The beginnings of all things are indeed hard, but hardest of all are the beginnings of her who gives birth. The holy Church of Ravenna, that she might first bring forth, made a way, endured anguish, felt pains. And this she did, brethren, that she might preserve the order of the divine birth along the whole track of truth: for after the Virgin mother, to bring forth the firstborn of all creation, traversed the road of her whole fatherland, so too was the virgin birth, so too was the nativity of the firstfruits consecrated. And necessarily, brethren, the Way is generated on the way. 'I am,' He says, 'the Way' (John 14); that every approach of error might be excluded, and that the wayfarer might at last seek heaven, who long had endured in vain the sweats and toils of an earthly journey.
'And it came to pass in those days,' says the evangelist, 'that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, to make the profession with Mary his espoused wife, who was with child. And it came to pass in those days that the days were fulfilled that she should be delivered, and she brought forth her firstborn son' (Luke 2). Here it pleases me to say something about the grief. The Lord of all runs to obey the decree of Caesar, and a pagan one at that; and against the decree of blessed Peter, the decree of a Christian prince, does some servant still irreverently set himself in opposition?
But since neither prosperity is to be mixed with adversity, nor sorrows with joys, let these matters be set aside, and let us proclaim the gladness of today's offspring. Let the newborn, who was the first to be born, have the reverence of the firstborn, and let him hold the honor too: Marcellinus has today seized and won over all the affection of a homeborn birth. His sons stand around, his kinsmen are present, all his relations run together, the whole household exults, and the very inner chambers of the house dance for joy and rejoice: because with their eyes they have been counted worthy to see, and to receive in their hands, today the holy mother's first offspring and progeny. The mother herself, spouse and mother and virgin, in the very bridal chamber of her union, marvels with fresh thanksgiving that she has given birth.
But let no one be troubled, let no one be moved, that in the very bridal chamber the bride herself is seen to have given birth: such a conception is not from crime, but from virginity, since in such an offspring the birth is heavenly, not human; nor is there here any place for sinister suspicion, where the bridegroom himself is held to be witness and guardian of his own bride. Whoever you are that is anxious about the deed, be untroubled by reason of the greatest example, and let the trepidation of the one who went before profit for your own safeguarding and protection. That Joseph, a husband in name only, in conscience a betrothed, gazes upon his pregnant spouse wavering and anxious, because he could neither accuse the innocent, nor accuse the pregnant one; to keep silent was not safe, to speak was a peril.
The accuser of the innocent admits the charges but does not betray them. He himself was the testimony of chastity, he was the guardian of modesty: he knew one thing, he beheld another; sight confounded him whom the Virgin's faith did not confound: his acts and his life at a crossroads; his just mind and holy spirit are tortured by wavering thought; he perceives, but cannot penetrate so great a mystery, because he could neither accuse, nor was he able to defend before men. Rightly does the angel soon come to meet him, rightly does the divine answer soon come to his aid, in whom, though human counsel failed, justice did not fail. And what does he say? 'Joseph, son of David, fear not.' He who had done nothing, why did he fear? He feared, because although there was no guilt in the deed, there was in the cause the greatest dread.
The holy soul dreads whatever it does not understand. Beware then, O man, of disputing in such a way about the birth of our mother, since it is enough that the angel replied: 'Fear not to receive Mary thy wife; for that which is born in her is of the Holy Spirit.' Happily she brings forth, who by giving birth more and more won for herself the crown and glory of virginity. But this one who has been born to us today has ever cast his nets in the sea. Let no one wonder, then, that Peter has rejoiced to have a fisherman as his colleague. Pray then, brethren, that he may be counted worthy to fish for men, who until now has labored to catch fish for the life of men.
By the edict of Valentinian III, the metropolitan who by decrees of this kind governed the cities subject to the Church of Ravenna resisted, asserting his own rights and unwilling to be deprived of the metropolitan's power over those same cities. From this arose the necessity for the Church of Ravenna to defend her new privilege against the former metropolitan; with how much zeal, with how many difficulties, those words sufficiently intimate: 'She endured anguish, she felt pains.' To what end? 'That she might first bring forth.' The bishop of Vicohaventia formerly looked to the archbishop of Milan, for St. [Ambrose...].
Ambrose of Milan wrote Epistle 49 (in other editions 44, and in the most recent edition 2) to Constantius, bishop of Vicohaventia, commending to him the Church of Forum Cornelii as being of his own jurisdiction and subject to him. But this Church, like that of Vicohaventia together with the other cities, was subjected to the bishop of Ravenna in the edict of Valentinian III, as may there be seen, and accordingly those cities used to belong to the Milanese see. Vicohaventia is now called Ferrara. For since there were many villages there along the Po, the town was called Vicohaventia, as it were 'having villages'; then, the word being corrupted, it passed into various names:
for it too utterly perished, destroyed by the Goths, and when its inhabitants had been moved to the other bank of the Po and had founded Ferrara, the episcopal right was transferred thither by Pope Vitalian. 'We have a metropolitan who fought with the Ravennate, and heaped anguish and pains upon that Church now constituted as mother and metropolitan, before she should bring forth her firstborn. Wherefore Chrysologus, continuing his sermon, says: And this she did, brethren, that she might preserve the order of the divine birth along the whole track of truth. For after the Virgin mother, to bring forth the firstborn of all creation, traversed the road of her whole fatherland, so too was the virgin birth, so too was the nativity of the firstfruits consecrated.'
He impresses the likeness of the birth of the firstborn of the Church of Ravenna to the birth of the firstborn of the Mother of God: both in that beforehand it was necessary to run, and to traverse several roads, and to labor in traversing the Aemilian Way and the Flaminian, which is joined to it (or rather which sets out from it), beseeching the Apostolic See, imploring its help and authority to defend firmly the privilege that had once and recently been granted—just as it was necessary for the Mother of God to traverse the road as far as the borders of Jerusalem, that is, as far as Bethlehem; and also in that the Mother of God brought forth the firstborn on the road, or beside the road, while the Church of Ravenna brought forth her firstborn on the Aemilian Way, in which lies the domain of the Ravennate metropolitan:
'And necessarily, brethren' (Chrysologus continues), 'Life is generated on the way. I am, He says, the Way, that every approach of error might be excluded, and that the wayfarer might at last seek heaven, who long had endured in vain the sweats and toils of an earthly journey.' Christ is not only generated, or brought forth, on the way, but is Himself the Way; and therefore, since on the way no one can go astray—for whoever as a wayfarer strays, strays because he leaves the way, and undergoes many toils to be brought back to the way. The Church of Ravenna was indeed on the Aemilian Way, but did not have the Aemilia subject to her, since she acknowledged the Milanese Church as mother.
But after she had the privilege of mother and metropolis, together with the power of generating, she had a way, and made a way, as Chrysologus had said at the beginning of the sermon: to such a degree that the bishoprics which lay on the Aemilian Way did not go astray if they obeyed the Ravennate, because the privilege was valid and lawful, and not taken from the Milanese by robbery, being granted as it were by the ordinary way, namely by apostolic and imperial authority. 'The likeness in this birth of the bishop of Vicohaventia, consecrated by the Ravennate metropolitan, to the birth of Christ the Lord from the altar of God is not yet complete. For in this there intervened the edict of Caesar: And it came to pass in those days, says the evangelist, there went out an edict from Caesar Augustus, that the whole world should make profession.'
'And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, to make the profession with Mary his espoused wife, who was with child. And it came to pass in those days that the days were fulfilled that she should be delivered, and she brought forth her firstborn son.' And this indeed in the birth of the Mother of God. But what in the birth of the mother Ravenna? Here it pleases me to say something about the grief: the Lord runs to obey the decree of Caesar, and a pagan one; and against the decree of blessed Peter, the decree of a Christian prince, does some servant still irreverently set himself in opposition? In both births, therefore, the edict of Caesar and a decree were promulgated: there of Caesar Augustus, here of Valentinian III Augustus;
there, to a decree and edict of this kind of a pagan emperor, the Lord of all obediently and without any delay, without any resistance, submitted; here, to the edict of a Christian emperor, not the Lord but a servant and subject, the bishop of Milan, dares without any reverence to resist, and to resist for a long time, so that he begets anguish and pains for the Church of Ravenna, that she should not bring forth. Truly it is to be grieved over, and grieved over most greatly; the more so because in this privilege of granting the mother, or metropolis, not the edict of the emperor alone intervened, but also the decree of blessed Peter, and indeed to be named in the first place, since from it, as from a first root, a prerogative of this kind has its firmness.
'Hence assuredly the archbishops of Ravenna, the successors of Chrysologus, could learn reverence toward the Apostolic See, and not to trumpet autocephaly, that is, independence from the Roman pontiff, fortifying themselves with the privilege of Valentinian: since in this sermon of Chrysologus not the decree of Caesar alone, but the decree of blessed Peter, and then indeed the decree of Caesar, ought to have been considered. Hence also they are to be refuted who deride the edict of Valentinian III as spurious and to be rejected; for the authority of Chrysologus compels anyone of sound mind to confess that the privilege of the emperor Valentinian was promulgated, as also the decree of the supreme pontiff, whereby such a faculty was granted to Ravenna.'
But since this second document has perished, the first too has perished, or perhaps is read corrupted by some addition; yet it cannot be denied that there was an edict of Caesar by which the bishop of Ravenna was constituted archbishop and metropolitan, with the subjection of the cities that lay on the Aemilian Way, and which had formerly looked to the Milanese prelate, who not without labor and grief of Chrysologus contended long over this matter, opposing both the decree of blessed Peter and the edict of the emperor Valentinian;
but at last, victory having been won after so many anguishes, Chrysologus was the first who, by consecrating the bishop of Vicohaventia as it were a firstborn and Son of grief (since indeed a greater grief is felt by the mother when she brings forth the firstborn than when she brings forth the rest, so the virgin birth, so the nativity of the firstfruits was consecrated), exercised the chief office of a metropolitan, namely by consecrating the bishops of his own province. 'It seems, moreover, to be gathered that to John of Ravenna, surnamed Angeloptes, the predecessor of Chrysologus, toward the end of his prelacy the privilege of Valentinian had been granted; so that in this very contention the Milanese met his end:'
seeing that after his election Chrysologus, delivering a sermon on the metropolitan see, complains in those words which we have set forth, and indeed in the present tense, 'does some servant still irreverently set himself in opposition'; which plainly intimates that, after a victory so happily obtained that Ravenna proceeded to the consecration of the bishop of Vicohaventia, the Milanese still murmured unwillingly, as if he would not yield; just as after the sentence of a judge in some cause long agitated, the vanquished adversary is wont still to complain and mutter. 'But since neither prosperity is to be mixed with adversity, nor sorrows with joys, these matters being set aside,' Chrysologus continues, 'let us proclaim the gladness of today's offspring.'
'Let the newborn, who was the first to be born, have the reverence of the firstborn, and let him hold the honor too.' Indeed the see of Ferrara did have this, that not only was its bishop, when he was called of Vicohaventia, the first among those consecrated by Chrysologus, but also that he was the firstborn of the metropolitan Church of Ravenna: whence he could demand from men this reverence and this honor as a firstborn. 'Marcellinus has today seized and won over all the affection of a homeborn birth.' The birth of the Mother of God, when she bore Christ, was a Dominical birth: because the Lord of all had been born; the birth of bishop Marcellinus in his consecration is the birth of a homeborn and an aged man.
The first birth seized and won over all the affection of the Christian people; the affection, I say, which is owed to the Lord by worship of adoration (latria) as well: while Marcellinus's birth seized all the affection of the people which can belong to a homeborn and human birth; for the one affection does not drive out the other, since, being set in a different order, it worships in a different manner—just as neither does affection toward the Creator exclude affection toward creatures. Now 'to seize' shows violence and efficacy; but 'to win over' demonstrates the drawing forth of affection plainly from all hearts. The word 'homeborn birth,' [signifying] the servile condition [...]
he called Marcellinus's family of servile condition and lowliness by birth, as seems to be gathered from what follows. But since in ecclesiastical ranks and dignities not the splendor of birth and the smoke-stained images of an illustrious house are regarded, but the brightness of piety, the ardor of virtue and religion; therefore Marcellinus's birth, however homeborn, as it did not exclude him from consecration, so neither did it debar him from the joys and full jubilation of the people. 'His sons stand around, his kinsmen are present, his whole kindred runs together, all the household exults, and the very inner chambers of the house exult and rejoice, because with their eyes to see, in their hands to receive, they have today been counted worthy of the holy mother's first offspring and progeny.'
Since the eye of the mind and the intention of the speaker regard the two births of a firstborn, these words are to be understood rather of Marcellinus's birth than of the Dominical one; since neither sons nor kinsmen ran together to the birth of the Mother of God, that they might see with their eyes and receive with their hands. Wherefore by the name of 'sons' can be understood the suffragan bishops, who are as it were sons of the mother and metropolis; but by the name of 'kinsmen,' the bishops of another province, subject to the Roman metropolitan or to another.
For not a few prelates were running together to Ravenna, where the emperor and the Augusta were; and when they saw this first solemnity and the exercise of the newly made metropolitan, they applauded the consecration of Marcellinus the more thronging, and with the greater joy and exultation. The citizens likewise and foreigners gave signs of gladness and congratulated Marcellinus. But we may also explain of sons truly begotten by Marcellinus—formerly a married man—and of kinsmen carnally; for there are not lacking examples even in those times, when, the wife being dead or separated and devoted to a religious life, men outstanding in piety, or learning, or merits were promoted to the episcopal insignia. Salvian alone would suffice for Gaul;
but in Aemilia, Severus, prelate of the Ravennates, had gone before. The gathering of sons, kinsmen, and of the whole house and family was easy in the very metropolis of Ravenna; for not the mother to the son, but the son to the mother, ought to hasten; and so the holy Genetrix is the holy Church of Ravenna, mother of the others subject to her. 'The mother herself too, both spouse and mother and virgin, in the very bridal chamber of her spouse, in the very chamber of her union, marvels with fresh thanksgiving that she has given birth.' Nor can these words be taken of the Mother of God and her virgin birth; accordingly these too are to be explained of the Church of Ravenna, which is not only a holy mother but also a virgin, having as Spouse Christ the Lord, as the Mother of God had a spouse;
yet with this distinction, that the Mother of God was not joined with her spouse in order to bring forth her firstborn—otherwise she would not have remained a virgin—but that he might be for her a witness and guardian of her virginity; whereas the Church, because she brings forth not carnally but spiritually, in order to bring forth her firstborn needs a Spouse and His bridal chamber, indeed even a union, in which and through which, bearing sons, she ever remains a virgin, inasmuch as she communicates spiritual gifts in consecration out of the grace of the Holy Spirit, which is implored in every operation of the Church. Not obscurely, the bridal chamber of the Spouse is the greater Church, and the metropolitan one;
and thus from this too it can be established that the consecration of Marcellinus was performed at Ravenna, and that this prerogative—that the bishop of Vicohaventia was consecrated in the metropolitan [church]—Chrysologus perceives to be a fresh matter of rejoicing. 'But since the names of bridal chamber and union seem at first sight to be opposed to virginity, the holy orator and pastor loosens this knot in this manner: But let no one be troubled, let no one be moved, that in the very bridal chamber the bride herself is seen to have given birth: such a conception is not from crime, but from virginity; since in such an offspring the birth is heavenly, not human, nor is there here any place for sinister suspicion, where the bridegroom himself is held to be witness and guardian of his own bride:'
'whoever you are that is anxious about the deed, be untroubled by reason of the greatest example, and let the trepidation of the one who went before profit for your own safeguarding and protection.' Namely, this birth in the consecration of a bishop is not carnal, nor is the union carnal, but spiritual; virginity, however, excludes carnal union, and therefore in the very generation or birth, the Spouse who is joined spiritually, namely Christ, is the witness and guardian of virginity, just as by the greatest example we are taught in the virgin birth of the Mother of God, that Joseph the spouse was witness of the virginity of his spouse, and guardian. Wherefore let everyone be assured that no blemish, no shameful mark, intervened here;
nor was there lacking in this the likeness of Marcellinus's virgin birth of a firstborn to the virgin birth of the firstborn of the Mother of God. 'That Joseph, a husband in name only, in conscience a betrothed, gazes upon his pregnant spouse wavering and anxious, because he could neither accuse the innocent, nor excuse the pregnant one: to keep silent was not safe, to speak was a peril. He admits the charges of the innocent one, but does not betray them. He himself was the testimony of chastity, he was the guardian of modesty; his acts and his life at a crossroads; his just mind and holy spirit are tortured by wavering thought; he perceives, but cannot penetrate the mystery, because he could neither accuse, nor was he able to defend before men.'
'Rightly does the angel soon come to meet him, rightly does the divine answer soon come to his aid, in whom, though human counsel failed, justice did not fail. And what does he say? Joseph, son of David, fear not. He who had failed in nothing, why did he fear? He feared, because although there was no guilt in the deed, there was in the cause the greatest dread. The holy soul dreads whatever it does not carry through.' Since the Gospel, in that part which was suited to Marcellinus's consecration, had been expounded at length, lest Chrysologus should seem more inclined than was right toward his own case and to have forsaken what is chief in the evangelical oracles, he now lingers a while in weighing the mysteries contained therein, and makes a transition from the consecration of Marcellinus to Joseph, the most holy spouse of the Mother of God:
by the commemoration of the Spouse, Christ, in the virgin birth of the firstborn Marcellinus, striving to shake off the suspicion of a carnal embrace and of a birth not virginal, from the fact that Christ the Spouse was both guardian and witness of virginity, just as Joseph had been witness and guardian of the virginity of the Mother of God. He describes therefore Joseph's suspicion, without losing his justice, and that fear divinely shaken off. Now he returns and concludes with the consecration of the bishop of Vicohaventia. 'Beware then, O man, of disputing in such a way about the birth of our mother, since it is enough that the angel replied: Fear not to take Mary as thy wife, for that which is born in her is of the Holy Spirit.'
'Happily she brought forth, who by giving birth more and more won for herself the crown and glory of virginity. But this one who has been born to us today has ever cast his nets in the sea. Let no one wonder, then, if Peter rejoiced to have a fisherman as his colleague. Pray therefore, brethren, that he may be counted worthy to fish for men, who until now has labored to catch fish for the life of men.' Returning to the consecration, he shows concern only about it, and perhaps intimates that there would not be lacking some who might suspect such a birth to be not virginal, seeing that still [...]