The Catacombs of Rome, and Their Testimony Relative to Primitive Christianity

by W. H. Withrow

Fig. 130.—Chamber in the Catacomb of St. Agnes, with seats for Catechists and Catechumens.

Some Roman Catholic writers have asserted that these chambers were confessionals: but the chairs are too far apart if one was for the confessor and the other for the penitent, especially with an open door between; and too near, from the liability of the confessions being overheard, if each was a confessional; and in either case the necessity for the stone bench cannot be conceived. In some chambers, probably for the male catechumens, there is only one tufa chair, no deaconess being present.

Another curious chamber in the Catacomb of St. Agnes communicates with the one adjacent to it by a

circular opening cut through the tufa wall about breast-high. It is conjectured that this was for the purpose of allowing the catechumens to hear the public instructions of the faithful without witnessing the celebration of the sacraments. The zeal of the candidates would thus be the more inflamed,[884] that they might be found worthy of admission to the fulness of Christian privilege and to the sacred mysteries hidden from the uninitiate and the unworthy. The following epitaph from the Lapidarian Gallery commemorates a youthful catechumen: VCILIANVS BACIO VALERIO QVE BISET ·(sic) ANN VIIII · MEN · VIII · DIES XXII CATECVM—“Ucilianus to Bacius Valerius, a catechumen, who lived nine years, eight months and twenty-two days.”

The ordinance of baptism receives several illustrations from the monumental evidences of the Catacombs. There are numerous epitaphs of neophytes—a term applied only to newly baptized persons—which indicate that this Christian rite was administered at all ages from tender infancy to adult years; in the latter case the subjects being probably recent converts from heathenism. The following are examples of this class: TEG · CANDIDIS NEOF Q · VXT · M · XXI—“The tile of Candidus, a neophyte, who lived twenty-one months;” FL · IOVINA · QVAE · VIX · ANNIS · TRIBVS · D · XXX · NEOFITA · IN PACE—“Flavia Jovina, who lived three years and thirty days, a neophyte, in peace;” MIRAE INDVSTRIAE ADQVE BONITATIS ... INNOCENTIA PREDITVS FL · AVR · LEONI. NEOFITO QVI VIXIT ANN VI · MENS · VIII DIES XI....—“Innocentia Preditus to Flavius Aurelius Leo, a neophyte of wonderful industry and goodness, who lived six years, eight months, eleven days;” ROMANO NEOFITO BENE MERENTI QVI

VIXIT · ANNOS · VIII · D · XV · REQVIESCIT IN PACE—“To the well-deserving neophyte Romanus, who lived eight years and fifteen days; he rests in peace.” We have already seen the epitaph of Junius Bassus, who died a neophyte at the age of forty-one, and shall presently observe other instances of adult baptism.[885] We find also the epitaph of “two innocent brothers, one a neophyte, the other, one of the faithful.”

In course of time the rite of baptism degenerated into a superstitious charm, and was regarded as a mystical lustration which washed away all sin and was essential to salvation.[886] This change probably resulted from a reaction against the Pelagian heresy, which denied the necessity of baptism, and from the rhetorical exaggeration by the Fathers of the spiritual efficacy of this sacrament.[887] The church of the Catacombs, while duly administering the rite of baptism, did not, after the manner of the Church of Rome and other modern extreme sacramentalists, invest it with regenerative power, nor

regard its involuntary omission as excluding the body from consecrated ground and the soul from heaven.[888]

Sometimes, by a beautiful metonyme derived from its spiritual significance, baptism is indicated as the palingenesis, or new birth, of which it is the appropriate symbol. The following is a characteristic example of this usage: ... CAELESTE RENATVS AQVA (sic)—... “Born again of heavenly water,” (A. D. 377.)[889] We read also of a certain Mercurius, who is described as a boy born and dying in the same year, aged twenty-four. The allusion is to the spiritual regeneration symbolized by baptism. With reference to this he was but a boy—puer—at the time of his death.[890] This rite was also called illumination, and we find in the Catacombs the epitaphs of persons said to be thus “newly illuminated.”