LOL!! That's ridiculous! Christianity is defined as followers of Christ. How can Constantine be more important? Only an idiotic Atheist can say such a stupid thing!
I think we're talking on a different level. Doctrinally, Christ of course more important than Constantine. Historically, Constantine's decision to make Christianity the official religion of the strongest and most populous empire of the day hugely spurred it's subsequent popularity. Claiming that someone else is actually more important than the most doctrinally important figure in a movement has a degree of irony to it, that was really the whole point. It seems you are a person differently abled when it comes to irony, so, I apologize, and shall attempt less subtlety with you in the future.
Constantine SUPPOSEDLY converted to Christianity on his death bed.
Constantine converted around 312, but like most pagan rulers who converted to Christianity, he was not the most studious of followers. He did a heaping of evil throughout his time, as well as hedging his bets a bit and showing some remaining reverence to the traditional gods and religion his people had held to since time immemorial in addition to the new fangled, eastern crap called Christianity his mother believed in that he thought might be strong because he won a battle once with crosses on his shields. He still did more to popularize the religion than anyone before or since, and, in the Nicaean council, which he called in 325, he laid down the basic trinitarian theology that would largely guide the religion for the rest of its history. In that, he's probably had more effect on the theology of Christianity than whatever remained of Jesus's actual thought in the bible after decades of people altering it to sexy it up and misattributing things to him before the four different conflicting versions of his life were actually written down.
Christians were persecuted threw out the empire, but it was Diocletian who really persecuted all the Church leaders.
Christians had been persecuted since before the 100's, basically from the time it was decided that they weren't Jews. Only Jews had the exemption of paying respect to the emperor, because they were old and the Romans had respect for old things. In refusing to honor the Gods of their people, Christians were often blamed for natural disasters and such, it was assumed the Gods were punishing the whole for their toleration of Christians. However, before Diocletian, you pretty much had to try to be persecuted by the Roman authorities. They didn't bother to do regular investigations, informers were usually just ignored, and Christians could get it of it by rote recitation of some pagan words, after which no questions would be asked. Diocletian made it a fairly central policy, but even then it was not uniformly enforced by the other emperors in his tetrarchy - him and the other eastern emperor enforced it in their domain, the two western emperors largely didn't care. Then Constantine came onto the scene and abruptly did a 180.
Whatever, Diocletian is still my favorite emperor ever.
Many of the so called Church leaders ratted/snitched out the identity of their fellow Christians and they were slaughtered. The snitches were rewarded by keeping their positions as church leaders. Those who resisted were martyred. The Donatists did not recognize the authority of the Church leaders because they had led the sheep to slaughter.
Doesn't sound like much of a reward, IMO, to be non-punished.
There was an African governor who, during Diocletian's persecutions, required nothing of potential Christians but that they hand over their holy books to prove their faith in the Gods. After Constantine, these guys were forgiven, but a schismatic movement called Donatism emerged which rejected these converts. I believe this is the original source of your story, exaggerated by whatever fanatics you read.
Eventually the Emperor seen the money Christianity was generating(from people and widows leaving them their fortunes) and put his own relatives in positions of power within the Church.
Eh, I don't think Constantine did that, too new to the whole thing. Various offices in the church have over the years been occupied by relatives of powerful people on and off. The church was a good place for a family to put an extra son they didn't want feuding with the firsts claim. Of course, these attempts failed as often as they succeeded - such as when the Borja family tried to build their own personal empire out of the papal states when one of their own, Pope Alexander VI, got elected, and then he died and the papa enclave almost immediately thereafter elected him with the Borja's biggest enemy, Pope Julius II.
As for corruption, meh, that's just one of the things that happens, whatever theology or ideology you hold to would inevitably turn out to be just a bad, and anyway, I just don't give a rats ass. Calling the whole church corrupt forever, in contrast to your own apparently perfect, true theology, is a protestant trope as old as shit, it isn't any more enlightening now that you've reiterated for the millionth time, or interesting to me as a history of the church.
The Christian Church was corrupted long ago and became no better then the Pharisees.
Well, at least they're not the Essenes.
