Curated category
Christian terminology
- PentecostalismPentecostalism begins with a specific moment: a watch night service in Topeka, Kansas, on the 1st of January, 1901, when students at a small Bible school…
- EucharistThe Eucharist sits at the center of Christian worship, a rite performed in churches from Ethiopian highlands to Scandinavian cities, each time involving…
- Western SchismThe Western Schism began on the 20th of September 1378, with a single, startling act: a group of French cardinals gathered at Fondi and elected a second pope.
- BaptistsBaptists are a Protestant tradition distinguished by one radical conviction: that faith must come before water. No infant can choose to believe, so no infant…
- Pauline epistlesScholars have divided the thirteen books attributed to Paul the Apostle into three distinct groups since the 16th century.
- SacramentA sacrament, at its most stripped-back, is a Christian rite that has been judged to be particularly important and significant.
- MethodismMethodism began on the 24th of May 1738, when John Wesley stood in a Moravian service in Aldersgate and felt his heart, in his own words, "strangely warmed."…
- Confession (religion)Confession, in many of the world's religions, is the act of acknowledging sinful thoughts and actions. It can be spoken directly to a deity, shared with a…
- BaptismBaptism sits at the threshold of Christian life. A candidate steps toward water - or water comes to them - and something is said to change forever.
- EvangelicalismEvangelicalism is a worldwide, interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity, and the word at its heart comes from a single Greek term.
- UnitarianismUnitarianism is a nontrinitarian movement of Christianity built on a single, radical conviction: that God is one being, and one person alone.
- Investiture ControversyThe Investiture Controversy began with a letter. In the winter of 1076, King Henry IV of Germany wrote to Pope Gregory VII using a salutation that was not…
- PresbyterianismPresbyterianism takes its name not from a creed or a charismatic founder, but from a word for an elder. Presbyter. The idea is almost startlingly democratic…
- Grace in ChristianityGrace in Christianity is described in one definition as God's favor, a "share in the divine life of God", and a gift that is "generous, free and totally…
- Cenobitic monasticismThe word cenobite emerged from the Greek terms koinos and bios, meaning common life. Ancient writers applied this label to followers of Pythagoras in…
- NontrinitarianismNontrinitarianism is the name given to a broad family of Christian belief that refuses one of mainstream Christianity's most defining claims: that God is…
- Church FathersIn the late 1st century, a bishop named Clement of Rome wrote a letter to Christians in Corinth. This document stands as the earliest surviving epistle from…
- PurgatoryPurgatory sits at the intersection of mercy and justice, promising neither heaven nor hell but something in between. The word itself traces back through…
- ProtestantismProtestantism began with a protest. Six princes of the Holy Roman Empire, joined by rulers of fourteen Imperial Free Cities, issued a formal dissent against…
- PaganismPaganism is a word that carries the weight of centuries of argument, misuse, and reinvention. Before the 20th century, no one actually called themselves a…
- LutheranismLutheranism began with an insult. In July 1519, during the Leipzig Debate, German Scholastic theologian Johann Maier von Eck reached for the oldest weapon in…
- English DissentersEnglish Dissenters were Protestants who broke from the Church of England across three centuries, from the 1500s through the 1800s.
- BishopThe word bishop comes from a Greek term meaning "overseer" or "supervisor," and for roughly two thousand years that single idea has rippled through…
- New TestamentThe New Testament is a collection of 27 texts written in Koine Greek that forms the second division of the Christian biblical canon.
- Christian martyrChristian martyrdom begins with a single Greek word: mártys. It means witness. Not hero, not saint, not sacrifice. Just witness.
- Mass (liturgy)The English noun Mass derives from the Middle Latin word missa. This term entered Old English as mæsse, sometimes glossed as sendnes meaning a sending or…
- Edict of MilanRomans viewed their success as a world power through collective piety. They honored a great number of deities. Greeks on the Italian peninsula introduced…
- Threefold officeThe threefold office of Jesus Christ rests on a single Latin phrase: munus triplex. Three roles. Three functions. One person. Prophet, priest, and king.
- Diocletianic PersecutionOn the 23rd of February 303, the Diocletianic Persecution began not with soldiers in the street but with a building coming down.
- Sacramental breadSacramental bread sits at the center of one of the oldest rituals in Christianity. Known by many names, the host, the Lamb, Communion bread, Communion wafer…
- Christian mysticismChristian mysticism sits at the heart of a tradition stretching back to the second century AD, and it begins with a surprisingly practical question: how does…
- ChristiansChristians are the largest single religious community on the planet, numbering approximately 2.4 billion people as of 2020 - roughly a third of the entire…
- Counter-ReformationThe Counter-Reformation was a sweeping Catholic resurgence that grew in response to, and in parallel with, the Protestant Reformation.
- Greek East and Latin WestIn 330 AD, the Roman Empire shifted its administrative center to Constantinople. This move marked a turning point in how Greek and Latin functioned across…
- Nicene ChristianityNicene Christianity is the doctrinal tradition that binds together the vast majority of Christian churches on earth today.
- Holy Roman EmpireThe Holy Roman Empire was, in the words of the philosopher Voltaire, "in no way holy, nor Roman, nor an empire." That sardonic line has clung to it for…
- Judeo-ChristianJudeo-Christian is a term that carries enormous political and cultural weight, yet it began its life with a surprisingly narrow meaning.
- Sacramental winePaul the Apostle wrote in 1 Corinthians 10:16 about wine being used in the earliest celebrations of the Lord's Supper. In the Early Church, both clergy and…
- Thirty-nine ArticlesIn July 1536, the Church of England adopted its first post-papal doctrinal statement known as the Ten Articles. This document emerged from a period of…
- ChristendomChristendom is a word coined in the 9th century by a single scribe, somewhere in southern England, possibly at the court of King Alfred the Great of Wessex.
- Christian ChurchThe word church in English comes from the Old English cirice, which traces back to a West Germanic root kirika. This term itself derives from the Greek…
- Christian nameThe phrase Christian name appears in Elizabethan England as a term for any given name, not strictly tied to baptism. William Camden observed that these names…
- Northern CrusadesThe Northern Crusades were military campaigns by several Catholic kingdoms and military orders aimed at Christianizing the pagan peoples of the Baltic Sea's…