Title — Decretals of Gregory IX
Title XXXIX: On the Syndic
Chapter I
Latin source headnote: Religious ought to have a syndic who sues and defends the monastery's cases, even, if necessary, with a salary fixed for him.
Pope Gregory to the Subdeacon, Defender of Sicily.
Just as it ought to belong to our solicitude to remove monks from forensic litigation [so that they may attend piously and diligently to the divine ministries], so it is necessary for us to order by our provision how their business ought to be arranged, [lest the mind, distracted by the cares of various cases, waste away and, enervated, grow sluggish in celebrating its accustomed work. John, the abbot who bears the present letters, asserts that he has very many affairs of his monastery.] For this reason we command you that you ought to speak with Faustus, [who had been chancellor of the magnificent Roman, the former praetor,] and, if he is willing, upon the fixing of a salary you ought to entrust to him generally the affairs of that monastery. For it is expedient that the servants of God should, at a small cost, be free from the tumult of lawsuits.
DE SYNDICO.
Religiosi debent habere syndicum, qui causas monasterii agat, et defendat, etiam, si oportuerit, constituto illi salario.
Gregorius Papa Subdiacono Defensori Siciliae.
Sicut studii nostri esse debet a litigiis forensibus monachos submovere, [ut divinis ministeriis pie ac sollerter invigilent:] ita necesse est nostra provisione, quemadmodum negotia eorum disponi debeant, ordinare, [ne distenta mens per varias causarum curas defluat, et ad celebrandum opus consuetum enervata torpescat. Praesentium itaque lator abbas Ioannes plurima se monasterii sui asserit habere negotia.] Pro qua re tibi praecipimus, quatenus cum Fausto, [qui Romani viri magnifici ex praetore cancellarius fuerat,] loqui debeas, cui, si voluerit, constituto salario, monasterii ipsius generaliter debeas negotia commendare. Expedit enim pro parvo incommodo a strepitu causarum servos Dei esse quietos.