Dec 21, 2011

St Paul wrote his New Testament advice to elders and overseers. By the end of the first century, St John's disciple Ignatius wrote about how these orders of clergy interacted in his experience...

Oct 18, 2011

Christians cannot be distinguished from the rest of the human race by country or language or customs. They do not live in cities of their own; they do not use a peculiar form of speech; they do not follow an eccentric manner of life...

Dec 15, 2010

Peter Leithart’s latest book is a stunning work of scholarship on a closely related collection of issues that are among the most important in Christianity: the life of Constantine, the meaning of Constantinianism, and the radical transformation of the world that took place while he was Emperor.

Jan 13, 2010

The Church, though dispersed through our the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith...

Sep 21, 2009

What are the actual historical evidences, before Zwingli, for the Baptist view of the Lord’s Supper? Long story short: No answer. If there are evidences, then someone needs to write a book, asap. It’s long overdue.

Jun 12, 2009

North African bishop Augustine of Hippo (354–430) had no skin in the game concerning the current origins controversies. He interpreted Scripture a thousand years before the Scientific Revolution, and 1,500 before Darwin's Origin of Species. Augustine didn't "accommodate" or "compromise" his biblical interpretation to fit new scientific theories. The important thing was to let Scripture speak for itself.

Sep 11, 2008

The Didachē is a short catechism, probably written in Syria during the second half of the 1st century. The Didachē is concerned with practical discipline and does not deliberately teach doctrine, but from the writer's assumptions we learn a great deal about the development of the early Church in his generation.

Aug 27, 2008

When the Lord Jesus Christ, having gathered his disciples round him to supper on the night before he suffered death, solemnly broke bread before them and blessed a cup of wine and gave them to his disciples, he enjoined them to continue this thenceforward as a continual memorial of his death and passion undergone for the redemption of the world. This command was obeyed from the time that the Holy Spirit descended upon the Church shortly after our Lord's ascension into heaven. We are told, of those who were converted by the preaching of St. Peter on the day of Pentecost, that 'they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers'.

Jun 26, 2008

Related: The Martyrdom of Cyprian of Carthage Since the Lord warns us, saying, “Ye are the salt of the earth,” and since He bids us to be simple to harmlessness, and yet with our simplicity to be prudent, then what else, beloved brethren, befits us than to use foresight and watching with an anxious heart, both to perceive and to beware of the wiles of the...

Jun 20, 2008

Though the Protevangelium has never been considered Scripture, it is well worth reading to see what early Christians accepted as normal. Within living memory of the last of the apostles, the Protevangelium was being copied, translated and distributed among the churches, who found it both profitable and familiar...