A Festal Letter on the Feast Kept in Every Land

When God the only Son had been made man and had carried out our salvation, those who saw him in those days, the one from whom these blessings flowed, kept no feast. But in our time, land and sea, town and village, though they cannot see their Benefactor with the eyes of the body, keep a feast in memory of all he has done for them. So great is the joy flowing from these celebrations that the streams of spiritual gladness run in every direction. So we now greet Your Piety, both to show the cheerfulness the feast has brought us and to ask your prayers that we may keep it to the end. [a]