ch. 10

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Ch 10 discusses Christendom. Christendom began in the year 0 when Jesus was born. As Jesus accumulated more followers, the Roman Empire felt continually threatened by him and decided to kill him. Once Jesus was dead his followers were persecuted, yet his people still practiced. His followers held secretive sessions in basements and other hidden locations to continue to practice Christianity. Eventually, the Roman Empire made the drastic change to make Christianity the official religion. There was no separation of church and state at the time. Once they made this decision, the Roman Empire then also determined the dogma on what Christianity was, and what should be read and practiced, as well as peoples interpretation of it. People who agreed with these beliefs were then tortured and killed by the government. The second big change the Roman Empire made was by Constantine and his move of the capital to a new city named Constantinople around 400 AD. Moving to the East made it easier to defend the borders from the Germanic barbarians coming from the north. Constantinople later became Byzantine which developed into Eastern Orthodox, while Rome developed into Roman Catholicism. Eastern Orthodox was picked up by Vladamir of Russia during this time as he was shopping for a religion, selected for its freedom of drinking over Islam.

This chapter is important because it gives a history of not only Christianity but how it started to branch out and eventually become the overarching umbrella of religions that it is now. It also shows geographically how religion diffused, and where and why it is still popular in those places today.

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