How Did Christianity Reach Rome?
Christianity probably reached Rome quite early and organically, through the Roman trade and travel networks. The first Roman Christians were probably Jewish converts or Gentile sympathisers connected to Rome's substantial Jewish community. Faith in the Risen Lord seems to have been most common amongst the poor who lived in the marshy (and malarial) low land near the River Tiber. The current part of Rome known as Trastevere is thought to be as one such area. Paul's letter to the Romans, written around 57 AD, and before he visited the city, addresses an already-established Christian community in Rome. That confirms the movement reached Rome independently of Paul's own missionary work, probably within a few years of Jesus' death.
The Roman historian Suetonius records that the emperor Claudius expelled Jews from Rome, around 49 CE, due to disturbances "at the instigation of Chrestus,". That is widely, though not universally, interpreted by scholars as a garbled reference to disputes involving early Christian claims about Christ within Rome's Jewish community. If so, it is a rare piece of independent non-Christian evidence for Christianity's early presence in Rome.
Paul himself later travelled to Rome as a prisoner, as recounted at the end of Acts, arriving around 60 CE. Early tradition holds that both Paul and Peter were eventually martyred there under Nero, following the great fire of Rome in 64 CE, which Tacitus says Nero blamed on Christians. That is also independent, albeit hostile, confirmation that a recognisable Christian community existed in Rome within a generation of Jesus’ death and resurrection.
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