The Apostle Paul was the first to spread Christianity in Illyria. Paul writes: “So I completed the good news of Christ from Jerusalem all the way to Illyria. In doing so, I used my honor to preach where Christ’s name had already been mentioned.”[1]

The new faith was quickly accepted by the Illyrian people. Initially the lower classes of the population became Christians, and later the higher ones too. The Illyrian Christians built their churches everywhere and very quickly. According to church sources, Proclus and Maximus were cruelly persecuted during the time of the Roman Emperor Hadrian (117-138). They were the teachers of the Dardanian martyrs, Flori and Lauri from Ulpiana near Prishtina, who suffered the sad fate of their teachers because of their love for Christianity and their service to it. There is much evidence that (Christian) Illyrian missionaries suffered from Roman persecution. Emperor Constantine I the Great finally brought a decisive change. The Christian religion was officially recognized in the Edict of Milan in 313. In 325 the First Ecumenical Council took place in the presence of the Emperor and Pope Libertus. Among 318 representatives of the entire Christian world, the Illyrian bishops Budi from Stobi, Domi from Sirmium, Protogenus from Sardica are mentioned in the council acts of Dacus from Shkupi (Skopje).

Reference

1. The Bible, New Testament, Albanian translation 1991-94, Tirana, Lajmi i Mirë, 15.19, p.1606.