35 Christianity Facts That You Never Knew

A man named Clyde Lott in Nebraska is breeding red cows and sending them to Israel in hopes of a pure red heifer being born there. Such an event will allegedly prompt Jews to build a Third Temple, which fundamentalist Christians believe will usher in Jesus' Second Coming.

2. Laws mentioned in the bible required farmers to leave parts of their fields unharvested for strangers, a practice that still exists in parts of the world.

3. David Barrett is an aeronautics engineer who resigned abruptly after seeing a vision of Jesus. He then spent 40 years single-handedly compiling the first and only complete list of Earth’s 10,000 existing religions and 33,830 denominations of Christianity. This led him to all 238 countries on Earth.

4. There is a version of the Bible translated into Hawaiian Pidgin called 'Da Jesus Book'.

5. Jehovah's Witnesses don't celebrate birthdays because the only two accounts of birthday parties in the Bible resulted in murder.

The keys to the holiest site in Christianity (Church of the holy Sepulchre) are held by a Muslim family that opens the church every morning. Meant to keep the peace between the denominations, this arrangement has been in place since 1187 A.D.

7. In 1974, fundamentalist Christians in Kanawha County were so upset over "immoral" books like "Autobiography of Malcolm X" being introduced to local schools they dynamited a school, attacked school buses with shotguns, and planted a bomb at a school board member's home.

8. The Buddha's story appears in Christianity as the legend of St. Josaphat and in Islam as the legend of Budasaf.

9. Christianity, Islam, and Judaism all worship the same Abrahamic god. Their religious texts also feature many of the same figures, histories, and places. Jesus is also a Muslim prophet.

10. Unlike most bronze sculptures of Roman emperors, the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius was not melted down during the Middle Ages because Europeans of that time thought it was a statue of Constantine, the first Christian emperor of Rome.

In 1950, Pope Pius XII confirmed there was no conflict between Christianity and the theory of evolution, and the Church supports the idea of theistic evolution.

12. One of the scholars (John M. Allegro) who translated the Dead Sea Scrolls was convinced that Christianity was based on an ancient psychedelic mushroom and fertility cult.

13. Indonesian President Sukarno ordered a Christian Architect to build the largest Mosque in the country. He also ordered it to be built next to a Cathedral and a Church as a symbol of the national religious harmony and tolerance. (Indonesia has the world largest Muslim population).

14. There have been 8 Christian Prime Ministers in Japan even though the Christians make less than 1% of Japan's population.

15. George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson were Christian Deists and did not believe that Jesus Christ was divine.

A mason in 1700's Jerusalem left his wooden ladder behind after doing some work on a church (Holy Sepulchre) and now it can't be moved without the agreement and permission of six different Christian leaders.

17. Irish Monks and Scholars were instrumental in contributing to the spread of Christianity in Britain and continental Europe. Irish missions had such a profound influence in Germany and the Frankish Empire that Ireland became known as the ''Isle of Saints and Scholars'' to continental Europeans.

18. There is a "cult" (Eastern Lightning) offshoot of Christianity in China that believes Jesus is currently living in China as a Chinese woman.

19. Saladin was a legendary leader of the Muslims during the Crusades, allowed Christians who wanted to leave Jerusalem to leave peacefully and those who wanted to stay, to worship freely. He even restored a church that was burned to the ground.

20. Christianity is increasingly popular among China’s youth. As many as 100 million people, or 7% of the population, have converted to the religion. The city of Wenzhou alone has more than 1,100 churches.

Among the many verses in the Quran that mention Christians, it is mentioned twice that they are equals to Muslims and will not grieve on Judgement Day.

22. A 4th-century bishop (Acacius of Amida) sold the sacred vessels of his church to free, clothe and feed 7000 Persian POWs: "Our God needs neither dishes nor cups; for He neither eats nor drinks." This made the Sassanid Emperor end the persecution of Christians, and hostilities ceased between the two empires.

23. Christianity is the fastest growing religion in Iran.

24. There is no physical description of Jesus in the Bible.

25. The government of Nazi Germany memorialized the victims of European witch trials of the 16th to 18th centuries, as they thought witchcraft represented the remnant of an indigenous "Aryan" religion untainted by the Judaic influence of Christianity.