Hormisdas, instructing the legates of the Apostolic See.

When, with God favoring, you have entered the Eastern regions, if any bishops meet you and wish to offer a libellus subscribed by themselves—whose contents you have understood—accept it, and grant them the fellowship of holy communion.

But if those who meet you refuse to profess in the manner we have stated above, treat them indeed with priestly affection, yet neither share a common table with them nor presume to accept provisions from them—except only transportation and hospitality if the situation demands it—so that they do not believe themselves wholly despised with disdain.

When, with God’s help, you have come to Constantinople, withdraw to the residence that the emperor will have provided, and permit no one to approach you for greeting before you see the emperor himself—except those whom the emperor has sent or those you know to be of our communion—until you meet the prince.

When presented to him, greet him and offer our letters, suggesting that we have received great joy concerning his empire and greatly rejoice that Almighty God has raised him to this, according to his sacred letters, so that, with God as author and his reign assisting, the peace and unity of the Churches, desired in these times, may come about in accordance with what has been established by the bishops of the Apostolic See.

If he urges you to see the Bishop of Constantinople, intimate that you have fixed terms, which they too have often known, which must be professed by all bishops embracing Catholic communion. If the Bishop of Constantinople is prepared to fulfill these, we gladly meet him; but if he scorns to follow the exhortation of the Apostolic See, why should our greeting serve as an occasion for contention, when our mandate is not for disputation or conflict?

If, however, the emperor wishes it to be revealed to him what you require to be done by the bishop, show him the form of the libellus that you carry. If, agreeing to the anathema of Acacius, he says that the names of his successors should be recited—because some of them (namely Euphemius and Macedonius) were exiled for defending the Synod of Chalcedon—suggest that you cannot remove anything from the form of the libellus, in which the followers of the condemned are equally included.

But if you cannot turn them from this intent, at least acquiesce to this: that, with Acacius specifically anathematized through the libellus we gave you, silence be kept concerning the names of his predecessors, their names erased from the inscription of the diptychs. When this is done, receive the Bishop of Constantinople into your communion.

Indeed, the libellus—whether of the Bishop of Constantinople or of others whom, God willing, you happen to receive—first ensure that it is recited publicly in the presence of the people. But if this cannot be done, let it at least be reread in the sacristy with clerics and archimandrites present.

If all these things are completed with God’s will, request the emperor to make it known—through sacred letters sent via the metropolitan bishops, accompanied by the letters of the Bishop of Constantinople himself—that the Bishop of Constantinople, with his own consent having celebrated the profession that the Apostolic See has appointed, has been received into the unity of communion; and through these letters, let him also exhort them to profess the same.

But if the emperor brings any difficulty in this matter, let the Bishop of Constantinople, through directives sent to his subordinate bishops or other metropolitans—in the presence of those sent by you alongside—make known what he himself has done. You must demand this from him by all means, so that, with the testimony of this deed spreading, it cannot remain hidden even from those who are far off.