The Sacraments in History

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Chapter 6

• The Sacraments in History

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Changeand Opportunities for renewal

• Change is Part of Everyones History
• Draw a time line with 10 significant
  life-changing events.
• Describe how one of those events was an
  opportunity for growth or renewal.
• Sometimes events can also be major set-backs and
  up-sets.

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Phase One

• Church and Sacraments Before 400 CE
• Paulinas Story (250 CE) When Christianity was
  not legal in the Roman Empire
• High moral standards
• Concern for the poor
• Agape (ah-guh-pay) Friendship Meal
• Christian Initiation Only the Baptized stayed
  for the agape meal. The other were dismissed for
  lessons in the Christian Faith.

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Emperor Nero (54-68 CE)

• Christians were persecuted
• They were called cannibals
• They were fed to wild dogs
• They were covered with tar and set on fire
• Christian had to hide in catacombs for their very
  survival
• Faith was strong, but Christians had to live
  secretively and were considered very mysterious,
  strange, and dangerous.

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Early Christian Worship

• Saint Pauls epistles and the Acts of the
  Apostles tell the story of the early Christians
• Singing, reading, preaching
• Sharing bread and wine
• Catechism and Adult Baptism
• Christianized old Pagan Holidays creating the
  first Christian Feast Days (ex. Dec.25)

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Tertullian (210 CE)

• Coined the Latin term sacramentum
• Christian Rituals were based on rituals used by
  the Roman Army to initiate its new recruits.
• Christians began to see a connection between
  sacraments (rituals) and the practice of the
  Christian Faith.
• Sacraments were encounters with God.

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Constantine (313 CE)

• This Roman Emperor legalized Christianity
• Now Christians could come out of the catacombs
  and into the publics eye
• A Century Later Christianity was declared the
  official state religion of the whole Roman Empire
• Now pagans would face the same kinds of
  persecution as the Christians used to face.

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TODAYS DEBATE

• ASSUME CHRISTIANITY IS ILLEGAL
• SIDE 1 Christianity would be stronger
• SIDE 2 Christianity would be weaker
• Both sides need to give their reasons in an oral
  debate in front of the class.

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WEAKER because
Christianity is illegal.Therefore, it will be
STRONGER because
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The Plague The Dark Ages

• Greek philosophy has been lost.
• Math and science now seem mysterious, magical,
  perhaps even demonic!
• The Church and cities builds walls around
  themselves for protection.
• Communication is limited.
• Fear is their daily bread

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Survival Mode

• When the plague visits your town everyone is as
  good as DEAD.
• Superstition reigns.
• Some monks rediscover the works of Aristotle, but
  all science is suspect.
• Curiosity is condemned as an offense against the
  sovereign mystery of God and the absolute power
  of the Church.

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Monasteries Mysteries

• During the Dark Ages monasteries were like little
  fortified independent cities.
• Books were carefully guarded in secret libraries
  hidden behind monastery walls.
• The Church held a fundamentalist biblical
  worldview and condemn anyone who denied or
  challenged its absolute authority to enforce it.
• Practicing science was a dangerous business and
  its secrets were carefully guarded.

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Nature takes it course.

• Eventually the plague died down.
• Cities began to rebuild.
• City-states formed and began to rival the power
  of the Church.
• Monks back at the monasteries had reinvented crop
  rotation. They could now grow enough food to feed
  whole cities.
• New jobs, therefore, opened up in the cities.
  People could do more than farming.

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New opportunitiesNew role for the Church

• Secular society developed.
• Arts and entertainment were no longer exclusively
  religious.
• There were parallel Church and National power
  structures. Each had their own court system with
  judges and prisons.
• The Church alone remained a sovereign uniting
  force in the emerging nations.

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Sacraments hold it all together.

• The Church created rubrics to guide the unified
  celebration of the sacraments in every nation.
• Latin was used as the official language of
  Christian worship and for church politics.
• Better communication during this age lead to more
  uniformity and central control of the Church by
  the Pope in Rome.

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Holy kings rule the land.

• Kings rather than bishops took political control
  of the nations.
• Kings received the divine right to be the
  sovereign ruler of the people through a Catholic
  coronation service of anointing.
• Knights also received a holy commission to work
  for the king via a ceremonial knighting service.

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The flow of power Hierarchy
Power flowed downward from above. GOD

• Pope
• Cardinals
• Bishops
• Priests
• Religious
• Laity

• Emperor
• Kings Queens
• Lords Ladies
• Knights
• Surfs
• Slaves

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Compare the characters