Running head: A Brief Evolution of Christianity 1

A Brief Evolution of Christianity

Shea MacIntire

Cerro Coso Community College

Brief Evolution of Christianity 2

A Brief Evolution of Christianty

When looking at the religions of the world, one can see that they have had to adapt and

change with time as technology, information, and cultural views opened. Practices from

prehistoric religions to the main religions we know today all stem from functionality and a need

for social cohesion, but those functions and needs have changed over time, meaning the religions

change accordingly in order to stay relevant within the culture. From the standpoint of

anthropology religion has changed from mainly a moral and spiritual identity and social

identifier to in many cases a business structure, national identity, or highly modernized version of

itself. Of course many religions have stayed relatively the same compared to others, but by

specifically analyzing the world's largest religion, Christianity, one can draw conclusions around

this type of evolution in order to better understand everchanging functions of religion.

Christianity is a religion that has developed rapidly and changed over time birthing many

different sects in order to deal with modernization, leading to it being the world's most popular

religion overall. Essentially being a new form of Judaism to emerge based around the teachings

of Jesus Christ, Christianity was majorly an outcast religion that was scapegoated and blamed by

many other groups. This situation changed completely when emperor Constantine decided to

adopt and declare Christianity the official religion of Rome in the year 380 AD, and unifying

what it meant to be a follower of the Christian faith through the Nicene Creed, which is shared

by all Christian groups(Morreall, Sonn, 2012). One can see from this period of change, that the

Christian religion had gone from its early phases of finding its moral identity outside of Judaism

based around new ideas and even being persecuted, to becoming a political powerhouse that had

been unified and adopted as the official religion of the Roman Empire.
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This change of status for Christianity had marked the beginning of expansion of political

power in a large way with the emergence of the Roman Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox

Churches which had become the main forms of the religion throughout Europe, the Catholics

especially cementing a long lasting hierarchy with the invention of the position of Pope.

Eventually tension would rise within this now well established religion and what’s known as the

Great Schism occurred, essentially separating their identities completely while still identifying as

Christian which created an antagonistic relationship between the groups. At this point the severe

levels of politicization and nationalism that had become intertwined with Christianity had created

issues for some individuals around ideas of profit, and governmental control, which can be seen

in the example of the Protestant Reformation and Martin Luther(Morreall, Sonn, 2012). This

rejection of the sale of indulgences and the profiteering around peoples spirituality would spawn

Protestantism, a large Christian sect that exists today, and in general this type of disagreement

with the Roman and Orthodox churches would spawn many more individual sects, leading to the

abundance of Christian groups we have today.

Rejections of ideas such as the Pope, confession, or infant baptism may be present in

these other forms of Christianity, but the core beliefs in the Bible and the books of the New

Testament stay the same, which has led in modern times to these different sects becoming less

antagonistic towards each other in what’s known as the ecumenical movement, essentially

embracing religious similarities rather than rejecting differences. All of these changes have led

Christianity to become the religion which holds the most wealth within the world, as well as a

massive amount of political power behind organizations such as lobbying groups. For better or

for worse, much of the identity of Christianity has shifted from any seperation between church
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and state focusing on idealogy, to being intertwined and becoming a type of nationalistic identity

in much of the West where it’s values are used to form laws and governmental changes.

Although this was a brief history and overview of Christianity in general, one can see how these

changes within a religion can change the fabric of the religion itself as well as how it’s used

within society.
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References

Morreall, John & Sonn, Tamara (2012) The Religion Toolkit: A Complete Guide to Religious Studies

Blackwell Publishing.