You catch my point. I didn't mean for it to sound like it was Jesus that was the cause of the wars, but moreover Christianity in general. Though it can be argued that these wars would happen anyways, and that religion was just the cause they used to keep the masses interested and invested.
I'm looking at you vatican.
yah, about that Christianity in general... want to add a few other religions to that? Christianity has been around for about 2000 years, give or take a decade or two, and war has been fought long before that, and in places Christianity never found its way to, and many times religion was used as the excuse.
There are many on this site who can quote historical fact, and conjecture, and back up their statements far more eloquently than I can on the subject of religion, and they will not be able to disagree with me that Christianity is not the only religion to have wars fought using it as a reason, nor will they disagree the Vatican does not speak for all Christian churches.
People can be civil, but many of them/us, need something to rally round, to make it purposeful. People can be patriotic, but add the flag, and they have a symbol to remind them of what they are doing, why they are doing it, and that it is important.
Jesus can be used as a tool like that, a symbol of what can be achieved by one person who lives their life dedicated to the betterment of others. Take any figure in history who is held up as a shining example of goodness and use them if you dislike the idea of Jesus, it won't matter. An instantly identifiable symbol can convey in brief nano-seconds what pages and pages of words cannot. That is why we could use Jesus, or Buddha, or whatever. The symbol, meaning, message of what he preached is now more important than the man.
My opinion, anyway.
