The majority of these Christians consisted of poor illiterate people, who tried to lead a clean and honest life. Their simple manners and frugal habits contrasted strongly with the luxury of those Greek and Roman patricians among whom they dwelt. They regarded such extravagance with contempt, and the unlimited emancipation and licentiousness of the rich women filled them with horror.
Accordingly they applied to themselves strict rules which would protect them against any temptation. For this reason their women never adorned themselves with jewelry or gaudy dresses of dyed cloth, silk, and embroideries; they never wore false or colored hair. If married, they took care of the house, attended to the children, and were devoted to their husbands, whom they respected as the head of the family. The only occasion for their going out was when they went to church, or to visit some poor or sick neighbor.
Depending on one another, husband and wife endeavored to form that union recommended by the scriptures as the goal of married life.
Such happy nuptial ties inspired Tertullian, a Carthaginian, who came in contact with Christians in Rome, to the following lines: “Whence are we to find language adequate to describe the happiness of that marriage which the church cements and the oblation confirms, and the benediction signs and seals, which angels report and the Father holds as ratified? Together they pray, together prostrate themselves, together they perform their fasts, mutually teaching, mutually exhorting, mutually sustaining.”
Commemorations of conjugal happiness, and commendations of such female virtues as modesty, chastity, prudence and diligence, we also frequently find in many sepulchral inscriptions of the Catacombs, those famous subterranean cemeteries excavated by the early Christians of Rome for the express and sole purpose of burying their dead. There are inscriptions as for instance: “Our well deserving father and mother, who lived together (for 20, 30, 50 or even 60 years) without any complaint or quarrel, without taking or giving offense.”
During the first centuries of Christianity women took a prominent part in all affairs of the church and they were allowed to be active wherever there was a chance to spread the Gospel. In particular, they taught the children, took charge of the orphans, and acted as door-keepers in the assembly rooms, directing the worshipers to their places, and seeing that all behaved quietly and reverently.
The new sect, which in every respect contrasted so strongly with Roman customs and conceptions, could not fail to attract the attention and inquisitiveness of the people as well as of the Government. But also suspicion and hostility were aroused. As the Christians met secretly in private houses, people suspected that they were conspirators banded together for criminal purposes, that they occasionally slaughtered infants, poured their blood into a cup, and that passing this cup around they all drank of it. Their insistance in only one God, that of the despised Jews, and their aim to discredit and overthrow all other creeds of the world in order to fuse all mankind in their own faith, were decried as contempt of those deities, under which Rome had become great and prosperous. Naturally, their enmity against these deities was regarded as enmity against the State, which stood under the protection of these deities. Accused of being apostates and revolutionists, the Christians soon enough became the objects of much bitter persecution; such as has been described by Sienkiewicz in his famous book “Quo Vadis.”
During these persecutions the Christian women shared with their husbands, children and brothers all the horrible cruelties Roman ingenuity could invent. In the arena they were thrown before lions, tigers, bears and other savage beasts. They were crucified, or besmeared with pitch and publicly burned. Worst of all, many of those women who regarded chastity as their highest virtue, were handed over to the keepers of brothels and made victims to the voluptuous passions of the lowest class of people.
But in time the pure and noble ideals which inspired the hearts of those first Christians, began to appeal to the masses of the people. The scriptures of the great apologists Tertullian, Justin, Origenes and others were read and studied with growing interest. And when later on Emperor Constantine, surnamed the Great, for motives of political expediency, favored and adopted the new faith, the triumph of Christianity was secured.
