Letter 13019: My dear Julianus, I have learned something that surprised and saddened me: you have been concealing your poverty out...

My dear Julianus, I have learned something that surprised and saddened me: you have been concealing your poverty out of a sense of shame, rather than allowing the Church to help you as she should. This is a misplaced scruple. Poverty is not shameful, and accepting help from those who have the means to give it is not weakness. I would rather you had come to me directly. I am also directing an annual payment to the monastery you built in Catania, in recognition of the piety that moved you to build it. That community of prayer owes something to your generosity and your faith, and this see will honor that by supporting it going forward.

AD JULIANUM. Dissimulatam ab illo ex verecundia inopiam queritur, Cons!ructlo Catane monasterio dat so0lidos anunues Gregorius Juliano. Gloriz vesire scripta 8uscipiens, legenda lztus aperui, sed tristis perlecta replicavi. In eis quippe dicebatur quod pudoris causa fuerit mibij vos ea que dicenda erant tempore longo tacuisse. Et certum est quia minus amatur qui adhuc erubescitur. Atque omnimodo contristatus sum, 1 YZY quia we a vo- bis comperi minus quam zslimayerim amari. [n hoc autem valde * me continetis, si mercedis causas mihi assidue providendas sludiese requiritis, Nec vo- bis debet esse verecundiz ei aliquid de eleemosynis importune dicere, quem constat non res $uas, ed ad dispensandum res pauperum habere. De causis itaque > mercedis apud episcopum libere agere de- buislis, etiamsi meum animum qualis in amore ve- stro existeret nesciretis. Postquam enim et nos om- nino gloriam vesiram diligimus, et dispensatoris locum in rebus, sicut scitis, pauperum tenemus, ve- s$tra, ſateor, verecundia valde accusabilis ſuit. Quam ideo tot verbis increpando insequor, ut hanec a corde vestro ſunditus repellam, et in mercedis causis ma- gnum $0latium vesirz provisionis habeam. Monasle- rio ilaque vestro, quod a vobis in Catanensi urbe constructum «<©5st, per Adrianum notarium et rectorem patrimonii, emissa precepli pagina, decem annuos s0lidos dari deputavimus, quos petimus sine injuria SuSCipi, quia non bac vobis nostra oblatio, sed san- cti Petri apostolorum principis benedictio offer- tur ©.