For now, the POD:
528 BA (AD 217)
Middle East
Marcus Opellius Macrinus, former leader of the Praetorian Guard, is declared emperor by his soldiers - the first emperor to be drawn from the Ordo Equestor. One of his first acts as emperor is to continue the campaign against the Parthians. Advancing into Mesopotamia, they discover that the Parthians have once again retreated before they could arrive. Macrinus sends a herald to Persepolis with very aggressive terms for the capitulation of the Arsacids.
Among the concessions are the semi-autonomous kingdoms of Mesene and Elymais in the south of Mesopotamia and Iran, which become Roman client states but continue to be ruled by branches of the Arsacid royal family (much like Armenia). The Parthians retreat to the Tigris.
Upon learning of Caracalla's death, the Dacians begin raiding Roman territory south of the Danube. Macrinus rushes back to Rome during the summer of 528/217 and dispatches his colleague
Adventus to Moesia to deal with the Dacian threat.
Meanwhile, back in Rome...
Upon the death of Zephyrinus, the Pope of Rome, Callistus becomes Pope.
Callistus, a former slave who had spend some time in prison due to a failed banking venture, was freed from hard labor on the treadmill by Zephyrinus, to whom Callistus owed his political career in the Roman church. Prior to his death, Zephyrinus had made Callistus his chief deacon, and his succession to Zephyrinus' office was obvious, if hotly contested from several quarters. Recognizing in him a fellow shark and opportunist, Tertullian lambasts him from Carthage; the Greek
Hippolytus, leading light of the Christian intellectuals in Rome, also claims the title of Pope; while relations between Callistus and Hippolytus remain cordial, their respective followers divide into two bitterly rival camps - the intellectuals standing with Hippolytus and the Christian rank and file falling with Callistus.
Callistus maintains that God had revealed himself to the world in three modes: the Father of the Old Testament, the Son incarnate in Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit following the ascension of Jesus Christ. Hippolytus, like Tertullian, preached that Christ was the incarnation of the divine Logos (originally a Stoic doctrine) which had been present at the creation of the world and which acted as a kind of intermediary between Man and God. Hippolytus' major criticism of Callistus was his laxity in church discipline; he alleged that he permitted bishops guilty of grace offences to remain in office, ordained men who had been married two or even three times, refused to condemn clergy who married, recognized unions (condemned by Roman law) between upper-class women and men of inferior status, and readmitted to the church converts from heretical or schismatic sects without penance. Hippolytus' particular brand of Christianity was much more strict; much like Tertullian, he envisioned the Christians as a community of saints.