Letter 1060: The care of a church without a bishop — or with a bishop whose governance has been disrupted — is a matter that...
To the clergy, the order, and the people residing at Perusia [Perugia].
That they should not put off the election of a bishop any longer.
Gregory to the clergy, the order, and the people residing at Perusia.
We marvel, dearest brethren in Christ, why you look upon the Church of God for so long a time without a Ruler, and give no thought at all to the governance of yourselves and of the whole people. For it is well known that a flock, if the shepherd's care be lacking, wanders through trackless places, and on this account the more easily falls into the snares of the enemy who lies in wait. Hence it is necessary, with the fear of the Lord, to seek out one from among those who serve the Church as soldiers, who may be able worthily to undertake the ministry of a Shepherd, and there, with the Lord protecting, to take his stand as dispenser of the divine sacraments, so that he may both daily offer the holocaust of a pure mind for the sons of your Church, and may show to the flock the way by which it may proceed to the heavenly homeland.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
AD CLERUM ORDINEM, ET PLEBEM CONSISTENTEM PE-
RUSIM.
Ne episcopi electionem diutius diſſerant.
Cregorius clero, ordini, ct plebi consistenti * Pe-
TuSiz.
Miramur, carissimi fratres in Christo, quare Eccle-
Siam Dei tanto tempore absque Rectore conspicitis,
ac de vestro lotiusque plebis regimine minime cogi-
latis. Notum est cuim, quod grex, $i pastoris cura
defuerit, per avia gradiatur, et ob hoc Þ ſacilius inj-
mici laqueos insidiautis incurrat. Unde necesse est de
his qui Ecclesize militant unum, habito timore Do-
mini, perquirere, qui Pastoris ministerium possit di-
gne suscipere, atque illic, protegente Doinino, sacra-
mentorum divinorum dispensator insisterc, qualenus
et pro filiis Ecclesize vesire purz quotidie mentis
holocaustum offerat, et viam gregi, quomodo ad $u-
pernam patriam gradi.atur, ostendat.
Revision history
- 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import
Initial corpus import from modern gregory great retranslated v1.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_1849_77
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