“Constantine’s policies towards paganism were, as noted above, relatively mild. The main pagan practice he forbade was animal sacrifice, which is illegal even in hypertolerant twenty-first-century America.”
Peter J. Leithart, Defending Constantine, The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom (Downers Grove:IVP Academic, 2010), p. 141.
Though for entirely different reasons.
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Yes, that’s well noted.
On the other hand, from Theodosius onwards policies towards the pagans became quite stringent. In a similar way, liberalism was quite tolerant of Christianity when it was newly established as the ruling power. Over time it is becoming more exacting in its demands to bring all things in alignment with its principles. Though it prefers to create fake substitutes for potentially dangerous religions (‘spirit of VII’ Catholicism, liberalized Protestantism, ‘moderate Islam,’ pacifistic Buddhism etc.) rather than enforce atheism.
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