It's Columbus Day. Who is Christopher Columbus? Here's why is he so important to American history.

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Columbus Day is the 2nd Monday in October. 

Who is he?

Columbus is credited for discovering the Americas in 1492. His real achievement was that he opened the door for more exploration to a New World, and successfully put the Americas on the map. 

Columbus arrived 500 years ago, and 600 monuments and statues have been erected to him in the USA since we became a nation in 1776. 

He made 4 voyages from Europe heading west, to find a passage to Asia by sailing west.

Cities and a large river in western United States, the Columbia River, were named in his honor, and even the seat of the United States government is was named the District of Columbia after Columbus. 

He was called  The Admiral of the Ocean Sea (Columbus’s official title) was so important to the American essence of our culture, that one of the first vessels in the Navy was the USS Columbus.

Based off of his words and his actions up until this point,  Columbus’s plan for colonization had 4  key aspects:

The establishment of a new trading empire in the Far East;Exclusion of all but Catholic Christians from the benefit of trade;Conversion of the natives to Christianity; andThe enslavement of hostile or recalcitrant natives, as a method of punishment and a source of profit.[xiii]

Slavery, as it continuously was to Columbus, the last option and only to those who were defeated in war were taken as slaves. During this Age of Conquest, defeated people groups had two options: be killed or be taken as slaves. This was happening throughout the known world at this time, and slavery was the norm in the known world until the 18th century.

His name Christopher means “Christ bearer”, and Columbus took this very seriously.

Columbus did a total of 4 voyages by ship from Spain to the New World, and explored much of what we know now as the Carribbean and started the pursuit and the hot race of exploration of the Americas. And opened the door for the hundreds of explorers of this new world who came after him. He was courageous, ambitious, and unashamedly Catholic, and wanted to spread the name of the Savoir Jesus Christ to these new countries and islands, along with establishing a trade route to Asia, which he never accomplished. 

Early explorers, founding fathers, and those who made this nation great are not to be revered, but we do well to study who they were and the contributions they made to form the United States of America. 

Quote from Christopher Columbus from his diary written towards the end of his life:

“I have seen and put in study to look into all the Scriptures…Our Lord opened my understanding. I could sense his hand upon me…All those who heard about my enterprise rejected it with laughter, scoffing at me.

“Who doubts that this illumination was from the Holy Spirit? I attest that He (the Spirit) with marvelous rays of light, consoled me through the holy and sacred Scriptures.. No one should be afraid to take on any enterprise in the name of our Savior, if it is right and if the purpose is purely for His Holy service”. 

https://exploration.marinersmuseum.org/subject/christopher-columbus/

https://www.history.com/topics/exploration/christopher-columbus

https://wallbuilders.com/discovering-columbus/

https://wallbuilders.com/columbus-and-the-context-of-colonization/

https://wallbuilders.com/columbus-and-sex-slavery/