Racking, scraping, branding, and barbecuing—all these horrors and more were visited on Christ’s unfortunate partisans during the later third century. Yet at the beginning of the fourth century Christians’ troubles abruptly eased. First they were tolerated, then they were embraced, and finally their beliefs and presence were championed. By the time the Roman Empire in the west suffered its fatal collapse in the early fifth century, Christianity was the official imperial religion, and its future as one of the world’s biggest faiths was assured. Much of this was down to the emperor Constantine I.
