Editing Constantinian shift (section)

{{Short description|Political and theological changes}}
[[Image:Raphael-Constantine at Milvian Bridge.jpg|thumb|''Battle of the Milvian Bridge'', [[Raphael]], Vatican Rooms. The artist depicted the troops of Constantine bearing the ''[[labarum]]''.]]
The '''Constantinian shift''' was, according to some [[Christian theology|theologians]] and [[Ancient history|historians of antiquity]], a set of political and theological changes that took place during the [[Christianity in the 4th century|4th-century]] under the leadership of Emperor [[Constantine the Great]]. [[Rodney Clapp]] claims that the shift or change started in the year 200.<ref>{{cite book|
title=A Peculiar People| url=https://archive.org/details/peculiarpeoplech0000clap| url-access=registration|publisher=InterVarsity Press|first=Rodney|last=Clapp|year=1996|page=[https://archive.org/details/peculiarpeoplech0000clap/page/23 23]|quote=What might be called the Constantinian shift began around the year 200 and took more than two hundred years to grow and unfold to full bloom.}}</ref> The term was popularized by the [[Mennonite]] theologian [[John H. Yoder]].<ref>e.g. in {{cite book|
title=The Future of Theology: Essays in Honor of Jurgen Moltmann|publisher = Eerdmanns|year=1996|
editor=Miroslav Volf |editor2=Carmen Krieg |editor3=Thomas Kucharz |first = John H.|last = Yoder|chapter = Is There Such a Thing as Being Ready for Another Millennium?|page=65|quote=The most impressive transitory change underlying our common experience, one that some thought was a permanent lunge forward in salvation history, was the so-called Constantinian shift.}}</ref> He claims that the change was not just freedom from persecution but an alliance between the [[State church of the Roman Empire|State]] and the Church that led to a kind of [[Caesaropapism]]. The claim that there ever was a Constantinian shift has been disputed; [[Peter Leithart]] argues that there was a "brief, ambiguous 'Constantinian moment' in the fourth century", but that there was "no permanent, epochal 'Constantinian shift{{'"}}.<ref>[[Peter Leithart]], ''[[Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom]]'', p 287.</ref>