The Basics of Christianity

 Note: Much of this will be jarring and different for readers as I'll be explaining the Catholic understanding of Christianity. The general idea of Christian theology has changed since the Protestant Reformation due to the decentralization of theological thought and the clashing theology that focuses on solely scripture. I will quote scripture but this is in no way to cite the justification of views but rather add to the explanations being made. Also note that this post is not comprehensive by any means and means to establish the basics for newcomers that have already some understanding of Christianity.


"The Glory of God is Man Fully Alive" -St. Irenaeus, early church father.
"I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete." -Jesus Christ, John 15:11

The basic premise of Christianity is one of personal transformation to provide human fulfillment in life and prepare yourself for the afterlife through the acceptance of nature's innate order and humanity's place in it. It sees mankind's lack of fulfillment and suffering and teaches that this exists because of man's dislocation from things natural purposes which began with a historical "original sin". It's effects now hamper our ability to act towards that fulfillment (The effect is what St. Augustine would refer to as concupiscence, which is our irrational desires towards things). This effecting us as a species now is what is called our "fallen state". The maintenance of moral grace (and therefore the potential for happiness/fulfillment) depends on one overcoming that inclination towards irrational desires, primarily through seeking the virtuous life and from forgivness. In Catholicism, forgiveness is achieved through a kind of therapy, whereby the "sinner" (the one who sins) has to contemplate and admit wrongdoing along with reflect on how they will move past it  so they can truly move past it. This destructive inclination can lead to failure in both things done and things failed to do.

The purpose I mention not only pertains to the natural ends of things in nature and individual parts of the body but also the proper ends of man and his will as a whole, which would be stated by Christian doctrine to be love. By love, I do not mean romantic or friendly love but love in the classical sense which means "the willing of the good of the other without self-interest". To Christian doctrine and philosophy, our creator made all things and made them all with purpose. The good is the fulfillment of something's natural purpose or purposes. For humanity, we are understood as the stewards (guardians) of the rest of creation and because of that we seek not only our own good but the good of all things itself. It would be proper to say that we seek the good itself. While things may occur to us that make us struggle to see or accept a love for the good itself, even going so far as to substitute things for that longing (sensual pleasures, honor, wealth, etc), but Christianity would assert that we may only find that personal fulfillment until it rests in the good itself and Christianity upholds the virtue in moving away from substitutions and towards the good.

One would fail to see love correctly if the ideal is seen as a kind of stereotypical Asceticism (denial of pleasure overtly), though in seeking love for love's sake there is a degree of self-denial. We must not forget to value ourselves, not over or less than others, but alongside others as part of creation as well. When we speak of sin, we are not speaking of a thing with real physical existence, but rather a simple "missing of the mark". Sin is the word for actions away from our natural purposes, separated into two understandings: a partial separation over simple things that don't explicitly move your interests away from the good (venial sin) or a direct separation of interests (mortal sin). It is common that too much focus is given by Christian teachers on sin, thus creating a "religion of no" to some people but we must come to understand that these 'no's' only serve to bring us to something greater - what we'd call the sinless life is synonymous with the understanding of the virtuous life - and to reject sin is synonymous with accepting love. To take it a step further, by loving the good itself we are also saying something synonymous with loving what Christianity calls God:


In classical Christianity, from the early Christians to the end of the medieval period and still upheld by Catholicism and other apostolic sects, God is not some anthropomorphic thing nor is it a being inside or outside the universe but something more fundamental and metaphysically ultimate: The very coming to be of being itself. This is in line with medieval thinkers who would label God to be "the subsisting act of being itself". In this view, God is not letting the world spin on its own after some first cause of the universe (if such a thing is possible) but rather there sustaining it and allowing it to be at all points of time. What comes to be and its order is according to the will of God and so to support the natural order of reality is to support God's will and ultimately to love the good itself would mean loving the unconditioned good which would be God, from this understanding. It is only through God that we live, and breathe, and have our being (Acts 17:28). Thus it is correct to say that by rejecting sin we are ordering ourselves towards God.

Christianity understands that attaining perfection in the refinement of the self and removing concupiscence is largely an impossible case but Christianity isn't about the attaining of perfection but simply the aligning of the self towards God so that God's will can give the world new life and so the reality may flourish and also we may gain from what God gives to us beyond this life. We all seek good, beauty, truth, and the like and to a certain degree we all do find some of it but to us it is never enough as we all seek those things absolutely and only find elements of that absolute - in our purpose.

Speaking of the afterlife, Catholic teaching explains that after you perish, your soul (The soul being understood as "the form of the body" in the philosophical sense, rather than some ghostly thing trapped in the body) are either reunited with the core of being itself, God, or reject it. If you wish to be with God's love you will get as you wish. If you wish to not be with God's love you will get as you wish. The union with God's love is what we call Heaven, the separation from God's love is what we call Hell, and the reforming of the self to join in God's love is what we call purgatory.

But it would be improper to judge Christianity's endgame as Heaven alone, though most Christians, especially in other sects, think of it as such. That is a leftover effect of Platonism on Christian thought to omit a part of Christian doctrine and think the endgame as Heaven. Christianity does not find that leaving the soul in a disincarnate state with God as the end, not at all. The Nicene Creed, the creed of the faith ends in the line "we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen." none of this mentioning Heaven as the one true end. Despite our sin, the God that makes all things good has no intent of giving up on creation. Christianity's true endgame is what we would call The New Heavens and the New Earth. This is not an escape from the material but a renewal of it and the transfiguration of the dead. This is where our Christian hope truly lies.

>Christianity is a religion of the weak and feeble!

This is a critique of Christianity as a whole that comes, I believe, from Nietzsche. The notion is that Christianity is a form is resentment, where strength and wealth and such are hated while poverty and weakness are lauded and that it comes to know it's form of good only through evaluating what it calls bad (As Nietzsche may put it, it is a slave morality as it is gaining its morality from an evaluation of its oppressors and what they value, rather than the values for themselves). To begin a critique of this I must first say that I will not be speaking for all forms of Christianity - Nietzsche himself grew up in a home of a Protestant minister - but only Catholicism:
The understanding of Christianity is fundamentally flawed, strongly through outright failing to include the concept of love.  The motive for love is not charity nor the neediness of the lover, but it is rooted in a deeply felt confidence that through loving people becomes more personalized and most real to themselves. Things such as strength and wealth are renounced not out of hatred but because they sometimes serve as obstacles towards a life truly ordered towards love. In fact, strength in many cases can be considered good. The saints are understood as beacons of strength due to their strength of will and dedication and the notion of physical strength implies caring for your body, which is an extension of man being stewards to creation as their body is part of creation. In fact, physical strength can often enable you to do more for others and thus allow for more varied expressions of love. Likewise, sickness and poverty are not lauded in themselves. Poverty can be a sign of a person who renounced wealth to live in love, which is a form of the good, but it can also be a sign of struggling in the economy to achieve wealth. Sickness and poverty in itself is never lauded nor wanted in many cases but give opportunities to express God's love. Of course there can be some dismay about events such as St. Francis' love and care for the lepers and his personal wellbeing  but the threats to well-being are inconsequential because at the core of his being there is the awareness that his existence is firmly rooted in and sustained by the ground of the ultimate. Despite his contingency, his work is an expression of the non-contingent's superabundance.


>What is evil in this context?

Evil cannot be understood as a "thing" but rather the lack of the good. Evil has no real being in reality same as darkness has no physical existence in reality - it is the privation of the good.

>What is faith in this context?

We must first make a point to say that faith in this is not a simplistic belief in the truth of propositions. Instead, it is both a trust and love in God. It presupposes things like the existence of God. By faith, man freely commits his self to God by understanding God's position to and for all things. For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God's will. "...the righteous shall live by faith." -Habakkuk 2:4

>What is idolatry in this context?

Idolatry is what I mean when I spoke of sensual pleasures people use to supplement or substitute their longing for the ultimate good. We seek honor, experience, pleasure, etc in greater and greater amount - often not realizing that through it we gain addiction to it. These things we treat as idols are not bad in themselves - as they are part of creation they are most definitely good - but what is truly bad is taking them as idols.  Learning to overcome our vices to find to find the true discipline of the self.

>Aren't standards a bit high?

Well yes, but if you seek glory there is no reason to lower your standards. For a quality golf swing there is one thousand ways and reasons to be told 'no' but it's all in effort of a much finer 'yes'. This is what we were created for and despite our flawed selves we must always try to search for greatness. This is not to say we should seek to hurt ourselves over our faults. Simply continuing to try makes all the difference in the world.

>What about Original Sin and stuff?

Original Sin is a heritable corruption of our rational nature and will.  The first of our kin partook in the first sin, which was the fundamental rejection of the innate Good and Evil. From it we gained a somewhat but not altogether corrupted nature. The best way of describing it would be the early understanding of what we would now call the Human Condition. What came from it is what Augustine refers to as concupiscence. It is the capacity for irrational desire that leads to the weakness of will against our rational nature.

>What about all the Old Testament stuff?

The Old Testament is the stories of God's interactions with the nation of Israel in preparation of the coming of the Messiah, whom is the prophecized liberator of "God's people" - then known to be just the Israelites. This is not to say that other parts of world did not exist without divine inspiration in one way of another but rather Israel was the one group put forth by God to set up the scenario for his coming and establish the church in the manner he willed. Throughout the Old Testament you get get the slowly growing communion between man and God after the first sinning. From what began with the first of man joining in a marriage covenant led to Noah with a household covenant led to Abraham and a tribal covenant, etc, etc. From all of these stories we the struggle of sinful and difficult men trying to find God despite their situation. The Old Testament is most well known for the Mosaic Law and it is mainly what people refer to mainly when they refer to the 'Old Covenant'. Jesus had revealed to us that the Old Covenant's rules were both to prepare the people for the coming of the Messiah and for the people's during that period of time. Some because "there hearts were hard", as Jesus put it. Through Jesus' coming the Old Covenant's purpose is fulfilled and he places forward the New Covenant made for what is truly God's people - all people - and that New Covenant is what Christianity is.

>Where's Jesus in all this?

It may be strange to some people that I have hardly spoken of Jesus yet.
Jesus is the icon that Christianity identifies itself by and the icon to which Christians use to represent God. Jesus is the incarnation of God, the messiah, and what most people identify God through and - somewhat mistakenly - as. This is not to say that God became matter nor does it mean that Jesus is some form of demi-god. God is separate from matter and nature wholly - entirely non-competitive to it -  and so assuming the role of human he did not remove any aspect of humanity. In this respect, it would be accurate to say that Jesus is the incarnation of God that has two natures altogether, one wholly human and one wholly God. United.  Human in the regard of his spiritual and and physical make up while God in that he also contained alongside his will the will and knowledge of God.
For the life of Jesus, his human nature is highly reflected in his actions. He lived, slept, prayed, etc. as man because he was man. However, his will is aligned with the divinity in him, which provides him with knowledge and capability only capable as God. This alignment with the divinity assures union with the divine will, which means a lack of sin entirely, as sin is simply the dislocation from God. Now surely the purpose for the life of the Incarnation would likely come into question. The incarnation came to fulfill the purpose of the Old Covenant and set forth the New Covenant with man. This thing we call the New Covenant being the removal of the elements of God's law in Mosaic Law made for the people at the time, the promise of Heaven and the warning of Hell, and all Christian teaching which constitute doctrine. In his life he helped provide an example of the sinless life while doing this: He helped others, taught the masses the true good, overturned the bad that was accepted in society, and organized people for the good of all. On top of this, his divinity allowed him capability to great miracles which enabled the good to be strengthened even further.
This, of course, leads us to the crucifixion and the resurrection. There are several understandings of this event and I will explain some of them in the manner of which they arose:
The immediate response to the resurrection was an expression of God's infinite love for us. Humanity killed God, and in one of the worst ways possible - crucifixions were usually used by the Roman Empire as a threat to dissenters and politicians like Cicero struggled to even describe the scenes of the crucified bodies - and yet God returns to us in forgiving love. The sheer act is testament that the love of God being stronger than the deeds of man.  This is mainly where the idea of using the cross as a symbol for Christianity came from. It is a taunt, to say that the love of God is stronger than anything that world can throw at it.
After the resurrection, the apostles came to note reference of the Hebrew texts that imply the suffering of Christ their own dialogues with Christ which show foreknowledge that it would occur so through that and the dialogue during the resurrection itself they understood the cross as necessary as part of God's plan. Thus the understanding of the crucifixion itself changed from scandal to the fulfillment of the divine will, with salvation being key to the understanding of it. This manifested in two understandings: The view that Jesus saved the people through a positive moral influence on the world through his teachings, what he instituted, his martyrdom, and his resurrection (Moral Influence Theory) and the view his crucifixion itself had innate purpose to save us from stuff (Substitutionary Atonement). From putting an end to sacrificial systems and giving an examples to other civilization - sacrifices being a practice all throughout the ancient world - that the ultimate sacrifice had already been paid (Satisfaction Theory) to other ideas like allowing a the sins of man to overtake him to get him killed on the cross to allow a miracle of the resurrection to change the hearts of all and through it wipe away that sin and prove that God overcomes sin and thus ruin the hold the idea of sin has on the world (Christus Victor Theory) and a few others. There is truth to many of these views and many compliment one another so we may gain a richer understanding of the event of Jesus, whom we call Christ - a title meaning 'the annointed one'.

>What about Angels and Devils?

Angels are a nebulous thing to Christianity. They are the messengers of God, that we are sure of by what has been revealed to us, but their nature is still largely undefined by the church in any definite sense. Uniform to them all is that they are a part of creation that exists on a more core level of existence than the rest of us that has intellect and - with it - free will and acts to maintain and accomplish the will of the ultimate reality we refer to as God. They have the capacity to interact with nature and, through their interaction, give themselves a more noticeable form to those witness to it. In some cases more overt than others. While we should not be quick to specify their works and the works of other things, as we have no proper method to discern the difference exactly, we should be aware that their existence and that they act are certain.

These intellectual beings having free will they, like us, have the capacity to work against God's will for different interests. That which we call angels working for their own purposes outside God's will is basically how devils are understood. They carry with them the same capacity as angels, simply used in a different way. Most notable when talking about demons is a character we refer to as Satan or THE Devil. Satan, historically, has been a title that refers to people acting against God's will. However, the title has also been given to a specific angel whom is the being most mean when we speak about Satan, whom we understand through knowledge given to us as the principle angel involved in the coming of Original Sin.

>Is the world valued less because we value God over it?

This is a somewhat severe criticism that attempts to classify Christianity as anti-life, by assuming that the material world is outright denied or thought less of for interest in and pursuit of Heaven and God. No doubt there is some valid criticism of this some sects of Christianity (Puritanism, Eastern Orthodox Ascetics) but for Catholicism which I'm speaking for in this this cannot be further from the truth. The world is not a test or a prison, locking us from the goodness of God but rather all creation is an expression of God's goodness and we are called to live in the divine life that which God gives to us. Further, we are not called to look down upon the material or value it less simply because we value God and union with him. On the contrary, things are given greater value through God as they now rest in a picture of an even greater picture which affirms the existence of all of it alongside what we will of it, rather than simply what we will of it.

>Where is church in all of this?

The church is a fundamental part of what Jesus instituted in his life. Jesus, coming to enable all people to overcome their sins, founded in his apostles an institution to represent for man the man made whole again - man's capacity to overcome sin - so that all people may be united. The church exists in two senses - the institution itself and the body of people united in it, though some more visible than others. The 12 apostles Jesus orchestrated were given several authorities to act for the faith - an authority guided by God to ensure would not falter - whom the hundreds of followers of Jesus recognized at the time, and those authorities were passed down in their offices. Their authority established the first of the church practices, which included the authority to administer spiritual gifts at key parts of a person's life (What we call the Sacraments) along with other core elements of the church such as the church's teaching authority on the faith, The Magisterium.

All of this talk of authority, however, does not mean that the people in these positions are not they themselves sinners as well but rather they have powers in their office that they may exercise and the proper use of those powers is ensured to be done by God's will. We cannot forget that we are all still flawed people outside of those powers, nor assume the church is limited to the body of people acting in it, as the grace distributed in the sacraments and in doctrine does not come from the moral excellence or lack thereof of any people involved but from God. Through it we are called to unite all people and even all creation and saints in Heaven in God for the good of all. This union we speak of is what we call the "Mystical Body of Christ". It is treating us all together as a single organism and an expression of how we all truly come together as a whole in God. This is best seen in scripture:  "The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'" -Matthew 25:40. All we do for us aids us as a whole. This is the union of the church.


>Where is scripture in all of this?

Scripture, as Christians know it, is texts that deal with fleshing out the story of Christ. It is important, however, to not treat the Bible as a single book but rather a library, as it contains  a wide variety of texts with varied authorship, historical context, structure, and genre. What unifies it, however, is that all of them are inspired by the will and grace of God. They are not they themselves the word of God, however, but contain within their text the word of God is there through the words of inspired men. However, it would be incorrect to understand Catholicism as the "religion of the book" which is an apt understanding of Protestantism instead; God's word proceeds and extends beyond scripture into the continuing life of the church body itself. The compilation of texts was originally assembled for priestly use, as they are difficult texts to grasp, however as time went on they became available to monastics and then eventually the laymen.

Contained in the scripture is the overall backdrop of Christ's coming. From the eyewitness history given of the coming of Christ (the four gospels), the story of the founding of the church afterwords (Acts), letters of someone given authority to guide the formation of the church (Paul's letters), to even the historical/cultural/intellectual backdrop that Christ came into (The entire Old Testament) and more.

>How does God act in the world?

When trying to grasp God acting in the world we often view it as God coming into the laws of nature and breaking them as he wishes. This gets seriously confusing for some people when they approach lines like "it is through God that we have achieved all that we have done" that seem explicitly contradictory to itself. The issue with these is they do not realize the doctrine on God they are speaking about, at least when Catholics and other apostolic faiths speak of it. Just as referenced in the image of the burning bush (a bush on fire and yet the bush was not affected by the fire around it), God is considered non-competitive with the world. As God is the very source of existence it makes sense to think of God as a thing in the universe pushing things around to his whim but rather making change in the universe by sustaining the universe with things changed slightly, akin to a musician changing notes to bring about different sounds without ever touching is the sound itself. Speaking of sustaining, we cannot also think of God as "breaking into reality" and making changes as reality depends on God for existence at all times. From this divine conservation it's incoherent to think of God poking his nose in to interact as interactions happens literally at all times with each instance being what God wills, either in the sense of necessity or simply allowing things. In every case we have God "speaking" to us, and in a sense. We are all urged to towards the good.

>Where is prayer in this?

Working off of the last section, if God makes us with the urge to seek the absolute good then us coming to pray is a reaction to God's action. As St. Paul writes in the Letter to the Romans, "...For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words." But to talk about prayer we must first understand what it is. There are absolutely tons of forms of Christian prayer, to the point it is best defined as an application of the mind and heart towards union with God, whether this be petition, song, meditation, thanksgiving, contemplation, intercession (prayer on behalf of another), asking someone in Heaven to pray for you, or done with any formality or length. Their desire for God in the prayer does not need be explicit either. However, we must not misunderstand prayer as “therapeutic" in the sense of motivating us to be righteous and aiding us in that righteous life, though it can be. At the same time we should not be thinking of prayer is a form of wish-fulfillment, as our God is unchanging in his will and, as all-knowing, knows what you need. Instead, prayer is made part of the divine will and is part of the causal chain of what brings it brings about, which is what God wills. We are not called to change the divine will based on our actions but through prayer gain closer union with God and be moved by the Holy Spirit so, through it, we deserve and receive what has been eternally decreed for you to recieve through prayer and bring our wills in closer union with God. These things received can be a spiritual gift, the enabling of something through secondary causes (working through other things and people), or the wholly miraculous. What comes of this for some, however, is people unhappy with what is willed or what is not. Some treat it as will-fulfillment regardless, some fail to see the providence in what has occurred, and some fail to realize that some things work to no divine greater good being done but occur due to the freedom and sins of man. Regardless, this does not take away from prayer but compels us to it, to seek answers and align ourselves greater to the Holy Spirit. As prayer is in essence the seeking of God and part of the disciplining of the self to God prayer is in itself a virtuous act.

>How do you know when God is working through you?

We cannot know when it is actively working through you, there is currently no way to discern it, but we can know the effects of it on you and from those signs know that it has worked through you. The apostle Paul tells us in scripture of these signs which will all be present, which are "love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control". However, it would take much time to go specify what all these terms exactly mean in this pastebin so I urge people looking into these points in greater detail if they're interested in knowing them more. These signs St. Paul mentions are called "The Fruits of the Holy Spirit."

>Where can I go for a more detailed view of Christian beliefs?

The Catechism of the Catholic Church is the collected official teachings of the Catholic Church and is available in most forms of media, along with entirely free on the internet. There are also commentaries to it for further detail.

>tl;dr. What is the simplest way to sum up everything Christianity believes?

I find the best way to sum up Christianity is in the Nicene Creed, the collected doctrine of the faith summed up succinctly into a creed made by the church leadership early in the church's history. You'll have to excuse the old-fashioned language. It goes as followed:

I believe in one God,
the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible.

I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages.
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son,
who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets.

I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.
I confess one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins
and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead
and the life of the world to come. Amen.