A guided history of Christianity
Church History in Plain Language
Three thousand years of story, from the hills of ancient Israel and the schools of Athens to the megachurches of Lagos and Seoul. Told in plain, modern English, with maps, timelines and diagrams.
The nine eras at a glance
📖 Read it in orderStart at the beginning and use the Next button at the bottom of every page. It walks you through the whole story, chapter by chapter.
🧵 Follow a themeTrace one thread, like worship, the papacy, missions or women in the church, across all twenty centuries.
✝️ Focus on Protestant historyA 22-step reading path from Wyclif and Luther to today's evangelicals and Pentecostals.
🗓️ Browse the timelineEvery date on the site in one list, filterable by era and theme.
👤 Look someone upAn A–Z of the people in the story, with links to every chapter they appear in. Or press / to search.
The eras
- 0Background: Greece, Rome and Israelc. 1000 BC – 4 BCThe Greek, Roman and Jewish worlds that shaped Christianity before it was born.4 chapters
- 1Jesus and the Apostles4 BC – AD 70Jesus, the first church in Jerusalem, Paul's mission to the Gentiles, and the writing of the New Testament.5 chapters
- 2Catholic Christianity70 – 312Persecution, the fight against Gnosticism, the formation of the Bible, bishops, and the faith's spread from Spain to Persia.7 chapters
- 3The Christian Roman Empire312 – 590Constantine, the great councils on the Trinity and Christ, monks, Augustine, the fall of the West, and the first great splits.7 chapters
- 4The Christian Middle Ages590 – 1517Conversion of Europe, Islam, Byzantium, Charlemagne, the 1054 schism, popes and kings, crusades, friars, scholastics and the late medieval crisis.10 chapters
- 5The Reformation1517 – 1648Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, the Radicals, England and Scotland, Catholic renewal, global missions and the wars of religion.9 chapters
- 6The Age of Reason and Revival1648 – 1789Puritans and dissenters, Pietists and Moravians, the Enlightenment, Wesley's Methodists, the Great Awakening, and Russian Orthodoxy.6 chapters
- 7The Age of Progress1789 – 1914The French Revolution, the "Great Century" of missions, liberal theology and Darwin, the papacy against modernity, social reform, and American Christianity.6 chapters
- 8The Age of Ideologies1914 – presentThe world wars, Communism, ecumenism, Vatican II, Pentecostalism, evangelicals and fundamentalists, the Global South, and Christianity today.8 chapters
How this site was made
The story follows the eight "ages" of Bruce Shelley's Church History in Plain Language. It adds depth and a wider, global view from Diarmaid MacCulloch's A History of Christianity, plus material from The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity and The Oxford Illustrated History of the Reformation. Every page is written in fresh words. Nothing is copied from the books. Read more about the sources →