a flock divided

person

Banned
What are some ways to Balkanize western Christianity, and keep Paganism as a real and powerful force up until modern times?

I also would like to maintain strong independent Irish Church and Spanish churches. Maybe a later and weaker emperor goes Christian making it harder for them to spread the faith. Also what if the Eastern Empire goes Zoroastrian?
 
What are some ways to Balkanize western Christianity, and keep Paganism as a real and powerful force up until modern times?

I also would like to maintain strong independent Irish Church and Spanish churches. Maybe a later and weaker emperor goes Christian making it harder for them to spread the faith. Also what if the Eastern Empire goes Zoroastrian?
Can we balkanize western christianity?
Yes, otl, its called the protestant reformation.

Can we get paganism to survive? No. Oh, you could slow the march of christianity so the finns are converted a century later, or so, but thats it.

Could you get a balkanized church in the 'dark' ages?

Yes. Although it wouldnt be very balkanized. The most likely scenario is each national church acknowledges the pope - but the pope has no power to issue orders. Something like eastern orthodoxy, or modern anglicanism, where the heads have a lot of status, but no formal power.

Its even possible you could get mildish heterodoxies surviving. Equivalent to otls momophysite, duophysite split.


Could the eastern empire go zoroastrian? Nope. No way. Its the religion of their primary opponent. Nor is persia going to convert to orthodox christianity, for the same reason.
 

person

Banned
Can we balkanize western christianity?
Yes, otl, its called the protestant reformation.

Can we get paganism to survive? No. Oh, you could slow the march of christianity so the finns are converted a century later, or so, but thats it.

Could you get a balkanized church in the 'dark' ages?

Yes. Although it wouldnt be very balkanized. The most likely scenario is each national church acknowledges the pope - but the pope has no power to issue orders. Something like eastern orthodoxy, or modern anglicanism, where the heads have a lot of status, but no formal power.

Its even possible you could get mildish heterodoxies surviving. Equivalent to otls momophysite, duophysite split.


Could the eastern empire go zoroastrian? Nope. No way. Its the religion of their primary opponent. Nor is persia going to convert to orthodox christianity, for the same reason.

What if Christianity doesn't get an emperor until much later, when the empire is already to fragmented to institute a strong policy of conversion, and even that several previous emperors had made a conscious effort to strengthen Paganism. What if the Goths didn't go Christian, and Alaric encouraged a policy of centralization of the Pagan Religion. What if Attila the Hun doesn't invade the Western Empire and keeps his original empire based in Hungary, centralizing his power, and the religions he controls. What if the Churches longer history of oppression made it paranoid, every deviation from our dogma is a Roman Spy. So say one faction with definite theological divisions from the
Roman Branch is able to gain control in Ireland, making it a beacon for Christianity. While another converts the Spanish People's serving to unify them against the Pagan Barbarian invaders (by by Spanish Regionalism)
 
Actually in the form of Nestorianism they could have.

Which is why i specified "orthodox". Even nestorianism is really improbable for persia, but, as you say, its theoretically possible. There wasnt any equivalent heretical zoroastrianism running around the byzantine empire, afaik.

We also have the problem that christianity is pretty good at converting people, in its many variants. (Although islam seems to be even better at it, perhaps.) Zoroastrianism, not so much.
 
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