 Hello, my name is Philip Campbell, and I am the author of Story of Civilization, and I want to thank you for joining me on what promises to be a fascinating journey through the Middle Ages, over a thousand years of history that's going to take us through one of the most colorful periods of human history. Now, in Volume 1, we began with the earliest civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Near East. We saw the origin of writing, building, and many other of the accomplishments that make civilization possible. We saw pagan civilization reach its height with the glory of ancient Greece and Rome, and then in the fullness of time, the coming of the Son of God to bring the world out of darkness and into the light of the gospel. History is a story. It's one long tale. In Book 1, we looked at the first part of the tale, and in Book 2, we're going to move on to the next part. Have you ever noticed that great stories are always told in stages? Compare Star Wars, or Lord of the Rings. They're typically told in different parts. Volume 2 picks up after the Edict of Milan, when the Christian Emperor Constantine had legalized Christianity. This is the beginning of what we call Christendom, a period lasting over a thousand years when the Christian faith formed the basis of society. We're going to learn a lot of fun things in this book. We're going to talk about knights, castles, crusades, saints like Benedict, Patrick, Catherine of Siena. We're going to learn about medieval law, customs, the lives and deeds of kings, battles, and even the daily life of peasants. So let's begin. Chapter 1 begins talking about how Christian Europe grew out of the Roman Empire. Have you ever noticed how children look like their parents? Things that come from other things tend to have a resemblance, and just like kids look like parents, Christian Europe resembled the Roman Empire in some ways. Early Christianity existed within the Roman Empire, but gradually, as Christianity became the dominant religion, it inherited the laws and culture of Rome. It remained very much the same at first, just like a young child is very much dependent on its parent. But eventually things changed. The Gospel took the clay of those old pagan institutions and molded it in the image of the faith, and the result was Christendom. Christendom refers to the time and place where society was based on the teachings of Jesus Christ. This story is largely about Christendom. It's origins, growth, and full maturity. But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Our story starts when we still had just the Roman Empire. The year was 313, and the Empire was still split into eastern and western halves. The Christian Emperor Constantine in the west, and the pagan Emperor Lysinius in the east. The two had made a peace treaty after Constantine's victory at the Milvian Bridge, which we learned about at the end of Book 1. But they didn't really get along well after that, and they certainly didn't trust each other. They kept on invading each other's territory and bickering until finally Constantine marched east and got rid of him in the year 324, at which point Constantine became the sole ruler of the Roman Empire. How did things begin to change under Constantine? Constantine was the first Christian Emperor, and under his rule many things began to develop. He patronized the building of many churches, many splendid churches, the biggest of which were called Basilicas. A basilica is any very large or important church, and many basilicas from the time of Constantine still survive today. He also passed laws trying to instill society with a Christian ethic, for example laws forbidding gladiatorial fights and other laws that improved the treatment of slaves. He wanted the Empire's laws in as much as was possible to be based on the Gospel. But the biggest change under Constantine was the moving of the capital city from Rome to Byzantium on the Helispont, which is the point where Europe and Asia meet each other. This was right where east met the west. And he changed the name of the city from Byzantium to Constantinople, which means city of Constantine. Constantinople was founded in the year 330, and he wanted his new capital to be comparable to old Rome. Outside of the Coliseum he built a hippodrome, which is a massive track for chariot racing. It had its own senate, its own monuments, its own churches, and once Constantine set up his court there, most of the important people in the Empire flocked to Constantinople to be close to the imperial court, which was the seat of power. Now this new era was not without its challenges. Yes, Christianity was rising and becoming the dominant religion in the Empire, but with its rise it brought about the spread of heresies. Now heresy is defined as the abstinent denial of some aspect of the Catholic faith. In Constantine's time, the most popular heresy was Arianism. Arianism was named for a priest called Arius, who taught that Jesus was not divine. He was exalted, he was powerful, almost like a great angel, but he was not equal with God, he was not divine. This caused turmoil throughout the church, and there was such confusion that the Emperor Constantine had to call the first ecumenical council at Nicaea. An ecumenical council is when bishops from the Universal Church in Union with the Pope all gather together in a meeting to discuss matters of doctrine and discipline. The council examined the teachings of Arius and declared that he was wrong. The council taught that Jesus was divine and Arius was condemned. The most memorable part of the council was the Nicene Creed, which was a statement of faith, belief in Jesus' divinity, which you probably recognize that we recite every Sunday at Mass. After Constantine's death, there was rivalry amongst his heirs. Eventually his nephew, Julian, came to the throne in 361. Now, Julian's an interesting character. He was raised as a Christian, but after he became Emperor, he abandoned Christianity and returned to paganism. And for that reason, he's known as Julian the Apostate. An apostate is someone who had embraced Christianity but subsequently abandons it. Julian forbid Christians from becoming teachers. He rebuilt the pagan temples. He wrote philosophical books against Christianity, tried to do anything he could to stall the growth of the church. But it didn't have much effect. He ended up dying in battle two years later and was the last pagan leader of the Roman Empire. Not that Christian emperors couldn't give the church a hard time too. For example, Emperor Theodosius, he reigned from the years 379 to 395. He was a very zealous Christian, but he had a bad temper. One time after one of his officials was killed in the city of Thessalonica, he got angry and ordered his soldiers to slaughter 7,000 people of the city in order to teach them a lesson. Now, we actually talk about this in the book. In chapter one, there's a story about Theodosius' deed and his conflict with Bishop Ambrose. Ambrose of Milan was one of the most eminent churchmen of the day. And when he heard of this massacre, he forbid Theodosius from entering the church until he repented. Theodosius tried to come to church and Ambrose literally blocked the door. When Theodosius saw that his actions had put him outside the communion of the church, he eventually repented of his deeds and was reconciled. By the time of Theodosius, the majority of the Roman Empire was Christian. Theodosius and his successors passed laws making Christianity the official religion of the Empire. And the pagan cults, the old pagan sacrifices were outlawed. And so by about the year 400, you have the formal establishment of Christianity as the legal official religion of the Roman Empire. So the church was growing, things were looking great. As for the Roman Empire itself, things are not looking so great. In our next chapter, we're going to look at the end of the Roman world as it succumbs to attacks by Visigoths and other barbarians. Christian civilization was dawning, but the Roman world was crumbling. So stay tuned. In our next chapter, we are going to talk about the collapse of the Roman Empire.