To be honest I know very little about the communist revolutions that have taken place, so I'll briefly share my thoughts on that and concede that I might be wrong.

I see communism as similar to any other political revolution in which the government has become so corrupt and oppressive that the people have almost no choice but to advance a new or alternative political ideology for the sake of mere survival.  Things like this have happened in politics all throughout history and continue to happen today.  In the realm of personal belief systems being born in the face of persecution, however, Christianity is still unique. 

My point was that the religion was born and grew in the midst of persecution.  Jesus, his apostles, and all of the believers for the first 300 years were persecuted.  Before the government legalized the religion it had already grown exponentially against all odds.  What happened after that first 300 years cannot not erase for cancel out what happened during it.

What is currently happening in china is worth mentioning again too, because it's truly astonishing and the chinese government has tried all they can to stop or (more recently) contain and regulate the growth but they cannot.

Also, this is a little bit off topic and has little to do with the point that I made, but I'd like to add something.  During the historical time periods where persecution was done in the name of Christ, it's important to keep in mind that not least amongst the persecuted were those who tried to promote true Christianity.  I highly doubt that the persecutors were true believers because if they were then they wouldn't have blatantly disobeyed Christ.  There were many Christians who stood up and tried to promote true Christianity but were put to death.  Those, for the most part, are the true believers.  And from that perspective, (true) Christianity has always been persecuted at least to some extent.

The most shameful part of all of this is that much of the religious persecution in history could have been stopped if only us humans had the courage to merely speak up on behalf of the oppressed.  That's all it ever would have taken for the persecution to stop was enough people to merely voice their opinion against it.  How can we blame God for this when we have been the ones who have time and time again seen injustice and thought to ourselves "well it's none of my business."  And then we look back in the history books and instead of blaming our human ancestors we blame intangible things such as religions/ideas when we are indisputably the ones who thought up the idea of hatred.

There are a couple of things that have been mentioned in the creation thread (and also, things that i have heard before in quite a few places) that i think need to be cleared up. I am sure that many of you are aware of this, or do not care. I am also sure that there are some people that need to learn some more before they argue about Christianity.

One thing is that many seem to think (and i can see how they get that impression) that Christianity is a religion based on deeds; ie, following all the rules of the bible so you are good enough to get into heaven. This is what every other religion i have studied is based on, but is not what Christianity is based on. Christianity is the belief that Jesus Christ is the son of God, and believing in him is solely sufficient to have eternal life in heaven.

This of course brings up the question 'Then why do good things if you are a christian'. The answer to this is that if you truly believe in God, you will love him, and wanting to do good things will stem from this. A simple example is that if you really love your wife, you would not treat her badly every day, but instead work to please her and make her happy.

The other thing is that many people condemn christianity and christians for the laws of the old testament. By this i mean the arguement of 'You can't believe in some of the bible and not all of it'.

The old testament is the law before Jesus Christ.

God cannot be near sin. This means that for a person to be with God they must be completely without sin. This is why the old testament has many laws or whatever about animal sacrifice. The sacrifice pays for the sins, and thus the individual can be in the presence of God. Jesus Christ dying on the cross was a sacrifice for the sins of everyone, making these laws obsolete.

The arguement that can then be brought up following this is that there is no reason to, now, follow the ten commandments as a christian. This is not the case, because while Jesus essentially rewrote the laws of how we should live, he completely covered for all 10 commandments with 2 laws: Love your neighbour as yourself, and love the Lord your God with all you heart, soul and mind.

Ultimately, if you actually read the bible, this stuff is pretty clear. Also I would be happy to try and explain anything else like this if anyone is actually interested. I do not want to, however, argue about whether or not God is real. This thread isn't intended be any sort of Christianity V Athesiam debate, nor am I attacking anyone.

Spare me with the "true" christian argument. If they beleived in Christ they were "true" christians. They may have been oppressed for 300 years, but christians still oppress people even today.

And honestly I really don't think that any christian ever spoke up , for example, on behalf of the oppressed indigenous tribes in central and South America who were tortured and forced to give up their religion and convert to Christianity, not because they didn't have the courage but because they thought that those pesky pagans were getting what they deserved. Actually I believe that Europeans considered it  perfectly legal and justifiable to murder a non-christian back then, so I don't think most of them found anything wrong with oppressing others as long as they themselves were not oppressed. True hypocrisy.

And there's nothing unique about christianity. It spread through violence and foreced indoctrination like any other popular religion. Good thing Chinese commies keep religious extremists at bay. One of the only good things about that regime.

"Christianity is the belief that Jesus Christ is the son of God, and believing in him is solely sufficient to have eternal life in heaven"

I was a catholic and i was always told that your deeds are far more important...quite frankly if believing in Jesus would be sufficient enough to  get into heaven then i think that's ridiculous.

@Jordahn

What's so awesome about God? Honestly he reminds me of Big Brother from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty Four. Also having lived all my life in the second most religious European country after the Vatican, which of course is overwhelmly chrisitan, and having been raised by a fundametalist christian family, I wouldn't be so sure about getting into heaven that easily if i were you. Of course I presume you're from one of those pesky sects they were telling us at school to avoid. So you're probably gonna go to hell just because of that.

And of course christianity like all religions is all about violence and indoctrination. How else would it stay alive?

What's so awesome about God?