Epistolae

SS. LUPI ET EUPHRONII EPISTOLAE. EPISTOLA PRIMA. LUPUS TO THE LORD POPE SIDONIUS. I give thanks to the Lord God, our Jesus Christ, through the Holy Spirit, who, dearest brother, in this general shaking and oppression of His most beloved spouse the Church, has called you to the priesthood for her support and consolation, so that you may be a lamp in Israel, and just as you have pursued the ambitious honors of worldly military service with the highest praise, so may you, with Christ Himself helping, run eagerly through the laborious duties and humble ministries of heavenly service, and not, like lazy farmers, turn your eyes back to the plow once your hand is applied to it. You have attained imperial dignities through the most glorious affinities; you have exercised the trabeal ornaments and splendid prefectures, and whatever the restless chain of desires can imagine for itself more blessed in the world, honorifically and amid tumultuous applause. The order has changed, and in the house of the Lord you have reached the summit, which is to be handled not in the exuberant splendor of worldly pride, but in the greatest depression of the mind and the humble abjection of a prostrate heart.

You who once strove to surpass the honors of your birth with added dignities, and did not believe it sufficient for a man to be equal to others and not to overstep his equals, have come into that state in which, though you are superior to no one, you must consider yourself inferior to all; placed beneath the least of your subjects, you will be the more honored the more the humility of Christ girds you, and you will kiss the feet of those above whose heads you once disdained to place your own feet. Indeed, this labor now falls upon you, that you be the servant of all, who seemed the master of all, and that you bow to others, who trampled upon the rest—not because you were proud, but because by the majesty, not to say vanity, of past dignities, you were to surpass others as much as you must now recede before them. Therefore, apply your talent now to divine matters, you who were so powerful in human ones. Let your people gather from your mouth the thorns from the head of the Crucified, who from your words gathered roses from worldly pomp; and let them take from the speech of the priest the words of heavenly discipline, who took from the speech of the ruler the norm of civil discipline. I am the same who loved you so much when you followed the aridity of the world; with what measure do you think I now love you, who follow the fertility of heaven? I am already dissolving, and my dissolution is near, but I will not have thought myself dissolved, who, though loosed, live in you, and you in the Church, which I leave behind. I rejoice to have been stripped, after I have clothed the Church, and the Church has clothed you.

Brave in ancient friendship, but new in brotherhood. The latter title suppresses the former; there is nothing today that I would wish to recall from past affection, when present dignity makes love both stronger and more tenacious. If only God would allow me to embrace you! But in spirit I accomplish what I cannot in body, and in the presence of Christ I no longer venerate and kiss the prefect of the republic, but the bishop of the Church, who are to me a son in age, a brother in dignity, and a father in merits. Pray for me, that I, perfected in the Lord, may complete the work He has enjoined, and that I may finally fulfill in it the time that remains, I who have fulfilled so many and such great things (alas for me!) with those things I ought not to have done, but with the Lord there is mercy. Be better than I. LETTER II. From the holy bishops Lupus of Troyes and Euphronius of Autun, to Talasius, bishop of Angers. Concerning solemnities, and concerning bigamous clerics, and those who are assumed while married.

To the holy lord and brother most blessed, Talasius the bishop, venerated with worship and honor in Christ, Lupus and Euphronius, bishops together placed. We have examined the memorandum that was sent through the subdeacon Arcontius; to it we have taken care to respond to your sanctity, as you requested. The vigil of the Lord's nativity is to be celebrated in a far different manner from the vigil of Easter: because here the readings of the nativity are to be read, but there those of the passion. The solemnity of the Epiphany also has its own special observance. These vigils, or at the very least, either through the whole night, or certainly toward the approach of morning, are to be observed; the paschal vigil, however, is rarely prolonged from evening until morning. Then, in the vigil of Easter, readings from various books are to be recited, which entirely contain something of the prefiguration or prophecy of the passion; in the aforementioned vigil, however, as it shall seem fit, between psalmody and reading, whether from the prophets or from the New Testament, whatever one wishes, he will presume not by a prescribed but by a voluntary reading. Concerning clerics who are bigamists, the Church permits and tolerates them up to the doorkeepers; and whatever rule a priest has assumed for himself according to his own strictness, he will lawfully observe. But it entirely excludes exorcists or subdeacons from second marriages.

But as for the begetting of children by those whom we take as married men, it would be better, if it could be done, to prevent it: it is better not to take them at all than afterwards to dispute about them with various conflicting opinions, since it is better to exclude all causes of debate, so that whoever does not wish to have children begotten in the clergy should not place married men at the altar. We have set forth these matters in the discourse of this letter according to the custom of our churches, which have one rule. If anything can be added in strictness for the honor of the Lord, and if we cannot imitate it, we will praise it for the Lord's honor. For we do not allow those already enrolled in the service of the Church to pass to second marriages; and after they have been admitted, we completely bar them even from first marriages—only exorcists and subdeacons, however. But in the Church of Autun, even a doorkeeper placed in the lowest office, if he takes another wife, is completely removed from office. Subdeacons, moreover, ought to approach one another for the kiss of peace in the sacristy; but at the altar, they are not permitted to do so except when they hand the corporals to the deacon or receive what is brought back; but for the kiss of peace, it is by no means allowed to them. But if anyone of that madness—whether exorcist, or subdeacon, or even, as mentioned above, doorkeeper—binds himself to a second marriage, he is completely barred not only from office but also from communion.

(You have below several letters of Ruricius and Sidonius of Rhegium to Lupus of Troyes, transcribed.)