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Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that State acceptance of Christianity (rather than the personal conversion of the emperor) was decisive. The Roman state provided the new church with patronage in the form of land and money, as well as recognizing the status and sanctioning the actions of bishops; and pushed efforts to define orthodoxy at the various councils. Of course the State WAS the emperor.

Sadly, the 'new' interpretations and analysis of Christianity and Rome is not known by many readers - largely due to the exorbitant price of many of the 'specialist' books in which new appraisals can be found. As a result the concept that by the time of Theodosius Christianity had won and any 'non-Nicenes' were sidelined still holds in some peoples' minds. I wish that 'Specialist' publishers would follow in the footsteps of Peter Brown's publishers and lower their prices, even if only a little bit.