Canonical Letter to Letoius

Contents

1. 221Gregory opens his letter on penance by tying the Easter feast, a feast of rising from the fall of sin, to the restoration of penitents.
2. 223Gregory compares penance to medicine and divides the soul into reasoning, desiring and spirited parts, describing the right action and the vice of the reasoning part and the right action of the desire.
3. 225Gregory describes the right actions and failings of the desire and of the spirit, then sets lifelong penance for willing apostasy and a fixed term for those who denied under torture, and begins on those who consult sorcerers.
4. 227Gregory distinguishes apostasy to sorcery from deceived recourse to it, then defines sexual immorality and adultery: there is one lawful union, and adultery, which wrongs another, receives double the penance.
5. 229Gregory sets nine years of graded penance for sexual immorality, which the bishop may shorten for earnest penitents, double that for adultery and sins against nature, and begins on murder, distinguishing voluntary from involuntary.
6. 231Gregory sets twenty-seven years of graded penance for voluntary murder and nine for involuntary, both shortenable, allows communion to the dying, and turns to covetousness, which the Fathers left without penalty.
7. 233Gregory notes that covetousness goes unpunished and is common among clergy, then sets penance for robbery (as for murder) and for secret theft (almsgiving or labour), and distinguishes pardonable from unpardonable grave-robbing.
8. 235Gregory finishes grave-robbing, notes that sacrilege, stoned in the Law, receives less penance than adultery, insists that the penitent's disposition matters more than time, and closes the letter.