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On october 28th in 312 a.d., emperors maxentius and constantine and their armies met on the banks of the tiber river near the milvian bridge to fight for control of the empire. though constantine's soldiers were outnumbered four to one, he had a secret weapon. >> before the battle, he had a vision in which he saw a sign of the cross in the sky, and the words written over it that said "by this conquer" he didn't know what this meant, so he called in some dream interpreters, and they told him this meant that it was the cross of christ that would allow him to be victorious. and so he arranged to ...

>> the empire at this time was maybe 60 million people, so there might have been something like 3 million christians at this time. and they were known to be a problem throughout the empire, and so dioclesian decided to try and persecute the christians. >> a religion whose founder told people to turn the other cheek now witnessed its followers slaughtered by the thousands in public spectacles. it was another roman emperor, constantine, who came to the rescue. was his vision of jesus just before battle a miracle, or just smart politics to pacify a growing faith?

Saul invictus, the unconquerable sun, a reference to the sun god who in fact was overall. and so was he really a worshipper of the god of jesus or was he a worshipper of the sun god? >> by that time, of course, christians ran in the millions. and i suppose constantine thought.if you can't beat them, join them. and i think with his mother, too, well, he thought that this is true. >> constantine had an influential mother, helena, a devoted christian. she traveled to the holy land and located the most important sites from the christian story, building great shrines that remain among the holiest c...

Utterly and beautifully coherent. about everything, from the smallest detail of your daily life and the community around you through to eternity. this is very compelling. >> some would say it was ultimately power politics, both divine and earthly, with an emperor recognizing the power of the people and their faith. >> it seems to me that what really made the difference in turning what was the whole greco-roman world into christian was essentially the roman government decision. that is to say, christianity was spreading, and it was getting bigger and bigger. but without that decision on constan...

And christianity offering something that appeared to be utterly and beautifully coherent. about everything, from the smallest detail of your daily live and community around you through to eternity. this is very compelling. >> some would say it was ultimately power politics, both divine and earthly, with an emperor recognizing the power of the people and their faith. >> it seems to me that what really made the difference in turning what was the whole greco-roman world into christian was essentially the roman government decision. that is to say, christianity was spreading, and it was getting big...