St. John Chrysostom writes from Exile
Among the many letters of St. John Chrysostom the most famous are the letters he wrote to the deaconess Olympia after he was exiled from Constantinople in the year 404. She was a wealthy widow, a woman known in Constantinople for her faith and devotion to human needs. She was known for “supplying the widows, raising the orphans, shielding the elderly, looking after the weak, having compassion on sinners, guiding the lost, having pity on all, attending with all her heart to the poor, catechizing many unbelieving women and making provision for all their material necessities of life. Thus, she left a reputation for goodness throughout her whole life which is ever to be remembered. Having called from slavery to freedom her myriad household servants, she proclaimed them to be of equal honor [isotimon] as her own nobility [eugeneias].” The letters to Olympia are full of reassuring, comforting words despite his own suffering in the exile that brought his life to an end in 407. His words to Olympia can also comfort and reassure us 1600 years later as we face our own storms and fears.
To my Lady, the deaconess Olympia, most venerable and most beloved by God, from John the bishop, greetings in the Lord.
However much we are stretched by our trials, by so much do our consolations increase, giving us firmer hopes for the future. For now everything is flowing along well for us, and we are sailing with fair winds. Who could have foreseen this? Who could have foretold? Reefs and shoals, whirlpools and hurricanes all threaten shipwreck—a moonless night, darkest gloom, precipices and crags. And yet through all this we are settled, sailing on such seas that we are no worse off than a ship rocking in a harbor.
My lady most beloved by God, do not give yourself over to the tyranny of despair, but conquer the storm with reason [tō logismō]. You can do it, for the surging sea is not stronger than your ability to master it. Send me letters proclaiming this to me, so that, while enduring being in a foreign land, we may rejoice with great joy, knowing that with the understanding [syneseōs] and wisdom [philosophia] that befit you, you have borne this despondency well.
Quoted from the edition of the Letters to Olympia, translated by David C. Ford and published by St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2016.