Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 567

Gregory to John, bishop of Syracuse. What complaint has been stirred up against Lucillus, bishop of the city of Malta, has been made clear from the page of your letters and of the proceedings which you have directed to us. And therefore, because the punishment of so great a crime ought to be deferred by no delay, let your Fraternity take to yourself three or four of our brothers and fellow-priests, so that, they too being present, once the aforesaid matters have been established by proven truth, you may endeavor without ambiguity to depose the said Lucillus from the rank of the episcopate, which the contagion of such wickedness has stained. But because certain presbyters or deacons are recalled to have been aware of and party to the iniquity that was betrayed, let your Holiness examine this by subtle investigation.

And if you find it to be so, likewise cast them down from the rank of their honor, and send them off into monasteries where they may worthily do penance. But because through these many are reported to have fallen into the taint of this sin, it is fitting that you deprive all who shall be shown to be guilty of the participation of the Lord's Body and Blood, and that you admonish them more strictly by your letters to give their effort to litanies and prayers, and to wash away by weeping the stain of the sin they have contracted. When communion is to be restored to them, according to the measure of their penance, we commit to your judgment. This, however, you must carefully provide, that to those who are pressed by the peril of death the viaticum be not denied.

Moreover, you must exhort the clergy and people of the city of Malta that, since they cannot be without their own Pastor, they should, God being favorable, elect for themselves a priest to be ordained. But investigate carefully in every way the case of the presbyters and deacons who have been accused in the lapse. And if they are shown to be guilty of the crime, exhibit toward them a severe and canonical punishment, so that, by however much their iniquity was able to provoke God to wrath, by so much you may be able to appease Him by the most strict amendment.