Diarmaid MacCulloch, the eminently readable author of numerous books on ecclesiastical history, gave his bestselling work on the history of Christianity the provocative subtitle ‘The first three thousand years’, making the point that there is much in Christian ritual and iconography that is drawn from pre-Christian practice.
The Catholic Church makes no bones about this. When Pope Gregory I (Gregory the Great; AD 590-604) sent St Augustine of Canterbury on a mission to convert the English to Christianity, he recognised the difficulty of eradicating established cultural practices. Seeking to provide continuity for the new English converts, he advised Augustine not to destroy pagan shrines but to cleanse them with holy water, install relics, and convert them to Christian churches.
Pope Gregory based his advice on the successful Roman practice of syncretism: the integration of local deities into the state religious pantheon. Gregory also recommended adapting local ceremonies and festivals, and this pragmatic approach is often cited as a key method by which Christianity expanded during the early Middle Ages.
