If Christianity is true, why are so many atrocities committed in the name of Christ?
The Crusaders carried crosses on their chests as they massacred entire cities. Slave owners quoted Scripture to justify the chains of human bondage. Witch hunters tortured and burned their victims in the name of Christ. Critics point to this bloody history and ask: "If this is Christianity, how can it possibly be true?"
These episodes are indeed some of the darkest chapters in church history. And yet – here's the fascinating twist – the very fact that we recognize these acts as evil actually points us toward something profound about authentic Christianity. It highlights what happens when humans try to hijack divine truth for their own ends, in contrast to the true teachings of Christ.
Welcome back to Word for Word – I'm Austin Duncan, and today we're confronting one of the toughest critiques of our faith head-on.
Look, I'll be honest with you. This question keeps me up at night sometimes. If we're going to claim that Christianity is true and life-changing, we absolutely must address the reality that people have committed atrocious acts under the banner of Christ. Sweeping them under the rug doesn't just undermine our credibility – it dishonors those who suffered.
But here's what I want to explore with you today: Could it be that these historical failures don't actually disprove Christianity, but instead reveal the crucial difference between what Jesus actually taught and what happens when broken humans misuse His name?
So here’s the foundation for where we're going. Last week we talked about whether religion itself is the root of evil. We saw that while religion has been involved in conflicts, it's not the primary cause of most wars or atrocities. In fact, research shows that only about 7% of all wars in history had any religious motivation. Human greed, power-lust, and ideology are the real culprits. The 20th century proved this horrifically – atheistic regimes under Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot slaughtered tens of millions, far eclipsing religious violence.
But today, we're narrowing the focus. We're not talking about religion in general anymore. We're talking specifically about Christianity's own track record. And we need to be honest: it's complicated. It's messy. And if we're going to defend the truth of Christ, we can't dodge this.
The Thesis: Abuse Doesn't Equal Truth
Here's the central idea I want us to wrestle with today: The abuse of Christianity to justify evil doesn't invalidate the truth of the faith; rather, such abuse demonstrates the contrast between authentic Christian faith and human corruption.
Or you could say it like this: when you see horrible atrocities done "for Christ" or "for the Church," you are not seeing real Christianity at work – you are seeing human sin masquerading as Christianity. As theologian Jonathan Sarfati puts it, "Atrocities in the name of Christ are inconsistent with real Christianity, which is revealed in the Bible."
Think about it this way. Imagine a skilled architect designs a beautiful, solid house and gives the builders clear instructions. But the builders ignore the blueprints, do shoddy work, and the house collapses. Who is to blame? Not the architect or the design – but the builders who violated the instructions.
In the same way, you can't hold Christianity responsible when people commit gross evils while violating the clear instructions of Christ. The problem is not the Christian faith itself, but people failing to live up to it – or people exploiting the label "Christian" for their own agendas.
Now, before we dive deeper, here is the biblical foundation for this entire discussion. Jesus Himself anticipated that some would misuse His name. Listen to what He said in Matthew 7:
"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and in Your name perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from Me, you evildoers!'"
This is foundational. Jesus is describing people who claim to act in His name, even doing impressive religious things, yet He rejects them because they were "workers of lawlessness." Not everyone who claims to follow Jesus truly does so. Jesus warned there would be "wolves in sheep's clothing" – people who outwardly use His name or wear the costume of religion, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.
Here's a line I want you to remember: The presence of counterfeit Christians is not a flaw in the faith – it's exactly what Jesus predicted.
And the Bible gives us the measuring stick to discern true faith from false: "By their fruit you will recognize them," Jesus said. The fruit of the Spirit is love, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control. None of the fruit of a Spirit-led life includes mass murder, torture, greed, or oppression. Those are works of the flesh, not the Spirit.
Now, before we examine the historical evidence, I need to acknowledge something. The very moral conviction that these historical acts were evil actually aligns with Christian morality. Why do we unhesitatingly condemn the Crusaders' massacres or the Inquisitors' tortures as morally wrong? It's because we measure them against a standard of good and evil – a standard largely introduced to the world by Judeo-Christian teaching.
Concepts like the sanctity of life, the dignity of every person, the immorality of murder and oppression – these flow from a biblical worldview. In the Greco-Roman world before Christianity, infanticide and cruelty were commonplace. It was the spread of Christian ethics that made things like charity, human rights, and the value of each life widely accepted.
So here's the irony: when critics (including skeptics) denounce the church's sins, they're often using moral yardsticks that Christianity itself gave us. The very notion of "atrocity" (as opposed to "just the way things are") is meaningful because we believe some things are absolutely evil – a belief the Bible undergirds by teaching God's moral law.
This doesn't excuse the evil done by professing Christians. But it reminds us that the corrective to those evils is not to reject Christianity, but to return to Christianity's true teachings.
Alright, let's get into the difficult stuff. Let's look at what actually happened.
Understanding Christianity's Dark Chapters
The Crusades: When Holy War Became Unholy Massacre
When someone says "Christians have slaughtered people," the Crusades are usually Exhibit A. And they should be. The Crusades were a series of medieval military expeditions, initiated by the medieval Church and European nobles, aimed at reclaiming the Holy Land from Muslim control. They were framed as holy wars – the Pope promised spiritual rewards, even forgiveness of sins, to those who took up the cross to fight.
And tragically, while the stated goal had some noble elements – protecting pilgrims and freeing oppressed Eastern Christians – the reality involved terrible atrocities.
The worst was probably during the First Crusade, when the crusader army captured Jerusalem in July 1099. According to both Christian and Muslim chronicles, thousands of Muslim and Jewish inhabitants of Jerusalem were massacred by the victorious crusaders. One account describes blood flowing ankle-deep in the streets. Even Eastern Christians – the very people the crusaders were supposed to be helping – were not spared in the indiscriminate slaughter.
Here's a haunting image: The symbol of the red cross, intended to represent Christ, was carried into these massacres, turning it in the eyes of onlookers into a symbol of brutal conquest.
So what could drive men who thought of themselves as Christian knights to commit such bloodshed? Some context:
Medieval Culture of War: Medieval Europe was a warrior society. Violence was romanticized – think knights, honor codes, chivalry. War was a way of life. The idea of a "holy war" fit the spirit of the age. They drew misguided inspiration from the Old Testament's wars of Israel, seeing themselves as a new Israel driving out the infidels, even though Christ gave no such command.
Religious Fervor and Fear: There was genuine religious zeal among many crusaders – they believed they were doing God's will. Some sincerely thought fighting infidels would please Christ, distorted as that was. But there was also real fear. The Crusades were triggered after four centuries of Islamic military aggression that had conquered two-thirds of the Christian world. By 1095, the Byzantine Christian Empire was begging the West for help against Turkish invasions. So Pope Urban II's call to crusade was also a response to real threats.
This context doesn't justify the atrocities, but it helps explain the mindset: they saw themselves as fighting a defensive war for survival, which fueled their brutality.
Power and Politics: We also have to acknowledge the political manipulation involved. The Pope had his own agenda – he wanted to assert Rome's leadership. European nobles often had territorial ambitions. Many crusaders were second sons seeking land and glory abroad. When Jerusalem fell, the crusaders' frenzy of killing also came from a desire to loot the city and eliminate resistance.
Now, here's what's important: Their actions directly violated Jesus' teaching to "Love your enemies" and "Do not murder." It's telling that one medieval historian commented, "Unlike Christianity, which preached a peace it never quite achieved, Islam unashamedly came with the sword." In other words, the ideals of Christianity were peace, but Christians failed to live up to them.
And even during the Crusades, there were voices of conscience. Some Christians protested or felt uneasy about the violence. When crusader mobs murdered around 2,000 Jews in the Rhineland in 1096, some local bishops denounced it and tried to stop it – yet the mobs did it anyway.
So here's the bottom line on the Crusades: They were a mix of religious devotion and flagrant disobedience. Mark Galli, editor of Christian History magazine, notes that "the crusaders were real Christians. They prayed and fasted before battles and praised God after victories." Yet, simultaneously, "so much of what they did was wrong."
This is the uncomfortable paradox: they were not all "fake Christians" in name only – some were devout by the understanding they had, yet they were terribly misguided by the culture of violence and corrupted by power.
The Inquisition: Torturing for Truth
Another notorious chapter was the Inquisition – church-run judicial systems aimed at rooting out heresy. The most infamous was the Spanish Inquisition, which targeted converted Jews suspected of secretly practicing Judaism, as well as Protestant reformers. Inquisition courts used torture to extract confessions and handed over the condemned to secular authorities for execution, often by burning at the stake.
By any measure, this was religious persecution and cruelty, utterly at odds with Jesus' example. Jesus never coerced anyone into the faith. The New Testament teaches that conversion must be voluntary and that "wheat and tares must grow together until God's final judgment." The Inquisitors ignored this, thinking they were "purifying" society and saving souls by force.
How bad was it? The Spanish Inquisition, over its 350-year span, executed an estimated 3,000–5,000 people. That doesn't make it less evil, but it's far from the "millions" often claimed. Still, thousands burned alive or tortured is horrific enough. During the tenure of the first Grand Inquisitor, Tomás de Torquemada, about 2,000 people were burned at the stake.
What drove this? Fear and control. Spain had recently expelled Muslim rule and was anxious to enforce religious unity. There was also a warped theology: some churchmen had argued that compelling heretics back into the Church was an act of love – twisting Luke 14:23's "compel them to come in." They reasoned that if civil punishment could save a soul from hell by correcting heresy, it was justifiable.
It's a classic case of the ends justifying the means – something the Bible never endorses.
Once again, not all Christians went along quietly. When the witch hunts got out of hand, it was often Christians who protested. During the Salem witch trials in 1692, a Puritan minister, Increase Mather, helped stop the hysteria by arguing it was better that "ten suspected witches escape than one innocent person be condemned."
The key point: The Inquisition and related persecutions were a complete betrayal of Jesus Christ's teaching. Jesus rebuked His disciples for even suggesting calling down fire on a village that rejected them. He told Peter to put away his sword, "for all who draw the sword will die by the sword."
Slavery and Racism: Scripture Twisted for Greed
One of the most scandalous facts of history is that many Christians owned slaves and even used the Bible to justify it. Christian plantation owners would attend church on Sunday and yet hold fellow humans in chains through the week – sometimes even forcing Christianity on their slaves while utterly denying the love and equality the gospel demands.
The answer lies in a tragic mix of economic greed, cultural blinders, and willful misreading of Scripture. Slavery was enormously profitable. Those benefiting were highly motivated to defend it. They cherry-picked biblical passages: they cited verses about servants obeying masters, or the curse on Noah's son Ham (misinterpreted as marking African people for servitude).
This was a gross distortion. Yes, the Bible records and regulates forms of slavery in the ancient world – but it also sows the seeds of slavery's destruction by teaching the equality of all people made in God's image and commanding love of neighbor as self.
Christian abolitionists rightly saw this. William Wilberforce – a devout Christian in Britain – fought for decades to end the slave trade, explicitly arguing that it violated the teachings of Christ. He famously declared that the slave trade was "a compound of the grossest wickedness and cruelty" and utterly incompatible with the command to "love your neighbor as yourself."
In the United States, Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave and prominent abolitionist (and a Christian), blasted the hypocrisy of "slaveholding religion." In a striking quote, he wrote:
"…between the Christianity of this land and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference—so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. … I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land."
Douglass drew a sharp line between "Christians" who were Christian in name only, versus those living out Christ's teachings. And notably, the abolitionist movement was dominated by Christians – Quakers, evangelicals, and others – who felt compelled by their faith to fight the evil of slavery.
The broader context was cultural complicity. In the American South, almost everyone in white society was enmeshed in the slave economy. It was "normal." Only prophetic voices willing to stand against the culture, speaking from the Bible, could break the spell.
This pattern should humble us. It's easy to look back and condemn the slaveholders or crusaders and say, "I would never have done that." But many of them were ordinary people of their era, convinced they were righteous. It shows how human nature – our capacity for self-deception, prejudice, and cruelty – can infect religious practice when we are not steadfastly anchored in Jesus' actual teachings.
The Biblical Standard: What Does Christianity Actually Teach?
Now it's time to contrast all of this with what Jesus actually said and did. When we line up the teachings of Scripture against these historical episodes, the gap is stark.
The Sanctity of Life and Love for Enemies
From the very beginning, God's command "You shall not murder" set His people apart. But Jesus intensifies this: "You have heard it said... 'hate your enemy.' But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you."
When Peter tried to use violence to defend Jesus at His arrest, Jesus told him, "Put your sword back in its place. For all who draw the sword will die by the sword." He then healed the very man Peter had wounded.
Jesus made it abundantly clear His kingdom is not advanced by violence: "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, My servants would fight... but now My kingdom is from another place."
For the first ~300 years, Christians were well-known as a peaceful, martyrdom-accepting people who "do not repay evil for evil" but "overcome evil with good."
Given that standard, the Crusades and religious wars are entirely antithetical. Nothing in the teachings of Christ or the apostles would condone marching to kill people of another faith. True conversion is an act of the Holy Spirit and personal faith, which cannot be forced.
The Value of Every Person
Christianity teaches that every human being is made in the image of God and is loved by God. In Christ, divisions of ethnicity, social status, and gender lose their power: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
Jesus shattered ethnic barriers. He ministered to Romans, Syro-Phoenicians, Samaritans. James wrote that any form of prejudice or oppression is sin.
By these standards, the slave trade and racialized slavery stand utterly condemned. There is no New Testament command saying "Go capture people and make them your property." Instead, the thrust is to treat everyone as your neighbor.
Honesty, Justice, and Mercy
Christian Scripture emphasizes truthfulness, fairness, and mercy. "You shall not bear false witness" forbids false accusations. The law of Moses required multiple reliable witnesses to impose a death sentence.
Jesus upheld these principles. The Bible extols mercy: "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy." When confronted with an adulteress deserving death by the law, Jesus said, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone," and then showed her mercy.
What do we see in the Inquisition and witch hunts? Gross violations of these principles. Torturing people into confessions violates justice. Using questionable "spectral evidence" violates biblical due process.
Even if one believed a person was a heretic, the Christian response prescribed in the New Testament was to attempt correction with gentleness, and if they won't repent, to excommunicate – not to kill.
The Example of Christ Himself
Ultimately, Christians are called to imitate Christ. What is Christ like? He is the one who, when reviled, did not revile in return. He had all power, yet He humbled Himself to wash His disciples' feet. He taught, "By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you love one another."
The fruit of true Christian living is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. "Against such things there is no law."
Now, contrast that with the historical perpetrators: Were the leaders of the Crusades imitating the foot-washing, enemy-forgiving Jesus? Were slaveholders reflecting Christ's self-sacrifice? Did Inquisitors display gentleness? By Christ's standard of love, all those behaviors stand condemned.
Here's the crucial question: Is oppression and bloodshed a religious duty of Christianity or a logical application of the teachings of Christ? The answer is no – therefore violence done in the name of Christ cannot be laid at His door.
Common Ways Christianity Has Been Misused
Looking at these historical cases, certain recurring themes emerge.
1. The Pursuit of Power and Domination
Time and again, people have used religion as a means to power. Remember, Jesus was offered all the kingdoms of the world by Satan and He refused, choosing the way of the cross instead. Sadly, later church leaders didn't always refuse.
The Crusades had an element of the Pope asserting authority. The Inquisition was authorized to solidify religious uniformity, which was a form of social control. Even in the Reformation era, Protestant magistrates used state-church power to enforce orthodoxy.
Wherever Christianity is seen as a path to "win" – whether land, wealth, or influence – there is a grave risk of its abuse. Jesus said His followers must be servants, not lords, yet human nature loves to lord it over others.
2. "Cultural Christianity" and Nominal Faith
In many of these cases, people were "Christian" only because their society was. In medieval Europe, you were baptized as an infant and considered Christian by citizenship, not necessarily by personal conviction.
That means the church was filled with unconverted people – kings, knights, commoners who had never experienced a true heart change. Cultural Christianity produces Christians-in-name who lack the Holy Spirit's regenerating presence that produces love and self-control.
If you wonder how a "Christian" knight could butcher civilians, or a "Christian" planter could whip a slave – well, if they had not actually been born again or taught well, they were Christian only in label.
3. Selective and Twisted Use of Scripture
Those who committed or justified atrocities often did so by quoting Scripture out of context:
Medieval crusaders drew parallels to Israel's wars but ignored Jesus' new covenant commands of peacemaking.
Inquisitors cited verses about keeping the faith pure but ignored Christ's example of dealing with dissent through persuasion.
Slaveowners harped on verses telling slaves to submit but willfully neglected the gospel's spirit (Galatians 3:28, the law of love).
This selective reading is essentially using the Bible to rubber-stamp what one already wants to do, rather than humbly seeking God's will.
4. Personal/Political Agenda Cloaked in Faith
Many atrocities were more about personal or political agendas than truly about doctrine:
The Crusades can be seen as territorial expansion cloaked in religious rhetoric.
The Spanish Inquisition was partly about state consolidation and ethnic bias.
Slavery was entirely driven by economics and racism. The religious rationalizations came after the fact.
The pattern is: Start with a sinful desire (power, revenge, wealth, hatred), then find a religious rationale to justify it.
An Authentic Christian Response
So what do we do with all of this? How should we, as believers today, respond to these historical wrongs?
1. Historical Honesty and Repentance
First, we must honestly acknowledge the sins committed in the name of Christ. There's no point in denial or minimization. The Bible teaches us to confess sin and seek forgiveness.
Many Christian groups have modeled this. Pope John Paul II in the year 2000 asked God's forgiveness for the sins of Christians over the centuries – including specifically "the use of violence that some committed in the service of truth." He said "Never again" should such things occur.
When a skeptic brings up the Crusades, we shouldn't jump straight to a defensive stance. We can say: "Yes, that was a dark chapter. It should never have happened. It was totally contrary to Jesus' teachings, and Christians today denounce those actions."
By doing so, we disarm the objection and show that Christianity has self-corrective capacity through returning to Scripture.
2. Distinguishing Christ from Christians
We need to gently explain the distinction we've been drawing: the difference between Christianity's teachings and the actions of those who claimed Christianity.
Judge a religion by its founder, not just by its followers. Jesus is the standard. And Jesus's life – self-giving love, healing, compassion, forgiving His enemies – stands in judgment against those atrocities even more than any secular critic does.
3. Highlight the Self-Correction and Positive Fruits
Christianity has internal means of renewal. Throughout history, God raised up reformers to bring the church back in line with Scripture. The abolitionist movement was largely led by Christian conviction. The Civil Rights movement was largely led by Christian ministers.
William Wilberforce drove the anti-slavery effort precisely because of his evangelical faith. Christians hid Jews during the Holocaust. When Christians actually apply Jesus' teachings, the outcomes are dramatically good.
4. Personal Responsibility
It's easy to denounce long-dead crusaders, but the authentic response also says, "How am I living out my faith? Could I be blind to some evil or hypocrisy in my life?"
Jesus told each of us to take the log out of our own eye first. So a Christian today should be moved to self-examination. We ask God: "Search me and show me if there's any grievous way in me."
5. Active Love and Peacemaking Now
Part of our present responsibility is to actively demonstrate the true face of Christianity through acts of love, justice, and peacemaking. Where there were bad relations due to past Christian actions, Christians today can take initiative to build bridges.
Application: Walking the Talk
Here are some practical takeaways:
For Personal Faith:
Examine Your Heart: Each of us should ask, "Is there any way I am claiming Christ's name but acting in a contrary way?" Maybe it's pride, selfishness, prejudice, or a controlling attitude. We repent of those now.
Align with Scripture: Make a habit of measuring your beliefs and actions by the Bible, rightly understood. Don't cherry-pick verses. Let the Holy Spirit and the Word continually renew your mind.
Live Out Authentic Practice: Focus on embodying "faith expressing itself through love." Be the opposite of the hypocrite. In your daily life, treat people – all people – with the dignity and care you'd give to Christ Himself.
Stay Humble: Recognize that "but for the grace of God, there go I." We shouldn't get smug thinking we're better than our forebears.
For Cultural Engagement:
Know Your History: Equip yourself with knowledge about these issues. When someone says, "What about the Crusades?", you can respond with facts and context while also denouncing the evil.
Engage in Honest Dialogue: When talking to non-Christians about these topics, acknowledge the emotions. Validate that those things were evil. Don't immediately jump to defending – first empathize.
Draw Clear Distinctions: Don't be afraid to say, "Actually, that was anti-Christian by the very standards of the Bible." Quote the verses.
Demonstrate Loving Response: If someone aggressively blames you, respond with gentleness. "I understand why you feel that way. If that was my impression of Christianity, I'd hate it too. I assure you I hate those atrocities as well, precisely because I am a Christian."
Choosing the Way of Christ
We've journeyed through some painful history today. But here's the takeaway: There is a world of difference between the character of Jesus Christ and the atrocities committed in His name.
Christianity must be judged by Christ, and when it is, those dark chapters are revealed not as a product of the faith but as a betrayal of it. The abuse of Christianity by some does not negate the truth of Christianity itself. In fact, it confirms a core Christian doctrine – the sinfulness of man.
The "bad fruit" we examined grew from the soil of human greed, pride, and folly, not from the good seed of Christ's gospel. Jesus foretold there would be counterfeits and evildoers masquerading under His banner. Sadly, history proved Him right.
Yet hope is not lost. The very light of Christ eventually dispelled much of this darkness: reforms came, apologies were made, lessons were learned. Where did those corrective forces come from? From within Christianity – from believers rediscovering the heart of their faith.
For those watching who are not Christians: We invite you to look at Jesus Himself. Don't let the Crusaders or Inquisitors have the last word on what our faith is. Let Jesus have the last word. Consider His life, His teachings, and how He has led countless Christians to do incredible good.
The reason we all agree the atrocities were atrocious is because we hold certain moral truths – truths that Christianity heavily influenced the world to recognize. So rather than disproving the faith, it actually vindicates Jesus' teachings as the proper standard.
For fellow Christians: Our call is to authenticity. Let's be the "salt and light" Jesus said we are to be. Jesus said, "By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you love one another." Not by our monuments, not by our might, but by our Christ-like love.
So when asked, "If Christianity is true, why all the atrocities in its name?", we can answer: Because not everything done in Christ's name reflects Christ. Those atrocities happened when people ignored Jesus' words. Real Christianity is seen not in those who say "Lord, Lord" and act wickedly, but in those who actually follow the Lord in humility, love, and holiness.
The misdeeds of false or fallen Christians actually highlight the brilliance of Jesus' teaching – because we judge those deeds wrong by Jesus' own standards of truth and love. Remember Jesus' sobering and challenging words: "Not everyone who says to me 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of My Father." May we be those who do the Father's will, who truly know Jesus and are known by Him, so that no one ever has to ask how Christianity can be true if it produces evil. Instead, they will see our good works and glorify our Father in heaven.
Thanks for wrestling through this difficult topic with me today. I know it's heavy, but it's important. Next week we’re going to begin looking at some Old Testament issues and questions that people have. Until then, commit to living out authentic faith that honors the name of Christ.
