Newspaper Page Text
Thursday, March 1, 2001
F&itlh
The Southern Cross, Page 9
FAITH IN THE MARKETPLACE
Who is a figure from church history whose story inspires you?
“Three come to mind: Archbishop Oscar Romero, who was assassinated
in El Salvador for speaking out on behalf of the poor; Dorothy Day, who
was way ahead of her time in her social teachings about the poor; and
Henriette de Lille, a black woman during the time of Reconstruction who
founded a Catholic religious order for other black women.” — Father Pio
Jackson, Nashville, Tenn.
“For me it would be St. Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower. She
inspires me. She didn’t do anything great or big, but in little ways she
made a significant impact on the lives of others.” — Diana Rose, Kansas
City, Mo.
“Mary. I am a convert, and I never recognized until then that she was
the first person to know Christ.” — Dorothy Allen, Phoenix, Ariz.
An upcoming edition asks: Tell of a time you felt God responded to your prayer.
If you would like to respond for possible publication, please write: Faith Alive!
3211 Fourth St. N.E., Washington, D.C. 20017-1100.
The legacy of the early
church fathers
By Father John W. Crossin, OSFS
Catholic News Service
w.
e remember them in our
church names — St. Ignatius, St.
Polycarp or St. Justin. The apostolic
fathers are still with us. Their legacy,
however, is much deeper than a
church named in their honor or a
brief prayer in the feast-day liturgy.
Recently I celebrated the funeral
Mass for a friend — a colleague of
► many years who came to his Catho
lic faith as an adult. In the notes he
left for my preaching, he remarked
on “an increasing admiration of the
centuries-long and continuing uni
versality of the Catholic Church”
that helped bring him to Catholi
cism.
The Christian writers of the early
centuries provide a “rootedness” that
many find attractive. These writers
were close in time to Jesus Christ and
► deeply committed to him. They had a
practical sense of what it took to be
his follower.
The early fathers of the church left
writings that to this day are sources
of study, prayer and meditation —
benchmarks against which we mea
sure our faith. Concerned with key
issues such as Christ’s importance
and the practical implications of his
^teaching for moral living, the early
fathers move us toward the central
aspects of the faith and away from
secondary issues which can take up
too much of our time.
The early church fathers were ut
terly serious about the faith and com
mitted to it. Today people may find
commitment difficult. Ours is an age
of skepticism and relativism. Author
ity is most often under suspicion.
Thus, we can find it infinitely re
freshing to read the works of those
totally committed to Christ.
We intuitively know commit
ment, not skepticism, fulfills our
deepest longings. The early fathers
committed themselves to Christ de
spite rejections and persecutions.
They committed themselves in the
midst of the pagan world of the Ro
man Empire.
We, living in an increasingly
secular world, take comfort in
knowing that even the earliest
Christians had to deal with similar
situations. They did so effectively,
and so can we.
These early Christian witnesses fo
cused on the central elements of faith.
The fathers were diverse in time and
location, yet united in dedication to
the central aspects of Christ’s teach
ing. So their theological reflections
offer diversity in unity.
At a time when Catholicism em
braces a variety of world cultures, it
is comforting to know the earliest
Christians could maintain unity in
the midst of diverse circumstances
and varied ways of thinking.
These ancestors of ours in faith
remain very much alive to us. While
their names are attached to struc
tures of brick and stone, their com
mitment, writing, diversity and pri
orities provide roots for us even to
day.
(Oblate Father Crossin is execu
tive director of the Washington Theo
logical Consortium. He can be
reached at crossinwtc@aol.com.)
,na Nutshell
Would the writings of the early church fathers make for good
Lenten reading? The fathers had clarity of vision and intense
devotion.
The early fathers move us toward the central aspects of faith
and away from secondary issues. In their culturally diverse
world, they found ways to foster unity among the church’s
people.
Hearing the church fathers, it is impossible to feel
complacent about faith!
The scriptural language the
early church fathers spoke
By Father Eugene LaVerdiere, SSS
Catholic News Service
T>
he early church fathers, like
St. Ignatius of Antioch and St.
Polycarp, knew and understood the
Scriptures. For them, the Old Testa
ment was the word of God, and the
Gospel of Jesus was a living reality.
While writing their letters, they
did not refer to the scriptural words
as written on scrolls, for they knew
their tradition and the Gospel of
Jesus from memory. The words of
Scripture became their own, express
CNS illustration by Robert F. McGovern
“On
■■
ing their faith, their prayer and their
pastoral exhortations.
Ignatius was the third bishop of
Antioch. Eusebius, an ancient histo
rian, reported that Ignatius was
bishop of Antioch during the Emperor
Trajan’s reign (A.D. 98-117). At the
end of Trajan’s
reign, sometime
between 110 and
115, Ignatius was
sent to Rome to
be devoured by
beasts on account
of his Christian
witness.
During his
journey to Rome,
Ignatius wrote
seven letters —
six to local church communities and
one to Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna.
On his journey, Ignatius met
Polycarp in the port of Smyrna.
Imagine their meeting. The old
bishop and the young bishop were
friends!
Imagine the conversation between
Ignatius and Polycarp! Ignatius was
going to his martyrdom. Many years
later, like Ignatius, Polycarp would
witness to Christ by giving his life as
a martyr.
According to St. Irenaeus, as a
young man Polycarp was a disciple of
St. John, probably the apostle. Both
reflected on the Law of Moses, the
prophets, the books of Wisdom and
especially the Psalms. They saw
Jesus, his life, his ministry and his
teaching, especially his passion and
resurrection, through the lens of the
Old Testament.
Psalm 33 is a hymn of praise, in
viting us to sing a new song for the
Lord God, the creator of the heavens
and the earth. As occurred in the
Prologue of John’s Gospel (1:10),
Ignatius related this psalm to Jesus
Christ.
Speaking of the teacher who “prac
tices what he preaches,” Ignatius says
that “there was one such teacher, who
‘spoke, and it was made’” (Psalm
33:9); “and what he did in silence is
worthy of the Father” (Letter of
Ignatius to the Ephesians, 15).
In the phrase “what he did in si
lence” Ignatius refers to Jesus’ trials
and his interrogations before the high
priest and Pilate. With
that phrase, he
evoked the whole
psalm. Christians
must imitate the
one teacher, Jesus
Christ: “It is bet
ter to keep quiet
and be real, than
to chatter and be
unreal.”
These church
fathers were very
creative, relating
the Old Testa
ment, their Chris
tian tradition, the
Gospels and the
letters in the New
Testament to their
new pastoral chal
lenges.
Polycarp would refer to
the letters of Paul, the letter of
John and the Acts of the Apostles, at
the same time referring to the letters
of Ignatius, his friend.
Writing to the Ephesians, for ex
ample, Ignatius wrote on the birth
of Jesus and the incarnation: “A
star blazed forth in the sky, out
shining all the
other stars, and
its light was in
describable, and
its novelty pro
voked wonder
ment. And all
the starry orbs,
with the sun
and the moon,
formed a choir
round that star”
(No. 19).
Ignatius connected the star of the
Magi in Matthew’s Gospel to the choir
of angels in Luke’s Gospel. Ignatius
knew that the two stories of Jesus’
birth were very different. Taking se
riously the images of the star and the
angelic choir, he entered inside both
stories, joining them as one story in
his meditation.
(Father LaVerdiere, a Blessed Sac
rament priest, is a Scripture scholar
and senior editor of Emmanuel
magazine.)
All contents copyright ©2001 by CNS
his journey Ignatius met
Polycarp in the port of Smyrna.
Imagine their meeting. The old
bishop and the young bishop
were friends!”