Paternal Protestations

As you’ll see from the categorization of this entry, this is an apologetics post. In this article I am going to be defending the use of the writings of the Early Church Fathers in demonstrating the historicity and veracity of the Catholic Faith.

The problem with writing a defence of anything is that, even with the best will in the world, it’s still easy to come across as though you’re attacking those to whom you are responding.

So, if you’re reading this post and you feel that it comes across as Protestant-bashing then I’m truly sorry.  This is certainly not my intention.  In fact, this was one of the reasons why I penned the Ecumenical Apologist entry, to try and dispel such charges. In this post I simply want to present something of an explanation as to why one should care about the Early Church Fathers.

Forgotten Treasure

On the occasions when I’ve been engaged in apologetics with non-Catholic Christians I’ve often mentioned the Early Fathers.  I’m usually met with blank stares.  The Early who?! Unfortunately, like Catholics, our separated brethren haven’t read much of the Early Church Fathers either 🙁

One of my hopes for this blog is that it will encourage both groups to read the Fathers and learn more about our common heritage.  The Early Church Fathers are fundamentally important in ecumenical work since they were living in a time prior to the divisions of the Great East/West Schism and the Reformation.

On the odd occasion when I do encounter non-Catholics who have heard of the Fathers, they usually only have second-hand information and have actually not read any of their writings.  This is not true of all non-Catholics, of course, but in my limited experience it has at least been the larger majority. It should come as no surprise then, upon meeting Catholic or Protestant Christians unfamiliar with the Fathers, I immediately encourage them to begin by reading the letters of my favourite Early Church Father, St. Ignatius of Antioch 🙂

How You Shouldn’t Treat The Fathers

Yesterday, Joe over at Shameless Popery wrote a great post entitled Three Ways You Shouldn’t Treat The Church Fathers. Here were his three points:

Wrong Way #1: Ignoring or Fearing the Church Fathers
Reason: It Reduces Christianity to Incoherence

Wrong Way #2: Exploiting the Church Fathers
Reason: It Doesn’t Treat the Fathers Honestly

Wrong Way #3: Treating the Church Fathers as Infallible
Reason: The Fathers Occasionally Disagree

In this blog post I would like to talk a little bit about the third item. In apologetic exchanges I have often had to correct the non-Catholic assertion that we regard the Fathers as infallible. We don’t. As Joe points out, the Fathers occasionally disagree. It is on this point that I sometimes hear another objection. Here is what someone recently wrote to me:

“The fathers didn’t agree on every matter of doctrine so their opinion is no more reliable than anyone else’s. There were some heated arguments between some of them.  In what way are they different from two modern-day non-Catholic pastors disagreeing over a certain interpretation of the Bible?“

I would like to take the rest of this blog entry to address this objection.

Patristic Divergence

In the above extract, my non-Catholic friend asks a perfectly reasonable question and it offered a perfect opportunity to share with him more about the Early Church Fathers.

1. Scale
The disputes among the Fathers were predominantly over secondary matters.  By comparison, the disputes in the non-Catholic world, even today, are over the most crucial, basic aspects of faith: effects of baptism, nature of the church, the role of faith in salvation, the Eucharist, availability of charismatic gifts, role of women in ministry…

2. Schism
As a consequence of continuing Protestant disagreements since the Reformation there has been a constant splintering of church congregations and an ever-increasing diversity of belief.

This is true on a global scale, but also on a local one, such as in my hometown. When one member of leadership disagreed with another he left that church and founded his own down the street.  The Fathers, in comparison remained part of the same visible Church despite their disagreements.

3. First Attempts
The Early Fathers are the giants on whose shoulders modern theologians stand. For example, the Fathers were the first people to come up with ways of explaining the mystery of the Godhead (a theological minefield). Another example would be that they were the first to explore the relationship between Christian faith and the reason found in Greek Philosophy.  Given this, it was inevitable that there would be some heated debate among them.

4. Areas of Speculation:
Many of the disagreements between the Fathers were over matters not yet explicitly taught by the Church.  In an area where the Church has not definitively taught, theologians are free to speculate.  The Catholic Church has not offered definitive teaching on many aspects of the faith, such as some aspects of eschatology, and therefore there is some latitude of belief permitted.  Different theologians will have different speculations and will spend lots of time arguing about them (and usually try and sell their books in the process).

On this point, it is important to understand the difference between “formal heresy” and “material heresy”.  Formal heresy is the obstinate rejection of the official teaching of the Church in favour of one’s own private judgment.  However, in contrast, material heresy is some disagreement based upon either the lack of explicit Church teaching or an ignorance of it.

However, once the Church has directly addressed an issue (usually in a council) the discussion ends.  For example, prior to the official institution of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, St. Bernard wrote a letter attacking its celebration. However, he ended his letter with the perfect attitude of humility:

“…I have said all of this in submission to the judgment of anyone wiser than myself and especially in submission to the authority of the Roman Church to whose decision I shall refer all that I have said on this and any other subject and am prepared to modify anything I have said if it is contrary to what she thinks.”

5. Consensus Patrum (Consensus of the Fathers)
The Church draws upon the consensus of the Fathers.  This consensus is what is important, not an individual and personal view expressed by a particular Father.  If we find baptismal regeneration taught consistently from the beginning (and we do) then we can safely say it’s Apostolic Tradition.

Other examples of consistent testimony include the concepts of the bishops, the Eucharist and ecumenical councils.  With all these and many other issues the Fathers speak with one voice, despite the immense diversity among the Fathers in country of origin, point in history, language, culture and occupation.  When they do this, they are witnessesing to something beyond them, they are witnessing to ancient Apostolic Tradition of Christianity.

Perspective of the Early Reformers

In closing, something else is probably worth mentioning.  If you ever read the works of the founding fathers of the Reformation (Luther, Calvin etc), you will notice that they are not nearly as dismissive of the Early Church Fathers as the majority of non-Catholics are today.

People like Calvin saw a problem in rejecting the Fathers and went to great lengths to try and show that his theology was in accord with that of the historic Church.  This is why the Reformers regarded themselves as “reformers” rather than “revolutionaries” – they thought they were returning the Church to an earlier, purer stage.

Among Protestant apologetics today, I would suggest that this approach to the Fathers has virtually disappeared.  This isn’t that surprising since as Cardinal Newman, an Anglican convert, once said, “To read the Fathers is to become Catholic”.

So go on, read them.  I dare you… 😉

The article Paternal Protestations first appeared on RestlessPilgrim.net