In second century Roman society especially in the East the upper classes were hyper-local and chauvinist. The “well-off poor” and commercial classes were cosmopolitan and (more) universalist.
It was in this lower middle “half-educated” and newly mobile and anxious group that the Eastern mystery cults found popularity, and of course Gnostic and Pauline Christianity.
Also interesting that the Roman patricians remained pagan very late, some into the Fifth Century, because the old polytheistic religions were institutionally bound to civic identity
I have my issues with the Odyssey film but “did you piss of the gods” was a big question in antiquity and the 3rd century gave the elites reason to think someone might have
