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1…. In view of our
office, we are not free to dissemble or to keep silent, for our zeal for the
Christian religion ought to be greater than anyone's. We bear the burdens of all
who are heavy laden, or rather the blessed apostle Peter bears them in us, who
in all things, as we trust, protects and defends those who are heirs of his
government.
2. That Arians must not be rebaptized. At the beginning of your page, you
have observed that many who were baptized by the wicked Arians are hastening to
the catholic faith, and that some of our brethren wish to baptize them again:
this is illegal, being forbidden by the apostle, by the canons, and in a general
order sent to the provinces by my predecessor Liberius of revered memory, after
the quashing of the Ariminum council. As has been laid down in synod, we admit
these persons, in common with Novatianists and other heretics, into the
congregation of catholics, only through the invocation of the sevenfold Spirit,
by the laying on of hands of a bishop. All the East and West keep this rule; and
in future it is by no means fitting that you, either, should deviate from this
path, if you do not wish to be separated from our college by sentence of the
synod.
3. That baptism is only to be bestowed, save under stress of necessity, at
Easter and Pentecost..... Up to now there have been enough mistakes of this
kind. In future all priests must keep the above rule who do not wish to be torn
away from the solid apostolic rock upon which Christ build the universal Church.
4. That renegades to heathenism are to be excommunicated and, if penitent, to
be reconciled only at death.
5. That a girl who is betrothed may not be married to another man.
6. That Christians who, after penance, return to heathen lusts, are to be
denied Communion.
7. That unchaste ‘religious’ are to be expelled from their convents.
8-11 That married men, after ordination, are not to cohabit with their wives.
9. Why did He admonish them to whom the holy of holies was committed, Be ye
holy, because I the Lord your God am holy? [Lev. 20:7]. Why were they commanded
to dwell in the temple in the year of their turn to officiate, afar from their
own homes? Evidently it was for the reason that they might not be able to
maintain their marital relations with their wives, so that, adorned with a pure
conscience, they might offer to God an acceptable sacrifice. After the time of
their service was accomplished they were permitted to resume their marital
relations for the sake of continuing the succession, because only from the tribe
of Levi was it ordained that any one should be admitted to the priesthood.
10. Wherefore also our Lord Jesus, when by His coming He brought us light,
solemnly affirmed in the Gospel that He came not to destroy but to fulfil the
law. And therefore He who is the bridegroom of the Church wished that its form
should be resplendent with chastity, so that in the day of Judgment, when He
should come again, He might find it without spot or blemish, as He taught by His
Apostle. And by the rule of its ordinances which may not be gainsaid, we who are
priests and Levites are bound from the day of our ordination to keep our bodies
in soberness and modesty, so that in those sacrifices which we offer daily to
our God we may please Him in all things.
12. That digamists are not to be ordained.
13. What qualifications are necessary for the several Orders;
14. What for a layman who, in middle life, wishes to be ordained.
15. That digamist clerks are to be deposed.
16. That superfluous women are to be removed from the houses of clerks.
17. That monks might well be ordained.
18. That, as no clerk may be put to penance and remain a clerk, so a layman,
after penance, is disqualified for Holy Orders.
19. That, where penitents, digamists, and such as have married widows, have
been ordained, they must not be promoted to higher rank.
20. The contents of this letter are to be communicated to other provinces in
Spain and followed. We have explained, as I think, dearest brother, all the
matters of which you complained, and to every case which you have referred, by
our son Bassian the presbyter, to the Roman Church, as to the head of your body,
we have I believe returned adequate replies. And now we urge the mind of your
brotherhood more and more to observe the canons and keep the decretals which
have been framed, so that what we have replied to your inquiries you may bring
to the notice of all our fellow bishops, and not only of those who are in your
diocese: but let what we have profitably ordained be sent, with your letters
also, to all the Carthaginians and Baeticans, Lusitanians and Gallicians, and to
those in the provinces adjoining your own. And though no priest of the Lord is
free to be ignorant of the statutes of the apostolic see, or the venerable
provisions of the canons, yet it would be more useful, and, on account of the
seniority of your priesthood, a very high honour for you, beloved, if those
things which have been written generally, and to you especially by name, were
brought by your care to the notice of all our brethren; so that what has been
profitably drawn up by us, not without consideration, but with care and great
caution and deliberation, may remain inviolate, and that the way may be stopped
for all excuses in future, which are now open to no one among us. Issued on the
11th February, in the consulship of Arcadius and Bauto.
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