Letter 1,24 - to John of Constantinople, Eulogius of Alexandria, Gregory of Antioch and John of Jerusalem, and to Anastasius ex-patriach of Antioch, from the same original. February, 591.
"(For) why is a bishop chosen before the Lord except to intercede on behalf of sinful people? And so with what confidence do I come before Him as an intercessor for other people's sins when I am not secure about my own sins in his presence?
Just suppose somebody appearing before a man of power were to ask that I become his intercessor, and that man of power was both angry with him and unknown to me, I should reply at once; 'I cannot come to intercede, because I have no knowledge of him from a long-time friendship.'
Therefore if I should rightly blush to become an intercessor as a man before another man, about whom I would make no presumption, what great audacity it is to hold the position of the people's intercessor before God, when I do not recognize myself as a friend of His due to a life of merit.
In which matter there is still something else, which I should fear more seriously. For as we all clearly know, when one who displeases is sent to intercede, the mind of an angry party is provoked to a worse state. And I am extremely afraid that the Christian people entrusted to me may perish with the addition of my guilt, whose faults our Lord always used to tolerate with equanimity hitherto. But whenever I somehow suppress this fear and apply my consoled mind to the studies of pontifical work, considering the very immensity of the business, I am terrified."
Cited from: The Letters of Gregory the Great, trans. John R.C. Martyn (Toronto: PIMS, 2004), I: 135.
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