That may be, but we know that Peter never went to Rome in real life, and Catholicism evolved over some 800 years at the earliest to become 'The Church', when its wealth started to become a significant political base. Even then it was never the all powerful force in Europe the Protestant mythology of the the 16th Century invented for it. Feudal princes pretty much decided what was 'legitimate religion' in their own domains right up to the 19th century, with assorted German states still deciding such things even after Bismarck's and Wilhelm I's Federation was formed. It was never remotely successful at stamping out paganism in northern Europe, especially among the peasants.
But, it was far better than the alternatives nonetheless, and gets an undeserved bad rap. I doubt the Greek Orthodox would have done nearly as well, considering the evidence of eastern Europe and Russia over 2,000 years, and of course much of the 'Reformation' Protestantism was in part a neo-pagan revivalism, with a lot of peasant superstition finding full expression in with burnings and other hysterias even in France. The 12th century Church intellectuals rejected the existence of 'witchcraft' and 'magic' as just pagan superstitions, even as Feudal rulers still believed in the nonsense even after allegedly becoming 'Christian'. Clearly they weren't 100% 'converted'.
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