Ch-ch-chain…Chain of Fathers*
A while ago I wrote a post where I listed all the resources I draw upon each week in the composition of my commentary on the Sunday Mass Readings. I realized today that I forgot to mention one very important resource: the “Catena Aurea”.
So what is this “Catena Aurea”? I first heard about it on an episode of the world’s greatest podcast, “Catholic Stuff You Should Know”. The Catena is a book, a Scriptural commentary whose name, when translated from the Latin, means “Golden Chain”.
Mr. T pities the fool who don’t read the Catena!
As the podcast episode explains, the Catena Aurea is a commentary on the Gospels which was assembled by St. Thomas Aquinas…
St. Thomas: The man who wrote pretty much everything ever written…
…wait…Aquinas…again?! Really? I wish this guy had written a book on time management – he produced sooooo much stuff! Where did he find the time?!
Anyway…where was I? Oh yes, the Catena… It’s a commentary on the Gospels and was assembled at the request of Pope Urban IV in the Thirteenth Century. The Pope wanted to improve the quality of the homilies in the Church and asked Aquinas to produce this book as a preaching tool for the clergy.
It’s not Aquinas himself who wrote the commentary. Instead, the commentary for each verse is a collation of everything the Early Church Fathers had to say about each verse. Anyone who’s ever read some of the works of the Fathers will have sense for what a mammoth task this would be! And the good news? His commentary is available for free online:
If you’d like to know more about the Catena, including why it’s actually called the “Golden Chain”, I’d invite you to listen to the podcast… 😉
*Just in case you didn’t get the reference…