Gregory's pontificate was characterized by his clear-sightedness, his realism, his cool assessment of any situation facing him, and his ability to adjust himself to facts which were beyond his capacity to change. Descended from the Roman aristocracy, the gens Anicia, he inherited the characteristic Roman genius for law, administration, and organization no less than the statesmanlike qualities which he had every opportunity to employ.
Nothing is known about Gregory's early education. Having become prefect of the city of Rome for a short while, he gave up his political career, founded the monastery of St. Andrew on the Coelian Hill in Rome and became its deacon. Soon he attracted the attention of Pope Pelagius II, who sent him to the court of Constantinople as apocrisiary (ambassador). This sojourn at the imperial residence for some six years was to be of inestimable value to him when, at the age of about fifty, he was elected pope after the death of Pelagius in 590.
The papacy in the preceding decades had had some serious conflicts with the imperial government in Constantinople: the crux of these differences was the papal insistence on the primatial rights of the Roman Church, both as regards doctrine and jurisdiction, a standpoint which the government at Constantinople did not recognize. The position for the Roman Church was, moreover, made much more difficult by the fact that if the pope remonstrated against the doctrinal and jurisdictional rulings of the government, he incurred, as a member of the Roman empire, severe and constitutionally justifiable censures amounting to charges of high treason. How firmly the imperial ideology culminating in the emperor as divinity on earth, as king and priest, had been entrenched was brought home to Gregory during his official residence at Constantinople. Popes before him had not realized the strength of this imperial ideology, according to which the pope was merely another patriarch. What Gregory so clearly perceived was the impossibility of making the Roman claim to its principatus or primacy effective against the Byzantive government, without at the same time exposing the pope to legal proceedings.
It was as a result of this realization that Gregory, as pope, opened up the West of Europe to papal influence. Western Europe was not subjected to imperial rule; the kingdoms constituted regions which were outside the imperial jurisdiction and in which the claim to Roman primacy could be pushed without any interference by Constantinople. The missionary activity of Gregory--above all his conversion of England, begun in 595--becomes understandable if thrown against this imperial background. Although Gregory bowed to unalterable facts in the East and never provoked the wrath of the emperor, in the West he relentlessly drove home the papal theme of primacy; the West of Europe became "Romanized." This Gregorian policy of bifurcation--one kind of policy towards Constantinople, the other towards the West--bore fruit. It was from the farthest corner of Europe, from England, that the impetus for the conversion of the north of Europe came (Irish and Anglo-Saxon missions). The ties between England and the Roman Church had been forged. The great events of the eighth century are nothing but a sequel to this pontificate. That at the same time the rift between the Roman Church and Constantinople was only made worse is evident, although the final break did not come until the pontificate of Leo IX in the eleventh century.
Next to this historic conversion of the English, Gregory's missions to the Lombards are equally noticeable: they too were converted, although they were the conquerors of Italy and the enemies of the Roman empire. Clearly realizing the value of liturgy as an external means to bind people together, he was greatly instrumental in reforming and refining liturgical practices. This aspect of his work has stood the test of time, although he cannot be credited with all the liturgical reforms which have sometimes been attributed to him. His active interest in the advancement of Benedictine monasticism, founded by St. Benedict (c. 480-c. 550), is not surprising either. The administration of the papal patrimonies--in Italy, Gaul, Sardinia, North Africa--was exemplary as a result of his active interest in the organization of these estates.
Although counted among the Doctors of the Church, Gregory's claim to this position is not overwhelming. There is very little originality in his numerous writings which range from sermons to homilies on the Gospels and from moral-theological products to a manual for pastoral work; but they were superbly attuned to the contemporary intellectual level and exercised an enormous influence throughout the Middle Ages. His official correspondence has been preserved and takes up two large volumes in the modern edition.
Nothing illustrates the enduring influence of Gregory the Great better than the title which, in obvious allusion to the Gospel, he chose for the pope. The pope is not, as the patriarch of Constantinople claimed to be, a universal patriarch (an unmistakable reflection of the imperial ideology), but the servus servorum Dei, the servant of the servants of God, an intitulation which is used to this day.
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