The Protestant Reformation changed Christianity forever. No longer would the Vatican dominate most of the political or the religious power of Europe. The Catholic Church failed to stop the influence of the Reformers. By the late 1500s, the Reformation existed in three major groups of the Lutheran, Reformed, and Anglican traditions. Reformed churches were created by the theologian John Calvin, who argued that the church can function without interference from the state. They had the ideal of a constitutional representative government in both in church and in society. Puritans and other Dissenter groups were formed in England. There were the Huguenots in France, Beggars in Holland, Covenanters in Scotland, who became the Presbyterians, and Pilgrim Fathers of New England. These were Reformed churches that have their theological origin from John Calvin. The Anglican church was formed by Henry VIII that became the Church of England. King Henry VIII appointed himself Supreme Head of the Church and England, and Henry preserved Catholic doctrine and the church's established role in society. Luther made his German New Testament Luther Bible in 1522, The Freedom of the Will was published by Erasmus in 1524, and the Anabaptist movement was formed by 1525. The Tyndale New Testament in English was created in 1526 with great influence from the Greek text of Erasmus. The Lutheran movement spread into Denmark, Norway, and Holstein by 1528. Luther believes in the real presence of Christ's body and blood in 1528, so he had a debate with Zwingli in 1529 in the Marburg Colloquy. Huldrych Zwingli was killed during the Second War of Kappel in 1531. In 1531, there is the claim of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico. The Myles Coverdale Bible was created in 1537. It sued Tyndale New Testament and the Latin and German versions. Thomas More (who was a Roman Catholic scholar) was executed for his refusal to accept King Henry VIII's claim to be the supreme head of the church. Desiderius Erasmus passed away in 1536 being the historic editor of the Textus Receptus. Tynadale was put to death in 1536 for just expressing his religious liberty rights in translating the Bible to English. The 1536 Institutes of the Christian Religion was written by John Calvin in 1536. There was the growth of Anabaptists. Later, Michaelangelo painted The Last Judgement from 1536 to 1541. The Matthew Bible was created by John Rogers in 1551. The Great Bible was created by Thomas Cromwell. Francis Xavier was the Jesuit missionary who spread Catholicism as far as China. The Geneva Bible was created in 1560. The Reformed Churches formed the Heidelberg Catechism by 1563. After the 1571 Battle of Lepanto, Pope Pius V organized the Holy League, led by Don Jaun de Austria to defend Europe from the larger Islamic Ottoman forces (of 230 galleys and 56 galliots). In 1572, John Know created the Scottish Presbyterian Church due to disagreements with Lutherans over sacraments and church government. The Bishops Bible was created from 1572 to 1606. The St. Bartholomew Day's Massacre in 1572 was when thousands of Protestants in France were unjustly murdered by Catholic mobs. It was one of the most wicked actions of fanatics.
Pople Gregory XIII made the Gregorian calendar in 1582 which has been adopted by many regions of the world. The Catholic Church published the 1582 Rheims New Testament. It has been part of the 1610 Douay Rheims Bible. The Jesuit scholar Francisco Ribera published a pre-trib futuristic interpretation of the books of Daniel and Revelation in 1585. The Japanese people with Toyotomi Hideyoshi expelled the Jesuits from Kyushu in 1587. The Catholic missionaries come to St. Augustine, Florida. The Spanish Armanda was defeated in 1588 in their attempt to reconquer England for Roman Catholicism. Michaelangelo's dome in St. Peter Basilica was completed in 1590. The historic Edict of Nantes in 1598 grants toleration to French Protestants or Huguenots. This victory is not just a victory for Protestants but of religious liberty in general. It was a great law. By 1600, Giordano Burno, a Dominican priest was burned at the stake. Jamestown, Virginia was founded in 1607. Ironically, I visited Jamestown 410 years later in 2017. In 1611, the historic King James Version of the Bible (the Authorized Version) was published. It was created mostly on Tyndale's work and the Bishops's Bible (done by Reformers and Anglicans). It has printings and separate Apocrypha (shown as background literature, not as authoritative as the Bible) between the testaments. Later, the Rosicrucian Manifesto existed in the 1600s, and some Protestants (not all Protestants) started to work with some Rosicurcians. We saw the Plymouth Colony in 1620 founded by Puritans. We see Roger Williams banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1635 for advocating the separation of church and state. Harvard was founded in 1636 as originally a religious university. Jansenism (in Catholicism who believed that God's grace was the only way to salvation and that human free had not role) was created by Corneilus Jansen, bishop of Ypres. Roger Williams formed the Rhode Island colony to promote religious liberty. George Fox made hte Quakerm ovement in 1648.
There were many royal houses being in conflict with each other religion and political ideology. There were two religious camps (of Catholics and Protestants) having wars. There were many wars in France by 1562. The most destructive war of that era was the Thirty yeas' War from 1618 to 1648. By this time, we saw the growth of colonialism and imperialism done by many Catholics and Protestants. Imperialism and colonialism are evil and immoral, because human beings have the right to voluntarily and peacefully form their own cultures without other people unjustly oppressing, exploiting, or dominating them. The Golden Rule refutes the nefarious evils of colonialism and imperialism 100 percent.
Black people have been involved in the Christian religion since the beginning. Jesus Christ was not a blonde hair, blue eyed European (regardless of the images shown in cathedrals and churches worldwide). When Christianity was created by the first century, early Christians included many black sub-Saharah people like the eunuch mentioned in the Book of Acts accepting salvation and being baptized. One of the Christians who experienced Pentecost was a black man named Simeon. Early Christians were enslaved and oppressed by the mostly paganized Roman Empire. Therefore, many professing Christians, who enslaved black people (during the late Middle Ages and beyond), lied and said that being black is inferior, and black people deserve no justice are not only heretics. They are completely demonic and wrong. Likewise, many in the Body of Christ in many cases didn't do enough to combat the lie of black inferiority and stand up for the liberation of black people. The millions of black people, Native Americans, and people of color experiencing genocide, enslavement, racism, xenophobia, sexism, and all forms of oppression (done by those who claimed to be Christians, Muslims, atheists, etc.) have no justification. Those responsible for those atrocities are degenerate, obscenely wicked people period. That is why we should always never sugarcoat the Maafa and other atrocities that human beings experienced. Many Catholics, many Protestants, many Baptists, many atheists, and many Muslims have a definite role in the Maafa and the genocide of Native Americans. That truth must not be omitted or whitewashed. That wickedness is contrary to morality as the OT and NT forbids murder, forbids rape, forbids slave trading, forbids splitting families, forbids mistreating your neighbor, forbids stealing lands, forbids lying, forbids being a respecter of persons, and forbids oppression against human beings. The commandment of love they neighbor is an eternal edict that slave traders and racists didn't follow. The New Testament is clear that all believers are one in Christ, regardless of race, color, or sex. Historically, many of the earliest Christians lived in Africa. Jesus and Mary lived in Africa. The children of Abraham lived in Africa, Joseph lived in Africa, the Nubian Church flourished in Africa, and other people were strong in the faith in Africa, long before the Maafa. The Gospel of Christ was in Africa, India, and other places before it spread into England. Today, about three fourth of Christians live in the Third World, heavily persons of color. Real, authentic Christians have been leaders in the abolitionist, civil rights, labor rights, environmental justice, and other social movements for decades and centuries. Also, we have to oppose those who want to whitewash atrocities against human beings for the sake of religiosity. We must adamantly be in favor to show real history to be known by the general public (in opposition to the MAGA agenda that wants book bans, bans some black history from websites, and desires black museums to be targeted in 2025 not 1865). So, Christianity is not the white man's religion. It's a religion that is universally found in all believers coming from God. There is a distinction between distortions in faith used to advocate oppression and an authentic faith used to free souls to be free from injustice.
The era of Thyatira was one of the most important ages of Christian history. It lasted for over one millennium filled with false doctrines promoted and a rising up of believers who stood up against these heresies. The Christian Church, during that time (from 606 A.D. to 1648 A.D.) spread far and wide from Africa to Asia and beyond. The time saw the Middle Ages, the growth of the monks, the rise of more Chinese dynasties, African civilizations flourishing, the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the imperialistic advance of European forces globally. It saw the righteousness of the Waldensians spreading the simplistic gospel to the people, and the evil of the start of the Maafa bringing death, rape, and oppression to innocent African human beings. This time saw the conflict of Roman Catholicism within itself. There was the total split with the Orthodox Church by 1095 A.D., and the Reformation by 1517 A.D. Also, the rise of Islam was another monotheistic religion that was popular in the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and parts of Spain. The Reformation sent so much shock waves to the Catholic Church, that they formed the Jesuits and the rest of the Counter-Reformation to solidify their belief systems plus trying to end the spread of the Reformation. They failed, and the Catholic Church would promote missionary services in the world. The Protestant Reformation accelerated the translation of the Bible in many languages, inspire the spread of the rule of law, and caused the growth of independent spiritual movements. It had weaknesses like some in the movement promoting church/state unified kingdoms, and some persecuted Anabaptists and Baptists later on. The Roman Catholic Church's false doctrines from Rosary to calling the Pope Holy Father including all bishops to be celibate by force inspired believers to stand up against those errors to promote the truth. The end of this era saw the modern world filled with global revolutions, opposition to monarchies, and a shift to government run by the people increasingly.
We have new threats in our generation thirty years after the Oklahoma City bombing terrorist attack. In the last 10-15 years, there has been an increase of hate crimes against black people, Jewish people, Latino people, LBGT+ people, Asian people, Muslim people, many Christian people overseas (in Nigeria, in India, in China, Burma, Iran, etc.) and other human beings unjustly. That is why we can't let our guards down because we live in the 21st century. Many of the same bigotry and prejudice that existed back in the day continue today in our time, James Bryd Jr. was a victim of a hate crime in Texas along with Matthew Shepard. That is why in 2009, the government passed The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act to expand federal hate crime authority. This was after the terror attack in America on 9/11. In 2015, a white racist terrorist murdered many people in the Charleston church shooting in 2015. The black victims just wanted to worship and celebrate their faith. There was the murderer of people in the San Bernardino attack in 2015. By 2016, social media has found many people showing hate speech and bigotry. The murderer Omar Mateen murdered 49 people and wounded 53 people at the LGBT+ Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. Mateen claimed the attack in the name of ISIS, but there was no links between ISIS and him. In 2017, white Neo-Nazis and other racists promoted anti-Semitism and racists in Charlottesville in my state of Virginia. Many of them showed a Nazi salute, many of them marched in the streets at night carrying torches saying anti-Semitic rhetoric, and one far right racist terrorist killed a woman via a car. Another black man was assaulted by the terrorist mob. In 2018, many immigrant children were dehumanized and oppressed by the Trump administration. Many children were separated from their migrant parents. There was the Pittsburgh synagogue terrorist shooting against Jewish people being the deadliest attack on Jewish people in U.S. history. The attack happened at the Tree of Life synagogue. A white racist killed Hispanic people at El Paso, Texas in 2019. There was another racist attack on black people at a Buffalo grocery store in May of 2022. Recently, there has been attacks on Jewish people in 2025 in Boulder, Colorado.
Viligance against tryanny is always important. We live in a totally different world than thirty years ago from the Oklahoma City Murrah Fedeal Building bombing. Trump has deployed the National Guard in Los Angeles against the wishes of California's leaders, because California's leaders say that this situation doesn't merit this response. The National Guard forces now are guarding federal locations in Los Angeles. The mayor of Los Angeles said that peaceful protest will always be protected. These protests exist because of the excessive response of some ICE members, who in many cases, detained people without due process of law, even U.S. citizens. This has caused a climate of fear and family pain. This has nothing to do with the rule of law as the Trump administration has defied the rule of law from the Trump team defying a Supreme Court decision, Trump desiring to abolish birthright citizenship as found in the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, etc. Homan has threatened to arrest Congressional leaders if they "cross that line." Also, the Trump administration is promoting a travel ban that will affect millions of innocent people with no ties to terrorism. Trump has allowed DOGE to run wild to fire innocent federal workers without just cause and cut funding from legitimate public programs that have worked to help human beings from USAID to Job Corps. This Trump MAGA movement is a whole lot worse than the Reagan Revolution (we know how vicious that movement was to vulnerable populations too). A large percentage of Americans support MAGA, and xenophobia represents the necessity to not coddle extremists. It's not a time to be centrists. It's time to be bold, revolutionary, and honest to speak truth to power even if the majority of people are with evil. We have the right to disagree the policies of the tyrant Donald Trump. That is the truth that we must accept.
By Timothy
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