The History of Christianity in 5 minutes

The story of Christianity begins, of course, with Jesus Christ, from whom Christianity gets its name. After Jesus' resurrection from the dead, he sent his followers to spread the news of salvation across the world. His followers began in Jerusalem, but quickly spread out to the surrounding cities and nations. The popularity of Christianity exploded in the first hundred years after Jesus' return to heaven. Preachers such as Paul the Apostle traveled throughout the Roman Empire, spreading the word everywhere they went. Churches and gathering places for Christians sprang up nearly every time. At first, these early Christians thought that Jesus would come back within their lifetimes. But as the original disciples grew old and began to pass away, they realized that they needed to prepare for a longer stay on earth, just in case. They began to establish more permanent, more connected churches with greater structure and official leaders. As Christianity spread throughout the land, Jews began to persecute Christians as liars and false teachers. Before this persecution, Christianity had generally been considered a part of Jewish beliefs. Now, Christianity began to be thought of as a religion of its own. Christianity expanded so fast that Roman authorities grew afraid of it. When a large section of Rome burned to the ground in AD 64, Emperor Nero blamed the Christians and made Christianity illegal in the Roman Empire. This began a massive, terrible persecution of Christians that lasted for over 200 years. Christians were forced to meet in secret under threat of torture and death. Finally, in 306 AD, Emperor Constantine came to power. Constantine claimed to have undergone a conversion to Christianity. In 313 AD, he issued the Edict of Milan, which made Christianity legal again and ended the persecution in the Roman Empire. Eventually, Christianity even became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Constantine ushered in a new phase of Christianity. Following the Edict of Milan, Christianity became popular. Christians such as Jerome, Ambrose, and Augustine became the great thinkers of the world. The churches, which had lost contact with each other during the persecution, held several important councils in which they established key points of Christianity. These councils established the list of books we now consider the Bible, threw out several false ideas that arose, and made compromises between arguing churches. However, during the last of these councils, it became clear that there were major differences between churches in the East and churches in the West. The West had established a formal structure of church government including deacons, priests, bishops, archbishops, cardinals, and at the very top of the church, the Pope. The East, on the other hand, disliked having one man over the whole church. The problems grew until finally, in 1054 AD, the church split in two, with the Roman Catholic Church in the West and the Eastern Orthodox Church in the East. The Roman Catholic Church grew larger and larger over the next several centuries. As it did, several questionable teachings became part of the church. Some men began to protest against these practices, earning the name Protestants. Some of the most important Protestants were Erasmus, Ulrich Zwingli, and John Calvin, but the most important Protestant was Martin Luther. Luther was a Catholic priest, but he became so upset at the problems in the church that he rejected the Catholic Church altogether and began a whole new type of church. So, after splitting into the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, Christianity split again when the Protestant Church broke off. After this split, Europe went through several centuries of war between Catholics and Protestants. The Protestant Church never formed one large leadership structure like the Catholics did, but instead remained a lot of smaller pieces. When the Americas were discovered, Catholics and Protestant countries began to compete for control of the new lands, sending missionaries along with explorers and conquerors. Catholics were the first to arrive in much of South and Central America, while North America was mostly settled by Protestants. North American colonies looked very attractive to Protestants, who were being persecuted in their home countries. Large numbers of Protestants traveled the ocean to set up colonies where they could freely practice their own religions. These colonies grew large and gradually grew angry at the oppressive countries from which they had come, such as England. Eventually, they declared their independence, and after a period of war, they founded a country known as the United States of America. After the Americas were established, countries began sending missionaries all over the world, including China, Japan, India, and especially Africa. The good news of Christianity has reached all the way around the globe, though with varying levels of success. Today, about 2.1 billion people claim to be Christians, about 30% of everyone in the world. And all this took place in just over 2,000 years, starting with one very unique person, Jesus.