203 AD Perpetua’s Vision in Prison

In 203 AD, Perpetua, a 22-year-old noblewoman, and Felicitas, a pregnant slave, were arrested in Carthage with Saturus, Revocatus, and others for refusing Roman sacrifices. Imprisoned in a crowded dungeon, Perpetua recorded visions of heaven and her brother Dinocrates. Governor Hilarian tried them on March 6, ignoring pleas from Perpetua’s father. On March 7, they entered the arena, singing psalms. Bears and leopards mauled them, but gladiators delivered the final blows. Perpetua’s diary, hidden by deacons, detailed their prayers. Relics were buried in a church, and their story spread across North Africa.

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TRANSCRIPT

The prison walls didn’t muffle the cries.

They echoed—piercing, guttural, human.

Some were women. Some were infants. One was a Roman noblewoman, no more than twenty-two, cradling her newborn. Her name was Vibia Perpetua, and she had just refused to deny Christ.

She didn’t look like a rebel. But she was.

She refused to call Caesar “Lord.” Refused to renounce her faith. Refused to abandon her fellow Christians.

And so the empire did what empires do.

They locked her in the darkness, hoping the silence would crush her courage. But Perpetua saw visions in that darkness—visions of a ladder, of heaven, of glory.

She didn’t cry out for pity. She wrote.

In that cell, she kept a diary.

And her words—written in the shadow of death—became one of the oldest surviving writings from a Christian woman in history.

Before we face the arena with her… we need to understand why she was there.

From the That’s Jesus Channel, welcome to COACH—where we are tracing the story of Church Origins and Church History. I’m Bob Baulch.

On Mondays, we stay between 0 and 500 AD.

Today, we step into the year 203 AD, into the heart of Roman North Africa, in the city of Carthage.

Christianity was growing. Quietly. Courageously. But to the Roman authorities, it was a threat—a religion that refused to worship the gods, refused to sacrifice to the emperor, refused to blend into the polite expectations of Roman life.

In this setting, the governor of Carthage—Hilarianus—was enforcing a new edict. Christians were to be arrested and made to swear loyalty to Caesar or face execution.

One of the Christians arrested was Perpetua, a well-educated woman from a noble family. She had recently given birth. She was just starting her adult life.

She had everything to lose.

And yet, she chose to be baptized just before her imprisonment. Along with a group of new believers—Felicitas, Revocatus, Saturus, and Saturninus—she was thrown into a dark, overcrowded cell and told that unless she recanted, she would die in the arena.

But she didn’t recant.

She wrote.

And what she wrote became one of the most haunting, hopeful, and heroic documents in all of early Christianity.

Perpetua’s story comes to us in an unusual form. Part of it is a prison diary—written by her own hand. The rest is a record compiled by an anonymous editor, likely a Christian eyewitness, who preserved the full account after her death.

The combination is powerful. Personal. Emotional. The earliest firsthand testimony of a Christian woman facing death for her faith.

At the beginning of her diary, Perpetua writes (verbatim):

“When my father saw that I was firm in my faith, he came to me and tried to persuade me. ‘Have pity on your father,’ he said. ‘Have pity on your baby son.’”

*(The Passion of Perpetua and Felicitas, sec. 3)*📌

Her father was not a Christian. He begged her to deny Christ—not out of malice, but out of desperation. He loved her. He didn’t want her to die.

But Perpetua answered him si