Question

1. How does the historical past of the catholic religion shape worship today?

2. What are the specific challenges faced by catholic religion today, locally and nationally and even globally?

Answer 1

The Catholic religion has undergone a number of changes, it begins with Jesus Christ and his teachings. The first followers of Jesus were Jews descents and or Jewish proselytes; the first difficulty the Christians faced was from the Jews converters.

The spread of Christianity took place during the regime of Roman Empires, and Christianity was taken as the state religion, the Saxon king after conversion to Christianity converted many Saxons to Christianity, in Middle Ages it spread to North Europe and Russia, and during the period of Exploration, it spread to throughout the world.

Due to schisms and theological disputes, it got divided into Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox churches, and Oriental Orthodoxy and Protestant churches. The Christian religion was first taken as the part of Jews religion, due to conflict with some Jewish religious authorities,  Christianity got an identity distinct from Judaism, and the world Christian was used by Jesus disciple Antioch for the first time.

Christianity has many traditions from Jews community, they have kept their teachings in the Old Testament and the New Testament was written later on in which Jesus is described as the God of Israel, and son of God and Messiah.

Early Christianity was following many practices of  from Jewish tradition like  liturgical worship including the use of incense, an altar,  scriptural readings,  use of sacred music in hymns and prayer, their own religious calendar, the male priesthood, ad practice of fasting,

After the death of the apostle, the teachings were taken over by bishops that are called post-apostolic period legalizing the Christian worship under Constantine the Great. For about 250 years the early Christian faced a very difficult period because they refused to worship the Roman emperor.

The changes continue till the enlightenment took place in 17^thand early 18^thcentury primarily in Europe and, later, in North America, there were Isaac Newton and writers like John Locke were challenging the old order of Christian faith and doubting even the divinity of Christ. The old thinking was representing Christianity as superstition, an angry God, and absolute submission to authority, but the new thinking was the age of thinkers, refuting that the king rule by the divine right, the people had deviated from the early Christianity and they were more inclined towards worldly wealth, and that predestination is not right, people have to struggle for their destiny.

Jonathan Edwards started a great awakening in response to enlightenment in American colonies converted many American slaves to Christianity and started their own schools and churches throughout the colonies and the result was greater religious toleration. The Great Awakening was based on democratic values.

There was a conflict the way the Roman churches were working and as a reaction to medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices. Along with Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, Protestant became one of the three forces that were against the Roman Church, the protestant does not worship Jesus as son the God and they do not do idol worship.

Thus the past has changed the way the Christian world is today although it is a sect of Judaism now it is a separate religion called Christianity, they believe in Prophet Moses and Jesus while Jews do not believe in Jesus. Jews had crucified Jesus, but now the past is forgotten. The Christians follow various churches and believers in the pope, while the protestant way of worship is different, although they believe in Jesus but not as a son of God and they do not o idol worship.

2 Christianity is not facing any challenges today. The challenges they are facing may be due to the political policies of the country where Christianity is the first religion. As a religion, it is accepted and followed by millions of people, but the devotion towards religion has decreased, people have become most worldly and religion is taken as a routine, following Sunday Prayers and occasionally visiting churches, there is no daily reading of the holy book by an individual, they follow pope and Bishops, but the true essence of Christianity is changed and taken over by worldly, wealth.