To Peter, Bishop of Terracina, on the Meeting Place of the Jews

Gregory to Peter, and so on. [a]

Joseph, a Jew, the bearer of this letter, has told us the following. The Jews living in the camp of Terracina had been accustomed to gather in a certain place to celebrate their festivals. Your fraternity drove them out of it, and they moved, with your knowledge and consent, to another place to celebrate their festivals in the same way. And now they complain that they have been driven out again from this same place. If this is so, we want your fraternity to refrain from giving cause for complaints of this kind. Let them be allowed, as has been the custom, to gather in the place which, as we have said, they obtained with your knowledge as their meeting place. For those who differ from the Christian religion must be gathered into the unity of the faith by gentleness, kindness, admonition and persuasion. Otherwise those whom the sweetness of preaching and the foretold terror of the judgment to come might have invited to believe may be driven away by threats and terrors. It is right, then, that they should come together in a kindly spirit to hear the word of God from you, rather than become afraid of a severity pushed too far. [b]