there was little indication during his lifetime in the first century a.d. that his enthusiastic wanderings and writings would eventually plant Christ’s name in the hearts of literally billions of people during the next two thousand years of world history. In a.d. 112, Pliny the Younger wrote to the emperor Trajan to describe a legal investigation he had undertaken in Bithynia (modern Turkey) following complaints against local Christians. Having tortured a number of them, including young girls, Pliny wrote, he had only really been able to establish that they followed a “bad . . . and
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