Vatican Museums

Many inscriptions contain interesting references to the life of the early Christian community; the sector partly displayed to the public relates in particular to meaningful expressions for the "faith" of the ancient Christians and their attitude in relation to death. The invocation of the name of the Lord, for example, expresses confidence in salvific reunification with God; the "communion of the living and the dead" in the dimension of prayer emerges from the exhortations to the dead to pray for their relatives, and also from faith in the "saints", especially martyrs, to whom the souls of the dear departed were "commended"; finally, other inscriptions remember the deceased for the journey of faith they made during their lives.