# The summarized history of the Christian church

God has a unique way of using rejects and rebels to advance His mission. Even when those people are utterly delusional, He still finds a way to use them.

The original rituals and customs of the Church are extremely ancient [traditions](habits.md) connected to Judaism.

- The Church inherits those customs, but it's always flavored by the new generations' [cultures](people-culture.md) that adopt them.

Frequently, a denomination forms through a specific pattern:

1. Have a [disagreement](people-conflicts-why.md) about something in a different denomination.
2. Break off and attempt to reconcile that disagreement.
3. Within a few decades, resist *other* changes proposed by the younger members.
4. After enough time, culturally freeze at least some traditions as members oppose [new trends](people-trends.md) and lock [habits](habits.md) against [changes](people-changes.md).
5. These traditions become the cornerstone of the denomination, with other derivative denominations borrowing from them.

These distinctions come through [four spectra](history-church.jpg) that capture all the truths of God's existence:

1. Collective scope:
   - Me (Evangelical): Faith is a personal relationship with Jesus.
   - We (Catholic): Faith is about belonging to the Church.
2. Presence scope:
   - There (Orthodox): God is other, sovereign, transcendent, and holy.
   - Here (Charismatic): God is very close, friend, brother, and lover.
3. Action scope:
   - Be (Contemplative): Faith is resting in God accepting you, through His work and not yours.
   - Do (Activist): Faith is a choice that leads to action and striving to do the right thing.
4. Trends scope:
   - Stop (Traditional): Stability and preservationists, focus on how things were handled in the past.
   - Go (Innovative): Relevance and modernith, asks if there's a new or better way to approach things.

The history is divided into several sections:

1. [Judaism](history-church-1_judaism.md)
2. [New Judaism](history-church-2_newjudaism.md)
3. [Illegal Religion](history-church-3_illegal.md)
4. [Legal Religion](history-church-4_legal.md)
5. [Breakup #1](history-church-5_breakup1.md)
6. [More Politics](history-church-6_politics.md)
7. [Protestant Prototype](history-church-7_prototype.md)
8. [Breakup #2](history-church-8_breakup2.md)
9. [Protestant Renaissance](history-church-9_renaissance.md)
10. [Protestant Romantic](history-church-10_romantic.md)
11. [Protestant Post-Modern](history-church-11_postmodern.md)
12. [Protestant Post-Post-Modern](history-church-12_postpostmodern.md)