Those 5000 converts Peter bagged would be deemed irredeemable heretics in just a few years/decades as a result of all the changes occurring in 'Christian' dogma, strictures, and theology. The specifications of the new religion wouldn't be hammered out in large part for a few centuries, and considering the schism rate remains astonishingly high ~2000 years later, it is reasonable to conclude the religion was never hammered out completely at all.
The granting of a pardon is an imputation of guilt, and the acceptance a confession of it.
