Letter 191: Theodore Studite, Letter 191; Greek heading: Γρηγορᾷ λαϊκῷ.

Man of God, today the Lord has raised you up for the help and salvation of many, and most of all of us, the lowly. And so I hear of the care which you have taken up, as if from God, among those who contend for the Lord's sake, and I am amazed. Yet nevertheless, since your ministry is divinely appointed, it is no strange thing. And that it is from God, the facts themselves make plain; for how would you have been preserved up to this point without being seized, unless you were sheltered by divine providence? Blessed be God, who has roused you up as a trainer [aleiptes, the trainer who anoints athletes for the contest] of those who struggle on behalf of his name, who guards you beneath his mighty hand, who grants you tirelessness, the refusal to weary of doing good, and a readiness to risk all dangers. Your work shines forth, your performance is proclaimed abroad; and how should it not be, since you have taken up a ministry of God? You contend, you contend alongside them, and what is most astonishing of all, you are not only a martyr but a many-times martyr; for to each one of those who contend, through your visitation, through your anointing of their wounds, through your provision of nourishment, through your exhortation and your kindling of their eagerness, you are reckoned before God as a fellow-martyr, and you possess not one crown but as many as those whom you serve. You sent forth the holy Thaddaeus; you have three who bear witness and one who was not sought out from prison; wait a little, and you will receive yet others. But alas for my sin, alas for the defeat of those who have fallen, I mean those around Lucian and the half-dead, who have denied not in deed but in word. Do not turn even these away, man of God, when they weep and repent, even though they have made themselves unworthy of God and of divine things; how greatly they will weep, how greatly they will suffer, that they may attain to salvation. May God make you firm, you man of adamant; may he himself shelter you and save you into his kingdom. Pray for me, the lowly one.