"It is not very long, and it seems to us a model of the tact and art which a Minister of the Gospel ought to use in his speech when just grievances compel him to address deserved reproaches to the faithful. It would be impossible to blame with greater force, to complain with more frankness, and yet to do it in a way less offensive to the hearers. Praise, indeed, is so mingled with blame in this discourse, and there is in its tone something so earnest and affectionate, that the audience, though sharply reprimanded, not only could not take offence, but was compelled to conceive a yet greater affection and admiration for him who so reproved them."
Gregory took the opportunity to write another very long Oration as his apology for his flight. In it he sets forth at great length his conception of the nature and responsibilities of the Priestly Office, and justifies himself both for having shrunk from such a charge, and for having so soon returned to take it up. It is very improbable that this Oration, numbered II. in the Benedictine Edition, was ever delivered vivâ voce; but it was published, and is a complete Treatise on the Priesthood, used both by S. John Chrysostom as the foundation of his Six Books on the Priesthood, and by S. Gregory the Great as the basis of his Treatise on the Pastoral Rule. It has also furnished material to many of the best Ecclesiastical writers of all ages.
Julian had now succeeded to the Empire, and had entered Constantinople in 361. He had by this time completely broken with the Church, and renounced even the outward semblance of Christianity. He persuaded Cæsarius, however, to retain his position at Court, hoping perhaps that he might succeed in perverting him. This was a matter of deep regret to his father and brother, and they felt, the latter says, obliged to keep the fact from the knowledge of his mother. Gregory wrote his brother a letter of most affectionate though earnest remonstrance; with the result that Cæsarius soon made up his mind to retire, and put his resolution in practice on the opportunity afforded by the departure of the Emperor from Constantinople to assume the direction of his campaign against the Persians. Nazianzus was not allowed to remain without attempts being made against its Christianity, for the Prefect of the Province was sent with an armed escort of considerable strength to demand possession of the Church. But the aged Bishop, supported by his son and by his people, boldly refused to comply with the Imperial commands, and there seemed such a probability of powerful resistance that the Prefect felt compelled to withdraw his force, and never came to Nazianzus again on such an errand. The Gregorys, father and son, frequently came into collision with Julian during his stay in Cappadocia on his way to Persia; and indeed it is not too much to say that the firm stand which they made on behalf of the right was, under God, the means of diverting the Emperor from his purpose of making a vehement assault upon the faith and rights of the Church in that Province. As the Abbé Benoît remarks, Julian saw that he must be careful in dealing with a province where Christian faith was such a living power, and where a simple village Bishop could dare to make so stout a stand against Imperial Authority; but he declared his intention of avenging himself upon his opponents on his return from his expedition. The Providence of God, however, interfered, and he never did return, but was defeated and killed.
In 363 or 364 Basil, like Gregory, was ordained Priest much against his will. The Bishop of Cæsarea, Metropolitan of Cappadocia, was Eusebius. He had been elected in 362 by a popular clamour, while yet only a Catechumen, and was very unwillingly consecrated by the Bishops of the Province. He felt it necessary to have at hand a Priest who by his skill in Theology would be a help to him in the controversies of the times, and he selected Basil. But for some unknown reason, possibly no more than a certain jealousy of Basil's superior reputation and influence, within a very short time Eusebius quarrelled with him, and endeavoured to deprive him. This might easily have led to a serious schism, had Basil been a self-seeking man, but as it was, he quietly retired to his Community in Pontus, accompanied by his friend Gregory, who, however, was not able to remain long in that congenial society, as his presence was still much needed by his father. On the succession of Valens, an Arian, to the Throne of the Empire, Eusebius wrote to Gregory, entreating him to come to Cæsarea and give him the benefit of his advice. Gregory, however, respectfully declined the invitation on the grounds of his sense of the wrong which his friend had suffered, and after some correspondence he succeeded in effecting a reconciliation between the latter and his Metropolitan, in the year 365.
Cæsarius meantime had returned to the Court and had received from Valens a valuable piece of preferment in Bithynia; but in the end of 368 or beginning of 369, having been terrified by a great earthquake, during which he had been in considerable danger, he was arranging matters for his final retirement, when he was seized with illness, and very soon died, leaving all his property, which must have amounted to a considerable sum, to his brother in trust for the poor. He was buried at Nazianzus, and on the occasion of his funeral his brother preached the Sermon which is numbered VIII. in the Benedictine Edition. About the same time, but a little later, Gorgonia also departed, and he preached a funeral sermon on her too. Eusebius of Cæsarea died in 370, and Basil at once wrote an urgent letter to Gregory, begging him to come to Cæsarea, probably in order to get him elected Archbishop. Gregory, however, declined to go, and he and his father exerted themselves to the utmost of their power to procure the election of Basil; the elder Gregory writing through his son two letters, one addressed to the people of Cæsarea, the other to the Provincial Synod, urging Basil's claims very strongly. Though ill at the time, he managed to convey himself to the Metropolis in time for the meeting of the Synod; and Basil was elected and consecrated. Gregory wrote him a letter of congratulation; not, however, a very warm one; but when troubles began to arise he spoke out with all the fervour of their early friendship in support of the Archbishop. About this time Valens divided the civil Province of Cappadocia into two, one of which had Cæsarea, the other Tyana, for its Metropolis. Anthimus, Bishop of the latter See, thereupon claimed to be ipso facto Metropolitan of the new Province, a claim which Basil strenuously resisted, as savouring of what we call Erastianism. A long dispute followed, in the course of which Basil, to assert his rights as Metropolitan, and to strengthen his own hands, erected several new Bishoprics in the disputed Province; and to one of these, Sasima, a miserable little village he consecrated his friend Gregory, almost by force. Gregory was, not unnaturally, indignant at this treatment; while Basil, whose great object had been to strengthen himself against Anthimus, took it as unkind of Gregory to be so reluctant to comply with his friend's wishes. So the two were for a long time in very strained relations to one another. Although, however, Gregory ultimately yielded to the earnest wish of his father, and submitted to the authority of the Archbishop, yet he did not disguise his reluctance, and in the Sermons which he preached on the occasion (Or. ix. x.) he spoke very strongly on the point. Anthimus, however, occupied the village of Sasima with troops, and prevented Gregory from taking peaceable possession of his See, which it is probable he never actually administered, for his father begged him to remain at Nazianzus and continue his services as coadjutor Bishop. The contest about the Metropolitanate of Tyana went on for some time, but in the end, mainly by Gregory's mediation, it was amicably settled. In 374 Gregory the elder died, and his wife also, and thus our Saint was set free from the charge of the diocese. He spoke a panegyric at his father's funeral, and wrote a number of little "In Memoriam" poems to his mother's memory; and out of respect for his father continued to administer the See of Nazianzus for about a year, making great efforts meanwhile to secure the appointment of a Bishop. But, perceiving that his efforts would be fruitless, because of the devotion of the people to himself, he at length withdrew, after a very serious illness, to Seleucia in Isauria (375,) where he lived three or four years, attached to the famous Church of S. Thecla. Very little is known of his life there; but it must have been at this period that he heard of the death of Basil, upon whom two years later in the Cathedral of Cæsarea he pronounced a splendid panegyric.
In 379 the Church at Constantinople, which for forty years had been oppressed by a succession of Arian Archbishops, and was well nigh crushed out of existence by the multitude of other heresies, Eunomian, Macedonian, Novatian, Apollinarian, etc., which Arian rule had fostered, besought the great Theologian to come to their aid. Theodosius the new Emperor, who was a fervent Catholic, backed their entreaty, as did also numerous Bishops. Gregory resisted the call for a long time; but at last he came to see that it was the will of God that he should accept the Mission, and he consented to go and fill the gap, until such time as the Catholics of the Capital might be able to elect an Archbishop.
The following account of the religious condition of Constantinople at this time is condensed from Ullmann:--
"Religious feeling like everything else had become to the idle and empty mind a subject of joke and amusement. What belonged to the theatre was brought into the Church, and what belonged to the Church into the theatre. The better Christian feelings were not seldom held up in comedies to the sneer of the multitude. Everything was so changed by the Constantinopolitans into light jesting, that earnestness was stripped of its worth by wit, and that which is holy became a subject for banter and scoffing in the refined conversation of worldly people. Yet worse was it that the unbridled delight of these men in dissipating enjoyments threatened to turn the Church into a theatre, and the Preacher into a play actor. If he would please the multitude, he must adapt himself to their taste, and entertain them amusingly in the Church. They demanded also in the preaching something that should please the ear, glittering declamation with theatrical gesticulation; and they clapped with the same pleasure the comedian in the holy place and him on the stage. And alas there were found at that period too many preachers who preferred the applause of men to their souls' health. At this period the objects of the faith excited, particularly in Constantinople, a very universal and lively interest, which was entertained from the Court downwards, though not always in the most creditable manner; but it was in great part not the interest of the heart, but that of a hypercritical and disputatious intellect, where it was not something far lower, to which the dispute about matters of faith served only as a pretext for attaining the exterior aims of avarice or ambition. While the sanctifying and beatifying doctrines of the Gospel, which are directed to the conversion of the whole inner man were let lie quiet, everyone from the Emperor to the beggar busied himself with incredible interest about a few questions concerning which the Gospel communicates only just so much as is beneficial to the human spirit and necessary to salvation, and whose fuller expression at any rate belongs rather to the school than to practical life. But the more violently these doctrinal disputes were kindled, disturbing and dividing States, cities, and families, so much the more people lost sight of the practical essentials of Christianity; it seemed more important to maintain the Tri-unity of God than to love God with all the heart; to acknowledge the Consubstantiality of the Son, than to follow Him in humility and self-denial; to defend the Personality of the Holy Spirit, than to bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, love, peace, righteousness....In addition to these religious disputes came also political struggles, namely, the hard-fought wars of the Roman Empire with the Goths; so that the Empire at large presented the picture of a sea, tossed by violent storms. But the unhappy schisms which at this time were severing Christians everywhere, shewed themselves in a particularly discouraging form in the Capital. Under the late reigns several parties had been favoured; but especially those which, though again divided among themselves by differences of opinion, yet agreed in this that they all rejected the Nicene system of doctrine. Constantius had bestowed his favour on the Arians; Julian during his short reign on all parties, at least in appearance,--to crush them all. After Jovian's early death Valens succeeded to power in the East, and with him, even more than with Constantius, Arianism, which he not only protected, but also sought to make predominant by horrible atrocities against the friends of the Nicene Decrees. These had now been forbidden the use of all Churches and Church property, and the Arians had been put in possession of them. But Constantinople still remained the scene of ecclesiastical strifes and partizanships. Here where with a little good so much evil flowed from all three parts of the world, all opinions had their adherents; but the following parties in particular shewed themselves:--The Eunomians, professing an intellectual theology, which claimed to be able completely to explore the Being of God by logical definitions, and maintained in strict Arian fashion the Unlikeness of the Son to the Father, were very numerous in Constantinople (as is shewn by the fact that most of Gregory's polemical utterances were directed against them), and injured earnest religious thought principally by this, that they used the doctrines of the faith exclusively as subjects for an argumentative dialectic. The Macedonians, addicted to the Semi-Arian dogma of the Like Substance, and thereby somewhat more nearly approaching the Orthodox, and distinguished besides by an estimable earnestness of demeanour, and a monk-like strictness of manner, were indeed themselves excluded by the pure Arians from the property of the Church, but were ever being abundantly multiplied, partly in Constantinople itself, partly in the neighbouring regions of the Hellespont, Thrace, Bithynia, and Phrygia. The Novatians, who even overstepped the Macedonians in the strictness of their practical principles, had somewhat earlier been on the point of uniting themselves with the Orthodox, from whom they did not differ on the chief doctrine in dispute, and with whom they found themselves under like oppression from the Arians; but the malevolent disposition of a few of the party leaders had stood in the way, and so they remained separate, and swelled the number of the opponents of Orthodoxy. Lastly the Apollinarians too began to establish themselves there. Their teaching was opposed to the acknowledgment of true and perfect Manhood in Jesus (for true Manhood lies in the reason especially); and there was at that time, as Gregory informs us, a report that an assembly of Apollinarian bishops was to be held at Constantinople, with a view of raising their teaching as to Christ into general notice, and forcing it upon the Churches.