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Christians of Jewish and those of Gentile descent, which led to a long and bitter contro-
versy. With the Jewish Christians ... the fast ended ... on the 14th day of the moon at
evening ... without regard to the day of the week. The Gentile Christians on the other hand
[that is, the beginning of the Roman Church, now substituting pagan for true Christian
doctrines] ... identified the first day of the week with the resurrection, and kept the preced-
ing Friday as the commemoration of the crucifixion, irrespective of the day of the month.

"Generally speaking, the Western Churches [Catholic] kept Easter on the 1st day of the
week, while the Eastern Churches [containing most of those who remained as part of the
true Christian Church] followed the Jewish rule. [That is, observing Passover on the 14th
of the first sacred month instead of the pagan Easter.]

"Polycarp, the disciple of John the Evangelist, and bishop of Smyrna, visited Rome in 159
[sic] to confer with Anicetus, the bishop of that see, on the subject, and urged the tradition
which he had received from the apostles of observing the 14th day. Anicetus, however, de-
clined. About forty years later (197), the question was discussed in a very different spirit
between Victor, bishop of Rome, and Polycrates, metropolitan of proconsular Asia [the
territory of the Churches at Ephesus, Galatia, Antioch, Philadelphia, and all those men-
tioned in Revelation 2 and 3 -- the Churches established through the Apostle Paul]. That
province was the only portion of Christendom which still adhered to the Jewish usage.
Victor demanded that all should adopt the usage prevailing at Rome. This Polycrates firmly
refused to agree to, and urged many weighty reasons to the contrary, whereupon Victor
proceeded to excommunicate Polycrates and the Christians who continued the Eastern us-
age [that is, who continued in God's way, as Jesus, Peter, Paul, and all the early true
Church had done]. He was, however, restrained [by other bishops] from actually proceed-
ing to enforce the decree of excommunication ... and the Asiatic churches retained their us-
age unmolested. We find the Jewish [true Christian Passover] usage from time to time reas-
serting itself after this, but it never prevailed to any large extent.

"A final settlement of the dispute was one among the other reasons which led Constantine
to summon the council at Nicaea in 325. At that time the Syrians and Antiochenes were the
solitary champions of the observance of the 14th day. The decision of the council was
unanimous that Easter was to be kept on Sunday, and on the same Sunday throughout the
world, and that 'none hereafter should follow the blindness of the Jews.' [That is, in plain
language, the Roman Church now decreed that none should be allowed to follow the ways
of Christ -- of the true Christian Church!]

"... The few who afterwards separated themselves from the unity of the church [Roman
Church], and continued to keep the 14th day, were named 'Quarto-decimani,' and the dis-
pute itself is known as the 'Quartodeciman controversy.'"

Thus you see how the politically organized church at Rome grew to great size and power
by adopting popular pagan practices and how she gradually stamped out the true teachings, doc-
trines, and practices of Christ and the true Church, so far as any collective practice is concerned.

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