Letter 200

200. To Amphilochius, bishop of Iconium.

One illness after another comes upon us, and the pressing demands both of ecclesiastical affairs and of those who do violence to the churches have held us fast through the whole winter, and through the time up to the present letter. For this reason it has not been possible for us either to send anyone to your reverence or to visit you. And we guessed that your circumstances too were similar — not as regards illness, I mean; God forbid! For may the Lord grant your body health enough for the service of his commandments — but because the care of the churches casts the same distraction upon you as well. And even now I was about to send someone for this very purpose, to make known to us how your health stands. But since our most beloved son Meletius, escorting the new recruits, reminded us that it was possible to address you through him, we gladly took up the occasion of writing, and we hastened to make him the bearer of our letters — a man who is sufficient even to stand in place of a letter, both for the truth-loving character of his manner and because he is ignorant of nothing concerning our affairs. Through him we ask your reverence first of all to pray for us, that the Lord may grant me release from this burdensome body, and to his churches peace, and to you quiet and leisure so that, when you have set in apostolic order the affairs of Lycaonia, as you have begun, you may visit the affairs here also — whether we are still at home in the flesh, or are already bidden to depart to the Lord — that you yourself, as your own (which indeed they are), may take charge of the places under us, and may strengthen what is unsound, rouse what is sluggish, and, by the grace of the Spirit who is in you, set all in order anew toward what is well-pleasing to the Lord.

And our most honoured sons Menetius and Melitius, whom you know from of old and judge to be your own, keep as a trust, praying for them; for this is sufficient for them toward all security. Deign also to greet on our behalf those who are with your holiness, and all the clergy, and the people shepherded under you, and our most God-beloved brethren and fellow-ministers. Remember the commemoration of the most blessed martyr Eupsychius, and do not wait for a second reminder, nor be eager to make your visit at a fixed later date, but to come beforehand and gladden us, if indeed we are still upon the earth. Until then, may you be kept safe for us and for the churches of God, sound in the Lord and praying earnestly for us, by the grace of the Holy One.