The first churches were not built for at least 200 years after Jesus, so during this time period Christians frequently meet in people's homes, called house churches. II and III John are prime examples of letters written to house churches. [In 303, the Emperor Diocletian decreed that all churches should be destroyed. This is the first written evidence of buildings set aside for worship by Christians.]

While Nero's persecution was the first Roman persecution of Christians, it did not occur for religious purposes. The first persecutions of Christians because of their faith did not occur until the 90s with Domitian. After Domitian, persecution of Christians was sporadic due to the Trajan letter (see the year 112). The first systematic, widespread persecution of Christians did not occur until the mid-Third Century.

In the year 30, Christianity mainly consisted of Jews who accepted Jesus as the Messiah. By the year 100, Christianity consisted mainly of Gentiles. This was due to the travels of the Apostles (go here) which increasingly focused on Gentiles, and because the Jews increasingly forced Jewish Christians out of the synagogues (see the year 95).

Early Christianity developed through four eras, which over lapped. They are, in order: the Age of the Apostles (Apostolic Age), the Apostolic Fathers, the Apologists, and the Teachers. These groups of leaders reflect changes which occurred in the early church period.

1. Right after Jesus, the Apostles were tasked to carry the word of God to the ends of the (then-known) world.
2. The next leaders, the Apostolic Fathers, provided leadership in making decisions about practical and even theological ideas in the young and growing churches.
3. The task of the next leaders, the Apologists, was to defend the faith.
4. The task of the last leaders, the Teachers, was to develop more fully the theological ideas of Christianity. In this last group we see the beginnings of the Councils.

Think of the four eras in this way. Jesus had the vision; the Apostles spread His message and determined that it included the Gentiles (Paul). Next the Apostolic Fathers determined how these new churches would be run. By 100 years after Jesus, non-Christians had begun to attack the new faith of Christianity, and the Apologists combat the heresies. After the early heresies were defeated, the Christians could take the time to examine their own belief in more detail, thus the Teachers and the Councils.

The time period from Jesus to the late First Century is known as the Age of the Apostles. The next era in Church History is known as the Apostolic Fathers. These Christians were the next generation of leaders and helped solidify the new churches and church leadership. Think of the Apostles as the founders of a corporation and the Apostolic Fathers as the CEOs who run the corporation. The Apostolic Fathers wrote books which helped determine how churches ran and even tackled some theological ideas. The Apostolic Fathers are Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Shepherd of Hermas, Polycarp, and Papias, and the writings of the Epistle of Barnabas, the Epistle to Diognetus, II Clement, and the Didache. To read a short description of each, go here.

The Apostolic Fathers are not included in the New Testament, but only because they were not linked to Apostles or Jesus. The Apostolic Fathers did not contain heresy--teachings against the basic ideas of Christianity such as the Trinity--although they did contain some error--incorrect teachings about less important Christian ideas such as how to baptize a new Christian. On the other hand, many writings were made in the 120 years after Jesus that appeared to be Christian but were heretical, that is to say that they taught against core Christian ideas like the Trinity. These books are known collectively as New Testament Apocrypha.

• Gnosticism predated Christianity and had many forms. It did have two constant ideas:
1. Dualism, that physical-ness is evil while all things spiritual are good and
2. A hierarchy of gods, where the highest god can be thought of as the spiritually purest god (or the "good" god). Different gods or spirits exist, with a "lower" or even evil god being responsible for creating physical-ness (think "earth"). Gnostics sought to communicate with this higher or good god in order to learn its wisdom.
• Docetism is an offshoot of Gnosticism. It taught that
1. The highest god sent a messenger to earth to teach spiritual truth.
2. Jesus was a messenger sent from the highest god (or maybe a lower good god depending on the Gnostic system) to teach that wisdom.
3. Since Jesus was a messenger from a pure spiritual god, that meant that he was spiritual and not physical. He appeared to be physical but was not; this state has been called a phantom.

These two were considered attacks on Christianity because they denied the Trinity and the Incarnation. Basically, some people could not accept the idea that God had come to earth in physical form (the incarnation), and so they married the idea of Jesus with Gnosticism and came up with Docetism. These heresies appeared in the First Century (as shown in I and II John), but will grow much stronger in the Second Century.

From the time of Jesus to the end of the Fourth Century, Christianity developed as an institution. Three aspects undergirded Christianity: the Canon, Creed, and Clergy. While some view this institutionalization of Christianity as a negative development, it was necessary. Think of it this way:

• The Canon, or Scripture, was the message given to the Apostles from God by inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it was the standard by which to measure true Christian faith and practice.
• But who was to define and interpret the faith? The Clergy. In addition, the Canon is long (think Old and New Testaments) and so an abridged or shortened version of the major teachings was needed.
• this was the Creed. Why was an abridged or shortened version necessary? Two reasons: to quickly defend against heresies--once you have a Creed you can immediately see where a heresy is wrong--and to serve as a measure and instruction for people becoming Christians.

Therefore, to protect against heresies and instructe the faithful, the Canon, Creed, and Clergy developed. No one decided in the year 100 that the church neeed to create the 3 C's, they just happened naturally from the time of Jesus to the end of the Fourth Century.

The Romans persecuted Christians primarily because the Romans saw them as a threat to the established (Roman) order. Therefore, all conquered people (except for the Jews) had to worship the emperor (or the gods) once a year; first, this showed loyalty to the Roman government and, second, this showed loyalty to the Roman gods. Failure to do so constituted a potential threat to the government through rebellion and by angering the gods. Since Christians believed in one God and would not worship the emperor/gods, they were persecuted. Often Apologists wrote to the Emperor to prove that Christians could be good Roman citizens and yet not worship the Emperor or gods.

The word "apology" technically means "a defense." Christian apologists were people who defended Christianity against heresies and literary attacks and rumors. By the middle of the Second Century, Christianity had become so prominent that non-Christian thinkers began to attack the central ideas of Christianity in an attempt to disarm it. A new position developed within Christianity, men who wrote responses which defended the faith, ergo, the Apologists. Among the most prominent Christian apologists were Quadratus (d. 124), Tatian (d. c.160), Justin Martyr (d. 165), Theophilus (d. c. 175), Athenagoras (d. 2nd Century), Aristides (d. 2nd Century), and Tertullian (d. c.225)

Marcion came under the influence of a Gnostic named Cerdo and began an attempt to synthesize Christianity with Gnosticism (see late First Century for an explanation of Gnosticism and Docetism). To Marcion the Old Testament represented the lower, inferior god of Gnosticism. Therefore, he rejected anything from the Old Testament. In addition, he compiled his own "scripture" which consisted of a stripped-down version of the Gospel of Luke and 10 letters of Paul (shorn of any OT references or influences)(I & II Timothy and Titus, known as the Pastoral Epistles, were not included). Marcion's movement lasted for several centuries. This was an important movement for the development of Christianity, because it helped caused Christians to realize that they needed to construct the new Christian scripture (which would supplement the OT) instead of letting someone else, like Marcion, do it. The process of deciding the eventual 27 books which comprise the New Testament took over 200 more years (go to the years 357 and 390 for more information). To see a list of different lists comprised during this period, go here. To learn more about Marcion, go here.

The veneration (adoring and honoring) of relics dates at least from this time. Polycarp was concerned that Christians would venerate his body and so asked that it not be buried to that the location could not become a shrine. In later times, and especially in the Middle Ages, relics become very important cause of pilgrimages. The Second Council of Nicea in 787 pronounced that everyone should venerate relics and that no altar should be consecrated unless it contained a relic.

The view of Christianity from sometime in the First or Second Century to the split between Catholics and Orthodox in 1054 was that of one Church which comprised all Christians. Or, to put it another way, if you were not part of the Church, you were not a Christian. Cyprian's definition of the Church above (year 251) encapsulated the idea of all Christians under one banner. So by the mid 200s, the idea of one common Christian faith, i.e. the Church, gained prominence. Therefore, by the mid-200s church leaders can make decisions which cut across Christianity about what to do with those who bowed under persecutions, and in 325 a Council of church leaders can be called, the Council of Nicaea, which defined what one has to believe in order to be a Christian.

The Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican Churches all have monks and nuns, which began with the Egyptian desert monks and, to a lesser degree, Syria. The answer to the question of why people began to withdraw into the desert cannot be fully satisfied. Part of the reason includes a discontent with Christian as it became more widely accepted and mainstream, the availability of a large space (the desert) which could be readily accessed and where one could be isolated (unlike in southern Europe), and a desire to fully surrender to God in an age when persecutions had ended (you could no longer be put to death for being a Christian after but you could die to yourself in the form of being a monk or nun). The two monks given credit for initiating the two types of monasticism, solitary or eremitic and communal or cenobitic, are Antony (see the year 285; eremitic) and Pachomius (see the year 320; cenobitic).

• These groups of monks left a number of sayings behind; go here

Diocletian (emperor to 305 and died in 313) realized that the Roman Empire was too large for one person to control and so divided the Empire between the rule of two emperors; one controlled the western part of the Empire and one the eastern part. Constantine felt he was strong enough to rule the entire empire yet moved his capital eastward from Rome to Constantinople; this may have reflected growing concern for the stability of the eastern front of the Empire. The Empire vacillated between rule by one emperor and two until 394, when Theodosius became the last sole emperor of the entire Empire. Upon his death, the Empire was divided between Theodosius' two sons. This divide in the Empire reflected differences between the two halves of the Empire which existed well before 394. Eventually these differences would help result in Christianity splitting into western and eastern Christianity: Catholicism in the West and centered in Rome and Orthodoxy in the East and centered in Constantinople.

With Constantine, Christianity saw its first imperial protector. Because of this, Christianity itself changed in style. Christians were no longer persecuted during his reign. More people became Christian, more resources were spent on building churches, Christians--no longer fearing for their lives--spent their effort in developing Christian thought and understanding through education and writing, and the church services themselves developed more elaborate ceremonies, such as clerical dress (vestments) during the service, incense, processionals before and after the worship service, and choirs.

Two ideas that confused people in the first 350 years of Christianity were the ideas of the Incarnation (God becoming human), and the Trinity (one God in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). Many of the early heresies taught different versions of the identity of Jesus. The cause of this lengthy confusion was the inability to accept the idea that Jesus was God. Arius believed that Jesus, being called the "Son," was created at some point in the past by the Father. This idea appealed to many people as well, such that after the Council of Nicaea the Arian view only grew in popularity. A number of church leaders wrote against Arianism after this Council, including Anthanasius, Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus (these three are known as the Great Cappadocians), and Ambrose. A second Council, the Council of Constantinople in 381, also attempted to end Arianism, but the heresy remained alive for several hundred years.

By the end of the Fourth Century, Christianity had a Canon (Scripture of Old and New Testaments), Creed (Nicene) and Clergy (priests, bishops, and "bishop of bishops" which we call the Pope). This completed the institutionalization of Christianity, that process where Christianity developed its own writing (canon), its declaration (creed) and its leaders (clergy). In addition, Christianity was the official religion throughout the Roman Empire. In 395, prior to Theodosius dying, Christianity as a movement was on the rise with few impediments. But fifteen years later Rome would be sacked and the beginning of the Dark Ages would begin.