Interesting video looking at the development and adoption of the AD/BC system of counting what year it is, as well as when and how CE/BCE came in to gradually supplant it (particularly in academic circles).
I think it’s more an historian and traditionalist than as a Christian that I find the transition to CE/BCE vaguely annoying, slapping a different label while keeping the same numeric origin point. It feels like political correctness, of the silly variety. Of course, I also don’t buy that the Founders using “A.D.” and “In the Year of Our Lord” on their document dates proves that they were devout Christians. It’s just a traditional label (and a fun retention of Latin in our culture), so it doesn’t particularly bug me.
Of course in a century we may be using the Chinese calendar (or be huddled in the ruins around our lizard dinners, counting the years since the Great Collapse), which will settle that debate in a Gordian fashion.
I've always thought it's a shame that the Roman calendar was pushed aside. No offence to the Messiah, but his birth year is smack in the middle of written history. It's a nuisance to have to add back those negative numbers to date things. 753 BC (or AC – Ante Christum) was the year in which the Romans believed their city was founded and using the AUC (Ab Urbe Condita – from the city's founding) calendar, this year is 2770.
And, as the last paragraph notes, CE/BCE is offensive to those cultures that already have their own calendar numbering systems. And even a move to settle on a completely independent calendar would fail as the solar vs. lunar calendar people battled.
My oldest kid's social studies class uses both of the above labeling system interchangeably, sometimes in the same sentence, which makes me want to tear my hair out.
+Doyce Testerman Yeah, that would annoy me even more. 🙂