Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli, "Citifying Jesus: The Making of a Roman Religion in the Roman Empire" (Mohr Siebeck, 2024)

Dec 24, 2025

Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli, an Associate Professor at the University of Bologna, dives into the intriguing concept of 'citification'—how early Christianity adapted to urban life. He highlights the intersection of religious studies and urbanity, examining how figures like Justin Martyr and Polycarp shaped Christian narratives within city contexts. Emiliano draws fascinating connections between spatial theory and religious practices, exploring how urban environments influenced the emergence of Christianity, its critique of polytheism, and its unique urban rituals.

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ANECDOTE

Origins At The Max Weber Kolleg

Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli recounts his move to the Max Weber Kolleg and joining an urban religion research project that shaped his book's topic.
He describes five years of intensive interdisciplinary study that produced Citifying Jesus from his habilitation work.

INSIGHT

Citification As Urban Adaptation

Citification measures how religious ideas and practices adapt to urban conditions rather than marking simple geographic urbanization.
Urciuoli argues religion should be explained via the city, reversing the usual hierarchy between religion and urban space.

INSIGHT

Critique Of The Polytheist Spatial Fix

Early Christian writers critiqued the 'polytheist spatial fix' that anchored gods to monumental urban spaces.
They promoted alternative spatial imaginaries that avoided costly, visible temple practices and reimagined sacred presence differently.

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Religion and urban life are the most successful strategies of handling, enhancing, and capitalizing on human sociability. By integrating religious studies, archaeology, and spatial theory, Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli aims to re-describe the formation of Christ religion as urban religion in Citifying Jesus: The Making of a Roman Religion in the Roman Empire (Mohr Siebeck, 2024). Spanning almost four centuries of Christian literature from Paul to Augustine, the author shows that several characteristics commonly attributed to Christ religion are, in fact, outcomes of the distinct ways in which religious agents enact urbanity and interact with the urban space. The study brings the urbanity of religious agents into focus, shedding light on significant elements of religious transformation, innovation, institutionalization, empowerment, and resistance to power. Simultaneously, it explores the key urban features that shaped the emergence and development of Christ religion.

Emiliano Rubens Urciuoli is Associate Professor in the Department of History and Cultures at the University of Bologna. Previously he was a postdoctoral researcher at the Max-Weber-Kolleg of the University of Erfurt and has spent research stays in Paris, Berlin, and Geneva. His research interests focus on the history of the ancient Christ religion, methodological advances in the study of ancient Mediterranean religious groups and traditions, issues of theory and method in the accademic study of religions, and the phenomenon of ancient and contemporary urban religion. He is conversant with issues of political theology, sociology of religion, critical theory of space, and critique of ideology (including religious ideologies).

Jonathon Lookadoo is Associate Professor at the Presbyterian University and Theological Seminary in Seoul, South Korea. While his interests range widely over the world of early Christianity, he is the author of books on the Epistle of Barnabas, Ignatius of Antioch, and the Shepherd of Hermas, including The Christology of Ignatius of Antioch (Cascade, 2023).

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