Modern Christianity, A Civilized Heathenism

The history of Christianity concerns the Christian religion, with its various denominations, from the life of Jesus Christ in the 1st century to the present. Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christianity spread to all of Europe in the Middle Ages, and since the Renaissance, has expanded throughout the world and become the world's largest religion (with over 2 billion faithful).

At first persecuted, but later embraced by the Roman Empire, the East-West Schism, or Great Schism of 1054, separated the Church into Western (Latin) and Eastern (Greek) branches, i.e., Western Catholicism (based on Rome) and Eastern Orthodoxy (based on Constantinople). The rise of Islam resulted in a number of Crusades fought by Christian Armies from Europe, whose aim was to re-capture and hold Jerusalem. In 1453, Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Empire, and Christianity was almost completely removed from the territory that now comprises Turkey. The three most important traditions that emerged from the Protestant Reformation (1521-1610) were the Lutheran, Reformed (Calvinist, Presbyterian, etc.), and Anglican traditions.