Christianity in our modern times is one of the largest religions in the world, but it was not always the prevailing belief system that it has become. Much earlier in the mists of time, the Christian faith came out of other beliefs and faiths that are now referenced as paganistic. In this paper we will take a very brief look at the move of faith from those paganistic belief systems into the early . Before writing further, it is important to clarify on the use of the word pagan when discussing religion in late Antiquity. It is somewhat an improper designation f the cults and religious practices of the Greco-Roman world, which were not affiliated with either Christianity or Judaism. The term polytheist is much more accurate, as the term pagan is actually what early Christians began using to label their opponents because it had negative connotations.
The Latin word pagan us actually meant both that the person was a rural dweller, as well as a civilian, both of which were somewhat negative ideas in that time (Cairns). Rural people tended to follow belief systems that were loosely knit together, but did not have the organization and structure of belief that established religions had. The people and cultures of the ancient world actually played a vital part in making the effective spread and success of Christianity possible. The Romans, unlike any other people up to their time, had developed a sense of the unity of mankind under a universal law. Their sense of the solidarity of man while within the empire created an environment that was favorable to the reception of a gospel that proclaimed the unity of the human race in the fact that all men are under the penalty of sin and in the fact that all are offered a salvation that makes them a part of single universal organization, the Christian church, which is Christ’s body (Lee). Another Roman step in fostering the idea of unity was the granting of Roman citizenship to non-Romans.
This process was started in the period preceding the birth of Christ and was completed when Caracalla in 212 admitted all freemen in the Roman Empire to Roman citizenship. Roman law, with its emphasis on the dignity of the individual and his rights to justice and Roman citizenship, and with its tendency to fuse men of different races into one political organization, anticipated a gospel that proclaimed the unity of the race both in setting forth the penalty for sin and the Savior from sin (Cairns). This general emphasis on organization helped set the stage culturally for an organized religion the extent of which had not truly been seen yet.