<< I am a Catholic but all Christians come from us >>
Actually, the Christian church was essentially one body starting at about the 4th century. After the fall of Rome in 387, Constantinople was basically the capital of the "Western" world, with Constantine I the head of the church and empire. One thing to note is that there were NO overt actions like the crusades until AFTER the Great Schism in the 12th century, when the church split into the Catholic and Orthodox churches due to significant dogmatic differences and the assessed control over people's lives. (btw, Catholic and Orthodox means the same thing, but one's Latin and one's Greek). The Catholic church was centered in Rome, and the Orthodox church remained in Constantinople.
It must therefore follow that, since the first church since the 4th century was centered in Constantinople, that the Orthodox church came first. Also note that the Orthodox church never participated in Crusades or inquisitions or buying pennances or anything similar, and was actually a victim of the Catholic church pillaging relics and other item. Of course, the Ottoman occupation of Constantinople in 1453 pretty much sent the Orthodox church into a bit of a spin, though the Ottoman Turks were not out to destroy it.
In fact, the Orthodox Christian faith has always been pretty quiet and more flexible, and the many aspects of the Protestant movement mirror a lot of the Orthodox dogma too. For example, divorce was and is still allowed up to three times, and priests are allowed to marry prior to ordination. Much of the negativity I find with Christianity is a result of the idiosyncrasies and past history of the Catholic church and the resulting halo effect. I'm not trying to slam Catholicism, but there are people who view Christians as they do Catholics or ultra-fundamentalist right-wing Christians, i.e. wanting to take the choice of others away, rules that make it impossible to live reasonably.
For me, it's live and let live, and I believe that God has revealed truth to all people in different ways. I don't think God would forsake most people for the sake of a few, and anyone who says differently isn't being fair to others. But I do believe that people should live a moral and good life no matter what they choose to believe.
. Jesus/God (same "person") will forgive you or ANY SIN, no matter how many times you commit it or how "big" it is, IF (a big if here) you are truly sorry for doing them. IF you are truly sorry then obviously you will not commit the same sin again. However I think God understands that due to human nature (to temptation) small sins are committed from time to time.
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