教牧守則·對話錄與書信 第 703 章

Gregory to Januarius, bishop of Cagliari. Know that the solicitude of your fraternity has been pleasing to us, in that it showed itself, as was fitting, with pastoral vigilance for the safeguarding of souls. For it has been announced to us that in the house of the late Epiphanius, a lector of your Church, you forbade a monastery to be built according to his will, on this account, lest, because that house adjoined a monastery of the handmaids of God, a deception of souls should thence arise. And we have greatly praised you, because you took precaution against the snares of the ancient enemy with fitting foresight, as was proper.

But because it has been brought to us that a certain religious woman named Pompeiana wishes to take away the handmaids of God from that same monastery, and to recall them through those monasteries of her own from which they had been taken, and there to establish a congregation of monks, it is necessary that, if this shall have been carried out, the disposition of the deceased be by all means preserved. (Gratian 13, q. 2, c. 4.)

But if this shall not have been done, lest the testator's will seem to be wholly frustrated, we will that, because the monastery of the late abbot Urbanus, situated outside the city of Cagliari, is said to be so deserted that not even one monk remained there, John—whom the aforesaid Epiphanius appointed to be abbot in the monastery which, as has been said, he had decreed should be built in his own house—ought, if nevertheless there is nothing which hinders him, to be ordained abbot.

And let the relics which were to have been enshrined in the house of the aforesaid Epiphanius be laid up there, and let there be applied to it by all means whatever the same Epiphanius had bestowed toward building in the monastery which he had designated; so that, even though, on account of the above-mentioned precaution, his will is not fulfilled with regard to the place, nevertheless the reward may be preserved undiminished. And let your fraternity dispose all these things together with Vitalis the defensor, and so strive to order them usefully, that, as from a praiseworthy prohibition, so also from a good construction, you may be able to have a reward. And although it is superfluous that the said monastery be commended to your fraternity, we nevertheless exhort you out of abundance to hold it as commended, saving justice, as befits you.