To Sabinianus, Bishop of Jadera, on Breaking with Maximus

Gregory to Sabinianus, bishop of Jadera. If you had taken the trouble to weigh with careful thought the rule of the church’s government and the order of ancient custom, no fault of unlawful presumption would have crept up on you, and others would not have been put in danger through your sin. Now there is no doubt that you knew this: certain things had come to our ears about Maximus that were no slight bar to his advancement to the priesthood, and so we had not given our consent to it. It was our will that he should not reach what he was striving after until there had been sufficient satisfaction about the things that were said. But when you should by all means have kept to this, it turned out instead that he, snatching at the office of bishop with the greed of a blind mind, led you unwarily to favor him in spite of our prohibition. Even then, so that the things reported to us should not go unexamined, he was summoned by letters from us to come here. And when he was so perversely inclined as to put it off, we took care to warn him in repeated letters, on pain of being barred from communion, to put aside all excuses and hurry to us to clear himself. But he chose to submit to excommunication rather than show obedience. The result, dreadful to say, is that the depravity of his perverse disposition draws others into his own ruin. [a]

Now, however, since we have learned that you dissent from his wickedness, we urge you by this letter, so that it may profit your soul to have cut yourself off from him, even if late, that from now on you neither hold communion with him nor mention his name in the sacred solemnities of mass. We urge you also to come to us without delay, and indeed to bring others with you, as many as you can, whether bishops or other religious persons. So, when the case has been thoroughly examined, your absolution, if the case requires it, may follow fittingly and properly; and those who have fallen into the sin of the same rashness may be called back to the way of salvation, with the help of blessed Peter, prince of the apostles, by an arrangement pleasing to Christ.

Moreover, let any bishop or religious person who may come to us know that he will suffer no prejudice or injustice, but that everything will be arranged so as to please our Redeemer once the truth has been fully established. So even from the way we order the matter, with the Lord’s approval, it may be plain to all that we are not moved by a private grudge against anyone, but by zeal for God and for the right ordering of the church.