Post-Constantinian Missions

Nearly three decades ago W. A. Visser’t Hooft suggested that Europe consisted of “statistical Christians who for one reason or another continue to be counted as church members though, in fact, their lives are controlled by non-Christian convictions.”1 He observed that among these statistical Christians of Europe “neo-Pagans” were found.2 A few years later William Edgar, in response to secularization, observed, “We are beginning to realize that Christianity is not being replaced by materialism, but by a sort of neo-[P]aganism.”3

A decade after Visser’t Hooft, Lesslie Newbigin posed the question, “Can the West be converted?”4 After returning from nearly four decades of missionary service, he began to identify the Paganism5 he encountered in England as more resistant to the gospel than the Hinduism he encountered in India.6 While Newbigin suggested that Paganism, indifferent of its expression, is “born out of a rejection of Christianity,”7 Marc Spindler added that, “For a significant number of people, European neo-[P]aganism is an ideology of resistance against global systems, drawing upon mythical elements in the pre-Christian tradition of European cultures.”8

Consistent with Newbigin and Spindler’s observations, Paul Heelas identifies a shift in contemporary Western society to witchcraft, earth goddesses and shamanism. He states, “I think that it is fair to say that [P]aganism has become the key resource for those (increasing numbers) who have countercultural concerns.”9 Similarly, Peter Jones has identified a new religious left from which results a Western spiritual monism. He states, “The real enemy of the Church’s faith is no longer antireligious atheistic humanism but a revived [P]agan religion.”10

The question of how we arrived in a religious climate with “otherworldly” expressions of belief can be answered by a critical look at what some have called the Golden Age of Faith. This paper discusses Christianity after Constantine and the remnant Pagan belief that became a part of the church and has contributed to the revival of pre-Christian European Native Religions. The study concludes with a discussion of a missiological lesson to aid in the avoidance of syncretism when Christianity is brought to a new culture.

After the “conversion” of Constantine the Christian church enjoyed a position of privilege unprecedented in its brief history. The religious edicts of toleration (AD 314 and AD 324) provided an environment of religious pluralism; however, it was not long before the church began to suppress the religious beliefs of Pagans. Constantine’s actions of legalizing the church bolstered the authority of the clergy. The clergy would now be exempted from certain taxes and civic duties in order to concentrate fully on the responsibilities of their office. Bishops sat as judges in civil suits and were given authority equal to law.11 Almost as a foreshadowing of Enlightenment rationalism, Constantine’s heirs issued a law against superstitions and sacrifice (AD 341).12 Wilbert Shenk described the situation in terms of an emerging religio-political context that equated citizenship in the empire with membership in the church.13 Rodney Stark points out that Constantine’s conversion eliminated Christianity’s dependence on volunteerism. It became an elite organization with state support.14

Constantine and Christian emperors following him embarked upon a massive and spectacular building campaign to honor God just as Pagan emperors who dedicated buildings to Pagan gods. These basilicas were immense and costly. The church of St. John Lateran in Rome is but one example of the great expense of building a church according to imperial standards,

Around 500 pounds weight of it [gold] were needed at a cost of some 36,000 solidi. This sum, which might be translated into approximately £60 million today, could have fed about 12,000 poor for a year (according to calculations from Dominic Janes’ God and Gold in Late Antiquity). Another 22,200 solidi worth of silver (3,700 lbs.) was required for light fittings and another 400 pounds of gold for fifty gold vessels.15

These basilicas looked more like the great audience halls of emperors and Pagan temples than the house churches of the previous centuries. Horrified by the change in Christianity, St. Jerome would write, “Parchments are dyed purple, gold is melted into lettering, manuscripts are dressed up in jewels, while Christ lies at the door naked and dying.”16 By the end of the fifth century the church would accept its newfound wealth.

Priestly vestments came in line with the ornate churches and those of the deposed Pagan priests. Under Constantine, the office of bishop ultimately became the most powerful office in a city. Their influence was felt not only in religious matters, but also in social and political matters. The very fact that they were reprimanded for accepting gifts for penance or from those desiring to be ordained for personal profit demonstrated their power over a congregation and in a city.17 The clergy’s newly attained authority negatively influenced their commitment to a discipline Christian life.18 This was far from the Christianity in Tertullian’s day, “There is no buying and selling of any sort in the things of God. Though we have our treasure chest, it is not made up of purchase-money, as of a religion that has its price.”19

In spite of the state and church’s efforts, from time to time Paganism enjoyed moments of revivals that sought to reinstate the priesthood and restore Pagan shrines.20 It was not until the Visigoth Alaric’s sack of Rome (AD 410) that organized Paganism in the Roman Empire ceased. However, the writings and decrees of history from Augustine to the antiquarians of the 19th century testify to what has been called “pagan survivals” among common people.21

The privileged position that Christianity enjoyed after Constantine’s conversion summarily oppressed religious others. Less than a hundred years after his conversion, Augustine sought theological justification for the use of diverse means to convert heretics.22 Perhaps motivated by the Edict of Unity, which he viewed as an act of providence,23 his understanding of Luke 14:2324 led him to coerce the conversion of heretics and unbelievers. He saw the justification of this type of conversion in Paul’s experience with Christ on the road to Damascus.

You also read how he who was at first Saul, and afterwards Paul, was compelled, by the great violence with which Christ coerced him, to know and to embrace the truth; for you cannot but think that the light which your eyes enjoy is more precious to men than money or any other possession. This light, lost suddenly by him when he was cast to the ground by the heavenly voice, he did not recover until he became a member of the Holy Church.25

According to Henry Kamen, “he [Augustine] established a precedent which fortified the practice of repression by the mediaveval [sic] Church.”26 Augustine regarded the punishment of Pagan practices as acceptable, “For which of us, yea, which of you, does not speak well of the laws issued by the emperors against heathen sacrifices? In these, assuredly, a penalty much more severe has been appointed, for the punishment of that impiety is death.”27 He believed that the church had a responsibility to weed out the tares from the wheat.

There is an unjust persecution which the ungodly operate against the Church of Christ; and a just persecution which the Churches of Christ make use of towards the ungodly.... The Church persecutes out of love, the ungodly out of cruelty.28

It was Augustine’s justification that set the agenda for the advancement of Roman Christianity on the continent of Europe.

According to Prudence Jones and Nigel Pennick, adherents of Pagan religions suffered the death penalty if they did not submit to baptism or if they continued their religious practices.29 David Bosch notes that a Christian emperor could not reign over a Pagan people. Baptism was forced upon them in order for the emperor to justly rule. There was no distinction between political and religious loyalty.30

Thomas Aquinas believed that Augustine’s justification of the use of force against those who opposed the Catholic Church was legitimate. Quoting from Augustine’s A Treatise Concerning the Correction of the Donatists as the theological basis for the church’s agenda to convert heretics, Aquinas affirms the Augustinian position,

None of us wishes any heretic to perish. But the house of David did not deserve to have peace, unless his son Absalom had been killed in the war which he had raised against his father. Thus if the Catholic Church gathers together some to the perdition of others, she heals the sorrow of her maternal heart by the delivery of so many nations.31

Conversion in Europe was often politically motivated: whether fear of death or hope for victory at war and prosperity. It was also from the top down. After a king’s conversion the people would follow.32 Emma Restall Orr, joint chief of the British Druid Order, might be correct when she asserts, “The conversion of kings took place as an acknowledgement of a more powerful god of battle, not a move to a god of love.”33 The result of this method of enticing Pagans to become Christian caused Pagan folk practices to go underground.34

While Christianity became the dominant belief system in the Middle Ages, it was not without having been profoundly influenced by its Pagan antagonists.35 The Christianization of Pagan practices provided elements of continuity in the new religious lives of converts.36 Rituals and festivals were Christianized and infused with new meaning while saints and martyrs replaced local deities; all officially sanctioned by the church only to be occasionally liberated by the Pagan masses as expressions of identity.37 Christianity was not successful in eradicating the Pagan influences of the past. The discontinuity between Christianity and Paganism no longer existed as it once had. Peter Brown notes that even in the church at Hippo Augustine “felt that the quality of his own congregation had already been seriously diluted by the semi-pagans who had joined the church en masse, when Christianity became the established religion.”38 The Roman Church in general did not discourage mixed marriages between Pagans and Christians since they seemed to work out in its favor.39 Pagan practices had crept back into the church and many were Christian by name only.

In spite of efforts by the church to disassociate with Pagan celebrations the practices remained. Ultimately the church would concede to the practices and instill or infuse them with Christian meaning. According to Jones and Pennick, under the papal direction of Gregory I, missionaries christianized Pagan religious expressions as well as holy places.40 Pope Gregory, writing instructions to Mellitus, abbot to the Gauls, as he is sent to join Augustine of Canterbury in England states,

For there is no doubt that it is impossible to efface every thing at once from their obdurate minds; because he who endeavours to ascend to the highest place, rises by degrees or steps, and not by leaps. Thus the Lord made Himself known to the people of Israel in Egypt; and yet He allowed them the use of the sacrifices which they were wont to offer to the Devil, in his own worship; so as to command them in his sacrifice to kill beasts, to the end that, changing their hearts, they might lay aside one part of the sacrifice, whilst they retained another; that whilst they offered the same beasts which they were wont to offer, they should offer them to God, and not to idols; and thus they would no longer be the same sacrifices.41

J. M. Wallace-Hadrill comments that this letter indicates a change of papal missionary strategy in England. Gregory had become painfully aware of the ineffectiveness of the mission and accommodated as much as possible.42

Nearly three hundred years after Augustine of Hippo’s City of God, which was written in part as a response to the desire to return to Pagan gods, the missionary bishop Boniface, also known as the apostle of Germany, expressed his concern regarding the continuation of Pagan practices in Rome to Pope Zacharias (ca. 742),

Some of the ignorant common people, Alemanians, Bavarians, and Franks, hearing that many of the offenses prohibited by us are practiced in the city of Rome imagine that they are allowed by the priests there and reproach us for causing them to incur blame in their own lives.43

A few years afterwards, Pope Zacharias writes to Boniface in response to questions regarding re-baptism. Pope Zacharias alludes to Boniface’s concern for those who had been baptized by heretics, “As to those sacrilegious priests who, you say, sacrificed bulls and goats to heathen gods, eating the offerings to the dead, defiling their own ministry....”44 It seems apparent that the church struggled, not only in Rome, but also all over the continent, with the continuation of Pagan practices after the efforts of the early missionaries. There are at least three areas where “pagan survivals” are explicit in contemporary Christianity: Christianization of Pagan gods and holidays as well as legitimization of animistic practices in the use of icons.

Holidays

To contemporary practitioners of pre-Christian native religion, three prominent Christian holidays are, in effect, Christianized Pagan festivals: Christmas, Easter and Halloween. Ronald Hutton, professor of history at the University of Bristol, a second generation Pagan and member of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids, points out that Christianity had no sacred calendar so it was developed based upon the old religions.45 These Christian celebrations have provided a continuous reminder of the past. For example, the traditional date of 25 December for occidental Christmas coincides with the mid-winter festival of pre-Christian Pagan Europe. Between 17-24 December Roman Saturnalia was celebrated in honor of Saturn, a Roman god of fertility. In AD 272 emperor Aurelian declared 25 December the day or birthday of the unconquered sun.

When exactly the early church began celebrating the birth of Christ is unknown. Some like Colin Chapman suggest Pagans used 25 December in response to the Christian celebration. Others like Jones and Pennick view the date as usurped from Pagans by Christians as a recognition of the “historical conflation of Christ, Mithras and Sol.”46 The point being made here is that there was a certain degree of borrowing going on at this time. Whether or not Christ was actually born on this date, while important, does not detract from the issue.

The mid-winter festival was celebrated in different ways all over Europe. Britain, Germany and the Scandinavian countries celebrated the Yule feast recognizing the lengthening of the day and hoping for the beginning of a fertile year.47 While the Pagan names of these festivals died out, the celebrations surrounding them remained in tact.48

The very English name of the western celebration of Christ’s resurrection suggests its relationship to the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, Eastre. While what the English speaking West calls Easter has been celebrated from early on in Christian tradition the parallels in the symbolic meaning of the resurrection and new life are strikingly similar to Pagan understanding of renewal. The Easter fires, long celebrated as a Pagan festival according to Sir James Frazer,49 became incorporated in the church from an early date. In spite of synod attempts to ban the practice, Pope Zacharias affirms the catholicity of the practice when writing to Boniface in 751.50

Halloween provides the most deliberate attempt to Christianize a Pagan festival. Originally, All Saints Day in the Christian calendar was celebrated on 13 May. In 834 the date was moved to 1 November making 31 October All Hallows’ Eve. These dates coincided with the calendar of Roman and Celtic people marking either the beginning of the new year or the end of the harvest season. It was a time to honor the dead as well as the spirit forces and to seek assurances for survival during the winter. The Christianization of this festival contributed to praying for the dead and honoring the saints rather than the various deities.51

Pagan Gods and Christian Saints

The third ecumenical council held at Ephesus in 431 convened to condemn Nestorius and Celestius’s teaching. The Nicene-Constantinople Creed was fixed as orthodoxy.52 While Nestorianism was defeated a new issue arose in Ephesus. Mary, the mother of Jesus, was given a place of honor. She was affirmed as the Mother of God (θεοτόκος) and the geographical and religious context added emphasis for the council’s proclamation: Ephesus, the great city of the goddess Diana.53 Hutton sees a direct correlation between Mary and Diana as well as goddesses of fertility with the various Black Madonnas of Italy.54

It is here that Christianity apparently begins to adopt and adapt Pagan gods and goddesses for Christian practice. Jones and Pennick note, “The procession celebrating the beatification of Mary used smoking censers and flaring torches, as were once used in the procession of Diana.”55 Adrian Ivakhiv suggests that the veneration of Mary in the Middle Ages was simply a reemergence of goddess worship.56 Chapman states,

In pre-Christian days localities or cities often had their own local deity who was believed to protect and guard his or her own people. Sometimes the supposed dwelling of such a god or spirit was a natural feature, such as a well. With the coming of Christianity, however, the instinctive desire for a local protector was sometimes transferred to a local Christian of prominence – perhaps the person who first preached the Gospel in the area. And not infrequently elements of the old pagan belief became mixed up in the tales of this local figure.57

Hutton posits that the western church fathers left the question of celestial deities open. Citing Augustine, Hutton suggests that his lack of explanation of the planets in effect allowed for the possibility of their recognition as deities. However, Augustine clearly had an aversion to astrology. In the City of God he notes, “But that all things come to pass by fate, we do not say; nay we affirm that nothing comes to pass by fate; for we demonstrate that the name of fate, as it is wont to be used by those who speak of fate, meaning thereby the position of the stars at the time of each one’s conception or birth, is an unmeaning word, for astrology itself is a delusion.”58 In spite of this, Hutton suggests that by 1320 western intellectuals considered the planets as deities controlled by God. There was the belief that Christians could legitimately use the planets to gain understanding for their future.59

While Hutton might exaggerate the level of acceptance of astrology on the part of the church, it is without doubt that the lay people continued in their beliefs. These beliefs in the efficacy of astrology have continued in western society. Consider for example, the data from International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) Environment I.

Astrology was also used as it was passed on to the Christian literati by the Druids. The Irish missionary monk Columba, who established his first monastery at Derry, launched his missionary journey and established some 300 churches in Ireland. After being exiled from Ireland in 563, Columba, with twelve disciples, established a second monastery off the coast of Scotland on the island Iona that was responsible for evangelizing the Picts and Scots. Iona evolved into a great missionary monastery evangelizing most of England and Scotland and sending peregrinatio pro christo (wanderers for Christ) to the continent.61 It was he who once claimed, “Christ is my Druid,” and consulted the stars to determine the appropriate time for his foster son to begin his education.62

The adoption of the Celtic goddess Brigit into Christianity is suggested to be one of the most overtly Christian usurpations of a Pagan goddess. Saint Brigit was born in 452 and is known for founding the double monastery at Kildare. Her feast day on 1 February coincides with the pastoral festival of imbolc. Imbolc is a festival that celebrates fertility, creativity and healing. It has traditionally been associated with the goddess Brigit. Many Pagans see the life of the saint as assuming the life of the goddess and disregard the historicity of Brigit the Celtic abbess. Timothy Joyce sees the difficulty in separating the goddess and the saint63 and Hutton seems to agree when he alludes to the notion that she was once considered divine.64

Animistic practices in the use of icons appear to go back as far as the Iconoclastic controversy itself. Saint John of Damascus himself was not immune to this. He stated, “Devils have feared the saints and have fled from their shadow. The shadow is an image, and I make an image that I may scare demons.... Material things are endued with a divine power because they bear the names of those they represent.”65 Here it appears that the icon is a source of power in order to be protected from evil. It is easy to see that one could believe that if he had more icons in his possessions he could have more power against demons. Similarly, he believed that the icons were actually the power source. They in themselves possessed divine power and grace.66

Hutton suggests that Christian iconography was in essence used as a talisman. As a second generation Pagan and member of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids, he takes comfort in the fact that the early church did not feel any discomfort with classical Paganism. Christianity was successful due to its absorption of these ancient beliefs.67 The early iconophiles believed that the image possessed some type of quasi-magical power.68

According to Hutton, magic supplemented religion in folklorized Christianity. At one and the same time an individual could attend church in order to secure eternal reward and perform magic in order to secure earthly reward. Magic was separate from “the great contest between God and Satan” so the mundane issues of life could be handle by manipulating lesser forces and not bothering the Almighty God. “The fact that humans have sought the latter [magic] in addition [to religion] has been the result of modesty (not wishing to trouble deities), frustration (the deity has not responded), double insurance, pride and curiosity (the desire to work spiritual power directly) and consideration of convenience and expense.”69 Stark makes this observation,

By thinly overlaying pagan festivals and sacred places with Christian interpretations, the missionaries made it easy to become a Christian – so easy that actual conversion seldom occurred. Instead, in customary pagan fashion, the people treated Christianity as an “add-on religion” and the popular Christianity that eventually emerged in northwestern Europe was a strange amalgam, including a great deal in the way of pagan celebrations and beliefs, some of them thinly Christianized, but many of them not Christianized at all.70

While a historically continuous link to organized pre-Christian European expressions of native religions is not demonstrable, contemporary Paganism suggests that there has been a “pagan survival” in the church. Many Pagan practices were integrated into the church and were never completely extinguished. In one sense, it is incorrect to talk of a resurgence of Paganism. Philip Carr-Gomm, Chosen Chief of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids, suggests that Christianity, paradoxically, assisted in the survival of Druidry in its adoption of Pagan festivals and gods, use of sacred sites and documenting the folktales of Bards.71

Since the turn of the twentieth century Paganism has increasingly gained a voice in the academy and popular culture. Consider for example the Nature Religions Scholars Network hosted on the University of Colorado-Pueblo web site. Their self description states:

We are a group of scholars working in the area of nature-based religions -- in other words, those religious paths which do not depend upon written scripture or the words of one prophet or teacher but which take nature as their symbolic center. These religious traditions tend to be decentralized, to give primacy to individual experience, and to seek to overcome such dichotomies as ‘nature-culture’ and ‘mind-body.’ Examples include most “animistic” tribal religions, shamanism, and revived Western Paganism.72

The contemporary expression of Paganism recognizes the remnant of pre-Christian belief in Christianity. Andrew Greeley suggests that due to continued belief in the efficacy of astrology, fortunetellers and good luck charms we are not all that different from the medieval peasants.73 This is quite a contrast from what Keith Thomas wrote 20 years before Greeley, “Astrology, witchcraft, magical healing, divination, ancient prophecies, ghosts and fairies, are now rightly disdained by intelligent people.”74 Thomas adds, “What is certain about the various beliefs discussed in this book is that today they have either disappeared or at least greatly decayed in prestige.”75 However, the data suggests otherwise.

Greeley asserts that religion continues to play an important role in the lives of Europeans. At the same time, magic is increasing and growing in situations where religious faith is uncertain.76 While Greeley provisionally agreed that the belief in magic as exemplified in the ISSP variables dealing with fortunetellers, astrology and good luck charms measures New Age attitudes he concurs with the notion set forward in this paper. Namely, it is more likely that this continued fascination with what was once considered superstition is a result of the tenacity of pre-Christian popular religion.77 According to Orr, astrology fits well within the practices of Druidry.78 Thus, the data on astrology fits just as well with Paganism as it would with New Age. Nevertheless, the point that is being made is that the data suggests congruency between the religious beliefs of Western society and contemporary Paganism.

Western society is witnessing a revival of pre-Christian native religions. With a deliberate attempt at historical continuity, Paganism, in its varied expressions are growing at an annual growth rate that exceeds 28 percent.79 Some consider it to be the fastest growing religious expression in the West.

If syncretism is understood as per Scott Moreau, “Traditionally among Christians it has been used of the replacement or dilution of the essential truths of the gospel through the incorporation of non-Christian elements”82 then it would appear that what might have been attempts at relevant ministry methods in the medieval church were in fact syncretistic. The lesson to be learned for contemporary missiology addresses cultural practices that have religious expressions.

The study has demonstrated that the evangelistic methods of the medieval missionary endeavors often resulted in accommodating religious others rather than conversion. When “conversion” did occur it was often motivated by factors other than a desire to be in relationship with the Creator. What is learned from this study is the notion that conversion without personal conviction will often result in some form of “split-level” Christianity. When religious beliefs are simply suppressed and go underground the old beliefs emerge in a folklorized form of Christianity.

When religious beliefs are simply suppressed and go underground the old beliefs emerge in a folklorized form of Christianity.

Eventually the folklorized form will desire a unique expression as it becomes disillusioned with Christianity, as we see in the resurgence of contemporary Paganism. The unique expression that emerges will have some sort of correlation to the religious beliefs prior to the arrival of Christianity. The fact of the revival of pre-Christian European religious expressions must challenge our understanding of the evangelization of Western Europe and make us aware of the impact of christianizing indigenous religious practices in other cultures. The question remains, “How do we prevent such incidents from occurring?”

The answer to this question, I believe, is found in the ministry of St. Paul in Corinth. When asked about food sacrificed to idols (1 Cor 8:1-13) he made the distinction between those who know and those who are weak. The knowers must maintain a strict monotheism for the sake of those who do not have the experiential or learned knowledge (γνῶσις) as them. Coye Still writes,

Thus, Paul has placed real limitations on the behavior of the knowers at two points. First, he counsels against all temple meal participation. Second, he curtails indiscriminate consumption at meals hosted by unbelievers. The practical aim of Paul’s argument is to persuade the knowers to abstain completely from food identified as offered to idols.83

When religious expressions (as distinct from aesthetic cultural expression) of a society are adopted or even contextualized it has the potential of legitimizing the practices and eventually leading to syncretism. Paul’s admonition to the Corinthian believers was one of abandoning the practices for the sake of the weak in Christ. Rather than accommodating as the medieval church did or infusing with new Christian meaning as many contemporary missionaries do, it appears that the only assurance of maintaining orthodoxy in Christian teaching and practice is abstinence from overtly non-Christian religious expressions. While the knower maintains the freedom to “eat,” so to speak, due to the right (ἐξουσία) in Christ these practices should be abandoned for the sake of the immature in Christ.

To Paul, conversion meant a cognitive as well as a behavior change from former religious practices to new life in Christ. This does not mean that Paul is suggesting a break from religious others. Paul affirms his desire to relate to them in 1 Cor 9:19, “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.” His service to all, however, had boundaries to assure that the weak were not destroyed and that Christian orthodoxy was preserved.

To Paul, conversion meant a cognitive as well as a behavior change from former religious practices to new life in Christ.

Is there a principle in Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 8 that might affect the way in which we observe cultural practices that have religious connotations? The fact of a remnant “pagan survival” in the church suggests an adoption, or at best adaptation, of religious practices while trying to infuse them with new meaning. However, the result was often syncretism instead of a “transforming ministry.” Rather than resulting in a break with the former way of life, the weak who do not have the knowledge of the mature were likely to stumble and be wounded in conscience. This paper suggests that the resurgence of Paganism in contemporary Western society provides a 1500 year case study of missionary practice. The lesson to be learned is that adoption or adaptation of overt religious expressions of a host country will coalesce with Christianity and ultimately re-emerge in a new syncretized religious expression. Paul’s strict emphasis on monotheism moves the missionary to abstinence for the sake of the new in Christ as well as the preservation of Christian orthodoxy.