Page "Arianism" Paragraph 26

Two days after Theodosius arrived in Constantinople, 24 November 380, he expelled the Homoiousian bishop, Demophilus of Constantinople, and surrendered the churches of that city to Gregory Nazianzus, the leader of the rather small Nicene community there, an act which provoked rioting.

Theodosius had just been baptized, by bishop Acholius of Thessalonica, during a severe illness, as was common in the early Christian world.

In February he and Gratian had published an edict that all their subjects should profess the faith of the bishops of Rome and Alexandria ( i. e., the Nicene faith ), or be handed over for punishment for not doing so.