Sunday, June 1, 2025

Pagans!

Pagan: A Word, a Wound, and a Mirror

By Chris M. Forte

Few words in the history of religion carry as much baggage as pagan.

Once a simple Latin term for “country dweller,” it eventually became one of the most charged and misunderstood labels in Western history — used to describe idolaters, heretics, and even Catholics themselves.

Today, the word still echoes in debates about faith and culture: “pagan holidays,” “pagan roots,” “neo-pagans,” “post-Christian paganism.” But what does pagan really mean? How did it begin? And why has it so often been hurled — wrongly — at the very Church that baptized the ancient world into light?

1. The Origin of the Word “Pagan”

The word paganus in Latin originally had nothing to do with religion. It simply meant “villager,” “civilian,” or “country person.”

In the Roman Empire, the term contrasted pagani (country dwellers) with milites (soldiers). Early Christians, who saw themselves as “soldiers of Christ” (milites Christi), began using paganus metaphorically to mean someone outside the Christian army — a spiritual civilian.

By the fourth century, when Christianity became the Empire’s dominant faith, paganus had come to mean “non-Christian.”

“Pagans were those who still clung to the old gods while the cities turned to Christ.” — Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (1986)

In short: a pagan wasn’t originally a devil-worshiper — just someone who hadn’t joined the Church.

2. Paganism in the Ancient World

Before Christianity, religion was everywhere — temples, sacrifices, household gods, public festivals. The Greeks and Romans weren’t atheists; they were profoundly religious. They just worshiped many gods instead of one.

From a Christian perspective, their rituals mixed genuine longing for the divine with deep confusion.

“They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator.” — Romans 1:25

But that same Scripture also acknowledges that these peoples “knew God” in part through creation (Romans 1:19–20). The Church Fathers, such as St. Justin Martyr and St. Clement of Alexandria, saw this as evidence that God’s grace was already at work even among the pagans — imperfectly, but truly.

St. Justin Martyr (2nd century) called these glimpses of divine truth the seeds of the Word (logoi spermatikoi):

“Whatever has been spoken aright by any man belongs to us Christians.” — Apology I.46

In that sense, ancient paganism was not pure darkness. It was twilight — not night, but not yet dawn.

3. Paganism and the Rise of Christianity

When Christianity began to spread through the Roman world, the term pagan became shorthand for those who resisted conversion. Ironically, paganism as a unified “religion” didn’t exist until after Christianity gave it that label. Before that, there were just countless local cults and traditions — Jupiter here, Isis there, Mithras in the army, Cybele in the countryside.

Once the empire began turning Christian under Constantine (early 4th century), defenders of the old gods like the philosopher Celsus and Emperor Julian “the Apostate” began calling Christians the real threat — atheists, destroyers of sacred tradition.

The tension was cultural as much as religious: to be “pagan” increasingly meant clinging to the past, while Christianity became the faith of the future.

4. How “Pagan” Became an Insult — Even Against Catholics

Over time, pagan evolved into a weapon.

In the Reformation era, Protestants began using the word against the Catholic Church, accusing it of “paganizing” Christianity through its art, incense, vestments, and rituals.

Writers like Alexander Hislop in The Two Babylons (1853) claimed that Catholic worship was nothing but “baptized Babylonian paganism,” insisting that statues of saints were “idols” and that the Mass, incense, and Marian devotion were stolen from ancient Rome.

Jack Chick, a 20th-century American fundamentalist cartoonist, repeated the same myths in pamphlets accusing Catholics of “sun worship” and “pagan rituals.”

The Ku Klux Klan, in its anti-Catholic campaigns of the early 1900s, likewise portrayed Rome as “the old pagan empire reborn.”

But this misunderstanding confuses continuity with corruption.

Christianity did not “borrow” from paganism — it transformed it.
Where pagan temples once burned sacrifices to false gods, Christian churches now offered the one true sacrifice of the Lamb.
Where pagan art once glorified emperors, Christian art glorified Christ and His saints.
The symbols were purified, not plagiarized.

5. What “Pagan” Means Today

Today, the word has taken on new shades of meaning.

In academic circles, “pagan” often means pre-Christian polytheist traditions.
In modern spirituality, it can refer to neo-pagans or Wiccans who consciously revive ancient nature-based religions.
In popular culture, it’s sometimes used loosely to mean “secular,” “hedonistic,” or “non-Christian.”

But even today, many use “pagan” as a pejorative — a way of dismissing something as superstitious, uncivilized, or un-Christian. Ironically, that’s the same weapon once turned against Catholics.

6. My Perspective

When I hear the word pagan, I don’t immediately think of wicked idolaters dancing around golden calves. I think of souls — searching, reaching, fumbling in the dark for light.

That’s how I see the ancient pagans. They weren’t all malicious idolaters. Many were searching for the divine — but without revelation, their worship got distorted.

In that sense, pagan rituals were like fractured mirrors: they reflected genuine religious intuition, but the image was twisted.

Christianity didn’t come from paganism; it fulfilled what paganism longed for.
The philosophers’ “Unknown God” became known in Christ.
The myths of dying and rising gods found their truth in the Cross and Resurrection.
The altars of idols gave way to the altar of the Eucharist.

So, no — Christianity isn’t a baptized paganism. It’s the answer paganism was waiting for.

7. Paganism as a Mirror of Human Desire

In every pagan ritual — from the offerings of the Greeks to the chants of the Druids — there is a human cry for transcendence.

Theologian Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) once wrote:

“The pagan religions are a search for God, a groping in the dark, a reaching out toward the unknown.” — Introduction to Christianity (1968)

The difference is revelation.
Paganism guessed; Christianity knows.
Paganism built altars to many gods; Christianity proclaims one God who built an altar for us.

8. Conclusion: From Pagan to Pilgrim

The word pagan began as a label for outsiders, then became a weapon, and now stands as a reminder of humanity’s restless heart.

When people call Catholics “pagan” for using candles, incense, or feast days, I smile. Those things don’t make us pagan — they make us human. They show that the body, the senses, and the world itself can glorify God.

The early pagans built temples of stone.
The early Christians built temples of souls.
And today, the Church continues to do what she has always done: take the fragments of broken worship and make them whole again in Christ.

“For what you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.” — Acts 17:23

That’s Christianity’s answer to paganism — not condemnation, but revelation.
The unknown made known.
The fragmented made whole.
The search completed in the One who was, and is, and is to come.

Sources & References

Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§27–28, 841.
Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (Knopf, 1986).
Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons (1853).
St. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 46.
St. Clement of Alexandria, Stromata.
Pope Benedict XVI (Joseph Ratzinger), Introduction to Christianity (1968).
Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition, Vol. 1.
Acts 17:16–34; Romans 1:19–25.

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