The ancient Church stood like an immovable pillar of righteousness amid the tidal wave of debauchery and violence that characterized the public amusements of pagan Rome. While the empire reveled in bloodshed, sensuality, and spectacle, the Christian faith summoned humanity to repentance, purity, and holy joy. In a world enthralled by cruelty masked as entertainment, Christianity offered not escape but elevation—joy rooted in reconciliation with God, delight in virtue, and hope of eternal life.
The Joy of Redemption Versus Pagan Frivolity
Christianity is not a creed of ascetic gloom, but of radiant peace—the peace that surpasses understanding. Its joy springs not from drunken feasts or vulgar entertainments, but from the serene knowledge of forgiveness and divine friendship. “What greater joy,” asks Tertullian, “than reconciliation with God? What sweeter freedom than a cleansed conscience, contempt for worldly pleasures, and fearlessness in the face of death?” In this sacred joy, the early Christians found their strength—earnest, inward, and incompatible with the corrupt amusements of the age.
The Theatre, the Circus, and the Arena
The main arenas of Roman entertainment—the theatre, the circus, and the amphitheatre—were originally linked to religious festivals but had long since become nurseries of vice. The theatre, once a haven of Greek moral drama, had degenerated into a showcase for lascivious comedy, artificial tragedy, and obscene dance. Tertullian saw it as a temple of Bacchus and Venus, feeding lust and drunkenness.
More popular still was the circus, with its horse and chariot races, military displays, wild beast hunts, and athletic contests. The crowds were fanatical. Gibbon describes the masses thronging the seats before dawn, braving sun and storm, their passions roused by color-coded teams, their joy bound to the outcome of a race.
But the most savage of spectacles were the gladiatorial games—ritualized murder, staged for delight. From sunrise to sunset, men fought to the death, and beasts were slaughtered by the thousands. During the inauguration of the Flavian amphitheatre, between five and nine thousand wild animals were slain in a single day. Trajan celebrated his Dacian victories with four months of games, where ten thousand gladiators died. Under Probus, the carnage was unimaginably worse. Carinus outdid them all, elevating spectacle into depravity.
These victims were often criminals, slaves, and prisoners of war—but in times of persecution, Christians too were thrown to the lions. Britons, Germans, Africans, and exotic beasts were imported to satiate Rome’s bloodlust. Domitian stooped even lower, staging battles between dwarfs and women. Even “philosopher-kings” like Marcus Aurelius furnished these entertainments during their absences from the capital.
The Spectacle of Emperors
The emperors lavished fortunes on spectacles as the surest means of public favor. “Bread and circuses” became the rallying cry of Roman contentment. Augustus institutionalized the practice; Nero, though a tyrant, was adored for his generosity in the arena. Vespasian—stingy in all else—erected the marble-laden Colosseum. Titus, after sacking Jerusalem, consigned thousands of Jewish captives to public slaughter. Even Marcus Aurelius indulged the crowd’s appetites. Nero performed on stage. Commodus acted the part of Hercules more than 700 times, killing animals and men from protected positions for applause.
These passions extended far beyond Rome. Amphitheatres dotted the empire, their ruins still visible from Pompeii to Nîmes. The taste for blood, cruelty, and vulgarity was virtually universal. Only Seneca raised a quiet protest, and even he did not denounce the games as murder. Paganism, lacking the concept of the imago Dei, had no true reverence for life. Even the Stoics offered only disdain, not moral condemnation.
The Church’s Counter-Witness
Against this vast structure of public vice, the early Church raised a bold and unwavering protest. There was no room for compromise. The Church declared the spectacles to be a manifestation of “the pomp of the devil,” renounced at baptism and forbidden on pain of excommunication. Converts who returned to the games often relapsed or fell into spiritual despair. Tatianus called them “banquets of terror,” where the soul feasted on blood. Tertullian, even before his Montanist days, wrote vehemently against them.
He reminded catechumens that the Christian life was incompatible with such indulgence. These spectacles, he said, incited rage, lust, and cruelty. Christianity, by contrast, called men to meekness, purity, and self-control. “What a man should not say, he should not hear,” he warned, “and what defiles the lips also defiles the eyes and ears.” The true contest for Christians was not fought with swords or in arenas, but through chastity, charity, and faithfulness.
Tertullian’s Arguments and Warnings
Tertullian dismantled the weak excuses of worldly Christians—those who cited David dancing before the ark or Paul referencing Greek races. He closed his treatise with a vision of the coming judgment, where fleeting pleasures will be weighed against eternal truth. He even went so far as to suggest that all art partook of fiction, and was thus incompatible with the truthfulness demanded by Christ.
In two other works, De Habitu Muliebri and De Cultu Feminarum, he admonished Christian women to avoid public display and theatrical attire. “The handmaids of God,” he urged, “must be visibly distinct from the handmaids of Satan.” Their dress, like their speech and behavior, was to reflect the gospel’s simplicity and chastity.
From Moral Protest to Legal Reform
Initially, the Church’s influence was moral, not legal. But by the fourth century, Christian ethics began to penetrate imperial legislation. Constantine, even after his conversion, continued to entertain the people with bloody spectacles, yet post-Nicaea he issued the first ban on gladiatorial combat in times of peace, and barred such games from Constantinople. This marked the beginning of the end for public murder as entertainment.
Later emperors followed suit. As Lecky observed, “There is scarcely any single reform in the moral history of mankind more significant than the suppression of the gladiatorial games—and this victory belongs almost wholly to the Church.” Few Roman philosophers or statesmen had the courage to denounce the amphitheatre; the Church alone did so consistently, loudly, and without retreat.
