On Concord

Below you can read a fragment from the very first letter from Gregory the Great. One would expect something special. But no, the huge collection of (kept) letters, almost begins at random. It seems business as usual.

Letter 1,1 - to all the Bishops in Sicily. September 590

"(Y)ou ought to settle with moderation (...) all that concerns the interest of the province itself, and of its churches, whether to lighten the burden of the poor and oppressed, or to admonish all men and those whose faults happen to have been proved.

Let hatred, the source of wrongdoing, be far removed from this synod [i.e. a planned synod of the bishops of Sicily], and let mutual envy and all too detestable discord of minds, fade away within you. Let concord, pleasing to God, and love recognize you as his priests. Therefore carry out all of these things with that maturity and tranquility, so that the synod can most worthily be called episcopal."

Cited from: The Letters of Gregory the Great, trans. John R.C. Martyn (Toronto: PIMS, 2004), I: 119.