A Somewhat Slanted Look at the History of the Christian Church – Part VIII

Like many of the later Roman Emperors, Constantine was not Italian. In fact, he wasn’t even “Roman” except technically. He was arguably British. How he became Emperor of Rome and head of the Christian Church makes a wonderful story.

By the time Constantine was in his teens, there were routinely four “emperors” of the Roman Empire at any given time: two in the east and two in the west. The idea was that they would share power and balance one another’s dreams of supreme oppression. So, both in Rome and in one or another cities in what we would today call Turkey, there was generally a ruler called “Augustus”, and another called “Caesar”. One or the other was usually a general, and generally ruled from a tent at the head of his legions. It was a complicated system and it never worked especially well, but it was what it was.

Constantine’s father was named Constantius. Constantius was originally from the eastern part of the empire, but rose through the ranks of the military to be named “Caesar” in the west. In the process, he married a girl named Helena, who seems to have been the descendant of British nobility. Constantius was later laterally promoted to “Augustus” and dumped Helena for Theodora, another Emperor’s daughter. Helena moved to what is now Greece with her son, Constantine, who had been born in Britain. Constantine entered the army and rose quickly through the ranks, eventually ending up on his father’s staff. Most of his army was made up of Brits and Gauls. When his father Constantius died suddenly while on campaign, Constantine replaced him and immediately set out to guarantee his position by force of arms. Since he already held Britain, Gaul and most of Spain, he attacked Italy. At Milvain Bridge, just north of Rome, Constantine (who at this time was a committed pagan) had a vision that included a cross or other Christian symbol in the clouds accompanied by the words (in Latin), “Under this sign, victory”. Constantine had his troops paint the symbol on their shields, and, the next day, won a startling victory. Soon, he moved eastwards, and before long had defeated all his other rivals, as well. He was named Emperor of the whole Roman Empire.

The story goes that he never forgot his debt to the Christian God in winning him his empire, and so he immediately legalized the Church. On his deathbed, several years later, he is said to have been baptized, himself. In the meantime, having legalized the Church, he set out to figure out how he could make use of it. He was astounded to find that there were several competing versions of Christianity, and that they quarreled with one another pretty much constantly. Of most immediate concern to him was what became known as the “Arian” controversy, which threatened to split the newly legalized Church in two, just as it was becoming likely to survive.