other · 379 · Constantinople
When he arrived the great churches of Constantinople were all in Arian hands and had been since Constantius. The Nicenes met in a room in a relative's house, and Gregory named it the Anastasia — the resurrection — saying it was a Shiloh where the ark had rested after its wanderings. There he preached the five Theological Orations, which are the reason he is called the Theologian, a title this church has given to exactly three people. He was mobbed, stoned on one occasion, and had a rival consecrated against him. Then Theodosius arrived, handed the churches to the Nicenes, and the council of 381 confirmed him as bishop of the city — whereupon the legitimacy of his appointment was challenged on a canonical technicality and he resigned in front of the assembled bishops, told them to find someone else, and went home to Cappadocia to write poetry. Theodoret says the flock that had once been small he made a great one.
To gather what was left of the Nicene party in a capital that had been Arian for forty years, in a room, because they had no church.
Five sermons that settled how the Greek church would speak about the Trinity, and a bishop's throne he held for about a month before resigning it.