Here Irenaeus underlines the Catholicity of the Church with many cultures professing a single truth, a common tradition of catholic and apostolic faith going back to the apostles and their disciples. Though this was written about 185 AD, one can recognize here the outline of...
Origen here shows how the Lord Jesus Christ is the true High Priest and sacrifice whose death occurs on Good Friday, the eternal Day of Atonement foreshadowed by the Yom Kippur of the Old Covenant. In this selection we also learn why the early...
Tertullian, in the late second century, writes of the power of Christian prayer, which replaces the sacrifices of old and makes us priests who are worshipers in spirit and in truth. Prayer is one of the three traditional tools for spiritual growth in Lent...
Paul's concept of "pedagogy," further developed here by Irenaeus, holds that the whole period of the Old Testament with all its characters, events, and institutions, was a preparation for and foreshadowing of the fullness of revelation that was to come in Jesus Christ and his...
This post on the Lord's Prayer comes from one of the earliest treatises on the Our Father, written around AD 240 by Cyprian of Carthage. It discusses one of the three pillars of Lenten penance, namely, the importance and power of prayer....
Irenaeus here comments on the famous line of John's Last Supper discourse in which Jesus tells us that he no longer calls us servants but friends. Friendship with God and service to him leads to immortality. [dropcaps type='normal' font_size='100' color='' background_color='' border_color='']O[/dropcaps]ur Lord, the Word of...
This excerpt from St. Clement’s First Letter to the Corinthians on repentance, written around AD 95, urges us to repent, change our lives, seek God’s mercy & fix our attention on the blood of Jesus Christ. It is traditionally read on Ash Wednesday...
[dropcaps type='normal' font_size='100' color='' background_color='' border_color='']T[/dropcaps]hat Jesus should come and be baptized by John is surely cause for amazement. To think of the infinite river that gladdens the city of God being bathed in a poor little stream of the eternal, the unfathomable fountainhead that...
Irenaeus, ca. AD 185, here writes of the incarnation, the Word of God born for us as Emmanuel, Jesus Christ, Son of Man, the sign of our salvation. He comes to restore God's likeness in us and lead us to glory. [dropcaps type='normal' font_size='100' color='' background_color=''...
Written by St. Irenaeus about 185 AD, this excerpt makes clear the Church's realistic interpretation of the eucharist as the risen body of Christ which serves as the medicine of immortality, the pledge of our own future resurrection. The real presence of the body...