Christianity. It's the world's largest religion, it's almost 2,000 years old, and it's very diverse.
Sometimes it looks like this, and sometimes it looks like this. How did this happen?
So right after Jesus ascended into heaven, he left the 12 apostles in charge until he comes back.
When's he gonna come back? Well, he said it wasn't for them to know, but still,
everyone thought Jesus was about to come back. So at Pentecost, the 12 apostles all receive
the Holy Spirit, who empowers them to preach the gospel in many different languages.
So they're living together as one big happy family and preaching to the people,
and their numbers begin to increase dramatically. They're worshiping in the temple,
and the Jewish leaders of the temple don't really like these new followers of Jesus.
So they begin to persecute them, and they even kill some of them, starting with Steve.
One of the people who persecutes the Christians is Saul of Tarsus. He's all like,
Christianity is cringe, change my mind. He changed his mind. And his name. And now it's
his job to preach Christianity everywhere, not just to the Jews. He goes to a bunch of cities
and begins preaching to the Gentiles, which are people who are not Jewish people. Which raises
the question, is Christianity Jewish? Yes, said Peter. No, said Paul. Who's right? Paul is right.
You don't need to become Jewish to become Christian. Cool. Now we've got Christianity
all figured out. And just in time, because everyone still thinks Jesus is about to come back.
Man, I'm so glad we have all these apostles who can teach us. Oh wait, no, they're dying out.
Quick, preserve their teachings. So people begin preserving their teachings and writings,
and compiling them into what would eventually become the New Testament. And it's good that
we have the New Testament, because in the second century, a bunch of weird heretics
and schismatic groups begin to pop up. You've got the Gnostics who hate the world, the Marcionites
who hate most of the Bible, the Montanists who get a bit too crazy sometimes, and the Docetists
who think Jesus was too cool to be human. And the apostolic fathers, like these guys, the successors
of the apostles, are able to use the New Testament as a shield against these heresies. It's kind of
hard to officially deal with these heretics, because remember, Christianity is still illegal.
Unless you live in Armenia. But in Rome, it's illegal. But it's hard to keep it illegal because
people keep converting. Don't worry, the emperor will solve this. Oh wait, no, he just converted as
well. Now he wants everyone to be Christian, so he gathers all the Christian leaders at Nicaea to
clarify what Christianity is. Well, we worship Jesus because he's God, says almost everyone.
Actually, said some guy named Arius, Jesus is like God, but he's still created by God. There was a
time when Jesus didn't exist. Bro, that's heresy, said Santa Claus, punching him in the face. So the
council of Nicaea clarified that Jesus is truly God. Arius got kicked out, and they wrote a statement
summarizing the basics of Christianity. And the Arians kept trying to creep back into the church,
but luckily Saint Athanasius was able to defend the true faith, even though he was against the
world at times. Cool, now we've got Christianity all figured out. Just kidding, we need a second
council to clarify what the first council meant. The Holy Spirit is also God, just in case you're
wondering, and Jesus is also fully human, because this one guy thought Jesus had a human body but
not a human mind. Okay, so he got kicked out, and now we've got Christianity all figured out.
We know that Jesus is both truly human and truly divine. Some guy named Nestorius said,
yeah, but humanity and divinity are like really different things, so we gotta separate them.
The human part of Jesus isn't God, and Mary gave birth to human Jesus but not divine Jesus.
Bro, that's heresy, said Cyril of Alexandria. The whole point of Christianity is God coming down,
becoming human, and dying for us. So they had another council, and Cyril wins, and Nestorius
gets kicked out. They decide that Mary is the mother of God, but some people still side with
Nestorius. You can make a denomination out of this. Okay, so we know that we can't separate
Jesus's humanity and divinity. Now we've got Christianity all figured out. Some people really
want to avoid the Nestorian error, and they don't want to separate Jesus's humanity and divinity,
so they say they're united in one nature. Hold up, Jesus is one person, but he has two natures.
That's Nestorian. No it isn't. Yes it is. No it's not. Jesus has two natures. We can't separate them
like the Nestorians did, but we can't mix them into one like you're doing. He has two natures,
and they're united in one person. They have another council, and the two natures people win,
and the one nature people get kicked out. But some people still side with the one nature people
because they thought the council of Chalcedon was stupid. You can make a denomination out of this.
Okay, so Jesus has two natures, human and divine. We can't mix them or separate them,
and Saint Augustine just clarified that we need to depend on God. Now we've got Christianity all
figured out. Good news, it's now cool to be a Christian. Bad news, a lot of people are only
being Christian because it's cool. Bro that's so lame, I'm so sick of all these phonies.
Say the hardcore Christians going off to live in monasteries to show how Christian they are.
There they pray for hours, deny themselves, and sing Gregorian chants, which are a cool new style
of music invented by Gregory. Knock knock, it's Muhammad. He's politely asking everyone to become
Muslim, and when that doesn't work, he asks less politely. So the Muslim armies spread rapidly and
take over a lot of formerly Christian lands. And if you're someone who's not Muslim living in a
Muslim land, you need to pay to not be Muslim. And there's a lot of persecution of Christians.
So in these times, it's very important for the Christians to stick together and defend against
the Muslim empires. So it's important that Christianity stays united, despite cultural
differences. Yo, remember the Nicene Creed, the document that says what Christianity is?
The Pope wants to add something to it to clarify that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father
and the Son. Dude, you can't change the Creed, says the Patriarch of Constantinople. Yes I can.
No you can't. You're kicked out. No you're kicked out. So Christianity splits. You can make
denominations out of this. Bro, the Muslims keep invading. We should defend our land and maybe even
retake the Holy Land. It's time for a crusade. They recruited soldiers from everywhere and got
the war really hyped up. It's going to be the most epic holy war ever, and everyone thinks Jesus is
about to come back. Maybe the war can reunify East and West. Just kidding, they turn on each other and
they don't retake the Holy Land. But they do retake Spain and Portugal. That's actually really
impressive. They reconquered Spain. They retook the Spain-lined church. Very inspiring. Anyway,
the crusades end up being kind of anticlimactic. They weren't that violent, and they definitely
weren't nearly as bad as your high school history textbook probably said they were. Despite the fact
that they didn't do much, there's still a lot going on, because Saint Anselm just figured out that God
exists. He exists because of the way he is. And just in time for the period of medieval scholasticism,
Thomas also comes along later and finds other reasons why God exists. He also has a thing where
he takes non-christian philosophy and makes it christian, because all truth is God's truth. He's
got a whole system for figuring out everything, and the catholic church gets on board. The orthodox
church has an alternative. And he's not the only one doing this. Everyone's trying to figure out
everything. And since we're figuring out everything about God, we should learn about the world as well,
because the world's God's creation. So they learn about astronomy, the sciences, math, and music,
and lay the groundwork for modern science, because theology is the queen of the sciences. And they
start the modern university system and hospital system. Now it looks like we've finally got
christianity all figured out. Bro, the church is getting kind of corrupt. Yeah, shut up. It's time
for the black plague. Everyone's dying, and no one knows why, so everyone thinks Jesus is about to
come back. But after the plague dies down, the church has time to party, so they make a lot of
really cool art and stuff. It's the renaissance. But who's paying for all this? Easy. The people
give money to the pope, and the pope gives them less time in purgatory. Yeah, this is really
corrupt. It's time for some brave man to speak out against this. Martin Luther? No, it's Huss. He's
gonna reform the church. You can make a denomination out of this. Except it fails, and he gets executed.
That's too bad. Maybe try again in a hundred years. Martin Luther has something to say. 95 things,
actually. So he nails them to the door of the church. Maybe he can fix the church. Except no, he
gets kicked out. But churches keep siding with him, and doing the reformation anyway. So he begins
reforming the church's teachings, saying that salvation's by faith alone, purgatory's not real,
and the bible is our ultimate authority. Everything gets really heated, and everyone thinks Jesus is
about to come back. So the reformation spreads throughout Germany. I wonder if it's happening
anywhere else. It is, actually, in Switzerland. What if we could unite the two reformations and
reform the entire church? So Luther meets with Zwingli, the head of the Swiss reformation,
to see if they agree on the issues.
Bro, what do you think about the Lord's Supper? So the bread isn't really the body of Christ.
What do you mean? He says, this is my body. Well, is means represents. No, is means is. Is means is.
Calm down, Luther. Get out, Zwingli. So that failed, and now there's two reformations. You can
make denominations out of this. And there's also some radicals who don't want to be part of either,
because they want to change everything, and that means not baptizing babies.
You can make a denomination out of this. Man, all these reformations going on,
Bro, you can't divorce your wife, says the pope. So Henry cancels the pope and makes himself the
head of the Church of England. You can make a denomination out of this. Looks like Zwingli
just died, so John Calvin is predestined to take over the reformation in Switzerland,
and he's predestined to write a big book about a bunch of stuff, including the fact that God's in
control of everything, especially whether or not you'll be saved. And he wants to unify with the
Lutherans, so he modifies the reformation. So, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.
with the Lutherans, so he modifies the reformed view of the Lord's Supper. He says we really do
receive the body and blood of Christ, just spiritually. He sends them his view, but
they're predestined to leave him on read. John Knox takes Calvin's reformed ideas to Scotland,
and makes it so that the Church is run by elders. You can make a denomination out of this. But the
Church of England still isn't sure whether it's reformed or Catholic. I guess it's somewhere in
the middle. Bro, that's not good enough, say the Puritans, trying to purify the Church of
England of everything Catholic. You can make a denomination out of this. Some of them give up on
trying to purify the Church and just run away to America. It takes a bit of time for the dust to
settle, but once it does, it's time for Protestant Scholasticism. Let's write down everything we
believe and put our beliefs into neat theological systems. The Dutch Calvinists are writing everything
they believe, including the whole predestination thing. Arminius is one of them, but he doesn't
like that part. So in response, the Dutch reformed to clarify what the Calvinist position is.
But aside from that, this inspires people to start a bunch of universities to study all sorts
of things. And people's religious beliefs inspire them to make advancements in math, music, law,
and philosophy. And now it looks like we've got Christianity all figured out. Bro, this is all
going way too far. We need less of this nerdy theology and more personal piety. Say the pietists
who think the Lutheran churches are getting way too nerdy. And they invent the concept of a Bible
study because everything needs to be more personal. Something similar is happening in the
American colonies, where a bunch of preachers go around and preach personal religious experience
over religious ritual. Is this a good thing? Churches split over this. One of these awakening
guys is John Wesley, who wants to awaken the Anglican Church, which he thinks has gotten
spiritually cold. He starts a movement, which ends up making a denomination out of this.
So all this questioning of religious authority is leading people to question
everything, which leads to the Enlightenment. America questions whether they need a king.
France goes even further and questions whether they need God. I bet they're going to be the
most enlightened people ever. Oh wait, no, they just killed everyone. Let's not do that. But
anyway, the Enlightenment makes everything more secular, and some people adopt a more deistic
view of God, which causes other people to think we need another Great Awakening. People are starting
to distrust traditional religion. So now we've got revivals, social movements, and societies galore.
There's also the Restorationist movement, where people try to rebuild Christianity from scratch.
You can make a bunch of denominations out of this, some of which are actually heretical.
And do I even need to say it? But that's all going on in America. How's Europe doing?
Prussia just said the Lutheran and Reformed churches in their country have to unite,
and they end up just being Reformed. So some of the Lutherans run away to America.
I wonder how the Catholics are doing. I haven't checked in on them in a while. They just had a
council where they said the Pope can make infallible statements. Things are pretty crazy
for the Protestants too. They're being influenced by the Enlightenment, which leads to theological
liberalism, which is basically where Christians stopped believing in Christianity. You see,
now we're enlightened. We know miracles can't happen because there's no examples of them
happening, because all supposed examples of miracles have a natural explanation,
because everything has a natural explanation, because miracles can't happen. Makes perfect sense.
So there's no virgin birth, no divine revelation, Jesus didn't do any miracles,
and there's no resurrection. Bro, you're denying the fundamentals of Christianity,
say the fundamentalists yelling at the modernists who are beginning to take over the mainstream
churches. But the instinct of the fundamentalists isn't really to reform the churches. It's more
like they want to run away, because they're still coming out of the Great Awakening,
and they're beginning to distrust everything mainstream, like mainstream schools, mainstream
universities, mainstream science, and they want to retreat from the cities because they think
Jesus is going to come back anyway, so they should just retreat to the rural areas until that happens.
And with the fundamentalists gone, it just makes the mainline churches even more theologically
liberal. Yo, a bunch of people just had some serious spiritual experiences on Azusa Street.
You can make a denomination out of this. Also, sick of theological liberalism? Karl Barth sure
is, because after World War I he realized that human progress can't save us. But he's not a
fundamentalist either, so he has a sort of middle ground. And he signs a statement with Dietrich
Bonhoeffer saying they're not going to be fascist. And after World War II starts, yeah. After the war
is over, the state of Israel forms, which causes a rise in dispensationalism, which is where people
think Israel is going to make Jesus come back. Also, some fundamentalists want a more friendly,
diet version of fundamentalism, partly because they don't like racial segregation. Speaking of
evangelicals, a lot of churches are now non-denominational. It's actually Baptist,
but don't worry about it. And a lot of conservative Christians are flocking to
these non-denominational churches from the mainline churches, which only causes the
mainline churches to become more theologically liberal. I wonder what the Catholics are up to.
They just had another council. They clarified that the Pope is only infallible in very special cases.
And they said that Protestants are still technically Christian, so that means they
can start to be more ecumenical. How's the Eastern Orthodox Church? Persecuted. How's
the Oriental Orthodox Church? Persecuted. Hey, can pastors be women? Yes, said the liberals. No,
said the conservatives. And the liberals win, so the conservatives get kicked out. Actually,
no, they don't really get kicked out. But they run away anyway, and they make their
own evangelical denominations, which only causes the mainline church to get more theologically
liberal. These evangelical denominations have a new style of worship music, and their numbers
are rising, even though Christianity in the West overall is collapsing. It's exploding in Africa
and Asia, though. Hey, can marriage be gay? Yes, said the liberals. No, said the conservatives.
And the liberals win, so the conservatives run away again. And at this point, the mainline
churches are so theologically liberal that most of the churches within them don't even really
believe in Christianity at all. So if you're in America, and you go to the old historic church
in the center of any given town, like First Presbyterian Church or First Methodist Church
or First Anything Church, chances are it's a mainline church that's so theologically liberal
it doesn't even have any real Christian believers in it. There's evangelical churches that have a
lot of passionate believers, but they're kind of on the outskirts of society. So Western
Christendom is basically dead. Unless we retake the mainline church.