SC - Dolmas, Dolmades

[lilinah@earthlink.net]

Ras, 
An awful lot of the people tortured and murdered under the inquisition were 
Christian... I dont have numbers, but a very large part of the record includes
"Heritics" ( read _very_ Christian Protestants), and Homosexual Christians.
Torqemada, who also targeted Jews, was well regarded for "recovering"
"lost" souls, as well as conversions. 

> There were areas of Europe that did not labor under the yoke of the Church. 

Perhaps they were not ROMAN christians, but IIRC, the Hebrides, Ionia, and 
a lot of Ireland were operating under the "Celtic church", and many remained 
that way well after Patrick and Columcille brought the Roman church to the 
British isles.
The Isle of Man and Brittany were late to receive the Church, this is true, 
but these were rather sparsley populated, and together amounted to 
Fewer in population than did some towns, such as Paris or especially 
London.
To say that these places amounted to a "large proportion of the population
not being Christianized", is a rather large assumption. these places were so 
remote and difficult to reach, that they should be regarded as a statistical blip.
Even the Vikings were thoroughly Christianized by 1300.

> Such a carry 
> over does not indicate to me that Christianity was as 'pervasive' as is 
> commonly thought or as widespread as the Church would have us believe. It is 
> a fact that we have much art, books, architecture, etc., that shows an 
> apparent large scale influence of the church in all areas of life but those 
> works were created by the very class that was most influenced. 

I dont recall many Nobles building cathedrals, Ras.
The construction of a Chathedral like Chartres or Rheims required the 
investment of entire communities over the course of generations, and the 
records of the various masonic guilds support this contention.
People did not do such work just cause they were ordered to by the 
"muckey-mucks", either. 
People had a habit of becoming scarce when the work parties were drawn up
if they did not want to do a project. This is also evident from such records. 
I think that there is enough evidence (including graffittoes on various such 
works) to show that the populace were rather proud of contributing to such 
things, and did them in hope that their contributions would go to their 
salvation. That sounds a whole lot like the countrysides were pretty well 
christianized by the time the large chathedrals were being constructed.

> Just because 
> there is evidence of a fox in a hen house does mean that the chickens were 
> friends with the fox. :-)
I don't know what you mean.

> Be that as it may, I have no argument that the Church's stranglehold on the 
> nobility and the wealthy class was very pervasive and complete at the very 
> least with only a few notable exceptions. 

Your Paganism shows in your choice of words, Ras.
History should be studied in an impartial light. I think that you are letting 
yourself be biased by your evident dislike of the Christian Church, and it's 
Institutions.

(I have nothing against Paganism, BTW.
I was pagan for years, married and divorced a pagan, and my eldest son still 
is one. 75% of my best friends are.)

> I still have seen no evidence that the preparation of specific feast foods or 
> the abstention from certain foods was in anyway based on original thought. 
> There are many instances where the exact opposite is true. Easter eggs 
> (universal), coins hidden in cakes (Greek), the Yule log (Celtic), the boar's 
> head (Celtic), decorating the hall with evergreens/wheat/fruit laden branches 
> (universal), abstention from eggs and dairy on certain days (Roman), morality 
> plays within the feast (Roman) , etc., are all plagiarized activities of the 
> Church.

And your point is????

Seriously, just because the Church may have borrowed the activities of 
indigenous peoples, to aid in prosletizing them, does not mean that they were
not present among them and not successful at converting them.
Indeed the very universality of those previously regional "Traditions" you 
mention argue strongly for the general and early adoption of the church in 
Europe.
 
If you look at the existing documentation, there is plenty to support the 
notion that virtually ALL of Europe and her people (with a very few 
exceptions) were Christianized by the end of the Medieval era.

There is little that I have seen to support your contention, so I have to 
ask:

"Documentation, Please?"

Brandu