Letter 2

From: Sidonius Apollinaris, Bishop of Clermont To: Faustus, Bishop of Riez Date: ~469 AD Context: Sidonius praises Faustus's literary gifts with characteristic extravagance — the two men are mutual admirers who understand each other's literary world. Sidonius, bishop, to the most blessed and holy Faustus. I have read your letter three times. Once for pleasure, once for instruction, and once to try to understand how you achieve certain effects that I find myself unable to replicate — not that I would try, since imitation of a distinctive style is always recognizable and always regrettable. You write in a way that makes theology feel urgent and alive. This is a rare gift. Most theological prose — and I include my own in this judgment — is clear enough but inert. You read it and you understand it, and then you put it down. What you write stays with you, not because you have used any tricks, but because the thinking behind the words is genuinely deep and the words are chosen to convey that depth rather than to display the writer. I say this not to flatter you — you are intelligent enough to recognize flattery and dismiss it — but because I mean it, and because I want you to know that what you are doing matters beyond the immediate occasion of any given letter. These things are preserved. Centuries from now, someone will read what you have written, and they will know what it was like to be a Christian bishop in the dying western empire, still holding to the tradition, still believing it worth holding. I find that thought both terrifying and consoling. Your friend and colleague, Sidonius