I've always wondered how a foreign religion was received in Europe. I'm from the US and I have to admit that my European history never went into depth about the issue. It also doesn't help that I was raised in the bible belt where these kind of questions are frowned upon. I know that Rome was the dominant power at the time and they viewed other Europeans as barbarians and relatively uneducated; so I expect most mainstream accounts to be from a Roman perspective. But are there any other accounts from that time? If anybody could point me in the direction of answers or an interesting read it would be you guys. Thanks in advance for any help.
The christianisation of Europe was a long, slow process - it began in the very early years of christianity and wasn't really completed until as late as the 13th century. So it's very hard to make a blanket statement. Sometimes people voluntarily adopted christianity, and sometimes it was conversion by the sword.
Hungary was one of the latest ones, happening around 1000 AD. Basically King Saint Stephen realized that a pagan country wedged between two large Christian empires (Holy German Roman and Byzantine) will not survive. They will sooner or later squash it.
It wasn't nice. He had to import German knights to suppress the opposition. Married a German woman. Of course people would see it as a treason of the identity of the country. (Of course modern national identities didn't exist but still there was an us vs. them regarding people who speak a different language, have different religions and customs etc. etc.)
Clearly he made Hungary "less Hungarian, more German" - there was no other way.
To make it clear - King Saint Stephens birth name was Vajk, which is related to the Turkish word bay or bey, meaning hero, rich, prince. And he was baptized Stephen, a Christian (Greek) name by a German bishop: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Benczur-vajk.jpg
So you can see what kind of identity break that means, when you even given up your name in your country's language and pick another one in a foreign language? Not everybody was down with it - he fought with his uncle etc.
Stephen was a fairly harsh ruler. Church attendance was mandatory, every ten village had to build a church, and so on. Behave disrespectfully during a mass, get whipped.
I wouldn't call him cruel for the sake of cruelty - but basically he just wanted it done and used as much force as necessary.
There have been pagan uprisings. The whole thing was often unpopular, as it was understood as a change in identity. For example even hairstyles were different amongst Pagans and Christians. Long hair = Christian. Shave your heir, just leave some braids = Pagan.
However later on he was considered a hero, because really this was the only way how to make the country survive. Otherwise one of the two large Christian empires would have crushed the country sooner or later.
In the 1980's it was commemorated in a rock opera. It got hugely popular and it has many layers of interpretations. The way I interpret it is that it presented a dilemma for the Christan Patriots - taking up Christianity was a good idea, but it meant sacrificing national identity, inviting foreigner knights to fight Hungarians (really a huge treason) and taking up German customs - did it worth it or not? I think this is what the rock opera presented.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Christianity_in_Hungary
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_I_of_Hungary
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vata_pagan_uprising
The rock opera - a modern view, an artistic reinterpretation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istv%C3%A1n,_a_kir%C3%A1ly
Pro-Christian side: www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=6OOubj4UAX4#t=2700
Pro-Pagan and national independence side: www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=6OOubj4UAX4#t=2922
This song may also be interesting - this is what the Hungarian artist in 1983 thinks how a Pagan prayer in 1000 could have looked like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=6OOubj4UAX4#t=3474
(Obviously this is not meant to be historically accurate, but I thought you may be interested in how people may see this today!)
