Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 180

Gregory to John, bishop of Sorrento. To religious desires it is easy to grant consent, so that a faithful devotion may obtain a speedy effect. And since Savinus, abbot of the monastery of Saint Stephen on the island of Capri, has suggested to us that the relics of Saint Agatha the Martyr have long since been granted into his keeping, and that he wishes those same sacred relics to be deposited in his monastery, therefore we command you to go to the aforesaid monastery, and, if it be established that no body lies buried there, you shall solemnly deposit the aforesaid sacred relics, so that he may obtain the effect of his devotion. Gregory to Anthemius the subdeacon.

Not only by frequent injunctions, but also in person I remember to have often admonished you, that there in our stead you should exercise your office, not so much for ecclesiastical advantages as for relieving the necessities of the poor, and that you should rather vindicate them from the oppressions of any man. Now the bearer of the present letter, Gaudiosus, has informed us that violence is being done to him by the agents of the holy Roman Church, over which by God's authorship we preside, asserting that the men of the aforesaid Church wish to claim his sons.

For upon the documents produced by him, we have recognized that Sirica, the wife of the bearer of the present letter, was bestowed by the once glorious-memoried Ecia upon a certain woman Morena under the title of donation, and by the same Morena manumitted through a letter; and therefore we believe it unbecoming that sons born of a free woman should be dragged back into servitude. Therefore we command your Experience by this present authority that upon these very documents, just as we too have learned, your mind being freed from cares, you diligently attend, so that if there are no documents on the Church's part which ought to stand against the documents of this man, you should suspend him from her molestation without any withdrawal.

For it is hard that, if others for their own reward grant liberties to those under them, we should be called back by the Church, which ought rather to protect these liberties. Again therefore and again we necessarily admonish your Experience that, if any disputes arise there between the poor and the holy Roman Church, you discuss them with all integrity of mind, and so carry out the patrimonial advantages, that you do not depart from the benignity of justice.