Quote from Letter 4,39 to clergy, senate and people living in Ortona. August 594.
But know this, that if it is necessary and he can find men worthy of this office, we have given him the license to ordain priests and deacons. Thus, in obedience to the church, a bishop may be sought who has no reason to disagree with the venerable canons and who can be found worthy of such a great ministry.
When he has been requested with the solemnity of a decree, reinforced by the signatures of all, and accompanied by a letter of the visitor, let him com to us for ordination. Before all else, take care that you do not presume to elect a layman, whatever his way of life and merit.
Cited from: The Letters of Gregory the Great, trans. John R.C. Martyn (Toronto: PIMS, 2004), I: 319
About Me & About the Project
- Arnold Smeets
- BIO - I am a theologian. Radio broadcaster at Dutch Public Broadcast Organisation KRO-NCRV and Senior Research Fellow at CPO (Centre for Patristic Studies), the Netherlands. In 2007 I took my degree cum laude at the Faculty of Catholic Theology of the University of Tilburg on a semiotic analysis of three letters of Pope Gregory the Great (Ad Leandrum, concerning his own conversion, and Ep. xi,37 and Ep. xi,56, two instructions on the mission of the English). PROJECT - Every few days I'll blog a paragraph and twitter a line from one of Gregory the Great's Letters. Passages from the letters are quoted with kind permission of the publishers, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto, Canada.
No comments:
Post a Comment