Early Christians faced intermittent persecution from roman officials. During the early centuries C.E., Roman authorities launched a series of campaigns to stamp out Christianity, since most Christians refused to observe the state cults that honored emperors as divine beings. Paradoxically, imperial officials viewed Christians as irreligious because they declined to participate in state-approved religious ceremonies. They also considered Christianity a menace to society because zealous missionaries attacked other religions and generated sometimes violent conflict. Nevertheless, Christian missionaries took full advantage of the Romans’ magnificent network of roads and sea lanes, which enabled them to carry their message throughout the Roman empire and the Mediterranean basin. Continue Reading »

Before the Reformation, people believed the church was everything. Churches collected money from the indulgence and used the money to build more magnificent churches. These baroque churches were filled of decorations. In addition, the cups, they used were decorated. However, the Reformation caused this to all change. As a substitute of a chalice, wooden cup was used. Reformation caused churches to be plainly designed. The features the wooden cup reflected the theology and the ideals of the Reformation.

Between the chalice and wooden cup, there were many different features. A sixteenth-century Roman catholic priest in the celebration of the Mass used the chalice. The wooden cup was created from the Reformation. It was used to celebrate the Lord’s Supper after he left the church and became a follower of Martin Luther. Continue Reading »

The purpose of this essay is to explore the religion of scientology and to further understand the main aspects of the religion in better detail. The religion of scientology intrigued me because I have never known anything about it, and it sounds like it might be something that is quite interesting to learn more about. There will be many areas covered, including the founder of the religion, the different aspects of it, and facts about Scientology.

Scientology as a religion began in 1954 and was based on the thoughts and teachings of L. Ron Hubbard. (Nation) He came to be respected and known with his book “Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health”, which contains a therapy for enhancing life, as well as curing emotional and psychosomatic illnesses. (Nation) This was the basis for the beginning of the religion, along with the book “Science of Survival.” Continue Reading »

We live in a nation that says personal freedom is the fundamental and supreme value. There is no room for state-mandated prayer in a nation of citizens that greatly value their individuality. The nation we live in has no governmentally adopted religion or particular religious faith, this is because of the constitutional principle that the Supreme Court has maintained for many years, this “wall of separation between Church and State” that makes America a model of religious freedom.
Religion matters tremendously in the United States, a world torn by conflict over religious differences the United States is the most religiously diverse nation on Earth. Therefore we are not officially a Christian nation, which gives us the ability to actually live up to the First Amendment and have more religious liberty in this country. That diversity will be endangered, not enhanced, if an amendment is passed that would promote organized school prayer. Continue Reading »

When studying the synoptic Gospels it becomes quite apparent that God is eager to establish a personal, loving relationship with all people through His Son, Jesus Christ. And Jesus is patiently waiting for all the people of the earth to accept His invitation: “I have been standing at the door and I am constantly knocking. If anyone hears me calling him and opens the door, I will come in and have fellowship with him, and he with me.” (Rev. 3:20) This passage illustrates Jesus as a door through which we all must enter. And also that Jesus is willing to accept all people who turn to Him. Man or woman, rich or poor, empowered or enslaved, Jesus was sent here by God so that anyone who hears His message and believes in Him will be saved. Continue Reading »

Gandhi was born on October 2nd, 1869 in Porbandar, a town of 70,000 people and was ruled by a native prince whom the British usually left alone as long as he did as he was told.

Gandhi family belong to the Modh Bania which is a subdivision of the Vaisya caste. According to the old Hindu social scale, the Vaisya is classified as tradesmen or farmers which ranked third. The Bania which had a connotation of moneylender, slightly lower. However Gandhi’s father and as his father before him was a Diwan or chief minister for the Porbandar prince. Continue Reading »

The year of the fall of Samaria was approaching. Hoshea, son of Elah, was ruling over Israel. As most of the kings before him, Hoshea “did evil in the eyes of the Lord”. Therefore, God put curses on Samaria with the invasion of Assyria. All Israelites had to leave their land and move to Assyria. The king of Assyria took the complete power over the land of Israelites and “brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath and Sepharvaim and settled them in the towns of Samaria to replace the Israelites” (2 Kings 17:24).

God did this because of Israel’s numerous sins. Israelites did not follow the book of Law written by Moses, but instead acted in opposite way. They worshipped other kings, had a lot of high places, where they burned incense, and even sacrificed their sons and daughters in the fire. God removed all Israel from his presence, but left only one tribe Judah, as he still was holding to the Covenant he made with David.More…This happened to be a warning to the tribe of Judah. Nevertheless, it was not enough for people to stop act against God. Although, Hezekiah, king of Judah, ruled “right in the eyes of the Lord, just as his father David had done” (2 Kings 18:3), removed all high places and even broke Moses’ Bronze Snake, to which people burned incense, Hezekiah’s follower Manasseh made the most evil thing by rebuilding high places erecting altar to Baal and making an Asherah pole, and even sacrificing his own son in the fire. Continue Reading »

Athanasius utters his theological views about the incarnation of Word of God as Christ Jesus. He is addressing Jews, gentiles and the whole world, in this talk. Athanasius develops his talk from what John says in the ‘Gospel according to John’ that “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.” (John 1:1-3). Word of God is completely divine and it is the Word of God that made the whole universe evolve. Word of God manifested in human form as Christ Jesus and represented the love and goodness of father in the world, gifting precious salvation that human beings never deserved. Each and every evolution and all renewal that is happening in the world were brought by the same Word of God that made everything evolve from nothing, long centuries back. Creation as well as salvation is from the same root ‘the Word of God’. Father almighty has assigned the duty of dispensing salvation to the world to nobody else but to his Word (Christ Jesus) who is responsible for the creation of the world. The author rules out the opinion that the universe is self originated. He argues that there is a mastermind behind all these wonderful creations and nothing will appear in this beautiful fashion unless or otherwise some one plans it in his mind. Athanasius called Lord, ‘the designer and maker of everything’ and brushed off the concept of spontaneous generation. Other theories that explained creation like the ‘The Epicurean theory’, Plato’s argument and the ‘Theory of Gnostics’ were all completely disproved by Athanasius. Continue Reading »

Religion is a potent instrument in directing people’s opinions and conviction so the masculinity of the god it represent certainly have a impressive influence to those who believe that doctrine. When this attitude is taught to a child, he/she receives it as the ultimate truth. As he grows up, the patriarchal society imposes the same teaching through the stories like Beauty and the Beast, Psyche and Eros, Iseult and Tristan, and Lancelot and Guenevere.

Because of how I was brought up, I am having a hard time believing that even divine scriptures could be only derived from what a writer just want to believe. And based from the book, the writer is a masculine imposing his power and control over women.
The gender used in the Bible that refers to God only imposes men’s superiority over women, so as the use of “man” instead of “woman” and “he” instead of “she”. Using god for this gender issue make patriarchy the natural and original thing. Continue Reading »

The separation between God and people was born at the very beginning of the existence of human beings. Chapters 1-3 of the book of Genesis illustrate the famous Creation account where the idea of separation was first established. From this point and further in the Old Testament, this idea was even more reinforced. The strongest proofs of division between God and people are found in the stories about God’s choice of Abraham to form a chosen nation, God’s exclusive defense of his special people in Egypt, God’s support of Israel’s holy war against the inhabitants of Palestine, and God’s ultimate revenge on Israel’s enemies at the end of all time.

The separation idea is based mostly on division of all the people by God into two groups – “insiders” (chosen or special) and “outsiders” (not chosen). In Gen. 4 God likes Abel more than Cain and this is because Abel brought God “fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock” (Gen. 4:4) as an offering while Cain brought him some fruits. It follows that God likes fat that is the flesh of an animal. But to get this fat somebody must kill an animal. It means that God needs death and pain (sacrifice). When God showed preference to Abel’s offering, he treated Cain unfairly. This situation created a feeling of jealousy and separation which in its turn served as an incentive for Cain to kill his brother. It looks like God is guilty for everything that happened because he showed a special love.

In Gen. 12 God makes a great choice – he chooses Abraham in order to create a chosen nation through him. First God makes Abraham leave his country and people (God separates him from others), then God blesses him and all his descendants, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you… and all peoples on earth will be blesses through you” (Gen. 12:2-3). Again God shows preference to one person and one nation over others. God doesn’t explain why he likes one people and hates others. It is a sign of his capriciousness and ego. It is very similar to that how people now choose friends to support their ego. God promises Abraham to make his name famous (Gen. 12:2) but the whole sense lies in such words, “I’ll make your name famous, because you’re going to be my guy. You’ll go to other places and tell about me”. This is exactly how God supports his ego. In Gen. 12:7 God promises that he will give the land of Canaan to Abraham’s descendants (so that Israel could feel superiority to Canaanites). When Abraham comes to Egypt (Gen 12:14), he says that his wife Sarah is just his sister. Pharaoh takes her in his palace as a wife and Abraham acquires a lot of stuff (Gen 12:16). But God punishes Pharaoh and his household because of Sarah (Gen. 12-17). If to think logically, Pharaoh is not guilty at all. It is only Abraham who is really guilty for this because he himself said that Sarah was just his sister. It follows that God anyway cares about chosen people only, since he punished Pharaoh instead of Abraham. Continue Reading »