The article deals with the specifics of the relationship of Roman statehood and society to Christianity in the first three centuries of its existence. There are three groups of factors that lead to rejection and persecution of Christians, which are correlated with the ideas about the followers of the faith of the Christian Roman administration, the masses and intellectual elite. Such a consideration of the problem of the relationship between Christianity and its surrounding social environment makes it possible to derive the most fundamental causes of the conflict: the claims of the Roman state to the supremacy in the field of religion and Christian universalism, the inconsistency of Christian dogmatic with the ancient world view, social alienation of Christians from society. One of the main factors that led to the solution of these contradictions was the development of the Christian doctrine, its dogmatic and canons, which enabled Christianity to adapt to the social order and spiritual atmosphere of the late-antique society.