Title: Constantine I - Commitment to Christianity | Britannica
Headings: Commitment to Christianity of Constantine I
Commitment to Christianity of Constantine I
Final years

Content: Constantine’s refusal to take part in a pagan procession offended the Romans, and, when he left after a short visit, it was never to return. Final years
These events set the course of the last phase of the reign of Constantine. After his defeat of Licinius he had renamed Byzantium as Constantinople, and immediately upon his return from the West he began to rebuild the city on a greatly enlarged pattern as his permanent capital and the “second Rome.” The dedication of Constantinople (May 330) confirmed the divorce, which had been in the making for more than a century, between the emperors and Rome. Rome had long been unsuited to the strategic needs of the empire. It was now to be left in splendid isolation, as an enormously wealthy and prestigious city—still the emotional focus of the empire—but of limited political importance. mosaic
Justinian I (left, holding a model of Hagia Sophia) and Constantine the Great (right, holding a model of the city of Constantinople) presenting gifts to the Virgin Mary and Christ Child (centre), mosaic, 10th century; in Hagia Sophia, Istanbul. Dumbarton Oaks/Trustees for Harvard University, Washington, D.C.
It was perhaps in some sense to atone for the family catastrophe of 326 that Constantine’s mother, Helena, embarked on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Her journey was attended by almsgiving and pious works and was distinguished by her church foundations at Jerusalem and at Bethlehem.