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Are you grasping at straws. Surely you are not merely someone who is biased, anti-Christian, and basically anti-religion who wishes to slam Christianity.

People first must free themselves from the tyranny of warlords before they can free anyone else.

Also....I suggest that you do a Google search in the words: “Gutenberg, Literacy, and rise”. You will see that literacy spread rapidly throughout Europe after the invention of the printing press in the mid-1450s.

The big breakthrough was Luther's and Tyndall translations of the bible in the early 1500s. There is a reason the English warlord, King Henry VIII, burned William Tyndall at the stake. The bible is a genuine threat to any tyrant's power. Imagine that! We are equal in the sight of God!

The warlords of Europe were tamed because the common people understood that if we are equal in the sight of God, then we must also be equal when standing before earthly law. The common people demanded it and got it.

Once free they could turn their attention to others. It was Christians, especially, and their tireless preaching and work that finally abolished slavery throughout the world. Please do a Google on William Wiberforce and his tireless work.

But...I suppose you would prefer to hold to your anti-Christian prejudices. Where did you learn this? A government K-12 school? A university?

The rule of law, peace, freedom from slavery, and prosperity that you and I enjoy to today is built entirely upon the philosophy of Christianity. We no longer need to be tribal with allegiance only to our clan. We can trust our neighbor and others beyond our tiny village. Trade is possible because we have honest courts to enforce contracts.

Destroy Christianity and we will soon be living under warlords like the barbarians in Somalia.

Surely, I hope you do not stand with those bigots who hate Christianity.

I suppose you would prefer to hold to your anti-Christian prejudices....I hope you do not stand with those bigots who hate Christianity

Kosta is Orthodox.

Disagree with what he argues, argue against his points, but be careful about judging his heart, motives, or his Christianity from a couple replies to a thread that is bound to stir heated argument.

Also....I suggest that you do a Google search in the words: “Gutenberg, Literacy, and rise”. You will see that literacy spread rapidly throughout Europe after the invention of the printing press in the mid-1450s

Really? What was the literacy rate in 1600, 1700, 1800 and 1900? Depending on what you define as "literacy," of course, will determine how literate the nation was. If you make say "able to sign your name" then your numbers will be higher. If you say "read and write prose, your numbers willbe lower. No wonder literacy rates were sampled according to the former standard, which is meaningless.

Just because you can sign your name doesn't mean you can read complex prose. So, to put this in perspective, according to one source, one hundred years after Gutenberg's invention, that is by the end of the 16th century, allegedly 50% of the population in England could sign their name!

On the other hand, the same source says that a century later in France as many as 75% of the population were illiterate (i.e. could not sign their name)! Accordingly, the government of France in 1880 published a report showing that between "1686 and 1690 the female literacy rate (based on ability to sign) was just 14 percent, while the male rate was 36 percent."

Allegedly Protestant Europe fared better than Catholic Europe, with literacy rates between 35 and 45 percent, that is literacy as in "sign your name." By 1861, four hundred years after Gutenberg, the 1861 Newcastle Report in England reported 67% "literacy" among men and 51% among women. Other sources say that by 1860, 40% of people in England could not sign their names.

Even if they could doesn't mean they could read and comprehend the Bible—or even afford one!? You made a claim which is not supported by facts. It seems that, in Protestant England, which was supposedly well ahead of Catholic France, the literacy rate—meaning one could sign his or her name (but not necessarily read)—grew from 50% to mere 67% among men and barely 1% among women over a 400-year time span!).

So, where are you getting your ideas from? And btw, I don't use Google. Google is a quick reference that makes everyone appear 'smart' and it is good for general reference. Yet Google is highly unreliable because anyone can edit it! No serious researcher will use Google as a reliable authority.

Once free they could turn their attention to others. It was Christians, especially, and their tireless preaching and work that finally abolished slavery throughout the world.

They were Christians alright, but they did not abolish slavery based on what the bible teaches.

But...I suppose you would prefer to hold to your anti-Christian prejudices. Where did you learn this? A government K-12 school? A university?

So, if someone disagrees with your unsupported statements or your Google "facts," the next step is insults? Where did you learn that? In your church?