The Areopagus sermon, a talk given by St. Paul the Apostle during his pivotal visit to Athens in AD 50-51, is seen by many as a rhetorical masterpiece. During his seminal speech, held at the top of the Areopagus hill, Paul crafted his message to fit the worldview of a pagan culture and philosophical audience, citing the alignment between Christianity’s founding beliefs and those of Greek philosophers, as captured in Acts 17:28: “For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.”
A new exhibition in Athens’ Fethiye Mosque, inside the Roman Agora, will explore this pivotal sermon and the wider influence of Apostle Paul’s visit to the Greek capital for the eventual Christianization of Athens.
Cultural interest in Apostle Paul’s travels, a series of voyages covering more than over 10,000 miles undertaken by Paul after his conversion, has been pieking up in recent years, with many cultural institutions around the Mediterranean hopping on this trend -- from an exhibition held at Thessaloniki’s Museum of Byzantine Culture in 2015 to the Paulist Fathers’ cultural travels “In the Footsteps of Saint Paul,” started in the 2020s.
Road Trips
Paul traveled an impressive number of miles for a traveler of his time, following three major itineraries.
His first trip took him from Antioch, in modern day Turkey, to Galatia, Cyprus and back to Antioch. His second journey focused on Greece, with visits to Thessaloniki, Athens, Ephesus and Corinth. It was during this second journey that he delivered his famous Areopagus sermon.
His third journey, during which he famously wrote the letters to the Corinthians and the letter to the Romans, saw him travel from Antioch to Macedonia, Greece and Jerusalem.
Finally, Paul reached his dream of arriving at the heart of the Roman Empire, the city itself, albeit in tumultuous ways.
In 57 AD he was arrested for taking a Gentile too far into a Temple in Jerusalem and appealed to be judged by Roman Emperor Cesar, a right enjoyed by every Roman citizen. After a challenging sea voyage that included a shipwreck in Malta, Paul arrived in Rome and lived under house arrest awaiting judgment, while continuing to preach the Gospel.
Dialogue
Paul’s Areopagus sermon is certainly one of the highlights of his extensive evangelical mission. Indeed, some of the oratory techniques adopted by Paul hold value in today’s multicultural and diverse world. As explained in the Greek newspaper Proto Tema, Paul’s conversations with Greek philosophers started an ongoing dialogue between pagans and Christians, bridging cultural gaps and creating a pathway for Christianity.
Before his seminal speech, Paul noticed that one of the statues of gods erected in the Areopagus was dedicated to an “Unknown God.” Showing a keen oratory instinct, Paul used this as a bridge to introduce the idea that the Christian God may be a God that the people of Athens were already unknowingly worshiping.
By setting the foundation of his sermon in this commonality of faith, Paul focused on a shared belief held by him and his audience, the fact that God is the ultimate source of existence and purpose. While being culturally sensitive, Paul’s sermon was also bold, urging Athenians to embrace Christianity.
Titled In the Footsteps of Apostle Paul. Apostle Paul in Athens, this travelling exhibition, first presented to the public at the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki in January 2025, is carried out by the Directorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities of Greece’s Ministry of Culture and funded by the Recovery and Resilience Facility.
Part of a wider initiative to celebrate the Apostle Paul’s legacy titled “Cultural Route: In the Footsteps of the Apostle Paul,” it features more than 50 antique artifacts, a program of live music from pagan, ecclesiastical, and Christian traditions and a series of educational games designed to bring to life Paul’s Second Missionary Journey and his impact on spiritual and philosophical dialogue.
