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To: HarleyD
"If only Athanasius could see what's happening now."

Mat_15:6b ... So for the sake of your tradition you have made void the word of God.

St. Athanasius held to both Sacred Tradition and Scripture:

""But after him (the devil) and with him are all inventors of unlawful heresies, who indeed refer to the Scriptures, but do not hold such opinions as the saints have handed down, and receiving them as the traditions of men, err, because they do not rightly know them nor their power" Athanasius, Festal Letter 2 (c. A.D. 350).

Origen was a man of Tradition too:

""The Church's preaching has been handed down through an orderly succession from the Apostles and remains in the Church until the present. That alone is to be believed as the truth which in no way departs from ecclesiastical and apostolic tradition." Origen, First Principles 1,2 (c. A.D. 230). "

As was Clement of Alexandria:

""Well, they preserving the tradition of the blessed doctrine derived directly from the holy apostles, Peter, James, John, and Paul, the sons receiving it from the father (but few were like the fathers), came by God’s will to us also to deposit those ancestral and apostolic seeds. And well I know that they will exult; I do not mean delighted with this tribute, but solely on account of the preservation of the truth, according as they delivered it. For such a sketch as this, will, I think, be agreeable to a soul desirous of preserving from loss the blessed tradition" (Miscellanies 1:1 [A.D. 208]). "

44 posted on 01/25/2014 9:06:47 AM PST by GonzoII ("If the new crime be, to believe in God, let us all be criminals" -Sheen)
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To: GonzoII
The “tradition” at that time only stretched back 200-300 years. There was no corruption to the scripture. Augustine relays in one of his writings that the church recognized how heresy could enter the church. He said the birth of Christ was like a pebble tossed into a pond. The further away from the point of impact the more distorted the message becomes. That is why the blessed church fathers felt the urgent need to seal the scriptures. To keep them from the contamination of ourselves.

This was not unlike our Hebrew fathers who felt the same way with the early writings in the Old Testament, meticulously guarding that which was entrusted to them. At such points they hid the scriptures in sealed rooms not against enemies for the most part but against leaders who would corrupt the very gospel entrusted to them. It got to the sad point in time that what Jeremiah wrote was chopped up into little pieces and tossed into the fire. Yet we have the writings that man sought to destroy today.

Catholics can say they go back to tradition but that tradition only goes back about 500 years to the Council of Trent. It's not unusual for our Catholic friends to be quoting from Anselm rather than Augustine or Ignatius. There is nothing that they have in common with the early fathers.

56 posted on 01/25/2014 9:42:30 AM PST by HarleyD (...one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved.)
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