John Funnell

“In addition, local authorities were ordered to seize each Christian man, to pluck out his beard and to tattoo a black mark on his shoulder. When few Christians defected in response to these measures, the Khān then ordered that all Christian men be castrated and have one eye put out—which caused many deaths in this era before antibiotics, but did lead to many conversions.37”
― Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World's Largest Religion

“our dear old bag of a democracy” is sustained, not by itself, but by belief in something deeper and greater than itself.”
― Alan Jacobs, The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis

“Henry Wallace: “The idea of freedom . . . is derived from the Bible with its extraordinary emphasis on the dignity of the individual. Democracy is the only true political expression of Christianity.”39 And Christianity is the only genuine source and sustainer of democracy”
― Alan Jacobs, The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis

“To sum up: Western history consists of four major eras: 1) classical antiquity, then 2) the Dark Ages when the church dominated, followed by 3) the Renaissance-Enlightenment which led the way to 4) modern times. For several centuries that has been the fundamental organizing scheme for every textbook devoted to Western history,9 despite the fact that serious historians have known for decades that this scheme is a complete fraud—“an indestructible fossil of self-congratulatory Renaissance humanism.”10”
― Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World's Largest Religion