Christianity was originally a Judaist social movement that emerged in the Middle East over 2000 years ago. It originated in Jerusalem at the time of the Roman population. After the death of the founder of the religion, Jesus Christ, the movement started to spread to preaching of the apostle Saint Paul, who created gentile churches. This spread reached all over the wold. Christianity and particularly its Roman Catholic faction, is without a doubt, the religion that impacted more significantly Western countries (Marshall, 1994) and the world as whole.
It is a monotheistic religion based on the teachings of Jesus Christ. Christianity is based on the belief that there is only one God. This God is the sole creator of the world. The concept of sin is very significant for Christianity. Human beings fall into sin (ibid).Jesus is Regarded as the son of God by Christians and the messiah whose arrival was announced in the Old Testament, Jesus Christ is the savior, who will save the world from divine punishment for all the sins of the human population, and who died in the cross to save humanity.
Christianity is the world religion with the highest number of members, having more than 2 billion Christians all over. The concept of the trinity is also important, differentiating this religion from others. Unlike other monotheistic religion, even though there is only God, this God have three different elements: God as the Father, God as the Son and The Holy Spirit. Easter, Christmas, and other holidays are significant for Christians, as they mark significant events on Jesus' lives.
[...] In this respect, the Bahai faith interests me profoundly, mainly because of its links to Christianity. One of the youngest of the world's major religions, Baha'ism was founded by Bahaullah in Iran in 1863. Its major theme is that the human is a single race, and all of us should be unite into a single global society. Baha'ism preaches that there is not a group of living beings that should regard itself as superior to any other. Therefore, it preaches against racial discrimination. [...]
[...] The controversies created films like Jean-Luc Godard's “Je vous salue, Marie”, and Martin Scorcese's “The Last Temptation of Christ” generated debates in numerous European countries and all over the world. The interpretation of the life of Christ contained in these two films caused outrage amongst Christians in Europe, especially amongst Catholics. In the case of the film “Je vous salue, Marie”, Jean-Luc Godard's interpretation of the conception of Jesus caused anger in numerous Catholic groups. In countries like Spain, the premiere of this film had to be suspended due to the pressure of Catholic groups, who were completely shocked by the film. As a Christian, this is extremely offensive. In addition, several members of the Christian clergy have been involved in a number of criminal cases throughout recent years (abuse, etc.). A great concern comes from these events, particularly in how people from other faiths regard Christianity, and the well spread stereotypes of individuals who do not have enough knowledge of the spiritual and theoretical tenets of the church. [...]
[...] During the last years, the opinions of the Church on issues such as abortion and contraception have not changed either. The Catholic faith still considers abortion as a sinful act. Numerous Protestant groups in Norway and other Scandinavian countries are also opposed to “certain directions taken by modernisation, particularly abortion” (Crouch, 2000: 93). However, other Protestant churches such as the Church of England or the Methodist Church (Watton, 1999) allow abortion in particular situations. As Ginsborg (2001) argued, the Catholic Church has “remained obdurate on many of the fundamental gender issues (…) above all, a whole structure of organization, hierarchy and belief which was the very essence of patriarchy” (Ginsborg, 2001: 132). [...]
[...] The concept of sin is very significant for Christianity. Human beings fall into sin (ibid.). They are all sinner sinners. Regarded as the son of God by Christians and the messiah whose arrival was announced in the Old Testament, Jesus Christ is the saviour, who will save the world from divine punishment for all the sins of the human population, and who died in the cross to save humanity. Christianity is the world religion with the highest number of members, having more than 2 billion Christians all over (http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity). [...]
APA Style reference
For your bibliographyOnline reading
with our online readerContent validated
by our reading committee
