During the middle ages, the Church was fighting off the diffusion of pagan ideas throughout Europe. Despite the Christian teachings of god, purity, and salvation, Pagan ideas still held their force and appeal. One reason may be that the message of Christianity could not be successfully transmitted to the remotest corners of Old Europe, and even when it did people would have to 1) take the message of Christianity as salient to their own lives, and 2) make an effort to inculcate Christian rhetoric in the language of their children (if they deemed it worthwhile). Another factor for the entrenchment of Pagan practices is that to illiterate ruffians, Paganism is attractive because it offers a living mythology as opposed to a dead or pre-scripted mythology as in Christianity. Additionally, the ad-hoc, pray anywhere characteristics of Pagan rituals do not require a priest, a central place of worship, nor a tithing of man's labor. Thus even in the Middle Ages amidst rising Christian fervor, Paganism remained a viable method for negotiating with problems seemingly supernatural.
Historian Franz Cumont, an expert in the shadowy mystic religion Mithraism, points out that Mithraic images of the heavens, earth, ocean, sun, moon, planets, signs of the Zodiac, and the elements, are found on Christian sarcophagi, mosaics, and miniature carvings/figurines from the third to fifth centuries (Cumont). He said of his discoveries, "A few alterations in costume and attitude transformed a pagan scene into a Christian picture." (Cumont) The Mithraic holy father donned a red cap, garment, ring, and shepherd's staff, as does the Pope wear a red cap, garment, ring, and holds a staff. In Mithraism, the priest is called "Father" as in Christianity despite Matthew 23:9, "And do not call anyone on earth 'father,' for you have one Father, and he is in heaven;" the proof that the Mithraic naming of the Priest 'father' overshadowed the gospel Matthew to ...