Over time, ideas and beliefs tend to change. With this change in beliefs different thoughts on religion seem to occur. Written in Victorian times by Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre is an interesting novel about a young girl's journey through life and her quest to be loved. Along her journey religion plays a huge role in her decisions of everyday life.
Despite the claimed reverence for puritan ideals, the Victorian era brought numerous challenges to Christianity, including the growing trends of materialism, rationalism, communism, and "higher criticism" of the Bible. The theory of evolution proposed by Charles Darwin also struck at core truths of Christianity: that man was created by God, created in God's image, and responsible for his sinful actions. There are several reasons why the sovereignty of Christianity was threatened; for this was the era of the Enlightenment, where reason and science questioned time old superstition and religious beliefs. Also the industrialization over time changed people's priorities, no longer were they living in small farm communities, growing and hunting their food, concentrating on surviving. The people's environment was now opened, thus religion and spirituality was set aside more as materialism grew. Another factor was education; traditionally education was available only for the few, the elite and dominant parties of the country. Consequently the people had the Bible read to them, they knew no different and were not in the position to question the validity of what they were taught. The Church was a wealthy, strong, authoritative institution which ruled unquestioned. However it was during the Victorian period that education became available for the masses. As a result the people began thinking for themselves, forming their own opinions, rather than being told what to think and believe from the pulpit.
On the other hand Christian evangelization and missionary work flourished tremendously during this era, and a wealth of books, and...