RELIGION BELIEF AND THOUGHT Before Christianity the

RELIGION, BELIEF AND THOUGHT

Before Christianity, the British Isles were inhabited by pagan Celtic tribes. English tradition links the introduction of Christianity to Britain to the Glastonbury legend of Josef of Arimathea. Then Christianity was introduced through the Romans. The Romano-British population after the withdrawal of the Roman legions was mostly Christian. http: //www. allaboutjesuschrist. org/joseph-ofarimathea-faq. htm

• http: //www. britannia. com/history/biographies/jose ph. html • Joseph of Arimathea was a wealthy disciple of Jesus, who, according to the book of Matthew 27: 57 -60, asked Pontius Pilate for permission to take Jesus' dead body in order to prepare it for burial. He also provided the tomb where the crucified Lord was laid until his Resurrection. Joseph is mentioned in a few times in parallel passages in Mark, Luke and John, but nothing further is heard about his later activities.

• Apocryphal legend, however, supplies us with the rest of his story by claiming that Joseph accompanied the Apostle Philip, Lazarus, Mary Magdalene & others on a preaching mission to Gaul. Lazarus & Mary stayed in Marseilles, while the others travelled north. At the English Channel, St. Philip sent Joseph, with twelve disciples, to establish Christianity in the most far-flung corner of the Roman Empire: the Island of Britain. The year AD 63 is commonly given for this "event", with AD 37 sometimes being put forth as an alternative. It was said that Joseph achieved his wealth in the metals trade, and in the course of conducting his business, he probably became acquainted with Britain, at least the south-western parts of it.

• Cornwall was a chief mining district and wellknown in the Roman empire for its tin. Somerset was reknowned for its high quality lead. Some have even said that Joseph was the uncle of the Virgin Mary and therefore of Jesus, and that he may have brought the young boy along on one of his business trips to the island. Hence the words of Blake's famous hymn, Jerusalem: • And did those feet, in ancient time, Walk upon England's mountains green?

• It was only natural, then, that Joseph should have been chosen for the first mission to Britain, and appropriate that he should come first to Glastonbury, that gravitational center for legendary activity in the West Country. Local legend has it that Joseph sailed around Land's End and headed for his old lead mining haunts. Here his boat ran ashore in the Glastonbury Marshes and, together with his followers, he climbed a nearby hill to survey the surrounding land. Having brought with him a staff grown from Christ's Holy Crown of Thorns, he thrust it into the ground announced that he and his twelve companions were "Weary All". The thorn staff immediately took miraculous root, and it can be seen there still on Wearyall Hill. Joseph met with the local ruler, Arviragus, and soon secured himself twelve hides of land at Glastonbury on which to build the first monastery in Britain. From here he became the country's evangelist.

• Much more was added to Joseph's legend during the Middle Ages. He was gradually inflated into a major saint and cult hero, as well as the supposed ancestor of many British monarchs. He is said to have brought with him to Britain a cup, said to have been used at the Last Supper and also used to catch the blood dripping from Christ as he hung on the Cross. A variation of this story is that Joseph brought with him two cruets, one containing the blood and the other, the sweat of Christ. Either of these items are known as The Holy Grail, and were the object(s) of the quests of the Knights of King Arthur's Round Table. One legend goes on to suggest that Joseph hid the "Grail" in Chalice Well at Glastonbury for safe-keeping

• There is a wide variance of scholarly opinion on this subject, however, and a good deal of doubt exists as to whether Joseph ever came to Britain at all, for any purpose.

The first known saint of Britain was St. Alban, a Christian martyr who died about the year A. D. 287. Alban was a Roman-Briton who lived in the south of England in the town of Verulamium, now the city of St. Albans. Alban was arrested and put to death for sheltering a Christian who was fleeing persecution. Although the early beginnings of Christianity in England did not survive, for the Anglo-Saxon invasion largely wiped out Christianity from the areas occupied by the Saxons and Angles, the tradition of St. Alban’s heroic deed and conversion to faith did, and he is venerated as one of Britain’s most popular saints.

By the 7 th century, Anglo-Saxon England was largely pagan, meanwhile, some Christians among the Roman-Britons, remained in the south, in England, though they were scattered. It was already the end of the 6 th century when Saint Augustine (AD 604) set out from Rome to Canterbury (Kent) with the mission of bringing Christianity to the Anglo-Saxons.

His dream was to unite the Angles, Saxons and Britons into one Church. Although he was not successful, his dream was fulfilled nearly seventy-five years later by St. Theodore of Tarsus (A. D 602 – 690), the seventh bishop of Canterbury. He organized the Church into dioceses and was able to make peace with the Celtic bishops in the north and west of the country.

Ireland was converted largely by Roman. British missionaries – notably by Saint Patrick (389 – 461 A. D. ) at some time after withdrawal of the Roman legions from Britain. He brought the Christian faith to the Irish people and became known as the Apostle to Ireland. Irish Christianity developed in a monastic style. Celtic missionaries from Ireland brought Celtic Christianity to Scotland – notably through Saint Columba (521 – 597 A. D. ), one of the descendants of the royal house of Ireland.

Iona Abbey is located on the Isle of Iona, on the West Coast of Scotland marks the foundation there, by St. Columba, of a monastic community.

The abbey from a hill Isle of Iona He established a mission on the island of Iona, off the west coast of modernday Scotland. From there, he and his monks brought Christianity to the Picts and established churches throughout Scotland later in the Kingdom of Northumbria. Thus, the first strongholds of Christianity in the British Isles took root in the west, in Ireland, and in the north, in Scotland. The cloisters of Iona Abbey.

Wales continued to be Christian when England was overrun by pagan Germanic and Scandinavian tribes, though many older beliefs and customs survived among its people. It is known that St. David (520 -588 A. D. ), who was a descendant of the royal house of Cunedda and became renowned as a teacher and preacher, founding monastic settlements in Britain and Brittany, went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem and Rome during the 6 th century, and was serving as a bishop of Wales well before St. Augustine arrived to convert the king of Kent and founded the diocese of Canterbury.

Finally, it was in the northernmost part of England, just below the Scottish border, that this great variety of Christian traditions came together and flourished in English monasticism. The land of Northumbria became known for its famous monasteries in Whitby, Hartlepool, Wearmouth, Jarrow, Hexham, Ripon, and Lindisfarne. It is in Lindisfarne that we meet St. Aidan (+ 651 A. D. ) and St. Cuthbert (635 – 687 A. D. ), who are both known for their great missionary work.

And it was the monastery of Jarrow that provided the rich library and contemplative settings that enabled St. Bede (673 – 735 A. D. ), the first English historian, to write the history of the Church in England. It is largely through his Ecclesiastical History and Life of St. Cuthbert that our knowledge of the establishment and spread of Christianity in the British Isles is made possible.

Wearmouth-Jarrow is a twin foundation English monastery, located on the River Wear in Sunderland the River Tyne at Jarrow respectively, in the Kingdom of Northumbria. Its formal name is The Abbey Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Wearmouth. Jarrow. The twin Anglo-Saxon monastery is the UK nomination for World Heritage Site status in 2010.

And it was the monastery of Jarrow that provided the rich library and contemplative settings that enabled St. Bede (673 – 735 A. D. ), the first English historian, to write the history of the Church in England. It is largely through his Ecclesiastical History of the English People and Life of St. Cuthbert that our knowledge of the establishment and spread of Christianity in the British Isles is made possible.

Until the Reformation established different religious practices in different territories of what is now the United Kingdom, Christianity in the Islands generally looked to Rome for spiritual guidance, although figures such as Stephen Langton and John Wyclif and movements such as Lollardy occasionally posed challenges to the dominance of the Rome-based hierarchy.

The religious history of the country now comprising the United Kingdom has been turbulent and often violent. In response to a rising tide of Reformation sentiment and his own dynastic difficulties, Henry VIII of England cut ties with the Papacy, announcing himself as the supreme head of the Church of England. In Scotland the Reformation was more of a grass roots movement than an imposition by the Crown.

However, a majority of the population in Ireland remained faithful to Roman Catholicism. This situation ensured unstable and violent relations between the nations of the Isles. By the late 17 th century, a political settlement of religious questions had re-established stability, if not general conformism, although relations between adherents of Protestantism and the Roman Catholic Church have at times been difficult.

Despite its Christian tradition, the number of churchgoers fell over the last half of the 20 th century. Society in the United Kingdom is markedly more secular than in the past and atheism is also widespread. Religious Education (RE) is still an obligatory subject in the curriculum, but because of a greater religious mix among parents and pupils it tends to aim at providing an understanding of the main faiths of the world than forming a strictly Christian viewpoint.