10 Truths - 2- Christianity - Best

10 truths – 2 – Christianity – Best
Feast of the Assumption: cinops Friday, Aug. 15, 2008
We continue with Coral Ridge’s classic “10 Truths about Christians and Politics”
Christianity Makes the Foundation for Law and Politics: p 21-3
“Christianity brought a moral overhaul to the ancient world is most evident in the treatment before and after Christ of the “least of these,” little children. What we take for granted about cherishing the young was not always so.

In 1 B.C. a Roman traveler to Alexandria, Egypt sent a warm note home to his wife. It was a tender letter with one chilling exception:

‘I send you my warmest greetings. I want you to know that we are still in Alexandria. And please don’t worry if all the others come home, but I remain in Alexandria. I beg you and entreat you to take care of the child and, if I receive my pay soon, I will send it up to you. If you have the baby before I return, if it’s a boy, let it live; if it is a girl, expose it. You sent a message with Aphrodisias, “Don’t forget me.” How can I forget you? I beg you, then, not to worry.’

This blunt and matter of fact direction to discard a baby girl offers stark and troubling insight into the moral character of the ancient Roman world, where infanticide was common. 19th century Irish historian W.E.H. Lecky called infanticide “one of the deepest stains of the ancient civilization.” It was so much a part of Roman culture that the myth of the founding of Rome recounts the abandonment of two infants, Romulus and Remus. Thrown into the Tiber River in the 8th century B.C., they were said to have survived by being nursed by wolves.

Opposition to Infanticide:
“Not only the exposure of infants a very common practice, it was justified by law and advocated by philosophers,” including both Plato and Aristotle. The Roman tradition of paterfamilias gave the father total authority to decide the fate of his children – including whether a new born was to be exposed to die outside the cit walls, or allowed to live.”

Early Christians followed the example of Jesus, who loved and blessed the children, as recorded in Matthew 19:14. They firmly opposed abortion and infanticide. Two early church documents that were widely read, the Didache and the Epistle of Barnabas, both prohibited infanticide. Eventually, these Christian views became Roman law. Emperor Valentinian, who had been lobbied by Bishop Basil of Caesarea, outlawed infanticide in 374 A.D. and in 529, Emperor Justinian emancipated all “exposed” children who had been forced into slavery.

Slavery was widespread in the ancient world, but it was not opposed by church fathers with the same firmness as infanticide. Still, Paul made it clear that in Christ, “there is neither slave nor free … for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). By the fourth century, legal reform to benefit slaves were adopted under the first Christian emperor, Constantine…. Constantine, for example, also ended the practice of branding criminals on the forehead because, he said, “The human countenance formed after the image of heavenly beauty, should not be defaced.

In the 6th century, Emperor Justinian reorganized the Roman legal code and essentially “enacted orthodox Christianity into law,” … Justinian’s Code “introduced into law a regard, hitherto unknown, for social justice, public morality, and humanity.”
George H. Kubeck, Duplicate and translate into Spanish and Vietnamese.