[Gumdrop]

Images, statues, and stained glass were tools used by the early church to teach the Christian faith to the illiterate, rustic people of the time. Remember, the printing press was not invented until the 15th century. That is why so many Catholic and Orthodox churches are filled with rich immages of scenes from the bible, images of apostles, saints, angels, etc.. They were teaching moments for the first 15 centuries of Christianity.

Because Protestantism arose in the 16th century to challenge the Catholic and Orthodox churches, it was easy for those who were against the Catholic Church for whatever reason doctrinally, to also curse the use of images. It was a simplistic way to condemn all those churches with images as idolatrous. Afterall, everyone should read the bible, right?

But, bibles were not available for the first 15 centuries of Christianity.

A better perspective of history would go a long way to understand this difference of opinion on the use of images.

[Uri’el-2012]

Images, statues, and stained glass were tools used by the early church to teach the Christian faith to the illiterate, rustic people of the time. Remember, the printing press was not invented until the 15th century. That is why so many Catholic and Orthodox churches are filled with rich immages of scenes from the bible, images of apostles, saints, angels, etc.. They were teaching moments for the first 15 centuries of Christianity.

But

NasbU Romans 10:17 So faith comes from hearing,
and hearing by the word of Christ

b'SHEM Yah'shua

[Uri’el-2012]

But, bibles were not available for the first 15 centuries of Christianity.

That is not so.

The first solution invented to overcome this problem was a set of simple wooden boards sewn together, around the 1st century A.D. Romans called this simple book a codex—the Latin for the trunk of a tree. However, it was the early Coptic Christians of Egypt who made the first breakthrough. They discovered that by folding sheets of vellum or parchment in half and sewing them through the fold, they could produce a book that could be written on both sides. Wooden boards held it together, and the whole book was slipped into a goatskin leather bag to be carried.