Christianity Changed the World

Christianity Changed the World
We thought the following article titled “How Christianity Changed the World” was an excellent summary of what we have been saying. It was printed in Citizen Magazine, November 2018, page 30. We are sharing it here by permission:

Do you sometimes think our culture is at the crossroads, tipping toward the gates of Hell? If so, you’re not the first to wonder if the Church will make a difference in a pagan culture.

Jesus began building His Church in a dark and depraved world that devalued life and denigrated marriage. The Greco-Roman culture of that day was brutish and violent; mercy, pity, and compassion were viewed with contempt.

Into this environment, early believers brought a message of God’s deep love for people. Empowered and transformed by the Holy Spirit, they modeled a gospel of grace and compassion. Along the way, they transformed the world.

Be encouraged that what our generation faces today is not new. The Church has been here before, and it prevailed. Here are some key ways the Church made a difference:

Christianity taught and demonstrated the dignity and sanctity of human life. The gladiator “games” vividly depict the Romans’ callous disregard for human life. Crowds of bloodthirsty spectators watched as slaves, prisoners, and criminals fought to the death or were torn apart by wild animals. Christians were vocal in their opposition to these horrific spectacles and encouraged believers not to attend. After hundreds of years, as Christian influence grew, the games were finally shut down. Christians also displayed their value for life in positive ways, helping the sick and needy, eventually building hospitals, hospices, institutions for the blind and homes for the elderly.

The early church advocated for children. Abortion, infanticide and child abandonment were common in the ancient world. The early Church carried the biblical belief that children are made in God’s image and are a gift from Him. Jesus’ followers fought to protect life with their teaching and their actions. They practiced their faith by rescuing abandoned children, providing care and adopting them into families.

Christians proclaimed God’s good design for sexuality and marriage. In the folklore of the time, pagan gods and goddesses engaged in art kinds of sexual immorality. Not surprisingly, their worshipers followed their example. The Church rejected this decadent ethic and elevated the importance of sexuality and marriage. Scripture taught that God ordained marriage and that it was a picture of Christ’s relationship with His Bride, the Church. Men were called to sacrificially love their wives and wives were to respect their husbands.

Christianity also elevated the status of women. In a world where many wives were treated almost like slaves, the early Church included women in leadership. Women played a vital role in supporting the ministry of Jesus and the apostles. The Church grew as women were drawn to a faith where they were valued and respected.

The world is immeasurably different thanks to centuries of Christians living out their faith. Their example should be an inspiration to us today as we lift up the values of human life and God’s design for marriage.

As we end this year and look forward with hope to a new one, we want to thank Citizen Magazine for allowing us to share these thoughts about how Christianity changed the world. We would add to this essay the fact that skeptics like to point to the errors of organized religion in the past. Those errors occurred because humans did things the Bible didn’t endorse or command. The broader picture shows a hugely positive action in Christianity when Christians have followed God’s teaching and Christ’s example.
–John N. Clayton © 2018

Anti-Christian Challenges to Free Speech

Anti-Christian Challenges to Free Speech
The number of seemingly ridiculous anti-Christian challenges to free speech by state schools and atheist groups just keeps growing. Here are some recent examples.

NEW YORK: The board of trustees rejected a “Students for Life” attempt to register at Queen’s College, while other groups were approved. The trustees gave no reason, but ultimately the policy was changed when the students took legal action.

MAINE: The Augusta school board threatened dismissal of special education teacher, Toni Richardson, for telling a co-worker she would pray for him. They attend the same church! Legal action stopped the dismissal, but saying that phrase when students can overhear it will still cause dismissal.

MICHIGAN: Students promoted the free market ideas of a group called “Turning Point” by dressing up as dinosaurs and passing out literature. Because the literature mentioned that the ideas were based on the Bible, they were disciplined and restricted by the administration of the Macomb Community College in Detroit. A lawsuit is pending.

NEW JERSEY: A Franciscan bishop conducted a “bless the animals service” at the Bergan County Animal Shelter in Teterboro, New Jersey. It was a huge success according to personnel at the shelter. Local atheist Candice Yaacobi picked the day of the highly publicized blessing to show up at the shelter and claims that she was “traumatized” when she was “confronted by the sight of a priest in full Franciscan vestments.” She is now suing the animal shelter. The point here is not that there is any significance in blessing animals, but that professional atheist groups want to silence any view but their own.

Citizen magazine reported these cases in the March 2018, issue (pages 9-10). Our files are full of other examples of atheists’ anti-Christian challenges to free speech. The Alliance Defending Freedom and Focus on the Family are leading the fight to stop this kind of abuse.
–John N. Clayton © 2018

Religious Freedom Challenges on Campus

Religious Freedom Challenges on Campus
We have reported on challenges to freedom of religion in the United States. A growing number of religious freedom challenges have taken place on college campuses, specifically orchestrated to attack Christianity.

At Florida Atlantic University a student named Ryan Rotella refused to participate in a class exercise in which students were to write “Jesus” on a piece of paper and then stomp on it. He was suspended from the class and told not to return.

At Missouri State University Emily Booker was required to write to state legislators urging passage of homosexual adoption laws. She refused, and the university threatened to withhold her degree.

Several graduate-level counseling programs require students to counsel homosexual couples rather than refer them to other therapists for relationship counseling. At Missouri State University and Eastern Michigan University, students were expelled from the programs if they referred homosexual couples to another counselor.

You can read about those cases in Citizen magazine for October of 2017 (page 30).

Another case that is very disturbing involves Community College of Baltimore County in Maryland. A young man named Brandon Jenkins applied for admission to the radiation therapy program. Even though he exceeded the minimum requirements, the college denied him admission because he was a Christian. When an interviewer asked him what was the most important thing in his life he said that God is. When Jenkins asked why he was denied, the director and coordinator the radiation therapy program told him, “this field is not the place for religion.”

The job of a college or university is to educate students for the area of work they choose. It is not to tell them what to believe or force them into actions which go against their conscience. A young person should not face religious freedom challenges just to get an education. Students and parents can find help concerning religious freedom on campus at this website.
–John N. Clayton and Roland Earnst © 2017