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Lent Day 30: Cyril of Jerusalem: Catechetical Lectures: Lecture XIX

Day Thirty: St. Cyril of Jerusalem: Catechetical Lectures: Lecture XIX Who: Bishop of Jerusalem and Doctor of the Church, born about 315; died probably 18 March, 386. Little is known of his life, except from his younger contemporaries, Epiphanius, Jerome, and Rufinus, as well as from the fifth-century historians, Socrates, Sozomen and Theodoret. What: Each of the lectures deal with a different topic to teach converts the mysteries of the Church, particularly: rites of the renunciation of Satan and his works, of anointing with oil, of baptism, of anointing with the holy chrism, and of partaking of the body and blood of Christ. Why: Cyril delivered to new conve...

Evidence of the Trinity in the Hebrew Scriptures

...ticles of Faith” in place of echad. However, Deuteronomy 6:4 (the Shema) does not use “yachid” in reference to God. II. God Is At Least Two Elohim and YHVH Applied to Two Personalities As if to even make the case for plurality stronger, there are situations in the Hebrew Scriptures where the term Elohim is applied to two personalities in the same verse. One example is Psalm 45:7-8: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever;A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.You love righteousness and hate wickedness;Therefore God, Your God, has anointed YouWith the oil of gladness more than Your companions.” It should be noted that the...

John Chau, missionary to the Sentinelese: martyr or madness?

...You've probably seen it in the news lately: John Chau, the American guy who tried to evangelise the secluded Sentinelese tribe off the coast of India. Much of the debate in secular media has centered around the grief of his friends and family; how he could have brought outside disease to the tribespeople and potentially killed them all (despite this not being their first contact with outsiders, with no known ill effect), or that he ventured there completely in ignorance with no preparation or wisdom — something which the missionary agency, All Nations, has recently debunked. But the question I want to look at is this: was Chau's mission total madness or is...

Fasting: A spiritual and physical discipline

...The topic of fasting often comes up in online discussion groups that I'm a part of, more often in Protestant circles where the practice is more often sidelined in low churches. So let's take a look at the practice of fasting from a practical and historical view, as it seems to be a spiritual discipline which has been pushed aside in many churches today, with prayer, worship and bible reading taking more precedence in a Christian's life instead (not that those are bad things to do!). Why fast? There are many reasons to fast, and recent studies have shown a lot of health benefits that can be derived from fasting. But on the spiritual side of life, there are also...

Should Christians get tattoos, and is it Biblical?

...I was in a discussion not so long ago about tattoos, and I was asked about the historical view on this practice. It wasn’t something I had looked into before from a Church Fathers point of view, so it was an interesting topic of study. In my searching, I found this article from a Catholic site which seems to give a pretty interesting overview of some of the views about tattoos in the earlier centuries. The following is a quote about a Church Council in the context of native Britons, who still practiced tattooing at that time for pagan ritual, something which Tertullian also gives a fleeting reference to around 213 AD in his On the Veiling of Virgins, ch. 10....

Lent: Day 7 - Ignatius to the Trallians

...at to the Faith anymore. Even so, remembering the fact that Jesus was indeed “revealed in flesh, vindicated in spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, [and] taken up in glory” (1 Tim 3:16) is the cornerstone of our Faith. Anything less is not the Gospel, and that is what Ignatius was emphasising to this church. I'm going to close by quoting Ignatius’ “history of Christ” just because I really like the way it summarises the Gospel: Stop your ears, therefore, when anyone speaks to you at variance with Jesus Christ, who was descended from David, and was also of Mary; who was truly born, and did eat and drink...