after non-trivial inquiry from far-away California, my best understanding is that the Celts did gracefully embrace the Christian faith among the monks and those serious about religious life. Since there were vivid and lived religious traditions alive at all times through history, this transition was not uneventful. However the kind of "top down" and by-the-sword conversion that did occur e.g. the Baltic tribes, was not the case with the equally fierce Celts
But the graphic suggests that Celtic Christianity was in some sense theologically distinct from Chalcedonian Christianity, and that doesn't seem to have been the case. The main ways that the Christians of Ireland and Britain differed from those of continental western Europe seem to have been in the shape of the monastic tonsure and the calculation of the date of Easter; and in the latter, at least, British and Irish Christians were in conformity with Rome by the end of the eighth century. (There was also an emphasis on penance and absolution as a private rather than public rite, but this was ultimately adopted by the wider church.)
There doesn't seem to have been any doctrinal disputes, nor any suggestion that British and Irish Christianity was in any way separate from the Church of Rome.
Yes it was, as since it was never part of Roman empire it developed from missionary activity, and even started its own monastic missionary activity back to North Umbria, Faeroes and apparently even Iceland.
But was it doctrinally different from Chalcedonian Christianity to justify its own colour on the map. Wikipedia suggests no, which chimes with my understanding: some local minor differences in practice, but nothing like the Christological disputes that caused the rift with the Church of the East, nor like the row over papal supremacy etc. that led to the Great Schism between Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.
That is correct afaik, though there were serious disputes in Anglo Saxon Britain about these and other issues (mostly about 'leadership' of the church as in any human organization). I'm not sure if it warrants another color, etc though per this video.
Yes, it seems to be promoting the idea, popular in New Age writings, that Celtic Christianity was a separate denomination (or what Rome would have considered a heresy); and that just doesn’t seem to have been the case.
Ah I see thanks, wasn't familiar with that. That sounds like a stretch, as it wasn't that long a period from St Patrick until the reunification back into the Latin church
It is not fully correct because St Thomas, who was one of the twelve disciples landed in India and martyred here in India and that's why we have A large autonomous branch, known as the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (or Indian Orthodox Church), tracing its roots to St. Thomas the Apostle and has its headquarters in Kottayam, Kerala. We in India just call it Syrian Orthodox church.
That part is not shown in the video.
Syrian christians in Kerala are not related to St.Thomas.
Syrian chritians landed in kerala while fleeing arabic invasion of Syria. (7th century)
Also 'martyrdom' of St.Thomas is debated.
The earliest mention of martyrdom of St.Thomas originate from 16th century portugese missionaries who operated in india at that time. not backed by any evidence.
Syrian christians of kerala is another name for st thomas christians related to st thomas visit who founded the community. The acts of thomas, which is an apocryphal writing mentions about st thomas visit. Many 3rd and 4th-century roman writers like the ambrose of milan, gregory of nazianzus, jerome and ephrem the syrian also mention thomas trip to india. Eusebius of caesarea records that st clement of alexandria's teacher pantaenus from alexandria visited a christian community in india using the gospel of matthew in hebrew in the 2nd century. There are way too many written proofs. Even long before the 1st, there were already many jews called cochin jews existing in malabar region, which itself shows the deep connections the region had with the middle east.
The ramban pattu of st thomas christians mention about his arrival in malabar and the conversion of natives and jews. Martyrdom of st thomas in mylapore is not debated since no other place on earth claims that event, and it's usually attributed to his remains being later transported to edessa. None of these things originated from 16th century portuguese missionaries, and it has all existed long before that.
What you mentioned about the denomination is not exactly accurate. The st thomas christians or syrian christians or malankara nasranis in kerala or the malabar region, were part of church of east that follows east syriac liturgy. The Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (or Indian Orthodox Church) that follows west syriac liturgy is a new church started out of a court case in the 19th century.
So, in short, it's like: was unified st thomas christians from st thomas arrival in the 1st century and under church of east since 4th century when it was organised as independent from church of rome till 15th century portuguese arrival and forced latinisations by them leading to coonan cross oath protest, splitting the community into two: one new catholic faction(84 church out of then 116 churches) using the modified east syriac liturgy and the other faction(32 church out of then 116 churches) under patriarch of antioch, adopting the west syriac liturgy locally called the jacobites. The catholic faction mentioned grew into the current syro malabar catholic church. The orthodox jacobite faction underwent another split when british came in the 18th-19th century and tried to create protestant influence, leading to the creation of the marthoma church, which is a protestant church using a protestantised west syriac. In the 18th-19th century times, if I am not wrong, a small faction from the syro malabar catholic church joined the chaldean syrian church, creating a small archdiocese of assyrian church of the east in kerala. Now in the 19th century, a small faction in this jacobite came into communion with vatican keeping the west syriac litury, forming the syro malankara catholic church. At this time in the 19th century the internal conflict regarding whether to be directly under patriarch of antioch came in the jacobites leading to Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (or Indian Orthodox Church) faction that was mentioned in the comment above.
Based on jacob baradaeus, a 6th-century bishop who helped preserve and organise the syriac orthodox church or the church under the patriarch of antioch after persecution in the byzantine empire.
They show dots eventually, but those Indian dots should be there by 100AD, same with Ethiopia. Some of the dates they use the official kingdom conversion dates, and not the presence of a church.
What blew me away was the proliferation of the Church of the East. I never knew Christianity had that much of a foothold in Asia. I wonder if geographically it appears more significant due to that region’s sparse population?
Also because the region was conquered by Muslims so it did not last. It was the majority religion of the Asian parts of the Byzantine Empire.
North Africa played a very important part in the development of Christianity. Augustine, Tertullian, Jerome and Origen were North Africans. Monasticism evolved in Egypt.
No, it's because your education is western-centric and Islamic invasions took over the east. Eastern Christians have been subjected to genocide at the hands of Muslims for 1300 years.
Edit - really, someone is asking for a citation that the Islamic conquests happened? Next should ask for a citation that the sky is blue...
This is basic world history, like the discovery of the new world, Alexander the Great's conquests or the Roman empire...
while tribal hunters simply killed for access to the best hunting grounds? Mongols killed why? IMO you can reconstruct this line of thought easily -- humans killed other humans brutally and without fail; some humans interpreted the world in divine terms and guarded fertility; Religion combines many strands with intention, while the killing for other reasons does not cease.
How can “genocide” apply to a voluntary religious group? And even if it could, the linked wikipedia article doesn’t seem to support your claim, either. Do you have anything else we could review?
This is such an incredibly ridiculous statement it's hard to believe it's in good faith.
No, the battle itself isn't genocide. But generally invading a country and defeating the defenders is a precursor to slaughtering civilians, aka. genocide.
In the case of the Middle East, they were Greek/Syriac/Coptic and Christian, then they were conquered, then they were Arab and Muslim. Demographic changes like that that accompany an invasion aren't exactly a coincidence.
If you read about Islamic conquests, you would see that in the vast overwhelming cases, no such events took place, if ever. Demographics changed because people entered Islam. Islam is against genocide.
Because hindus are not of the people of the book (jews, christians and zoroastrians), they weren't offered the choice of becoming dhimmis (pay jizya, 2nd class status), but the choices were convert to islam or muslims would fight you.
Way back when I heard someone state that the reason Christianity spread so wildly was because it was foundational to proselytize and convert non-Christians to the faith. That makes complete sense to me.
It's not like it was this passive meme that spread because people who encountered it loved it so much they wanted to join.
Hinduism is hardly non-proselytising. After all there's not a lot of Buddhists left in India. The Brahmin caste pretty intentionally and comprehensively reacted to and pushed out Buddhist practices once they became threatened by them.
The reason Christianity spread so wildly is that Emperor Constantine found it more politically useful for Christians to die in his military than the lions den, so he put the military might of the Roman empire behind it. If not for Rome and the imperial powers that followed, Christianity would probably have died out like all of the other weird Jewish apocalypse cults of the day. We might all rather be Mithrainists or something.
That is one important aspect, but there are several to my mind
- Life in the bronze age was very rough, and quality of life in cities was basically inhumane. Women were highly represented among earliest converts, as Christianity comparatively was rather progressive and demanded baseline respect for them. Also, pagan religions of the time, despite cultural significance, didn't promise much of a payoff for plebeians for all their toil. Conversion was easy after Paul pushed the case that they shouldn't have to convert to Judaism, with all that would entail.
- Especially in the early days, this was very much a pacifist religion, in addition to having an apocalyptic fixation. To Rome, "Render therefore unto Cesar the things which are Cesar's" is a handy sentiment for the populace to have. They fought and won several uprisings just from the Jews who wanted their independence (and expected their forthcoming Savior would literally help deliver this), and the vast empire was beginning it's slow decline. Killing Christians and making martyrs out of them didn't make much sense in the long-run.
- There is a magic sauce in universalizing, it extends the shared culture within territories and makes it easier to convince people to wage war for you. Prior, the motivators were mainly tribal/blood connections, and money.
The Jews for their part were content with what they had, Christianity didn't provide much value-added, especially for the "zealots" who were ready to die for freedom. The "Love-thy-neighbor" sentiment is sort of similar to parts of Leviticus, but the cranked up pacifism and relaxed outlook over some rules was a departure. I think the "afterlife" bit was a lot more persuasive for gentiles. Then of course the rituals and conception in the collective consciousness evolved over time, from influences like Augustine and others.
By the time there was a true Christendom, powers that be dropped the (absolute) significance of pacifism, as that was no longer as useful as it was.
If you come from a American Christian background these are really worth exploring. Being ex-catholic/ex-Christian I found that they share enough to make them more accessible (I guess) than other religions, but also different in thought from what I grew up in, and those combined really help me expand on my personal thinking. I did a study group that a Greek orthodox priest put on for non-orthodox and it was awesome. Watching him shutdown old school American Christians and their focus on decoding a few sentences in English when he pointed out 'that's not even really what the words mean in the original text' and then getting mini-lessons on old languages and meanings I felt like I was back in school and completely changed a lot of my surface level understand of Christianity (asking my family religious questions the answer was don't questions/it's this because it's this).
From the comments here I think I'm going to look into the Indian off shoots. Up until now I've mainly explored through Egyptian, Syrian, and Greek/Russian orthodox friends. I wonder if there is an Indian style church established in the US that would have literature created to be accessible to an American church centric point of view? I've always envied the deep spirituality my Indian Christian/Muslim friends have had, I wonder if exploring the Indian church could help me with that. I did a couple year long study with a Pakistani Muslim friend but I didn't really connect with it, though his beautiful spirituality/groundedness/family beleifs have been a godsend as a life mentor.
For indian you can check the st thomas christians or syrian christians or malankara nasranis from state of kerala that trace their origin to st thomas visit in the 1st century and were under the church of east. They follow the syriac based liturgies. I mentioned to specifically check with these because other christians in india are all latin rite catholic or protestant, which all started with european arrivals and so most won't be much aware of the histories outside their group. And checking with any hindu or muslim from india won't do any good because first they are not even much aware of all these different denominations, and most outside kerala won't be aware of all these since this community is historically concentrated in that specific region of the country; now the second reason is the nation is now in hinduthva peak where there is a lot of conflict from majority hindus with muslims and christians and the ideology itself say muslims and christians are internal threats and they all just dismiss everything about christianity as fake and try to always associate christianity with euorpean colonisation and hence anti national cheaters.
Now the migrants of st thomas christians or syrian christians or malankara nasranis community from the state of kerala are present in western nations, including america and have churches there. Currently, the community is split into the following different denominations:
* Syro malabar catholic church - follows a modified east syriac litrugy
* Malankara orthodox syrian/malankara jacobite syrian church - follows west syriac litrugy
* Syro malankara catholic church - follows a slightly modified west syriac litrugy
* Marthoma syrian church - follows a protestantified west syriac
It's even more interesting when you think about Christianity not as a clear category, but as a cloud of practices, beliefs and institutions in a broader family of religious patterns.
Mircea Eliade asks how Christianity reinterpreted sacred history, myth, salvation. What does Christianity do with motifs older than itself, such as paradise, rebirth, sacrifice? In A History of Religious Ideas [0], he treats the emergence and development of Christianity, including Judaism, early Christianity, Gnosticism, late antiquity, medieval religious forms and also how it interacted with other traditions. I think it complements quite nicely the geographical spread of Christianity by also clarifying what kind of transformations of religious symbols make it recognisable as Christianity across such different contexts.
There's also "Darwin's Cathedral" [1] that analyses religion as group-organizing system, with a focus on Calvinism. Didn't go through it, but seems relevant. It was recommended by Robert Sapolsky in his Introduction to Human Behavioral Biology lecture series [2].
During the last few years, I’ve been exploring Svealand, the central part of Sweden that contains Stockholm and some other provinces. The region contains many historical places, but I walk the countryside, away from the main tourist attractions. What has impressed me the most is the amount of ancient piles of ruble with vigilant, almost hostile churches next to them. There are rock paintings from prehistoric times still around, and many, many mounds and graves from the bronze and iron age, the region is literally littered with them. But I’ve never found a single extant statue nor statuette nor depiction of the old Norse gods.
the reason you do not find them is that they were purposefully destroyed in "iconoclasm" -- the battles were so bloody that the Christian victors not only converted the conquered but also destroyed all traces of their cultural practices.
Just south of there is the famous tree of Boniface ?
When western politicians and media lectures the world on human rights, I can't help but wonder how funny it is that because westerners front loaded their genocidal violence, they now get to feel superior to others that didn't completely wipe out the conquered.
You’re pattern matching something like the Saxon Wars under Charlemagne. In this case missing idols probably owe more to wood not surviving a millennium in Swedish soil + converts destroying their own former cult objects.
First of all, you're confusing different events: iconoclasm was the destruction of Christian icons, by Christians who thought that practice was idolatrous.
> the battles were so bloody that the Christian victors not only converted the conquered
Who do you think 'conquered' the Swedes, some continental Frenchman? Their own kings converted, and thereafter converted their countrymen. And the first such Christian king, Olof Skötkonung, inherited the throne -- he didn't conquer it.
I put the word "iconoclasm" in quotes because yes, you are right in a strict sense, but over time the word was broadened..
> Who do you think 'conquered' the Swedes
How can this written exchange now bring light to the subject?
I would say, infighting among fierce raiders was vanquished by organized and better equipped men to establish Nations. Tribal one-upmanship was/is rampant. I am touching a complicated topic over very long time periods. The educated Danes I know, do study French and Latin, actually.. but this is now and quite a lot of Danes moved to the USA a hundred years ago.
I wish it was an actual interactive map instead of a video, as it raises so many questions.
Where did Christianity come from in Tibet? If I'm reading it correctly, around 1100AD there seems to be a large number of Christians near Lhasa. And then around 1266 a majority Christian region around (I think) Mongolia suddenly gets wiped out.
If they made it interactive, it would be nice to be able to toggle various layers. For example, I was watching it thinking "It's odd that nestorianism is drifting away from the rest" until I realized that empty void in the middle was Islam. It'd be nice if they also had other religions like Islam mapped, and let us toggle which ones we want to see so it doesn't become too noisy.
The short version is that the internal politics of the Mongol Empire shuffled the religious map of Asia.
Christianity gradually spread further into Asia, but the rise of Islam severed the contact between the Church of the East and Western Christianity. Mongols had their own shamanistic religion, but many of their tribes had also become Christian, Muslim, or Buddhist. The Mongol Empire tolerated most religions, and individual leaders often favored one religion or another. When the empire fragmented, three of the major khanates chose Islam and the fourth chose Buddhism, while Christianity largely faded away in the Asian parts of the empire.
It would be cool to see this expanded to include other prominent religious systems.. in particular Islam, Budhism, Hindu, etc... as it is, there's no context at all in terms of contraction events.
All: please don't post religious flamewar comments to Hacker News. That includes proselytizing in any direction, pro or anti. Such threads are as tedious as they are flamey, and those are the two qualities we can most do without here.
Intellectually curious conversation is an entirely different thing and is of course welcome on this or any topic.
Interesting that in the last two years of the video, central Europe seems to turn gray. The decline has been going on for several decades (and the official numbers of Christian people are artificially inflated due to weird exceptions the church has by law).
I’m sure a book has been written with this thesis, but I often think that a system like Christianity was somewhat inevitable, sociopolitically.
By this I don’t really mean the specifics of the religion; but rather 1) the idea of universalizing the value all human life and not only certain subsets and 2) a synthesis of ideology and politics with the explicit goal of expanding its domain by means of assimilation, not just conquest.
Now of course the reality didn’t actually play out exactly along those lines, but I think a similar sort of movement probably would have occurred across the Roman Empire, had Christianity not specifically grown.
In other words I have a hard time imagining that the world would have continued with Roman values indefinitely. The world was changing and Christianity was as much a consequence as a cause.
I think there's something to this. For gentiles especially, Christianity was more attractive and life-affirming than what they had, as long-suffering subjects of the Roman Empire with little to hope for. Notwithstanding the enduring core messaging, the allure might have shifted over time between some components as quality of life improved (for instance I think the role of 'sin' and 'salvation' qua deliverance from guilt became more significant later for adherents, where earlier on the "afterlife" sells itself when life is shit).
I have recently noticed (especially over the last year) a lot of mainstream stories portraying Christianity as growing significantly, things like Instagram posts, tweets, etc., with phrases like “Christianity is back”, you get the idea.
I’m not really sure to what extent this is accurate, though, since those platforms are obviously shaped by my own algorithm. For example, Instagram knows I’m Catholic, so it tends to show me Catholic-positive content.
Does anyone know of a reliable source where I can check the actual numbers? I’m especially curious about Gen Z, since it seems to be relatively pro-Christian.
You might be interested in a book called Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth? by Kaufmann. Basically a lot of it comes down to birth rates and cohesiveness of culture.
Another good one is A Secular Age, although it's on a much longer timeline. It tracks the shift of Christianity from ±1500 to the present and what it will likely be in the near future.
I find it interesting how slow the spread really was after the initial burst. I am used to think about Christianity as a global religion. But before 16th century it was a pretty regional thing and its position seemed pretty precarious in handful of moments.
I find it disappointing that a clearly political topic isn't allowed to be discussed accordingly.
The impact of religion on a lot of humans like 'everyone who isn't following the norm of religion: woman not making kids...' etc. is something you should always clarify with topics like this especially in a context were its not clear what the general consensus is.
Rape is bad, done very little to be discussed for example.
dghf | a day ago
Also, why no Cathars/Albigensians in the south of France during the 12th & 13th centuries?
mistrial9 | a day ago
dghf | a day ago
There doesn't seem to have been any doctrinal disputes, nor any suggestion that British and Irish Christianity was in any way separate from the Church of Rome.
gedy | a day ago
dghf | a day ago
gedy | a day ago
dghf | a day ago
gedy | a day ago
Guestmodinfo | a day ago
graemep | a day ago
gedy | a day ago
anon291 | a day ago
lazyninja987 | a day ago
Also 'martyrdom' of St.Thomas is debated. The earliest mention of martyrdom of St.Thomas originate from 16th century portugese missionaries who operated in india at that time. not backed by any evidence.
vattoli_porinju | 14 hours ago
The ramban pattu of st thomas christians mention about his arrival in malabar and the conversion of natives and jews. Martyrdom of st thomas in mylapore is not debated since no other place on earth claims that event, and it's usually attributed to his remains being later transported to edessa. None of these things originated from 16th century portuguese missionaries, and it has all existed long before that.
vattoli_porinju | a day ago
So, in short, it's like: was unified st thomas christians from st thomas arrival in the 1st century and under church of east since 4th century when it was organised as independent from church of rome till 15th century portuguese arrival and forced latinisations by them leading to coonan cross oath protest, splitting the community into two: one new catholic faction(84 church out of then 116 churches) using the modified east syriac liturgy and the other faction(32 church out of then 116 churches) under patriarch of antioch, adopting the west syriac liturgy locally called the jacobites. The catholic faction mentioned grew into the current syro malabar catholic church. The orthodox jacobite faction underwent another split when british came in the 18th-19th century and tried to create protestant influence, leading to the creation of the marthoma church, which is a protestant church using a protestantised west syriac. In the 18th-19th century times, if I am not wrong, a small faction from the syro malabar catholic church joined the chaldean syrian church, creating a small archdiocese of assyrian church of the east in kerala. Now in the 19th century, a small faction in this jacobite came into communion with vatican keeping the west syriac litury, forming the syro malankara catholic church. At this time in the 19th century the internal conflict regarding whether to be directly under patriarch of antioch came in the jacobites leading to Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (or Indian Orthodox Church) faction that was mentioned in the comment above.
pyuser583 | 23 hours ago
vattoli_porinju | 15 hours ago
ecshafer | a day ago
whall6 | a day ago
graemep | a day ago
North Africa played a very important part in the development of Christianity. Augustine, Tertullian, Jerome and Origen were North Africans. Monasticism evolved in Egypt.
dismalaf | a day ago
Edit - really, someone is asking for a citation that the Islamic conquests happened? Next should ask for a citation that the sky is blue...
This is basic world history, like the discovery of the new world, Alexander the Great's conquests or the Roman empire...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Muslim_conquests
And yes, it happened over 1300 years ago, the first decisive battle was the Battle of Yarmuk, year 636 CE.
amanaplanacanal | a day ago
prerok | a day ago
trelane | a day ago
mistrial9 | a day ago
prerok | a day ago
za3faran | 14 hours ago
boston_clone | a day ago
ImJamal | a day ago
https://www.un.org/en/genocide-prevention/definition
boston_clone | 23 hours ago
whatgoodisaroad | 23 hours ago
dismalaf | 23 hours ago
whatgoodisaroad | 19 hours ago
dismalaf | 19 hours ago
No, the battle itself isn't genocide. But generally invading a country and defeating the defenders is a precursor to slaughtering civilians, aka. genocide.
In the case of the Middle East, they were Greek/Syriac/Coptic and Christian, then they were conquered, then they were Arab and Muslim. Demographic changes like that that accompany an invasion aren't exactly a coincidence.
za3faran | 15 hours ago
akikoo | 11 hours ago
https://www.firstpost.com/opinion-news-expert-views-news-ana...
Because hindus are not of the people of the book (jews, christians and zoroastrians), they weren't offered the choice of becoming dhimmis (pay jizya, 2nd class status), but the choices were convert to islam or muslims would fight you.
constantius | 9 hours ago
Your education seems to be Facebook-centric.
pstuart | a day ago
It's not like it was this passive meme that spread because people who encountered it loved it so much they wanted to join.
senkora | a day ago
The big three universalizing religions are Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism.
You can understand a lot of religious history as just those three religions expanding and displacing other belief systems.
Contrast with non-universalizing religions like Judaism, Hinduism, and Shinto.
larksimian | 20 hours ago
krapp | a day ago
lanfeust6 | a day ago
- Life in the bronze age was very rough, and quality of life in cities was basically inhumane. Women were highly represented among earliest converts, as Christianity comparatively was rather progressive and demanded baseline respect for them. Also, pagan religions of the time, despite cultural significance, didn't promise much of a payoff for plebeians for all their toil. Conversion was easy after Paul pushed the case that they shouldn't have to convert to Judaism, with all that would entail.
- Especially in the early days, this was very much a pacifist religion, in addition to having an apocalyptic fixation. To Rome, "Render therefore unto Cesar the things which are Cesar's" is a handy sentiment for the populace to have. They fought and won several uprisings just from the Jews who wanted their independence (and expected their forthcoming Savior would literally help deliver this), and the vast empire was beginning it's slow decline. Killing Christians and making martyrs out of them didn't make much sense in the long-run.
- There is a magic sauce in universalizing, it extends the shared culture within territories and makes it easier to convince people to wage war for you. Prior, the motivators were mainly tribal/blood connections, and money.
The Jews for their part were content with what they had, Christianity didn't provide much value-added, especially for the "zealots" who were ready to die for freedom. The "Love-thy-neighbor" sentiment is sort of similar to parts of Leviticus, but the cranked up pacifism and relaxed outlook over some rules was a departure. I think the "afterlife" bit was a lot more persuasive for gentiles. Then of course the rituals and conception in the collective consciousness evolved over time, from influences like Augustine and others.
By the time there was a true Christendom, powers that be dropped the (absolute) significance of pacifism, as that was no longer as useful as it was.
_DeadFred_ | 23 hours ago
From the comments here I think I'm going to look into the Indian off shoots. Up until now I've mainly explored through Egyptian, Syrian, and Greek/Russian orthodox friends. I wonder if there is an Indian style church established in the US that would have literature created to be accessible to an American church centric point of view? I've always envied the deep spirituality my Indian Christian/Muslim friends have had, I wonder if exploring the Indian church could help me with that. I did a couple year long study with a Pakistani Muslim friend but I didn't really connect with it, though his beautiful spirituality/groundedness/family beleifs have been a godsend as a life mentor.
vattoli_porinju | 10 hours ago
Now the migrants of st thomas christians or syrian christians or malankara nasranis community from the state of kerala are present in western nations, including america and have churches there. Currently, the community is split into the following different denominations:
* Syro malabar catholic church - follows a modified east syriac litrugy * Malankara orthodox syrian/malankara jacobite syrian church - follows west syriac litrugy * Syro malankara catholic church - follows a slightly modified west syriac litrugy * Marthoma syrian church - follows a protestantified west syriac
You can check with these churches to know more.
gobdovan | a day ago
Mircea Eliade asks how Christianity reinterpreted sacred history, myth, salvation. What does Christianity do with motifs older than itself, such as paradise, rebirth, sacrifice? In A History of Religious Ideas [0], he treats the emergence and development of Christianity, including Judaism, early Christianity, Gnosticism, late antiquity, medieval religious forms and also how it interacted with other traditions. I think it complements quite nicely the geographical spread of Christianity by also clarifying what kind of transformations of religious symbols make it recognisable as Christianity across such different contexts.
There's also "Darwin's Cathedral" [1] that analyses religion as group-organizing system, with a focus on Calvinism. Didn't go through it, but seems relevant. It was recommended by Robert Sapolsky in his Introduction to Human Behavioral Biology lecture series [2].
[0] A History of Religious Ideas - Mircea Eliade
[1] Darwin's Cathedral - David Sloan Wilson
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNnIGh9g6fA
thefz | a day ago
riffraff | a day ago
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prester_John
empath75 | a day ago
riffraff | 14 hours ago
dsign | a day ago
mistrial9 | a day ago
Just south of there is the famous tree of Boniface ?
HexDecOctBin | a day ago
rattlesnakedave | a day ago
achierius | a day ago
> the battles were so bloody that the Christian victors not only converted the conquered
Who do you think 'conquered' the Swedes, some continental Frenchman? Their own kings converted, and thereafter converted their countrymen. And the first such Christian king, Olof Skötkonung, inherited the throne -- he didn't conquer it.
mistrial9 | 21 hours ago
> Who do you think 'conquered' the Swedes
How can this written exchange now bring light to the subject?
I would say, infighting among fierce raiders was vanquished by organized and better equipped men to establish Nations. Tribal one-upmanship was/is rampant. I am touching a complicated topic over very long time periods. The educated Danes I know, do study French and Latin, actually.. but this is now and quite a lot of Danes moved to the USA a hundred years ago.
ezekg | a day ago
wood_spirit | a day ago
teepo | a day ago
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_(series)
mlmonkey | a day ago
Where did Christianity come from in Tibet? If I'm reading it correctly, around 1100AD there seems to be a large number of Christians near Lhasa. And then around 1266 a majority Christian region around (I think) Mongolia suddenly gets wiped out.
craftkiller | a day ago
jltsiren | 13 hours ago
Christianity gradually spread further into Asia, but the rise of Islam severed the contact between the Church of the East and Western Christianity. Mongols had their own shamanistic religion, but many of their tribes had also become Christian, Muslim, or Buddhist. The Mongol Empire tolerated most religions, and individual leaders often favored one religion or another. When the empire fragmented, three of the major khanates chose Islam and the fourth chose Buddhism, while Christianity largely faded away in the Asian parts of the empire.
samcgraw | a day ago
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Dominion-Christian-Revolution-Remade-...
ppsreejith | a day ago
atrooo | a day ago
cynicalpeace | a day ago
The exact opposite of what we tend to think.
lanfeust6 | a day ago
tracker1 | a day ago
josefritzishere | a day ago
dang | a day ago
Intellectually curious conversation is an entirely different thing and is of course welcome on this or any topic.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
jvdvegt | a day ago
keiferski | a day ago
By this I don’t really mean the specifics of the religion; but rather 1) the idea of universalizing the value all human life and not only certain subsets and 2) a synthesis of ideology and politics with the explicit goal of expanding its domain by means of assimilation, not just conquest.
Now of course the reality didn’t actually play out exactly along those lines, but I think a similar sort of movement probably would have occurred across the Roman Empire, had Christianity not specifically grown.
In other words I have a hard time imagining that the world would have continued with Roman values indefinitely. The world was changing and Christianity was as much a consequence as a cause.
Very interesting to consider in any case!
lanfeust6 | 22 hours ago
moralestapia | a day ago
I’m not really sure to what extent this is accurate, though, since those platforms are obviously shaped by my own algorithm. For example, Instagram knows I’m Catholic, so it tends to show me Catholic-positive content.
Does anyone know of a reliable source where I can check the actual numbers? I’m especially curious about Gen Z, since it seems to be relatively pro-Christian.
keiferski | 12 hours ago
Another good one is A Secular Age, although it's on a much longer timeline. It tracks the shift of Christianity from ±1500 to the present and what it will likely be in the near future.
wormius | a day ago
matusp | a day ago
warumdarum | a day ago
Curosinono | 6 hours ago
The impact of religion on a lot of humans like 'everyone who isn't following the norm of religion: woman not making kids...' etc. is something you should always clarify with topics like this especially in a context were its not clear what the general consensus is.
Rape is bad, done very little to be discussed for example.