(WR) Romans v. Christians (or not)

Here is Professor Candida Moss of the University of Notre Dame on the persecution of early Christians by the Romans (in the current issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education):
"There is no doubt that Romans executed Christians, just as they executed other social and political subversives. There is even evidence to suggest that there were brief periods (AD 257-58 under Valerian and 303-5, Diocletian's tetrarchy) when Christians were deliberately singled out by Roman legislators and administrators. But Christians were not the victims of sustained persecution by the Romans, as has been mythologized in popular imagination. For the vast majority of the pre-Constantinian period, Christians flourished."
You can find the whole article, which is nuanced and charitable about the reasons for the growth of the mythology, at: http://chronicle.com/article/The-Myths-Behind-the-Age-of/137423/