Critical Paper on Christianity

The origin of Christianity

Christianity is defined as a religion whose congregation believes in Jesus Christ being the son of God. They see Jesus as their savior and therefore their prayers are channeled to God through Him. Its origin may be traced to a sect of Judaism who believed Jesus was their messiah according to the Old Testament. Many Christians belief Jesus died and resurrected on the third day after His dead.

In Christianity, there are two things involved. It is either of divine nature or not. When it is seen as not of divine origin, it is therefore very clear that it is of human nature. To add on the assumption that it is of human origin, its believers considers it as a false and a misleading religion. It is believed that Christianity emerged from nowhere but after a short while, it was rampantly spread and was embraced by many. Roman Empire witnessed an explosive acceptance of the new religion. This led to the judgment of the Christians by the Jews. They convicted the Christians as having turned their religion upside down. Many Jews had been converted into Christianity in an alarming rate hence led to reactions by the Jewish leaders who clinched to their religion and beliefs. Jerusalem was the first city with the largest number of Christians according to the book of Act 7: 60. From this point, Christianity began to spread its roots to Palestine, Syria, Africa and finally into the European continent (Neusner, 2008).

Jesus Christ possessed leadership traits that were incomparable to any form of leadership by the leaders. Ordinary leaders were characterized by the formation of armies and empires which was to reinforce the articulation of rules and laws. The Christian leader was not physical in nature but his deeds were strong and natural. He had the ability that no other leader possessed. A good example is healing the sick and restoring the sight to the blind. Jesus could also turn water into wine as he did in Canaan. Normal leaders who were seen by the Jews as strong could not perform such miracles hence became rebellious towards the son of God. Just as a reminder, Jesus was the one and only son of God hence it is clear that God loved Him dearly. As the other leaders did, Jesus was totally of a different character since He never used wealth to launch his leadership strategies. God his father was the soul provider of his ability to perform miracles and guiding him in each and every step he undertook.

Christianity is against immorality such as sexual abuse, drunkard ness, and polygamy among other aspects that are against humanity. Unlike other religions, Christians are intolerant to such activities and considers them as a sin punishable by laws. In the case of Roman Empire, there was a common ideology of tolerance to any kind of activity. It is therefore important to note that this was exclusively before the emergence of Christianity. The then religions could even go to an extend of tolerating paganism unlike the Christianity that was in total disagreement with paganism and other evil deeds.

During its inception, Christianity became a danger that saw many believers lose their lives. The Jews took an initiative of physically killing the Christian believers since their religion was vastly being outweighed. For instance, in the Bible we come across a man by the name Stephen. This man was a Christian follower who was brutality stoned to death because of being a Christian. Hatred was beefed up due to the differences between the Jews and the new Christians. Also, it is witnessed that Jesus the son of God is crucified because he gave his life on behalf of other believers. Had the Jews been humane, they would have forgiven and let him free other than hanging him on the cross (Wise, 2009).

The Founder of Christianity

Contrary to the belief that Jesus being the leader of Christianity being the founder, John the apostle was the initial founder of the religion. Most new testaments books agree with this statement as true. The initial name of john was Saul. Saul was a Jew but later embraced Christianity and became its founder. During his youthful age, he was an active campaigner of the Jerusalem church and in most instances took part in prosecuting the members who were doing things contrary to the legal requirements by the religion.

Branches of Christianity

Christianity can be further classified into two major branches namely the Protestants and the Catholics. In other words, the non- catholic believers are referred to as the Protestants, and vice versa are true. The two emerged as a result of rivalries in the views of the Christians.

United States population is comprised of the two branches which are further classified as Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, and Lutheran for the Roman Catholics. On catholic groups may be further clustered into the following: The   Mennonites, Quakers (Friends), Seventh-Day Adventists, and the Church of God. 

Positive effects of Christianity

There has been much significance of the Christianity religion since it came into existence. Over past, Christianity has aimed at improving the quality of education offered to the public. As it was being introduced to the people, schools were established as the facilities where people could obtain knowledge. For example, the Europeans channeled Christianity to their colonies in African continents. The process was quite tedious and tough since at that time, most parts of the African continent were impassable. They therefore saw a need of establishing proper channels of communication and transport networks to ensure that the religion was wide spread to the people. Instances of immorality such as rape and other sexual violence have been reduced as a result of Christianity. Unlike before, other religions could tolerate such evils but Christianity was totally against it. Christians have been educated sufficiently on what is good and wrong. They are therefore in a position to sort out deeds that may hinder them from the kingdom of heaven which all Christians strive to be.

Better governance in many nations has been achieved as a result of the Christian religion. Christian beliefs leadership comes from God almighty with whom they worship. Leaders have therefore taken an initiative of asking of leadership traits and skills from the supernatural being in heaven. To add on this point, the schools established as a result of christianity has played a role in achievement of quality leadership since the graduands  are given an opportunity to put into practice what they learnt in school.

Peace has also been achieved as a result of Christianity. The religion advocates that Christians should live as brothers and sisters. It further challenges them to help each other so that the lord may give them a helping hand at the time of need. Economic growths have been further witnessed as a result of peace prevalence (Seaman, 2009).

Negative Effects of Christianity

Despite the positive consequences of Christianity, there have been unending conflicts as a result of their differences with other religions such as the Muslims. For instance, when Christianity was being introduced into the African continent, there was a lot of retaliation since the Muslim religion had dominated a better fraction of it. People had to fight with the Europeans since they believed that they only wanted to exploit them. In addition, Christianity became an avenue towards the colonization process. It is true that most colonialists were brutal hence bred animosity between the subjects and the colonialists. The subjects therefore hated the concept of Christianity since it propelled the colonization process. The religion was also against several African traditions such as singing and dancing to gospel music, drums beating, the practice of polygamy and also female circumcision. This therefore led to resistance by some African communities who saw their traditions as being violated.

In conclusion, it's clear that Christianity is one of the topics on philosophy since its major focus is on the ethics that relates rights from wrongs. Also it incorporates the existence of God as a supernatural being, and most of it all understanding of the facts about the world we are living in. this therefore makes it a relevant philosophical topic.