Dear Editor,

The most influential person to have ever lived was a Jewish carpenter and rabbi named Jesus of Nazareth.
Hundreds of millions of people around the world are gearing up to commemorate his birth on Christmas Day. The birth of Christ some 2,000 years ago in the small Jewish town of Bethlehem has undoubtedly changed the course of history. The Christian calendar, also known as the Gregorian Calendar, and indeed the entire world, revolves around the life of the Messiah. I shudder to think what life would be like had Jesus never been born. The founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, is reported to have said that she looked forward to seeing humanity free someday from the tyranny of Christianity. Imagine a world devoid of God and Christian influence.
Unbeknownst to Sanger, she was a beneficiary of Christianity, in that she was born and raised and lived in the free and prosperous United States of America, a country which was founded by a group of evangelical Christians, who are also called Puritans, because of their devoutness. Simply put, if there was no such thing as Christianity, the United States of America would not have been in existence today. I sincerely believe that the same can be said of The Bahamas.
The overwhelming majority of Bahamians would have been living on the continent of Africa today, and would have been pagans. Christianity has made many significant contributions to western civilization and thought. In the first few centuries of Christianity, the church encountered a Greco-Roman society which had a very low regard for human life. Gladiatorial shows, human sacrifice, abortion, infanticide, child abandonment and a general acceptance of suicide were widespread practices. The church fought against these heinous practices and championed the value of human life. The church also opposed the sexual decadence of the Greco-Roman culture, which included fornication, adultery, homosexuality, child molestation and bestiality, to name a few. The early Christians advocated sexual morality. This in turn elevated the world's sexual morality. Unbeknownst to many women living today in the West, Jesus Christ elevated their social status to a level that never before existed up until that time in the first century.
For what it's worth, women in many cultures were illiterate and were treated like cattle. And in many pagan cultures hundreds of years ago, and even today in the 21st century, female genital mutilation is practiced. Women in some cultures are not allowed to drive a car or even testify in a court of law, even though they might have witnessed a criminal act.
When Jesus allowed women to take part in his ministry, this was unheard of back then. He had even gone as far as allowing one of his female disciples, Mary Magdalene, to be the very first person to see him after his resurrection. The abolition of slavery and the rejection of segregation are rooted in the teachings of Jesus Christ and his holy apostles. That is why notable Christian figures such as William Wilberforce, Edward Beecher, Elijah Lovejoy, Harriet Beecher Stowe, John Hershey, Abraham Lincoln, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass all fought against state-sanctioned racism and slavery. It was the early church which demonstrated human compassion in an age where it was rare. According to one writer, the Greek philosopher Plato was of the view that a poor man should be left to die if he could no longer work. This utterly selfish viewpoint pervaded the Greco-Roman era.
During that era, many persons who were gravely ill and at death's door were dumped on the side of the road and left to die. Others were taken to the temple of Asclepius, where a pagan ritual was undertaken on their behalf. It was the church which first established hospitals and mental institutions. One historian noted that the first hospital was built in A.D. 369 by the church. Indeed, the modern nursing system was created by Florence Nightingale, who was a devout Christian. It was the church which founded charitable organizations such as the Red Cross, the Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity. It was the church which created the modern library system. It was the church which created the university. It was the church which created the public school educational system, in an age when only wealthy persons could afford to hire tutors to educate their children. It was the church which created the middle class.
It was the church which created capitalism, which is the prevailing economic system in The Bahamas and throughout the Western Hemisphere. The church is also responsible for the creation of modern science. Many of the great scientists of the past, such as Louis Pasteur, Johannes Kepler, Robert Boyles, Charles Babbage, Matthew Fontaine, Samuel Morse, Sir Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal, Lord Kelvin, Galileo and Nicolaus Copernicus were influenced by Christianity. In fact, many of them were devout Christians. Christianity has also contributed significantly to art, music, literature and architecture. Some of the greatest artists such as Da Vinci, Rembrandt, Masaccio, Durer and Raphael were Christians.
It would be remiss of me if I fail to mention that had Jesus never came, fallen mankind would be without a savior and redeemer. And so we can see that had Jesus Christ never been born, the world would have been an infinitely poorer and darker place to live. Thank God he was born on that first Christmas Day 2,000 years ago.

- Kevin Evans

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