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Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest religion, with about 2.5 billion followers. Its adherents, known as Christians, make up a majority of the population in 157 countries and territories, and believe that Jesus is the Son of God, whose coming as the messiah was prophesied in the Hebrew Bible (called the Old Testament in Christianity) and chronicled in the New Testament.

Christianity remains culturally diverse in its Western and Eastern branches, as well as in its doctrines concerning justification and the nature of salvation, ecclesiology, ordination, and Christology. The creeds of various Christian denominations generally hold in common Jesus as the Son of God—the Logos incarnated—who ministered, suffered, and died on a cross, but rose from the dead for the salvation of mankind; and referred to as the gospel, meaning the "good news". Describing Jesus' life and teachings are the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, with the Old Testament as the gospel's respected background.

The four largest branches of Christianity are the Catholic Church (1.3 billion/50.1%), Protestantism (920 million/36.7%), the Eastern Orthodox Church (230 million), and the Oriental Orthodox churches (62 million) (Orthodox churches combined at 11.9%), though thousands of smaller church communities exist despite efforts toward unity (ecumenism). Despite a decline in adherence in the West, Christianity remains the dominant religion in the region, with about 70% of that population identifying as Christian. Christianity is growing in Africa and Asia, the world's most populous continents. Christians remain persecuted in some regions of the world, especially in the Middle East, North Africa, East Asia, and South Asia. (Full article...)

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A Serbian Orthodox priest places the badnjak on a fire during a Christmas Eve celebration at the Temple of Saint Sava in Belgrade

The badnjak (Serbian Cyrillic: бадњак, Serbian pronunciation: [bǎdɲaːk]), also called veseljak (весељак, [ʋɛˈsɛ̌ʎaːk], literally "the one who brings joy" in Serbian), is a tree branch or entire tree that is central to Serbian Christmas celebrations. It is placed on a fire on Christmas Eve and its branches are later brought home by worshipers. The tree from which the badnjak is cut, preferably a young, straight and undamaged Austrian oak, is ceremonially felled early on the morning of Christmas Eve. The felling, preparation, bringing in, and laying on the fire, are surrounded by elaborate rituals, with many regional variations. The burning of the log is accompanied by prayers that the coming year brings food, happiness, love, luck, and riches. The log burns on throughout Christmas Day, when the first visitor strikes it with a poker or a branch to make sparks fly, while wishing that the family's happiness and prosperity be as abundant as the sparks. As most Serbs today live in towns and cities, the badnjak is often symbolically represented by a cluster of oak twigs with brown leaves attached, with which the home is decorated on Christmas Eve.

Since the early 20th century, the Serbian badnjak tradition has also been celebrated more publicly. Before World War I, soldiers of the Kingdom of Serbia developed the custom of laying a badnjak on a fire in their barracks. In the succeeding Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the military badnjak ceremony was further elaborated and standardized in army service regulations, but the tradition ended at the outbreak of World War II. Since the early 1990s, the Serbian Orthodox Church has, together with local communities, organized public celebrations on Christmas Eve in which the badnjak plays a central role. Parishioners festively cut the sapling to be used as the badnjak and take it to their church, where it is consecrated by a priest before being ceremonially placed on a fire pit in the churchyard. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various Christianity-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Pope Clement I prays to the Trinity, in a typical post-Renaissance depiction by Gianbattista Tiepolo (d. 1770) (from Trinity)
Image 2A Greek fresco of Athanasius of Alexandria, the chief architect of the Nicene Creed, formulated at Nicaea. (from Trinity)
Image 3Detail of the earliest known artwork of the Trinity, the Dogmatic or Trinity Sarcophagus, c. 350 (Vatican Museums): Three similar figures, representing the Trinity, are involved in the creation of Eve, whose much smaller figure is cut off at lower right; to her right, Adam lies on the ground (from Trinity)
Image 4The "Heavenly Trinity" joined to the "Earthly Trinity" through the Incarnation of the Son - The Heavenly and Earthly Trinities by Murillo (c. 1677). (from Trinity)
Image 5Father, The Holy Spirit, and Christ Crucified, depicted in a Welsh manuscript. c. 1390–1400 (from Trinity)
Image 6God the Father (top), the Holy Spirit (a dove), and child Jesus, painting by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (d. 1682) (from Trinity)
Image 7Russian icon of the Old Testament Trinity by Andrei Rublev, between 1408 and 1425 (from Trinity)
Image 8The Holy Trinity in an angelic glory over a landscape, by Lucas Cranach the Elder (d. 1553) (from Trinity)
Image 9Atypical depiction. The Son is identified by a lamb, the Father an Eye of Providence, and the Spirit a dove, painting by Fridolin Leiber (d. 1912) (from Trinity)
Image 10A 'Jesus Saves' neon cross sign outside of a Protestant church in New York City (from Salvation in Christianity)
Image 11Nativity at Night, by Geertgen tot Sint Jans, c. 1490 (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 12The Baptism of Christ, by Piero della Francesca, 15th century (from Trinity)
Image 13Jesus healing the paralytic in The Pool by Palma il Giovane, 1592 (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 14A diagram of the Trinity (from Trinity)
Image 15The Good Samaritan is a painting by James Tissot. The Parable of the Good Samaritan is one of the parables of Jesus. (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 1613th-century depiction of the Trinity from a Roman de la Rose manuscript (from Trinity)
Image 17God in the person of the Son confronts Adam and Eve, by Master Bertram (d. c.1415) (from Trinity)
Image 18The Communion of the Apostles, by Luca Signorelli, 1512 (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 19Jesus' Farewell Discourse to his eleven remaining disciples after the Last Supper, from the Maestà by Duccio. (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 20A depiction of the Council of Nicaea in AD 325, at which the Deity of Christ was declared orthodox and Arianism condemned (from Trinity)
Image 21Saint John indicating Christ to Saint Andrew by Ottavio Vannini, 17th century (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 22First page of Mark, by Sargis Pitsak (14th century): "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God". (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 23The Glory of Saint Nicholas, by António Manuel da Fonseca. Nicholas of Myra, a participant in the First Council of Nicaea, achieves the beatific vision in the shape of the Holy Trinity. (from Trinity)
Image 24Depiction of Trinity from Saint Denis Basilica in Paris (12th century) (from Trinity)
Image 25God the Father (top), and the Holy Spirit (represented by a dove) depicted above Jesus. Painting by Francesco Albani (d. 1660) (from Trinity)
Image 26Depictions of the Resurrection of Jesus are central to Christian art (Resurrection of Christ by Raphael, 1499–1502) (from Jesus in Christianity)
Image 27The Adoration of the Trinity by Albrecht Dürer (1511): from top to bottom: Holy Spirit (dove), God the Father and the crucified Christ (from Trinity)
Image 28A Gospel of John, 1056 (from Jesus in Christianity)

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Matthew West Live at the Grand Ole Opry

Matthew Joseph West (born April 25, 1977) is an American contemporary Christian musician, singer-songwriter, and actor. He has released five studio albums and is known for his songs, "More", "You Are Everything", and "The Motions". He was nominated for five Dove Awards in 2005, two of which were for his major label debut album, Happy. West won the 2013 American Music Award for Best Contemporary Inspirational Artist.

Starting as an independent musician in the late 1990s, he released three independent albums before signing with Universal South Records. With the release of his Dove Award-winning debut album, Happy, released in 2003, his first radio single, "More", stayed at No. 1 on Christian Adult Contemporary charts for nine weeks and received two Dove Award nominations. His second album, History, was followed by a 2006 re-release of the originally independent album, Sellout. In 2007, he faced vocal issues that threatened his career with two months of prescribed vocal rest. His third studio album, Something to Say, also enjoyed chart success with No. 1 hits, "You Are Everything" and "The Motions". (Full article...)

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Conversion to Christianity is the religious conversion of a previously non-Christian person to some form of Christianity. It has been called the foundational experience of Christian life. Conversion to Christianity primarily involves belief (faith) in the Christian God, thinking that they are far short of the Christian God's apparent "glory and holiness" (sin), repentance of "sin", and confession of their belief that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the all-sufficient and only means by whom one's sin can be atoned for and therefore the only route to salvation.

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... that "O komm, du Geist der Wahrheit" is an 1833 German-language hymn for Pentecost in which the "Spirit of Truth" is called to come and restore the attitude of early Christianity?
... that Tetsu Yasui, who was raised by devout Buddhists, later converted to Christianity and served as president of Tokyo Woman's Christian University for 17 years?
... that when Gessner Harrison was a student at the University of Virginia, he declined Thomas Jefferson's invitation to Sunday dinner, saying that it would be a violation of the Sabbath?
... that the Pelican Portrait of Queen Elizabeth I is named for the pendant on her breast in the form of a pelican in her piety?
... that the Rhodesian Independence Bell, a replica of the American Liberty Bell, was inscribed "I toll for justice, civilization and Christianity"?
... that one of the Cehennemağzı Caves in northwestern Turkey features a very old Christian church, which was used as a secret place of worship in the first years of Christianity?

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And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds. But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.

— Adoration of the Shepherds, Luke 2:10-20, King James Version

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