Blog Search Results

Lent: Day 15 - Justin Martyr: First Apology, Chaps. 36-47

...t and how salvation affects them (basically it does because Jesus was the pre-existing Word), and Christ ruling from heaven and the prediction of Judea being made desolate, fulfilling Isa. 64:10. Even though this has been a long post and not as brief as I maybe would have liked to keep it, since there was a lot of topics covered, I thought that it would be an injustice to skip on these things since they are central to some of our understanding of Christ and his relation to being the prophetic fulfillment of the Scriptures. I recommend that you read the original text of today’s chapters to really get an understanding of what Justin was saying and drawing out i...

Lent: Day 17 - Justin Martyr: First Apology: Chaps. 60-68

...d for our salvation” as the reason why the bread and wine “is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh” — something which the Mithras cult copied, apparently. Weekly worship A description follows about how Christians met together to pray and worship on a weekly basis, every Sunday. It's nice to see that some things haven't changed much in over two millennia! The reason for it being on a Sunday and not the Sabbath is because of the prevailing belief that the world was brought into being on Sunday in the very beginning, and then also the world was again changed on a Sunday when “Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead...

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

...water of salvation. Personally, I really like that analogy and I’ve never heard it put that way before. The phrases which the converts have to recite remind me of the liturgy which you have to say during a Christening. That in itself shows an interesting link to how this tradition and practice has been preserved in certain churches. I’ll contrast the two just to show the similarities, I’m using the Anglican liturgy since that’s what I’m most familiar with from memory: Do you reject the devil and all rebellion against God? I reject them.   Do you renounce the deceit and corruption of evil? I renounce them.   Do you repent of the sins tha...

Lent Day 33: Cyril of Jerusalem: Catechetical Lectures: Lecture XXII

...on toward salvation now you have put off the old garment and are clothed with a garment which is always “spiritually white”. Cyril closes off his lecture by saying that now his new converts have “learned these things”, they should be fully assured that, “the seeming bread is not bread, though sensible to taste, but the Body of Christ; and that the seeming wine is not wine, though the taste will have it so, but the Blood of Christ”. The more I've looked into this and read the Scriptures, and have read other Church Fathers, it has led me away from the doctrine that Communion is purely symbolic, and more towards the Real Presence idea that Christ is...

Lent Day 36: Ambrose of Milan: Concerning the Mysteries: 5-9

...Day Thirty-six: St. Ambrose of Milan: Concerning the Mysteries: 5-9 Who: Bishop of Milan from 374 to 397; born probably 340, at Trier, Arles, or Lyons; died 4 April, 397. He was one of the most illustrious Fathers and Doctors of the Church. What: The treatise was composed for use during the latter part of Lent, for the benefit of those about to be baptised, the rites and meaning of that Sacrament, as well as of Confirmation and the Holy Eucharist. For all these matters were treated with the greatest reserve in the Early Church, for fear of being misused by unbelievers. Why: Ambrose states that after the explanations he has already given of holy living (in pre...

Lent Day 37: Leo the Great: Letter XXVIII (called the "Tome")

...d for our salvation, born of the virgin Mary, the mother of God, according to the manhood; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures, inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one Person and one Subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and only begotten, God the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, as the prophets from the beginning have declared concerning him, and the Lord Jesus Christ himself taught us, and the Creed of the holy Fathe...