Walters, Erik ThaddeusConti, FabrizioGangi, Rossella2024-10-112024-10-112020Gangi, Rossella. "Late Antique Christianity as a Syncretistic Socio-Political Institution in the West". BA Thesis, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy. 2020.https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14490/457Thesis (B.A. in Art History, Minor in Humanistic Studies and Creative Writing)--John Cabot University, Spring 2020.Deconstructing Christian theology and doctrine to its core elements, it is possible to understand Church success in the Roman Empire as the result of Christianity adaptable socio-cultural and institutional structures. Christianity has differentiated itself from paganism and condemned ‘pagan’ religions as false. However, Christianity not only derive from ‘pagan’ beliefs, but it also applied a syncretistic political theology to configure itself into the Western Roman Empire's political and socio-cultural frame. The characteristic Christian doctrine of salvation has pre-Christian antecedents. Salvation is derived from archetypical purificative life-giving fluids like blood and water. Jesus theological function of savior stems from his association with Oriental Mysteries divinities whose birth and death have a regenerative function. The variety of characters in Christianity, such as saint, demons, and angels that work under the control of predominant sun god, display not only Christian nature as a henotheistic religion but also Christianity adaptation of ‘pagan’ divinities and cult to its necessity. Late Antique Christianity and Church establishment in the West resulted from Christianity flexibility and syncretism.53 pagesenAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internationalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Church historyChristianityThesis