Virgin and Child from the catacombs
Rome, 4th century
Rome, 4th century
Posted on 02/09/2014 2:09:50 PM PST by NYer
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Virgin and Child from the catacombs
Rome, 4th century |
My interlocutor has usually been reading a book by Garry Wills or Elaine Pagels, who view the events of sacred history as power plays by vested interests. If my weekend controversialist hasn't been reading a heterodox best-seller, he or she has been taking one of those smartly put-together adult Bible classes in Manhattan, which let it be known that the Real Presence and the Sacrifice of the Mass, the papacy, and the episcopate are late Roman inventions.
How, over a glass of chardonnay, does one respond? How does one lightly utter the names of Ignatius of Antioch, Clement of Rome, and the Didache? Or mention Irenaeus, Chrysostom, Augustine, and other early witnesses to the fact that the Church in the first centuries was Roman Catholic?
Before there ever was a canon of the New Testament, there was a Church. And its paper trail is Catholic. In his two anti-papal books, Garry Wills is dismissive of these early non-biblical documents, but they are well worth knowing about.
In 95 A.D., a three-man embassy with a letter from the fourth bishop of Rome arrived at Corinth, where there were dissensions in the local church. In that letter, Pope St. Clement speaks with authority, giving instructions with a tone of voice that expects to be obeyed. The interesting point is that the apostle John was still living in Ephesus, which is closer than Rome to Corinth. But it was the bishop of Rome (at the time, a smaller diocese) who dealt with the problem.
Then there are the seven letters of St. Ignatius, who was martyred in Rome in 106. Ignatius was the third bishop of Antioch (Peter had been the first) and a disciple of the apostle John. Because these letters, written en route to Rome, are so Catholic, their authenticity was long contested by Protestant scholars, but now they are almost universally accepted as genuine.
Ignatius was the first to call the Church "Catholic." He writes to the Ephesians that "the bishops who have been appointed throughout the world are the will of Jesus Christ…. Let us be careful, then, if we would be submissive to God, not to oppose the bishop." And his letter to the church at Smyrna attacks those who deny the Real Presence: "They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of Our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins…."
 What these documents reveal is a primitive church that is recognizably hierarchical and centered on the Eucharist. |
It is noteworthy that in addressing the Church at Rome — a less ancient see than Antioch — Ignatius's tone changes entirely. He is deferential, praiseful: "You have envied no one; but others you have taught."
There is also the Didache, which was a kind of catechism and liturgical manual written some time between 70 and 150. It is a short document that could be used in RCIA today without changing a syllable.
The Didache (which means "teaching") begins with a number of prohibitions (including abortion). Then, after what is probably the text of an early eucharistic prayer, comes the money quote: "Let no one eat or drink of the Eucharist with you except those who have been baptized…. On the Lord's day gather together, break bread and give thanks after confessing your transgressions so that your sacrifice may be pure…. For this is what was proclaimed by the Lord: 'In every place and time let there be offered to me a clean sacrifice….'"
The last line is from Malachi, the last of the Old Testament prophets, who talks about how God, displeased with the sacrifices of the people of Judah, will accept the "sacrifice… the clean oblation" offered everywhere among the Gentiles. Early Christians considered this passage an anticipation of the Sacrifice of the Mass.
What these documents reveal is a primitive church that is recognizably hierarchical and centered on the Eucharist. Catholics, of course, do not base their faith on these early literary scraps but on the living authority of the Church. Still, it can be fun to broach these ancient names while nibbling an hors d'oeuvre.
Well then, they were all Methodists for sure.
A perversion of history and a perversion of the bible...In other words, this is a lie...
Rev 1:9 I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
John was not any where near Ephesus...John was living off the coast of Turkey on an island...Why would the author lie about that???
John was being instructed on the future of the creation by God and you want us to believe there was some other human who was not even an apostle in charge of John??? Ludicrous...
Rev 1:4 John to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne;
So Rome is at the top of the list, right??? What??? Rome isn't even on the list...How do you guys figure that God neglected to mention his holy see??? I know why he didn't mention it to the last living apostle...
Then there are the seven letters of St. Ignatius, who was martyred in Rome in 106. Ignatius was the third bishop of Antioch (Peter had been the first) and a disciple of the apostle John. Because these letters, written en route to Rome, are so Catholic, their authenticity was long contested by Protestant scholars, but now they are almost universally accepted as genuine.
Ignatius was not a disciple of John any more that I was a disciple of Paul...Another lie...
The next lie is that the forged letters of Ignatius are now widely accepted...That ridiculous...
Ignatius was the first to call the Church "Catholic." He writes to the Ephesians that "the bishops who have been appointed throughout the world are the will of Jesus Christ…. Let us be careful, then, if we would be submissive to God, not to oppose the bishop." And his letter to the church at Smyrna attacks those who deny the Real Presence: "They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of Our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins…."
The forged letters claim the church was catholic, NOT Catholic...Another lie...
The two (or 3) sets of those letter contain one set that has no reference to Catholic traditions such as the Eucharist...Another set does...It doesn't take a genius to figure out which ones were forged...
Rom 11:13 For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:
Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles...Peter was to the Jews...
Act 8:14 Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John:
This puts to rest the false notion that Peter had authority above any one else...Peter was instructed by the other apostles to go to Samaria...Peter's preeminence is a myth put out by the Catholic religion...
So you are Eastern Orthodox? Anyway, I have provided several cites and discussions for the Church Fathers in the 1st and 2nd century. In addition, I have included in certain places, a link to The Church Fathers edited by P Schaff, the 19th century Reformed Patristic Scholar and the introduction which confirms that these are extant.
St. Clement of Rome wrote the letter to the Church in Corinth in 95 AD. He was certainly the Bishop of Rome. I know of no reputable Protestant patristic scholar that questions the authenticity of this latter. Schaff, Funk, Lightfoot, Von Harnack, and Zahn.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.ii.i.html
Saint Dionysius of Corinth wrote a Letter to Bishop of Rome Soter and the Roman Church in circa 166 to 174AD which we have an extant copy preserved in Eusebius History of the Church written in early 4th century.
The Letter states from the beginning it has been your custom to do good to all the brethren in various ways and to send contributions to all the Churches in every city, thereby relieving the poverty of the needy and providing for the brethren in the mines. In this way, through the contributions which have ever been made, you Romans have preserved the ancestral customs of the Romans. This custom, your blessed Bishop Soter has not only preserved, but is augmenting, by furnishing an abundance of supplies to the saints and by urging with consoling words, as a loving father his children.
In this same letter, Saint Dionysius also refers to Saint Clement, Bishop of Rome, which was sent to the Church in Corinth some 70 or 80 years earlier and he tells Bishop Soter that Clements Letter is still read in the Church of Corinth till this day.
St, Irenaeus of Lyons list Bishops, and he writes in 180AD [Against Heresies], that would be 2nd century and lists the Bishops of the Church at Rome that succeeded the Blessed Apostles, Peter and Paul, these would be Linus, Anencletus, Clement [whose Letter to Corinth is recalled and dicussed by Irenaeus], Evaristus, Alexander, Sixtus, Telesphorous, Hyginus, Pius, Anicetus, Soter and Eleutherus.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.ix.i.html
St. Irenaeus Letter to Victor [written circa 190 AD], Bishop of Rome speaks of the time Polycarp was visiting Rome in the time of Anicetus regarding the Quartodeciman practice. The Letter indicates that they remained in communion with each other and Anicetus allowed St. Polycarp to celebrate the Eucharist in his Church and they kept the peace of the Church in tact. It was Irenaeus’s intervention that stoped Victor from excommunicating some Eastern Bishops over the dispute of the celebration of Easter and how it was calculated. Eventually, the Roman custom would win out and be defined for the entire Catholic Church at the Council of Nicea.
The Muratorian Fragment [circa 155 to 200AD] speaks regarding the Shepherd of Hermas that it was written quite recently in the City of Rome when Bishop Pius sat in the chair of the Church in the City of Rome. Pius was Pope of Rome from 140 to 154/155 AD.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf02.ii.i.html
Saint Hegesipius, Bishop of Corinth, wrote his Memoirs around 180AD. He traveled to Rome around 155 AD when Anicetus was Bishop of Rome. The Letter that has come down to us was from fragments and from Eusebius History of the Church. In this letter he stated he went to Rome and met many Bishops in the West and saw that the Doctrine taught there was the same as in the East at the Church in Corinth. He traveled around the Western world to see what was the consensus orthodox doctrine so that he could battle the Gnostic Heretics. Hegesipius does make mention of the Bishop of Rome Anicetus and makes mention of those he met who would also come after Anicetus, he mention of both Soter and Eleutherus.
So, rather than check the post you suggested, I just went to my Church Father writings and found evidence that clearly contradicts your assertion that it is hard to tell wehter Rome even had Bishops at all during the first and second centuries.
Disregard any PROTESTANT theology PHDs. Do you actually think they would say anything that proved the early Church was Catholic. I think not. Look to Pope Benedict 16, probably the greatest Christian historian in the world, and no one else.
But if you don’t want to get former popes involved, former Prysbyterian minister, and now Catholic apologist, Dr. Scott Hahn is second to none.
Hahn received his B.A. degree magna cum laude in 1979 from Grove City College in Pennsylvania with a triple major of Theology, Philosophy, and Economics.[2] He obtained his M.Div. degree summa cum laude from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in 1982. In May 1995, he was awarded a Ph.D. degree in Systematic Theology from Marquette University (Phi Beta Kappa). His dissertation, entitled Kinship by Covenant: A Biblical Theological Analysis of Covenant Types and Texts in the Old and New Testaments, is an example of contemporary covenantal theology.
“Obviously, the Lutherans and Presbyterians all hold to a Real Presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, they just deny transubstantiation”.
Well they’re wrong.
NKP_Vet:
Actually, you don’t know how true you are. If you read P. Schaff’s Church Father work, his notes does all kind of mental gymnastics to get round the Catholicity of those letters. It kind of reminds me of the Planet of the Apes when Charlton Heston was being interrogated by the orangutan’s. They put their heads in the sand!
No reputable scholar denies the authenticity of St. Clement’s Letter to Rome or St. Ignatius of Antioch’s 7 epistles. Lightfoot, Von Harnack, Zahn and Funk accept them. The reason they were questioned because of there Catholicity.
Philip Schaff in his introductory note finally now only questions whether the Longer or shorter Greek versions or Syriac version is the most accurate one. The question of whether they are not authentic is only still found in American Fundamentalist circles.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.ii.i.html
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.i.html
And this food is called among us Εὐχαριστία [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh. For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when He had given thanks, said, "This do in remembrance of Me, this is My body;" and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, "This is My blood;" and gave it to them alone.All the protestations of the Protestants notwithstanding, this is clearly Catholic.
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Rather, anyone with a rudimentary understanding of Scripture should be able to see how amazing it is to confuse Rome with the NT church which: 1. Never had any pastors titled "priests" as they did not engage in any unique sacrificial function, that of turning bread into human flesh and dispensing it to the people. 2. Never differentiated between bishops and elders, and with grand titles ("Most Reverend Eminence," “Very Reverend,” “Most Illustrious and Most Reverend Lord,” “His Eminence Cardinal,” “The Most Reverend the Archbishop,” etc.) or made such distinct by their ostentatious pompous garb. (Matthew 23:5-7) 3. Never had apostles preaching receiving the Eucharist as the means by which one received spiritual life in themselves, so that without which eating one cannot have eternal life (as per RC literalism, of Jn. 6:53,54), versus believing the gospel, and the Lord's supper as focusing on the church being the body of Christ in showing the Lord sacrificial death by that communal meal. 4. Never required clerical celibacy as the norm, (1Tim. 3:17) which presumes all such have that gift. 5. Never promised a perpetual assuredly (if conditionally) infallible magisterium, or taught this is necessary for preservation of truth, including writings to be established as Scripture, and for assurance of faith, and that historical descent and being the steward of Scripture assured they had assured infallibility. 6. Never manifested where Peter is confirmed to be the "rock" of Mt. 16:18 upon which the church is built, rather than upon the rock of the faith confessed by Peter, thus Christ Himself. 7. Never taught or exampled that all the churches were to look to Peter as the bishop of Rome, as the first of a line of supreme heads reigning over all the churches, and having the last word in questions affecting the whole Church. 8. Never recorded or taught any apostolic successors (like for James: Acts 12:1,2) besides for Judas (who was to maintain the original 12: Rv. 21:14) and who was elected by voting, versus casting lots (no politics). (Acts 1:15ff) 9. Never recorded or manifested (not by conjecture) sprinkling or baptism without repentant personal faith, that being the stated requirement for baptism. (Acts 2:38; 8:36-38) 10. Never preached a gospel of salvation which begins with becoming good enough inside (formally justified due to infused interior charity), via sprinkling or baptism in recognition of proxy faith, and which usually ends with becoming good enough to enter glory via suffering in purgatory, commencing at death. 11. Never had a separate class of believers called “saints.” 12. Never prayed to anyone in Heaven but the Lord, or were instructed to (i.e. "our Mother who art in Heaven) who were able to hear and respond to virtually unlimited prayers addressed to them. 13. Never recorded a women who never sinned, and was a perpetual virgin despite being married (contrary to the normal description of marriage, as leave and cleave. ) and who would be bodily assumed to Heaven and exalted as a demigoddess. All of which conspicuous absence is not characteristic of Holy Spirit who reveals notable aspects of its significant subjects, from long life, to escaping death or being bodily assumed to God, to extra toes, to unique diets, to being sinless, etc. 14. Never supported or made laws that restricted personal reading of Scripture by laity (contrary to Chrysostom), if able and available, sometimes even outlawing it when it was. 15. Never used the sword of men to deal with its theological dissenters. 16. Never taught that the deity Muslims worship (who is not as an unknown god) is the same as theirs. I could go on, but this should suffice for now, and its late. |
You are supposing that RCs can objectively examine evidence in order to ascertain the veracity of RC doctrine, but which is not the case if they are faithful. Their function is simply to support Rome, thus any evidence, by Prots or Catholics, such as the RC scholars i provided above by God's grace, or secular stats , that impugns their cherished image of Rome is often summarily dismissed as biased and liberal.
And Scripture is treated simply as a servant to wrest support for her traditions of men. As Manning expressed above , history is what Rome says it is. Thus as Keating As Keating states as regards there strictly being zero proof from Scripture for the Assumption, "The mere fact that the Church teaches the doctrine of the Assumption as definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.” — Karl Keating, Catholicism and Fundamentalism (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1988), p. 275.
Sounds like the liberal elite. In-credible!
2Tim. 2:25
You may also find this http://vintage.aomin.org/1296CATR.html interesting and this: http://turretinfan.blogspot.com/2010/11/romes-meaningless-claim-to-unbroken.html
Have a God night.
“The mere fact that the Church teaches the doctrine of the Assumption as definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.”
That’s exactly right. God gave the Catholic Church this teaching authority.
Philip Schaff died in 1893...
So all of your history comes from Eusebius who wrote that he had copies of these historic Catholics...Your religion doesn't really have any extant manuscripts from these church fathers of yours...
Yet in all of PolyCarp's writings he never once mentions a Eucharist...A little odd don't you think???
Being right by God actually takes work.
That’s the biggest grudge against Catholicism, because the actual path is clear to recognize.
The arrogance of men knowing an easy way is their true hindrance.
°knowing°
Curiously, the copy I found from the 1st apology #66 has some different things to say...
And this food is called among us Εύχαριστία [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished. Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done. For, that bread and a cup of water are placed with certain incantations in the mystic rites of one who is being initiated, you either know or can learn
(First Apology 66).
Contrary to what the Catholic religion and Justin Martyr claim, the Mithra religion started about 3500 years ago...Mithra was the Sun god whose birth was celebrated on Dec. 25...
The Catholic Eucharist is very similar to one of the rituals used in worshiping Mithra...
What Justin Martyr is describing is what the early Christians actually believed and practiced. As Justin shows, this is based on the institution of the Eucharist by our Lord at the Last Supper. You are not saying that Jesus was just imitating Mithra, are you? I am so sorry that the historical record of what the early Christians believed and practiced is Catholic and not Protestant.
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