Edict of Thessalonica

The Edict of Thessalonica, also known as Cunctos populos, was delivered on 27 February 380 by Theodosius I, Gratian, and Valentinian II in order that all their subjects should profess the faith of the bishops of Rome and Alexandria. The edict was issued shortly after Theodosius had suffered a severe illness in Thessalonica and was baptized by Acholius of Thessalonica, the bishop of that city.Ferguson, McHugh, Norris (1999), p. 1126 It is commonly asserted that this edict made Christianity the State church of the Roman Empire.
==Background==
The emperor Constantine I converted to Christianity in 312. By 325 Arianism, a type of christology which denied the Trinity, had created enough problems in Early Christianity that Constantine (who had little patience for the finer points of theology) called the Council of Nicaea in an attempt to establish an empire-wide orthodoxy and end the controversy. The council produced the original Nicene Creed, which rejected Arianism and upheld the Trinity.Williams & Friell, (1994) pp. 46–53
However, the strife within the Church did not end with Nicaea. Constantine, while urging tolerance, began to think that he had come down on the wrong side, and that the trinitarians—with their fervent persecution of Arians—were actually perpetuating strife within the Church. Constantine was not baptized until he was near death (c.327), and then he chose an Arian bishop, Eusebius of Nicomedia, to perform the baptism.
Constantine's son and successor in the east, Constantius II was sympathetic to the Arians, and even exiled Nicene bishops. Constantius' successor Julian the Apostate was a pagan whose declared toleration for all the various Christian sects encouraged the less powerful in their disagreements. Julian's successor in turn, Jovian, while Christian, only reigned for 8 months and never entered Constantinople. He was then succeeded in the east by Valens who was an Arian.
By 379, when Valens was succeeded by Theodosius, Arianism was widespread in the eastern part of the Empire, while the west had remained staunchly Nicene. Theodosius, who had been born in Hispania was himself a Nicene Christian and very devout. In August, his counterpart in the west Gratian took steps toward legal persecution of heretics in the west. This was followed shortly by the jointly issued Edict of Thessalonica.
==Text==
==Importance==
The Edict was issued under the influence of Acholius, and thus of Pope Damasus I, who had appointed him. It re-affirmed the "Catholic" (i.e. universal and orthodox) Faith as the sole legitimate expression of the Apostolic Faith, which was "delivered to the Romans by the divine Apostle Peter, as it has been preserved by faithful tradition." After the Edict, Theodosius spent a great deal of energy suppressing Arianism and other heretical sects, and in establishing Nicene orthodoxy throughout his realm. 
The Edict was followed in 381 by the First Council of Constantinople, which affirmed the Nicene Symbolum and gave final form to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Boyd (1905), p. 45 In 383 the Emperor ordered the various non-Nicene sects (Arians, Anomoeans, Macedonians, and Novatians) to submit written creeds to him, which he prayerfully reviewed and then burned, save for that of the Novatians. The other sects lost the right to meet, ordain priests, or spread their beliefs.Boyd (1905), p. 47 Theodosius prohibited the residence of heretics within Constantinople, and in 392 and 394 confiscated their places of worship.Boyd (1905), p. 50
==Notes==
==References==
*Boyd, William Kenneth (1905). The Ecclesiastical Edicts of the Theodosian Code, Columbia University Press
*Ferguson, Everett; McHugh, Michael P.; Norris, Frederick W. (1999). Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, Taylor & Francis ISBN 0-8153-3319-6
*Williams, Stephen; Friell, Gerard (1994). Theodosius: The Empire at Bay, B.T. Batsford Ltd. ISBN 0-300-06173-0
Category:Religion and politics
Category:Christian terms
Category:380
Category:Christianity under the Roman Empire
Category:Christianity in Late Roman Thessalonica
Category:4th-century Christianity