as the Father of the faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims.
The history of the Christian Church begins with the death of Jesus and His appointment of St. Peter as the first Pope. St Linus served as the 2nd Pope and was selected by St Peter and St Paul. St Anacletus was the 3rd Pope 76-88AD. The Popes that followed were eventually elected by the Bishops. The Church is marked with persecution from 1AD to its rise in 400AD and then to its reformation in the 1500s. Protestant denominations declared independence from the Roman Catholic Church in the 1500s.
In 1AD Christians were persecuted by the Romans. In 312AD, the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity In 313AD Constantine ended persecutions. In 321, Constantine began to support the Church by granting land. In 325AD Constantine participated in the Council of Nicaea and produced the Nicene Creed publishing Church beliefs. In 326, Constantine built St. Peter’s Basilica. In 380AD, the Emperor Theodocia declares Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire and outlawed pagan religious practices in 391AD. The Roman Catholic Church began to function as part of the Roman Government to maintain church beliefs, keep the church stable and expand church membership to keep a common religion for the empire.
In 476AD the Western Roman Empire retreated from its holdings and the Emperor relocated to Constantinople. The Pope remained in Rome but continued to function as part of the Roman Empire.
In 630AD, Muhammad united Arab Tribes and founded Islam in Mecca. The Muslim religion spread across the middle east using the “convert or die” strategy. Muslims invaded North Africa and Spain in 711AD. They were expelled from Spain in 1492.
From 500AD to 800 AD in Europe, freedom from Rome allowed Kings to battle for and claim control over separate European countries. In 500AD these Kings merged their military and church leaders to work as a team throughout Europe. They bribed Popes to appoint their relatives as Cardinals. More relatives became Prince-Bishops and ruled parts of their Kingdoms.
The Medieval Global Warming Period ran from 800AD to 1400AD. This resulted in more crops and more people.
In 800AD, Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor, died in 814, buried in Achen Germany and succeeded by dozens of Holy Roman Emperors for the next 1000 years. This structure allowed the Kings to continue to bribe the Popes to appoint their relatives to become Cardinals until 1400AD. Kings merged their governments with the clergy and had Prince-Bishops rule their territories. By uniting Europe, you would think that peace could be established between Kingdoms, but that wasn’t always the case. In 1066 William of Normandy (France) conquered England. The Holy Roman Empire was finally abolished in 1806.
The Crusades to recapture the Holy Land began in 1095 and ended in 1291.
The universal requirement to celibacy was imposed upon the clergy in 1123 and again in 1139.
From 1346-1353 The bubonic plage ravaged Europe. It was a bacterial infection carried by flees on rats that migrated to Europe in trading ships and killed 25 to 50 million people.
In 1453, Constantinople fell
to the Muslims of the Ottoman Empire.
In 1492, Columbus discovered
land on the American Continent and claimed it for Spain,
In 1492, Pope Alexander VI was
elected and church corruption was apparent.
In 1506 Pope Julius II begins rebuilding St. Peter’s Basilica.
In 1517 Martin Luther posts
his 95 Thesis protest of Church corruption and beginning the Protestant
Reformation.
In 1534 Henry VIII was
declared as head of the Church of England by Parliament.
In 1540,Pope Paul III created
the Jesuit Order to support evangelization in America and across the globe.
1789: Georgetown University is founded as Georgetown College. It is the oldest Catholic university in the United States and the first of 28 colleges and universities founded by the Jesuits in the US.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Catholic_Church
Protestant denominations include Lutheran, Anglican, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, but also included Quaker, Puritan, Amish, Morman Evangelical and other Non-denominal churches. The best contribution Protestants made was the importance of having a personal relationship with Jesus.
The Catholic Church peaked in the1950s in the US in education, healthcare, movies and television. Most schools and hospitals were owned by Catholic Church Diocese and Religious Orders and were staffed by Nuns, Priests and Brothers, who were educated by the Church and assigned to work for room and board, healthcare, transportation and $50 per month, This continued into the 1960s, but the 2nd Vatican Council of 1962 resulted in a decline in religious vocations. It admitted after 600 years that Luther was right and that the Catholic Church had made errors. They declared correctly that the Holy Spirit was in charge but redirected religious orders to social activism, so they quit. They dropped the Latin Mass and replaced their classical music with coffee-house, guitar-based folk music. By the 1980s, classical music was reintroduced, but homilies remained unhelpful. The damage had already been done.
Orders
of Nuns sold their hospitals to Accountants and hospital costs began to
quadruple annually.
Nuns began to leave their religious orders and take their nursing degrees to hospitals to work as nurses.
Catholic School costs had been funded by Church contributions until the 1970s. Tuition payments first appeared in the 1980s. Nuns began to disappear and tuition costs rose. Joining the convent had been the escape hatch for millions of capable women for centuries to escape arranged marriages to jerks.
The Catholic Church is the largest non-government provider of health care services in the world.[1] It has around 18,000 clinics, 16,000 homes for the elderly and those with special needs, and 5,500 hospitals, with 65 percent of them located in developing countries.[2] In 2010, the Church's Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Health Care Workers said that the Church manages 26% of the world's health care facilities.[3] The Church's involvement in health care has ancient origins.
The mandate to convert the world to
Christianity had the greatest effect in Europe and America.
There are 2.5 billion Christians totaling 31% of the 8 billion global population. 1.2 billion are Catholic.
The Catholic Church has canonized hundreds of
saints over their 1990 years since 33AD.
https://www.churchtrac.com/articles/the-state-of-church-membership
Comments
I believe the Catholic Church was held captive by Emperor Constantine, but the Church chose to take the risk. It greatly accelerated their mandate to spread the gospel. I blame the Kings for taking control of the Catholic Church and I blame the Popes for causing the scandals in the middle-ages. In the 1400s, the Catholic Church had merged with the European Monarchy and the Kings bribed the Popes to appoint their Princes as Bishops and Cardinals. European local Rulers were Prince-Bishops. In 1492, the discovery of America was the “bright shiny thing” that completely distracted all of Europe.
I have been a Catholic and a Republican all my life and credit this for my high tolerance for pain. I was an active, practicing Catholic until the election of Pope Francis in 2013. His endorsement of the Climate Change hoax was the last straw. Pope Francis has returned to colluding with the Kings. I am grateful for my Catholic education and upbringing, but have diverted my donations to the kids, grandkids and great grandkids.
My belief in God is strengthened by my observations of His extremely complex creations and prayers that are immediately answered. I believe we are all mammals doing the best we can.
I believe that God has a plan for us and some of it is instructive, so we aren’t going to like some of what we experience with this plan. Human Beings have free will and are as unique as our DNA. We are here on Earth to figure out what God has planned for us. We are completely responsible for ourselves. Clues to God’s plan include our skills and interests. We are responsible for using these skills and interests to understand God’s Plan. Our life belongs to God, so suicide and infanticide are not optional.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
No comments:
Post a Comment