The Presbyters Project

Letter 167 [inc. "Epistolas fraternitatis tuae"]

Leo responds to the queries of Rusticus in the form of questions and answers:

Inquisitio 3. — De his qui altario ministrant, et conjuges habent, utrum eis licito misceantur?

Responsum. — Lex continentiae eadem est ministris altaris, quae episcopis atque presbyteris: qui cum essent laici sive lectores, licito et uxores ducere, et filios procreare potuerunt. Sed cum ad praedictos pervenerunt gradus, coepit eis non licere quod licuit. Unde, ut de carnali fiat spirituale conjugium, oportet eos nec dimittere uxores, et quasi non habeant, sic habere: quo et salva sit caritas connubiorum, et cesset opera nuptiarum.

(Patrologia Latina 54, 1204 = Ballerini 1753: 1421)

Letter 167 [inc. "Epistolas fraternitatis tuae"]

Leo responds to the queries of Rusticus in the form of questions and answers:

Question 3. — Concerning those who minister at the altar and have wives, whether they may lawfully cohabit with them?

Reply. — The law of continence is the same for the ministers of the altar as for bishops and priests, who when they were laymen or readers, could lawfully marry and have offspring. But when they reached the said ranks, what had been lawful before ceased to be so. And hence, in order that their wedlock may become spiritual instead of carnal, it behoves them not to put away their wives but to "have them as though they had them not," [1 Cor 7: 29] whereby both the affection of their wives may be retained and the marriage functions cease.

(trans. Ch. Lett Feltoe 1895: 110)

Place of event:

Region

Rome
Gaul

City

Rome
Narbonne

About the source:

Author: Leo the Great
Title: Letters, Epistulae
Origin: Rome (Rome)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian

Leo the Great was the bishop of Rome from AD 440 to his death in AD 461. We have the collection of 173 letters of Leo.

The present letter is not dated and various possible datings were proposed in the scholarship. The most convincing is a conjecture of Ballerini that the letter was written not before 458:

1) Leo`s letters safely dated to 458 such as Letter 159 to Bishop Nicetas of Aquileia and Letter 166 to Bishop Neo of Ravenna also mention Romans held in captivity by the pagan or heretical barbarians;

2) in Letter 166 to Neo of Ravenna (dated to 23 October 458), Leo refers to a problem of former Roman captives who return home not knowing whether they were baptized or not, as something new and unheard; the same issue is discussed by Leo in the letter of Rusticus which needs to be later than that to Neo.

The letter was written before 461, the year of death of Leo, but also before the episcopal promotion of the Archdeacon Hermes which took place still during the pontificate of Leo (see PCBE, Gaule, v. 1, Hermes).

Edition:

P. and G. Ballerini eds., Sancti Leoni Magni Romani pontificis opera, vol. 1, Venice 1753

Patrologia Latina, vol. 54

Translation:

Leo the Great, Letters, trans. Ch. Lett Feltoe, [in:] The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, 2nd series, vol. 12, Edinburgh 1895, 1-114

Categories:

Family life - Marriage

Family life - Permanent relationship before ordination

Family life - Permanent relationship after ordination

Family life - Separation/Divorce

Family life - Offspring

Sexual life - Sexual activity

Sexual life - Sexual abstinence

Former ecclesiastical career - Lower clergy

Described by a title - Presbyter/πρεσβύτερος

Relation with - Wife

Relation with - Woman

Sexual life - Marital

Further ecclesiastical career - None

Described by a title - Minister/λειτουργός/ὑπηρέτης

Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: M. Szada, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER1813, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=1813