Letter of Pope Liberius to Lucifer in Exile

Bishop Liberius to his most beloved brother Lucifer. Although under the appearance of peace the enemy of the human race seems to have raged more fiercely against the members of the Church, yet you, most acceptable priests in the Lord, your outstanding and singular faith both shows you here approved before God, and has already designated you martyrs for the glory to come. With what proclamation of praise, then, with what exultation of voice should I set forth the merits of your virtue, placed as I am between sorrow at your absence and joy at your glory, I truly cannot find: except that I know I offer you more credible consolations from this, if you believe that I have been thrust into exile together with you. Indeed, still hanging in that very expectation, because a harsher necessity meanwhile keeps me apart from your fellowship, I am grieved enough. For I had hoped, most devoted brothers, to be spent first on behalf of you all: so that your love might obtain through me rather the example of glory.

But let this be the palm of your merits, that you came first, through perseverance of faith, to the illustrious glory of confession. I beg your love, therefore, to believe that I am present with you; and to feel that I am not absent in affection, and to understand that I grieve enough that I am meanwhile separated from your fellowship. Indeed, you can know all the more from this how great a glory you have attained, in that if any have been crowned in persecution, they could feel only the bloody swords of the persecutor alone: but you, devoted soldiers of God in all things, having experienced false brothers as enemies as well, have won the victory over treachery: and the more their violence has been able to increase in the world, the more they are found to confer rewards of praise upon the holy priests.

Be secure, therefore, in the heavenly promise: and because you have been made nearer to God, lift up to the Lord, by your prayers, me your fellow-priest, the servant of God, that we may be able to bear tolerably the onslaughts that come upon us, which, as they are announced from day to day, inflict graver wounds: so that, with faith unviolated, with the estate of the Catholic Church preserved safe, the Lord may deign to make me equal to you. And because I desire to know more faithfully what has been done in the very encounter, I beseech your holiness, may you deign to make known everything faithfully by letter: so that either my very spirit, which is tormented by various rumors, or the strength of this body, which is already worn down, may receive a greater increase from your encouragement. And in another hand: May God keep you safe, my lords and brothers.