Religion and History

I have to write little more about the trip in Romania from other point of view. Main visits we made was monastery, which is church but built in country side. (in German, Kloster) The place we stayed is called Bucovina where is famous for old monasteries. First of all, I like history. The university I went was Catholic and I learned a little bit about Christian. (but as being Japanese university, religious is not that serious) So I have already strong interest about Histories, Christians and Old monastery. We visited 5 or 6 in total. It's all built in same age and concepts are same. Outlook is beautiful, the story of bible are painted colorfully. Most of the painting outside of the Monastery was about how souls are judged at the last gate. The picture of hell is clearly painted with black devil and souls which judged as guilty are kicked down to hell. When I stepped into the Monastery, it was cold and spiritual. First room you step in shows always about how torment or execution were done in those old ages. I've never expect to see such a brutal painting inside of Monastery. It is shown quite realistic with blood. When I paid attention to each painting, I recognized that those who are killed have holy gold hoop around the head, those killings are not. Obviously, it is about history of devotional believer and Christian persecution. Room in the middle was painting of gods which I understood that these are the people who was persecuted and died. And in last room is a big paintings and portrait of Chris and Maria. Here, devotional Christians are all make cross in front of their chest and kiss to portrait of Maria. Some people even tried not to show their back to this holy room when they step out. I was looking at it, as a non religious Japanese with many mixed feeling. In Japan, there is a variety of Buddhism and also Shinto existing for many years. But there was no religious war taken place. One Buddhism exist in one mountain and other one is existing on another mountain but that was no problem. First war relating to religion was "Shimabara no Ran" after Christian was brought from Europe. My question is, why Christian always had to fight for their belief. Of course everybody has different thought. Why being different was not accepted. Religion, which suppose to be a Oasis or motivation when man facing difficulty, created suffer in life. Even with such a bloody history, people are still being faithful and having strong worth ship. With such a negative mind in my head, I roamed around the Monastery once again. It is hard to explain by words but just very quiet, surrounded by nature in peace. I imagined hundreds of years ago that people came to this monastery and prayed. There, on the wall painted gods and only good spirits allowed to enter heaven. It must gave strong will to people which won't back off by any forces. Then one sister passed me by and smiled at me. In this moment, my negative thought found something positive. The history of Christian is nothing simple but people must be very proud of how they kept their thought and passed on to many generation, overcoming difficulties. I'm coming from the country where no one really serious about religion, celebrating Christmas, having wedding in church but funeral service is in temple. If I've been told to become a Christian, it requires strong will to make a decision while it's history is too deep for me. But same time, as I saw many believers, I was a little bit jealous how they could be so loyal.