Religion of Jesus vs. religion about Jesus #Life #religion

Every Sunday (except during summer, when most things Unitarian go on summer vacation), my church has a First Hour discussion group before the church service. This week, Russ Alberts presented a topic called "World Religions: Who the Real Founder of Christianity Was". Here's the description from our e-mail newsletter:

Most lay Christians would say Jesus, but scholars name other men who really created the religion we know today as Christianity. Who were these men and how did they change it from Jesus' religion to the religion of Jesus?

This is actually a topic that has interested me for a while — since high school, at least. Between this topic, and the fact I had promised to talk to our pastor about redesigning our Web site, actually got me out of bed this morning and to church for the first time since last spring. (I really should go more often — I always really like it once I'm there. It's getting out of bed that's the problem.)

I asked Russ if I could reprint the material from one of his handouts, and he said sure. It's interesting stuff to ponder, especially if you've ever wondered how people reconciled Crusades with "turn the other cheek", or why many Christian churches (especially the Catholics) restrict communion to members, even though Jesus dined with tax collectors and Gentiles.

As I've long since realized, most of the stuff I've never liked about Christianity never came from Jesus. I think that when Russ referred to the "cult of Jesus" in this table, he was referring to exactly that: the people who warped Jesus' message to their own ends. Interesting stuff.