One of the early leaders of the "Catechetical School" in Alexandria, he succeeded Clement at age eighteen. Origen set before his students the goal of genuine philosophy, the attainment of the good life. Ignorance, he said, is a great barrier to godliness. He developed the "allegorical interpretation" of Scripture. He…

On 14 May 1937, with the assistance of Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, the papal secretary of state who was soon to be Pope Pius XII, Pius XI drafted the encyclical With Deep Anxiety (Mit brennender Sorge). It was the first major church document to criticize Nazism. Smuggled into Germany, it was…

The Successor to Matthew Ricci, Jesuit Missionary to Peking, China. He carried Ricci’s scholarly work to an even higher level. He won the admiration of the Chinese scholar class by accurately predicting the time of an eclipse of the moon and became Director of the Imperial Astronomical Service. In 1650…

(1179) Held in Rome under Pope Alexander III. A hearing was granted to Peter Waldo, who was being threatened with Excommunication for his teachings on poverty. Waldo faced ridicule by an Englishman, Walter Map, but the Pope ruled that Waldo could preach, but only at the invitation of a local…

(1703-1791) 15th child of Rev. Samuel Wesley, Epworth Lincolnshire. Went to study at Oxford at 17, studied at Christ Church and Lincoln College. His brother, alarmed at the spread of Deism on campus he assembled a small band of Christians determined to take their religion seriously. Under John’s leadership they…

(1689) While the Independents and the Dissenting Brethren of Westminster were effective in developing and spreading a new tolerant attitude toward other faith-groups with their new denominational theory, this view of the church found only limited acceptance in England, where the Church of England still retained a favored position, even…

A biographer who wrote of Luther that he was "an irascible old man, petulant, peevish, unrestrained and at times positively coarse." [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history, Roland-Bainton[/tags]  

The first Protestants to attempt to reach distant peoples with the gospel were the Pietists. Moravian concern, however, was focused on individuals in some European colony, perishing without the knowledge of Christ. The Christian groups created by Pietists were tiny islands in the surrounding sea of "heathenism." William Carey introduced…

(1801) An agreement Napoleon forged with Pope Pius VII which restored the Church of Rome to a special place in France. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, Church-of-Rome, ChurchRodent, Concordat, history, Napoleon, Pope-Pius-VII, Pope[/tags]  

(see Congregationalists) [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Congregationalists, Denominations, history[/tags]  

(AD 265-330) Early Christian historian. The biographer of Constantine who represented the emperor as the ideal Christian ruler and envisioned the beginning of a new age of salvation. He also put forward a creed at the Council of Nicea. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Constantine, Creed, Eusebius-of-Caesarea, history[/tags]  

A famous Rabbi in Jerusalem. Saul of Tarsus studied under him. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Gamaliel, history[/tags]  

The pope who condemned the Peace of Westphalia (1648) because he was excluded from interference in the religious affairs of Germany. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history, Innocent-X, Peace-of-Westphalia[/tags]  

In 1920, Curtis Lee Laws, Baptist editor of the Watchman-Examiner, called "fundamentalists" within the Northern Baptist Convention to a conference in Buffalo, New York. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Curtis-Lee-Laws, history[/tags]  

When Emperor Diocletian divided the empire into two parts (East and West), Maxentius eventually became the senior Western Emperor when he murdered Constantius and usurped his position. Maxentius was the son of Constantius’s predecessor. He was later defeated by Constantine at the battle of the Milvian Bridge in the autumn…

When Pope John XXIII died in the midst of preparations for an additional session during Vatican II, Cardinal Montini, Archbishop of Milan, succeeded to the Papacy. He immediately announced his intention to continue the Council. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history, John-XXIII, Pope-Paul-VI[/tags]  

"Quaker" was a derisive name. In 1650 Judge Bennett told George Fox that he knew that at the meetings of Fox and his followers people shook with emotion. So he told him, "you folk are the tremblers, you are the quakers." And the name stuck. When dissent from the Church…

In 1553 this brilliant but erratic Spanish physician sought refuge in Geneva where Calvin’s enemies were challenging his authority. While Calvin wanted a more merciful death than burning for the heretic, he did support the silencing of the ill-balanced thinker. Servetus was burned at the stake. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history,…

Formed on 1945, it was an attempt by many Christians to bring nations and churches together. [tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history, United-Nations[/tags]  

Though we are not sure of the date of his birth, he was reared in northern England and only emerges from the medieval mists as a student at Oxford. He secured his doctor’s degree in 1372 and rose immediately to prominence as the leading professor at the university. He became…

(See also "Schleitheim Confession") A movement beginning on 21 January 1525 in the house of Felix Manz by men who believed that the Christian Church of the New Testament was not dictated by the secular government, i.e. separation of Church and State. Called Anabaptists by their opponents because they "re-baptized"…

Dismayed at the hundreds of divisions within Protestantism, in 1960, as chief executive officer of the United Presbyterian Church in USA, and later General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, he proposed that the Protestant Episcopal Church and Northern Presbyterians jointly invite the Methodists and the United Church of…

While the application of this term may actually be more broad than indicated here, our text uses it to refer to the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, or the Catholic Pentecostalism. Leaders traced its beginnings to the spring of 1966 when two laymen on the faculty of Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, realized…

(381) The Second General Council of the Church. Involved in the christological debate, silenced Apollinarius’ teaching. Established that Christ is fully human. [tags]Apollinarius, BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, Council-at-Constantinople, history, Constantinople[/tags]  

Founded by Spaniard Dominic Guzman (1170-1221), and given official approval in 1220, the preaching order was called "mendicant" meaning "begging" and the term "friar" (or brother) distinguished them from monks because, unlike monks, they went forth to live among people to preach and teach. Just as monastic housed had once…