On Death Cult:

The following was said by Marcus Aurelius the last great Roman Emperor.

The background of Aurelius' view of Christianity is that, one of his early stoic influences, Rusticus, had executed a Christian, Justinian.
Following which Justinian was given the title of a "Martyr" by the Christians.

Christians had come to see themselves as victims of religious persecution, and they took this as a badge of honour.

What Aurelius meant by "dramatic" was that Christians wanted the title of Martyrdom so desperately that they believed that the more gruesome & spectacular death the met, the better chances they had of reaching heaven and of achieving worldly fame.

Once Antoninus, a Roman, executed a few Christians from his province, but then, more Christians came to him in the hope of being martyred, finally even he got tired of killing them and asked them to kill themselves.

In their books the Christians wrote hundreds accounts of how the bloodthirsty Romans wanted to kill them and how they were so firm in their faith that they preferred death.
But in reality:

Infact, the Romans weren't as brutal as the Christians wanted them to be.
When the Romans didn't kill as many of them as wanted to die, the Christians resorted to suicide.

There existed a group of Christians who were called the Circumcellions.
These guys would celebrate with orgies every time one of them killed themselves.

Their behaviour was contagious, some other Christians groups too threatened to commit mass suicide.
They were considered so degenerate that even some Christians disavowed them and called them a 'death sect':

Even later, when Emperor Julian avoided executing Christians, the following was the Christian response:

The Romans couldn't but call the Christians "Deranged men".

In fact, this is how the ordinary Romans saw Jesus Christ (as a donkey) because for them, getting crucified was one of the most shameful things out there.

Translation: Alexamenos (a Christian) worships his God.