| Killiana1a said: Christian values are the foundation for which secular values could take root and grow. Without them, we may be living in some polytheistic tribal culture where if you offend one God, his followers will stone you to death. |
Inaccurate. Laughable.
Christianity dominated Europe and, along with Christian Barbarians, threw us into the Dark Ages for over a thousand years. During these Christian dark ages, not being a Christian was a very bad idea. Before then, during the Roman Empire, people were free to worship whatever God they wanted. Rome allowed free practice for the numerous religions in their empire, with the only stipulations being that you can't disrespect Roman gods and you can't revolt against Rome (the Jews refused to acknowledge Roman gods, and that was okay with Rome until the Jews revolted, which resulted in the destruction of the Jewish Temple). This was the norm long before Rome, as Europe had always been very secular and viewed the gods of other people as gods, just not their gods. A counquered people would be subject to the conquerer's god, as they did conquer your god and would demand respect, but the conquerer didn't want to upset the god of the people they conquered, for fear of angrying their god. The view that every religion was acceptable made pre-Christian Europe very secular and tolerant.
Fast forward to the Renaissance, which you laughable attribute the Christianity. The Renaissance and the use of reason was a retreat from Christianity. People gained interest in the philosophy of pre-Christian times (Greeks and Romans) and started to view rationalism reason as a better method to solving problems and answering questions rather than the Christian God. There is a reason why so many thinkers during this period were punished by the Church, they were using reason rather than religion, such as Galileo using science to answer questions about the orbit of Earth rather than the Bible...
