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Christianity

World religion derived from the teaching of Jesus, as found in the New Testament, during the first third of the 1st century. It has a present-day membership of about a billion, and is divided into groups or denominations that differ in some areas of belief and practice. Its main divisions are the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant churches.

Beliefs

Christians believe in one God with three aspects: God the Father, God the Son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit, who is the power of God working in the world. This is known as the Trinity. They believe that God created everything that exists and showed his love for the world by coming to earth as Jesus, and suffering and dying in order to reconcile humanity to himself. Christians believe that three days after his death by crucifixion Jesus was raised to life by God's power, appearing many times in bodily form to his followers, and that he is now alive in the world through the Holy Spirit. Christians speak of the sufferings they may have to endure because of their faith, and the reward of an everlasting afterlife in God's presence, which is promised to those who have faith in Jesus and who live according to his teaching.

Christians understand that God is to be regarded as their father, because in his teachings Jesus told his disciples to call God ‘Abba’, or ‘father’. In Aramaic the word translates better as ‘daddy’, symbolizing the closeness of the relationship between God and his children.

Central values of Christianity include Christian love, compassion, and justice. The Christian interpretation of justice involves fairness, equal distribution of resources, and positive discrimination in favour of underprivileged groups. Christians believe that God has created all people with equal worth, and so prejudice and discrimination are wrong. These views are supported by two teachings of Jesus: to love other people as one loves oneself, and to treat other people as one would want to be treated. Christians believe that the structure of modern materialistic societies, which put great value on money and possessions, encourages individuals to put themselves first, and that this is likely to lead to greed, competition, and selfishness. By contrast, Christian leaders like Martin Luther King Jr, Desmond Tutu, and Oscar Romero taught that it is wrong to keep silent when others were oppressed, even if it puts one's own life at risk.

Creation

Christians believe that the universe was created, and that it came about by the will of the creator, God, for a purpose and not by chance. This belief is not necessarily opposed to scientific theories of evolution. Some Christians interpret the creation stories in Genesis literally, others see them as symbolic expressions of the truth that, whatever the story, God is the ‘Creator’.

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Christianity - events

c. 200 BC	Israel	The Old Testament Book of Ecclesiastes is written.
27	Palestine-Roman	The Jewish religious teacher Jesus Christ begins his mission, in Roman Palestine.
27	Palestine-Roman	The Jewish prophet John the Baptist is put to death by Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and son of Herod the Great. The Jewish historian Josephus attributes his death to Herod's fear of a political rebellion.
33	Palestine-Roman	On the road to ‘Damascus’ (almost certainly not Damascus, Syria) to persecute the followers of Jesus Christ, Saul of Tarsus has an intense religious experience and is converted to Christianity. He is later known as the apostle Paul.
c. 47	Asia Minor-Roman	The Christian apostle Paul undertakes his first missionary journeys, accompanied by Barnabas and Mark. He visits Cyprus and Asia Minor. Their followers begin to be called ‘Christians’.
217	Roman Empire	Callistus is elected as the 16th pope but is opposed by the theologian Hippolytus who accuses him of laxity and of being a Modalist, one who denies any distinction between the three persons of the Trinity. Hippolytus sets up a breakaway church and becomes the first antipope.
275	Gaul, Roman Empire	St Denis, the first bishop of Paris and later the patron saint of France, converts Paris to Christianity and establishes a religious centre on an island in the Seine.
325	Byzantine Empire	The ecumenical council at Nicaea confirms the ‘consubstantiality’ of Christ with God the Father. The Nicene Creed, which is adopted as the fundamental statement of Christian belief, contains the anti-Arian statement that the Son ‘is of one substance with the Father’.
325	Roman Empire, Asia Minor	A schism arises within the Eastern Christian church over the nature of Christ's divinity. The Roman emperor Constantine I the Great, feeling it his religious and imperial duty to ensure unity within the church, summons an ecumenical council of bishops in Nicaea, Asia Minor (now Iznik, Turkey), over which he presides.
337	Roman Empire	Shortly before his death, Roman emperor Constantine is baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia.
413–426	Roman Empire	Bishop Augustine begins to writes his De civitate dei/City of God as a reply to the charge that Christianity was responsible for the decline of the Roman Empire. According to Augustine, obedience to the state is important, although man's ultimate end is the City of God beyond this world.
563	UK	St Columba flees from Ireland and founds a monastery on the Hebridean island of Iona, from where he sends out missionaries to mainland Britain. Iona becomes a great centre of book copying and illustration.
586–601	Spain	During Recarred's reign, Visigoth Spain converts from Arian to orthodox Catholic Christianity.
590	Rome	St Gregory, now abbot of St Andrew's monastery in Rome, is elected as pope. He sets about reforming the administration of the church and establishing its temporal authority.
730	Byzantine Empire	Byzantine emperor Leo III's iconoclasm arouses much opposition in the Empire and a rival emperor is proclaimed in Greece but he and his fleet are defeated while attempting to capture the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. Of more lasting consequence, it also arouses great hostility in the Latin West where religious images have great importance as teaching aids in missionary activity, thus beginning the gradual alienation of the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches. Pope Gregory II refuses to implement the decree. The monk John of Damascus attacks the Iconoclasts in a series of pamphlets. He remains safe from persecution by Leo III because he resides in Muslim territory.
776	Carolingian Empire, France	The abbey church of Saint-Denis in Paris, France, is consecrated in the presence of Emperor Charlemagne. It is designed with a three-aisled Roman basilica with two towers at the west end.
861	Byzantine Empire, Italy, Carolingian Empire	A major rift opens between the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches (the ‘Photian Schism’) when Pope Nicholas I objects to the Byzantine emperor, Michael III, appointing Photius, a lay theologian, as patriarch of Constantinople.
3 November 867	Byzantine Empire	The Byzantine emperor Basil I deposes Photius and restores Ignatius as patriarch of Constantinople, ending the schism between Greek and Roman churches.
c. 950	Bulgar Khanate	A heretical Christian sect called the Bogomils emerges in the Bulgar Khanate. Bogomilism has links with Manichaeism and the Paulicians: they believe that the world and the body are of Satan and only the spirit is created by God.
966	Poland	Mieszko I of Poland is converted to Christianity following his marriage to Dobrava, daughter of Duke Boleslaw I of Bohemia. The first Christian missionary bishop subsequently arrives in Poland.
990	Russia	The Orthodox Church is founded in Russia.
24–27 February 1075	Italy	At the Lent synod, Pope Gregory VII suspends seven German bishops for opposing his renewal of decrees against clerical marriage and issues a decree forbidding lay investiture of bishops, whereby secular leaders grant church officials the symbols of their authority. His ruling is strongly opposed, in particular by King Henry IV of Germany.
1139–1141	Italy	Gratian of Bologna compiles Concordia discordantium canonum/Reconciliation of Opposing Canons (known as the Decretum), a collection of around 4,000 texts which forms the first systematic codification of canonical law.
1147	Germany	Hildegard, a Benedictine nun, founds a monastery near Bingen in the Rhine valley of Germany. A woman of great learning and piety, she writes fervent religious poetry set to her own music.
c. 1158	Lombardy	Peter the Lombard writes Sententiarum libri quator/Four Books of Opinions, which after initial opposition becomes one of the most popular theological textbooks of the Middle Ages.
17 May 1186	Papal States, Italy, Holy Roman Empire	Pope Urban III causes a break with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa by consecrating the papal candidate for the archbishopric of Trier despite having sworn earlier that he would not do this.
1210	Italy	Pope Innocent III unexpectedly sanctions St Francis of Assisi's new order, the Friars Minor.
1212	France, Germany, Holy Roman Empire	Nicholas, a boy from the Rhineland, Germany, launches the ‘Children's Crusade’ in Cologne, Germany. Thousands of children from France and the Rhineland set out for the Holy Land in the hope of overcoming the Muslims through their faith. Many are sold into slavery, and the rest die on the journey.
8 August 1219	Egypt, France, Germany, Hungary, Spain	St Francis preaches to the sultan and to the crusaders in Egypt. Missions of his friars are sent to France, Germany, Hungary, and Spain.
1243	Germany	Jews from Belitz, near modern Berlin, Germany, are burnt to death in the earliest known case of a massacre of Jews in Germany, following an alleged desecration of the Host (the bread consecrated in the Christian Eucharist).
1245	Mongol Empire	Pope Innocent IV sends John de Plano Carpinis, a Friar Minor, to the court of the great khan at Karakorum, Mongolia. This embassy leads to the establishment of Christian missions in China, which continue until around 1368.
7 May 1274	France	Pope Gregory X opens the General Council of Lyon in France, in the hope of ending the schism with the Greek church. The council recognizes the Dominican, Franciscan, Carmelite, and Austin Friars, and orders the suppression of all smaller mendicant orders.
1309	France	Pope Clement V begins his (and the papacy's) residence at Avignon, in the south of France. Known as the Babylonian Captivity, the papacy's stay in Avignon lasts until 1377.
1318	Italy	Members of the ‘Spirituals’, an Italian group of Franciscans who insist on a strict interpretation of the beliefs of Saint Francis, are burnt at the stake in the persecution of this branch of the Franciscans ordered by Pope John XXII in 1318.
c. 1374	England	The English mystic Julian of Norwich writes the first version of her Revelations of Divine Love, a record of her visions. She writes a second longer version c. 1400.
c. 1375	Flanders	The Dutch mystic Gerhard Groot of Deventer forms the Brethren of the Common Life, a religious society of clergy and lay people, at Windesheim. Their teachings, known as the Devotio moderna/Modern Devotion, had an important impact during the 14th and 15th centuries.
1378	England	The English religious reformer John Wycliffe (Wyclif) publishes De potestate papae/On Papal Power, in which he rejects papal authority and proposes a range of church reforms.
1393	England	The first translation of the Bible into English is completed. The work was begun by the English reformer John Wycliffe in 1380 and continued on Wycliffe's death in 1384 by Nicholas Hereford.
30 November 1433	Swiss Confederation, Bohemia, Holy Roman Empire	The delegates of the General Council of Basel in Prague, Bohemia, make terms for a settlement with the Bohemian Hussite moderates – the ‘Compacts of Prague’ – which grant some degree of freedom to the Moravians and Bohemians if they swear loyalty to the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund. However the extremist antipapal Taborites do not agree to this.
24 January 1438	Swiss Confederation, Holy Roman Empire, Papal States, Italy	The General Council of Basel decrees the suspension of Pope Eugenius IV from the exercise of papal authority.
2 August 1483	Spain, Castile, Papal States, Italy	A bull of Pope Sixtus IV appoints Queen Isabella I's confessor, the harsh Dominican Tomás de Torquemada, as the first Grand Inquisitor of Castile. His implacable paranoid hostility toward Jews and Muslims subsequently directs the actions of the Inquisition.
22 September 1503	Rome	The Italian churchman Francesco Todeschini is elected Pope Pius III. He is pope for less than a month.
1522	Spain	The Complutensian Polyglot, a multilingual edition of the Bible, is published in Spain, written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin. The project lasted from 1502 to 1517 and was edited and financed by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez (Ximénez) de Cisnéros.
1534	Germany	The German religious reformer Martin Luther publishes his German translation of the Bible. It has a profound influence on the development of the German language and German literature.
1549	England	The first Book of Common Prayer is published, much of it the work of the English churchman Archbishop Thomas Cranmer. The official service book of the Church of England, its use is ordered by the Act of Uniformity of this year.
1559	France	Protestants at the First National Synod in Paris, France, issue the Gallican Confession, a Calvinist confession of faith.
1561	France	The Colloquy of Poissy, a conference in France between French Roman Catholic bishops and Protestant leaders, is held to try to reach agreement on shared principles. It prepares the way for the Edict of St Germain in 1562.
1562–1563	Italy	The third and last session of the Council of Trent is held in Trento in Italy. The first session was opened in 1545. The Council of Trent has a major impact on the Catholic Church, introducing reforms, defining doctrine, and setting out strategies for fighting the spread of Protestantism.
1567	England	Separatist congregations (Puritans who seek to separate from the Church of England) meet secretly in London, England.
1580	England	The English religious leader Robert Browne founds the first English Separatist congregation, in Norwich, England, in defiance of the established church.
1588	England	Welsh scholar William Morgan publishes Y Beibl Cyssegrlan/The Holy Bible, the first translation of the Bible into Welsh. It has a profound influence on the development (and the survival) of the Welsh language and Welsh literature.
28 February 1784	UK, America	The English evangelist John Wesley signs a deed of declaration as the charter of Wesleyan Methodism and ordains two ‘Presbyters’ for the American Mission.
12 July 1790	France	The Civil Constitution of the Clergy is established by the French National Constituent Assembly, reorganizing the church on national lines. It is to be state funded and its priests democratically elected. Jews in France are admitted to civil liberties.
1794	England	The English theologian William Paley publishes A View of the Evidences of Christianity, a defence of Christian belief which will achieve great popularity.
1802	France	The French writer François-Auguste-René, vicomte de Chateaubriand, publishes his defence of religion Le Génie du Christianisme/The Genius of Christianity.
1852	USA	Polygamy becomes a tenet of the Mormon faith in the USA.
30 June 1860	UK	At the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Oxford, Darwin's theory of evolution is widely discussed, especially its implications for the origin of humans among apes. Conservative English cleric Archbishop Samuel Wilberforce joins forces with scientists opposed to Darwin's theories. English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley aggressively defends Darwin, earning the reputation of his ‘bulldog’. is an important advocate of his friend Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection.
1870	England	The English churchman John Newman publishes The Grammar of Assent, a defence of religious belief.
1878	UK	The English evangelist leader William Booth begins his ‘Christian Mission’ in the East End in London, England. This forms the basis of the Salvation Army.
1879	USA	The US religious leader Mary Baker Eddy becomes pastor of the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, Massachusetts.
November 1908	USA	The Gideon Society, an interdenominational Christian society, begins distributing Bibles in hotel rooms in the USA.
1932		Swiss Protestant theologian Karl Barth publishes the first volume of Die Kirchliche Dogmatik/Church Dogmatics.
1937	USA	The US theologian Reinhold Niebuhr publishes Beyond Tragedy: Essays on the Christian Interpretation of History.
1948	India	Albanian missionary Agnes Bojaxhiu, better known as Mother Teresa, forms the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India.
29 July–7 October 1974	USA	Eleven women are ordained Episcopal ministers in the US. The ordinations are invalidated by the Episcopal House of Bishops on August 15, though the body endorses the principle of ordaining women on October 17.
July 1984	UK	The appointment of Rev Professor David Jenkins as bishop of Durham in England arouses controversy because of his views on Christian doctrine.For some, his views that such beliefs as the Resurrection should be seen as symbolically rather than literally true amount to a denial of basic Christian tenets.
January 2000	UK	Michael Scott-Joynt, Bishop of Winchester, announces that the Church of England is preparing to change its law in order to let divorcees marry in church.

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