The empress and the bishop
Chrysostom versus Empress Eudoxia
Constantinople is the new Rome — the imperial capital Constantine built on the Bosporus, glittering, cosmopolitan, and corrupt in the way that all centers of absolute power tend to become corrupt.
Chrysostom arrives as archbishop in 398 AD and immediately begins offending people. He sells the luxurious furnishings of the episcopal palace and gives the money to the poor. He stops hosting the lavish dinner parties his predecessor had used to cultivate the aristocracy. He preaches the same sermons he preached in Antioch — to audiences that are considerably wealthier and considerably less pleased to hear them.
The Empress Eudoxia is intelligent, powerful, and accustomed to flattery. She is not accustomed to being told — even indirectly, even from a pulpit — that her lifestyle is incompatible with the gospel. When a group of aristocratic women whose wealth Chrysostom has criticized complain to the empress, she listens.
The conflict escalates over several years. Chrysostom, preaching on the story of John the Baptist and Herod, refers to Herodias — Herod's wife who demanded the Baptist's head. The empress hears herself in the comparison. Chrysostom denies he meant her specifically. Few people believe him.
A council packed with Chrysostom's enemies condemns him on fabricated charges. The emperor orders his exile.
The night of his exile, an earthquake shakes Constantinople. The empress, frightened, recalls him immediately.
He preaches the Sunday after his return. The sermon begins: Again Herodias raves. Again she dances. Again she demands the head of John.
He is exiled again within weeks. Permanently this time.
“Again Herodias raves, again she is troubled, again she dances, again she demands the head of John on a platter.”
— John Chrysostom, sermon after his recall from first exile, 403 AD
“For John said to him, It is not lawful for you to have her.”
Chrysostom came back from exile, stood in his pulpit, and preached the sermon that would get him exiled again. He knew exactly what he was doing.
This is not a model for recklessness or for preaching that courts controversy for its own sake. It is a model for the preacher — or the ordinary believer — who, having been given a word to speak, speaks it regardless of who is in the room.
John the Baptist lost his head for telling a king the truth. Chrysostom lost his see. The pattern is old. The cost is specific. The call is the same.
Is there something you have been given to say that you are waiting for a safer moment to say? That moment may not come.