To what extent did Christianity alter the traditional values and infrastructure of the Roman state? Were these alterations inevitable?

       Christianity began to alter the traditional values and infrastructure of the Roman state when Constantine announced his "Edict of Milan." This is an edict that granted freedom of religion in all of Rome. One of the main differences Christianity made in Roman infrastructure was it created a hierarchy of positions in the government. We see on page 195 of Western Civilizations that the major cities were now required to have a bishop that governed the churches in that area. We also see that there had to be a religious capital of the nation, and this ended up being the city of Rome. Not only did Christianity affect the infrastructure of Rome, but it affected its values as well. One of these value changes was the value of women in society. On page 196 of Western Civilizations, we see that women used to have power in the religious hierarchy, however, with the emergence of Christianity, women did not have power like before. Women were priestesses, and leaders of churches, but now since Christianity became like imperial Rome, it had to "replicate the structures of governance that had been the province of men..." Christianity changed how Rome worked and thought, but the issue still remains if this change was inevitable.
       I think that these changes that Christianity made were not inevitable. As said before, most of the expansion of Christianity (the emergence of political hierarchy, and shifted values) was due to Constantine's allowing freedom of religion. However, Constantine's edict was not expected at all. On page 193 of Western Civilizations we see that Constantine originally associated himself with the cult of Sol for political reasons, but right before he marched on Rome, he supposedly had a vision that converted him to conquer Rome in the name of Christ. This is why Christianity become developed and started to change the structure of Rome, and this was an unforeseen event, so I think that these alterations were not inevitable.