Letter 162: Part of the papal correspondence surrounding the Acacian Schism (484-519), the major breach between Rome and...

Hormisda to Theodosius, archdeacon of Constantinople, and to all the catholics, in like manner. We fittingly render thanks to the divine mercy, which did not allow your faith to labor for long. For a time has now been offered in which the catholic Church may recover her faithful soldiers. For what greater gladness can take hold of your spirit than the recollected expulsion of evils? Compensate the hardships of affliction with the joys of the present: for our God, who was a remedy, did not wish your charity to be crushed by adversities, but to be proved. For if you compensate the evils of the time now past with the present recompense, which is not doubted to be divine, who doubts that you have obtained ampler rewards than the adversity could have harmed you? And although our solicitude has never ceased on behalf of the state of the catholic faith, nevertheless, stirred by the sacred utterances of the most serene prince, we have taken care to send legates, by whose office, with God as our author, we do not doubt that the effect will follow in those things which we have often enjoined. And therefore strive fittingly, so that you may be able to offer to the catholic Church this chief gift of your liberation: to the end that, all things which have hitherto done harm being driven back, rejoicing in the one communion which we have always desired, we may be able without ceasing to render praises to our God.

(a.5i9m. Hormisdae papae ad Theodosium arcliidiacoiium et universos ecclesiae Gonstautiuopolitanae catholicos. Quod ah haereticorum molestiis liherati sint gratulatur, seque legaios destinasse indicat, quo possit perfecta Ecclesiae concordia componi, Hormisda Theodosio archidiacono Constantinopo- litano et universis catholicis a pari. Gratias misericordiae divinae competenter exsolvimus, quae fidem vestram diu laborare non passa est. Nam tempus oblatum est, quo fidos*) milites suos catholica recuperare possit Ecclesia. Quae enim major animum vestrum potest obtinere jucunditas, quam malorum commemorata depulsio? Gaudiis praesentibus compensate afflictia- nis incommoda: quia Deus noster, qui remedio fuit, adversis op- primi caritatem vestram noluit sed probari. Nam si transacti tem- poris mala cum praesenti, quae divina esse non ambigitur, retribu- tione compensetis, quis dubitat ampliora vos praemia consecutos, quam nocere potuisset adversitas? Et quamvis pro statu fidei catho- licae nunquam soUicitudo nostra cessaverit, tamen serenissimi prin- cipis sacris aflfatibus incitati, legatos destinare curavimus, quorum officio Deo auctore in his, quae saepe mandavimus, subsequi non dubitamus effectum. Et ideo competenter enitere, ut Ecclesiae ca- tholicae hoc praecipuum vestrae liberationis mimus possitis offerre: quatenus, repulsis omnibus quae hactenus nocuerunt, in una quam semper optavimus communionae gratulantes, Deo nostro laudes re- ferre sine cessatione possimus. — ( EPISTOLAF. 02 -JO. ^t