John Chrysostom’s Body Brought Back to Constantinople

Not long after this, Proclus the bishop brought back to the church those who had separated from it over the deposition of Bishop John, having calmed their resentment by a wise measure. What it was we must now tell. With the emperor’s permission, he moved the body of John from Comana, where it was buried, to Constantinople, in the thirty-fifth year after his deposition. He carried it in solemn procession through the city and laid it with great honor in the church called the Apostles. By this means the admirers of that bishop were won over and joined once more in communion with the catholic church. This happened on the twenty-seventh of January, in the sixteenth consulship of the emperor Theodosius. But it astonishes me that the envy which has been poured out on Origen since his death spared John. For Origen was excommunicated by Theophilus about two hundred years after his death, while John was restored to communion by Proclus in the thirty-fifth year after his death! So different was Proclus from Theophilus. And thoughtful and intelligent people cannot be deceived about how these things were done, and are still being done. [a]