PDM Read Your History Books

Submitted by Mike (United States), Feb 20, 2006 at 08:18

Though Christianity does not continue to spread "by the sword" it did for many centuries. Europe was Christianized by the sword. When Constantine's son Constans became the emperor of the Western Roman Empire, he decreed Paganism and the practice of sacrifice illegal and punishable by death. When Constans died, his brother Constantius took over as sole emperor of the entire Roman Empire and had all Pagan temples in the empire closed. The oppression of Pagans continued long after the fall of the Roman Empire.

In Northern Europe followers of the Norse religion had their temples burned, their priests killed, and their followers told to convert to Christianity or be killed. During the Inquisition anyone deemed to be a heretic would be tortured and would be forced to recant and repeant or be put to death. It didn't take much to be deemed a heretic. You could be called a heretic merely for saying the Earth is round or that the Sun rather than the Earth is the center of the galaxy. In Colonial America people accused of witchcraft would be tortured until they confessed whether they were guilty or not, then they were burned at the stake. Say what ya want about Islam, but Christianity doesn't have a squeaky clean history either.

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