A Simple Timeline Proves the Early Church was Catholic

[hartge01]

For those interested in “time lines” I stumbled across this one from an Eastern Orthodox position.

saintignatiuschurch.org/timeline.html#timechart

Peace,

Gary

 

[Tomster]

I could, but the fundamentalist/evangelical response is ‘well, Constantine changed the Church and all these pagan elements came in after 300 years’. I limit this to one generation (roughly 80 to one hundred years). That way we can see the events through the eyes of the people who actually experienced them, or were the children and grandchildren of those early christians. What were they like? How did they think? What did they experience. To walk in their shoes for a short time and see what it was like from the horse’s mouth. How did they view two most important issues that divide Catholics and evangelicals: the Eucharist and Baptism?
Staying within that first generation reveals much.

Indeed, staying within that first generation does reveal much. A question comes to mind for our fallen away brethren in regards to St. Clement of Rome. Before his conversion, how did he, Clement, personnally, make the all important choice between following Peter or Simon Magus? Both men, after all, refer to themselves as “apostles”. Both have been associated with reports of miracles and other unexplained happenings. And both have come to Rome preaching in the name of Jesus the Nazarene, crucified God of the Christians?

In regards to the “pagan elements” it was Simon Magus, founder, according to the Fathers, of the ancient heresy called Gnosticism, Christianity’s oldest and most obstinate rival. He was, in fact, the origianl fulfillment of one of Christ’s darkest warnings, Matthew 7:15.

Great thread Justa! Thanks!

 

[brb2]

For those interested in “time lines” I stumbled across this one from an Eastern Orthodox position.

saintignatiuschurch.org/timeline.html#timechart

Yes, interesting in that it shows the CC as a branch off of the mainline Orthodoxy.

Perhaps more of a Y divide can be acceptible to both, … rather than a primary mainline & secondary offshoot

So perhaps soon the < divide will rejoin, Christ returns, and paints a picture for us: <><

 

[Tomster]

Thanks for the timeline, Justa. Extremely helpful!



I’m personally trying to decide if the Catholic Church is the church i should trust. Can anyone fill me in on when the papacy is first mentioned in the writings of the early church fathers? Or does anyone know who is the first church father who referred to himself as Pope?

Thanks in advance.

"Nor does the kingdom of heaven belong to the sleeping and the lazy; rather, the violent take it by force (Matthew 11:12) . . . On hearing these words, the blessed Peter, the chosen, the pre-eminent, the first among the disciples, for whom alone with Himself the Savior paid tribute (Matthew 17:27), quickly grasped and understood their meaning. And what does he say? ‘Behold, we have left all and have followed you!’ " (Matthew 19:27; Mark10:28). - Clement of Alexandria, “Who is the Rich Man that Is Saved?” 200 A.D.

 

[JustaServant]

Also, the date for the Didache seems late by a decade ? What is your source on what you are showing ?

Well, you’re right. Most scholars, and the Catholic encyclopedia start the date of the writing of the Didache around 50 AD, which I agree with. I’m just giving the Protestants a little breathing room. Assigning a date (not exact by any means) closer to Barnabus, who quotes from the Didache. The Catholic encyclopedia gives the most plausable dates, even Protestants use it.

 

[JustaServant]

Indeed, staying within that first generation does reveal much. A question comes to mind for our fallen away brethren in regards to St. Clement of Rome. Before his conversion, how did he, Clement, personnally, make the all important choice between following Peter or Simon Magus? Both men, after all, refer to themselves as “apostles”. Both have been associated with reports of miracles and other unexplained happenings. And both have come to Rome preaching in the name of Jesus the Nazarene, crucified God of the Christians?

In regards to the “pagan elements” it was Simon Magus, founder, according to the Fathers, of the ancient heresy called Gnosticism, Christianity’s oldest and most obstinate rival. He was, in fact, the origianl fulfillment of one of Christ’s darkest warnings, Matthew 7:15.

Great thread Justa! Thanks!

I remember a group within fundamentalism that tried to prove it was Simon Magus that actually founded the church of Rome and the Catholic Church. It was based on very unconvincing historical evidence.

 

[Ben_F]

I love this thread. If I showed it to my Protestant daughter, and my Protestant twin brother, they wouldn’t even take the time to read it. They would probably say. I don’t read that catholic stuff and I don’t want to discuss it.

 

[RNRobert]

So tell us Protestants, why is it within a 100 year period, does the Church look so Catholic?

Great post! :clapping::dancing:

This reminds me of something G.K Chesterton wrote about the early Church in his book The Everlasting Man (boldface my emphasis):

Those who maintain that Christianity was not a Church but a moral movement of idealists have been forced to push the period of its perversion or disappearance
further and further back. A bishop of Rome writes claiming authority in the very lifetime of St. John the Evangelist; and it is described as the first papal aggression. A friend of the Apostles writes of them as men he knew and says they taught him the doctrine of the Sacrament, and Mr. Wells can only murmur that the reaction towards barbaric blood-rites may have happened rather earlier than might be expected. The date of the Fourth Gospel, which at one time was steadily growing later and later, is now steadily growing earlier and earlier; until critics are staggered at the dawning and dreadful possibility that it might be something like what it professes to be. The last limit of an early date for the extinction of true Christianity has probably been found by the latest German professor whose authority is invoked by Dean Inge. This learned scholar says
that Pentecost was the occasion for the first founding of an ecclesiastical, dogmatic, and despotic Church utterly alien to the simple ideals of Jesus of Nazareth. This may be called, in a popular as well as a learned sense, the limit. What do professors of this kind imagine that men are made of? Suppose it were a matter of any merely human movement, let us say that of the conscientious objectors. Some say the early Christians were Pacifists; I do not believe it for a moment; but I am quite ready to accept the parallel for the sake of the argument. Tolstoy or some great preacher of peace among peasants has been shot as a mutineer for defying conscription; and a little while afterwards his few followers meet together in an upper room in remembrance of him. They never had any reason for coming together except that common memory; they are men of many kinds with nothing to bind them, except that the greatest event in all their lives was this tragedy of the teacher of universal peace. They are always repeating his words, revolving his problems, trying to imitate his character. The Pacifists meet at their Pentecost and are possessed of a sudden ecstasy of enthusiasm and wild rush of the whirlwind of inspiration, in the course of which they proceed to establish universal Conscription, to increase the Navy Estimates, to insist on everybody going about armed to the teeth and on all the frontiers bristling with
artillery; the proceedings concluded with the singing of ‘Boys of the Bulldog Breed’ and ‘Don’t let them scrap the British Navy.’ That is something like a fair parallel to the theory of these critics; that the transition from their idea of Jesus to their idea of Catholicism could have been made in the little upper room at Pentecost. Surely anybody’s commonsense would tell him that enthusiasts who only met through their common enthusiasm for a leader whom they loved, would not instantly rush away to establish everything that he hated.** No, if the ‘ecclesiastical and dogmatic system’ is as old as Pentecost it is as old as Christmas. If we trace it back to such very early Christians we must trace it back to Christ**.

 

[ChristIsLife]

Dear JustaServant,

Perhaps you are forgetting the meaning of the word “Catholic” in its original context? “Catholic” means “Universal” as used in your quote.

Why do you find it necessary to challenge Protestants? Perhaps it is the Roman Catholic church that looks like (or thinks that it looks like) the early church? That is a matter of perspective, though I think a correct one since the early church existed before the Roman Catholic church in its current form.

I doubt that you will get the response that you desire from this forum. Your baiting is rather too subtle for the average user to respond meaningfully to. May I suggest that you rather enjoy Christ?

Thank you for the useful timeline. I was never aware of the chronology of the writings until now.

Grace and peace be with you.

 

[deanarrca]

Christslife,

I am a former Fundamentalist who is now Catholic- The main reason is the Study of History and the Study of the Bible. It is because amazingly the early Church looks a lot closer to the Catholic Church today than the reinvented Church of the Reformers or modern fundamentalism.

What were the early Christians like? What were the first churches like? What were the churches like that the Apostles founded? What did those early Christians believe? Did they just baptize adults or did they also baptize infants? Did they pour, immerse or both? Did they believe in Jesus’s real presence in the Eucharist?

Yes I can go to the Bible, but I need to interpret and understand the things written in the Bible the way Jesus and the Apostles understood and taught them.

I can’t ask Jesus directly. For instance, I can’t say “Hey Jesus what did you mean when you said this?” or "Apostles what did Jesus really mean?

One way to get the answers to these questions is to see how the early Christians understood what Jesus and the Apostles taught. What did they believe? These early Christians were taught by the Apostles who were in turn taught directly by Jesus. How did they Interpret Scripture. An Infallible Bible can be interpreted fallibly- so it is indeed important to ask how the Apostles and early church interpreted Scripture.

Yes not all the documents written in the above timeline became canonized scripture. Some of them are more like finding ancient Church bulletins, ancient Church service outlines, the Pastor’s notes, or music hymnals. These things aren’t scripture, but you can learn what the early Christians believed and how they interpreted Scripture from them. Just like you can understand how modern fundamentalists understand and interpret the Bible by looking at Scofield and Moody’s notes.

Simple logic tells me I need to go closer in time to the source to discover the true interpretation. If a writer writes a book but then dies, those who want to understand the mind of the author and his book are going to go to the people that were the closest to him to understand him better. Waiting 1500 years after the fact to figure it out is not logical.

 

[RNRobert]

Dear JustaServant,

Perhaps you are forgetting the meaning of the word “Catholic” in its original context? “Catholic” means “Universal” as used in your quote.

Why do you find it necessary to challenge Protestants? Perhaps it is the Roman Catholic church that looks like (or thinks that it looks like) the early church? That is a matter of perspective, though I think a correct one since the early church existed before the Roman Catholic church in its current form.

I doubt that you will get the response that you desire from this forum. Your baiting is rather too subtle for the average user to respond meaningfully to. May I suggest that you rather enjoy Christ?

Thank you for the useful timeline. I was never aware of the chronology of the writings until now.

Grace and peace be with you.

The point that JustaServant was trying to make is that many Protestants think that the things taught by the Catholic Church were added on at a later date, when in fact they were taught by the Apostles. John Newman discovered this when he started researching the history of the church, and he became Catholic. Many other Protestants have converted to the Catholic faith because of this.

 

[jimpres]

Justa servant,

Great timeline will come in handy. Jim

 

[YADA]

JUST MY $0.02 thrown in …

Dear JustaServant,

Perhaps you are forgetting the meaning of the word “Catholic” in its original context? “Catholic” means “Universal” as used in your quote.

No, I do not believe they ‘forgot’ the meaning of universal … and references such “Catholics” and “Roman Catholic” as identifiers for Christians arose out of the Reformation … with Roman Cartholic being a perjoritive. … and has become almost a necessity since the reformation so quickly degraded the unity [universal] character of Christianity that Jesus so prayed for and wept over in the Garden of Gethsemene. Jesus prayed for us to be one, Paul wrote to the Church [singular] that resided in various geographical locations.

Why do you find it necessary to challenge Protestants? Perhaps it is the Roman Catholic church that looks like (or thinks that it looks like) the early church? That is a matter of perspective, though I think a correct one since the early church existed before the Roman Catholic church in its current form.

Oh, I don’t know … perhaps it is because every single day a Protestant comes to the Forums to challange and tell us how wrong, stupid, ignorant, unChristian we are … they come to tell us where we are wrong and they are right.

Even your attempt to be rather benign with this “the early church existed before the Roman Catholic church in its current form” is rather insulting IMHO … you see you have just defined the “formm” of the ealy church as any thing but something that resembles the Church without defining what that “form” is …

whereas the OP and others have provided referecnes to “Form” as foundational beliefs [Jesus’s True Flesh & Blood in the Eucharist, Baptism by Immersion and Pouring, Church organization including rspect for the Bishop of Rome as the Succcessor of Peter, compilation of the Scriptures. There are descriptions of the liturgy that are very similar to the Mass today

I doubt that you will get the response that you desire from this forum. Your baiting is rather too subtle for the average user to respond meaningfully to. May I suggest that you rather enjoy Christ? I believe that they living their life in enjoyment of Christ. The OP is followin their baptismal calling to be a “priest, prophet and king”… They are [to the best of their ability] sharing the Good News of Salvation in Jesus Christ. Jesus gave us a Church not a book, Jesus gave us the Eucharist - His very Flesh and Blood for our Savation, not a mere empty symbolic representation of some long ago meal eaten without purpose. Jesus gave us a visible head to last through the ages with an office that ontinues to this very day that was entrusted with the very “Keys” to heaven. A hierarchy of leadership witht he power to bind and loose our sins - not to condemn us to Hell but to assist us in raching the Christian goal of eternal life with Jesus in Heaven … Yes I believe they know Christmmore fully then you do, they receive His very Flesh and Blood - nourished for the journey … They hear God’s Word Proclaimed and ingest God’s Word … Now that is what I call “Enjoying CHrist”

Thank you for the useful timeline. I was never aware of the chronology of the writings until now. Grace and peace be with you.

Now what will you do with this information and how will it impact how you view your faith? If you were not ever aware of the timeline are you aware of the various writings? what these early Christians wrote and thought? - reading their words as they came to more fully apprecate and understand what a faith in Jesus was, the Trinity, how Jesus was God and Man, how God entered into time, the Eucharist …

You see, the Church today is not the same Church. We have fullfilled the mission to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the World … very continent, every country

think of your time line … at one point the Gospel had been spread through Asia and Europe, the ‘known’ world [yes, from the perpsepctive of history written from the Roman Empire and its successors] … they thought that the mission was occomplished … then the Western Hemisphere and all of the peoples found there are a wake up call … there was more “Ends of the Earth” to evangelize …

Today we have a world that runs on technological advances, travel, communications, commerce, science … so yes the Church as all organizations appear or operate differently … but alas things change they also remain the same … The Eucharist - like Jesus- is the same: yesterday, today and tomorrow

Pax Christe

 

[Bluegoat]

Well, it’s a nice enough timeline.

However, the comments about Protestants reveal a lack of knowledge about Protestantism.

Many Protestants see themselves as catholic. Many see tradition as essential in understanding Scripture. many realize that the Bible is the creation of the Church.

And conversly - the Orthodox do indeed see the Catholic Church as branching off, not as some kind of “Y”. They were, from their perspective, the first Protestants, and their error led to the error of the others. Such a time line in no way legitimizes the claim of the Catholic Church that they are THE Church against the Orthodox claim that they are not.

Of course, many Protestants would accept the claim that it was a “Y” division, which is also how they see their own division from the Catholic Church.

It isn’t as simple as a time line or a straw man version of Protestantism.

 

[deanarrca]

Actually Blue Goat This is just my personal opinion- But I believe the Orthodox can lay claim to being the true church they share the same line- And i look at them and the Catholic Church being two branches of the same lungs. I have other reasons for not belonging to an Orthodox church.

This thread is more in response to fundamentalists who want to claim the early Church looked more like modern day fundamentalism and things like the real presence and infant baptism are unscriptural and inventions of the Roman Catholic Church which they are not.

 

[brb2]

Thank you for the useful timeline. I was never aware of the chronology of the writings until now.

.

If it only gets you to read Early Church history … the thread will be a roaring success.

 

[Bluegoat]

Actually Blue Goat This is just my personal opinion- But I believe the Orthodox can lay claim to being the true church they share the same line- And i look at them and the Catholic Church being two branches of the same lungs. I have other reasons for not belonging to an Orthodox church.

This thread is more in response to fundamentalists who want to claim the early Church looked more like modern day fundamentalism and things like the real presence and infant baptism are unscriptural and inventions of the Roman Catholic Church which they are not.

Yes, I think it is quite true that the early Church looked not much like a fundamentalist Church, even if you ignore the cultural/practical aspects.

But it is important to differentiate Protestantism from fundamentalism. It’s a bit like assuming all Catholics are like my crazy RC relatives.

I understand that Catholics think the Orthodox are part of the Church. But I find that they forget that the Orthodox do not feel the same way.

 

[YADA]

Well, it’s a nice enough timeline.

However, the comments about Protestants reveal a lack of knowledge about Protestantism.

Many Protestants see themselves as catholic. Many see tradition as essential in understanding Scripture. many realize that the Bible is the creation of the Church.

And conversly - the Orthodox do indeed see the Catholic Church as branching off, not as some kind of “Y”. They were, from their perspective, the first Protestants, and their error led to the error of the others. Such a time line in no way legitimizes the claim of the Catholic Church that they are THE Church against the Orthodox claim that they are not.

Of course, many Protestants would accept the claim that it was a “Y” division, which is also how they see their own division from the Catholic Church.

It isn’t as simple as a time line or a straw man version of Protestantism.

You make some good points … I think fewer and fewer Protestants see themselves as ‘catholic’ a result of how far the faith has changed [which the OP was alluding to I think] … For example: when you have an Episcopal Bishop [with a huge following] writing that Mary was not virgin and that Jesus could have been the result of a rape by a Roman soldier … the faith has changed in a way that cannot be clarified as a “Y” … they fail to recognize the historical church at all … accepting the myth that the early church went under ground - where it operated silently, without record, to emerge and become what we have in Protestantism today … that the Visible Church for that time [the catholic Church] was in apostasy, never truely Christian … so they do not see a “Y” or any connection.

And while that example can be said to be extreme; we have the more mundane arguments like whether the use of musical intruments in worship services are sinful or not creating divisions … Communion - daily, weekly once a month quarterly annually … these differences amongst just the Portestants are numurous and when far greater then say the mainline Protestants who have maintained more of traditional Christian belief and practice [Anglican’s like yourself - though sadly many major changes appear to he occuring even in those] …

The Orthodox and Catholic schism was never as deep [though the adherents of each can be passionate - then and now] nor foundaitonal as the changes wrought by the Reformers … We both have maintained Apostolic Succession, 7 Sacraments, Belief in the True Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, basic liturgical form with variances for local custom, a unity of faith if not organization … in that sense it is more “Y”

 

[brb2]

Many Protestants see themselves as catholic.

many realize that the Bible is the creation of the Church.

Of course, many Protestants would accept the claim that it was a “Y” division, which is also how they see their own division from the Catholic Church.

It isn’t as simple as a time line or a straw man version of Protestantism.

Where should we start ?

Then they should join the Church. A division is a schism, a rift, … not pleasing to God. The Church started 300 years before the Catholic Bible was canonized.

A picture says a lot … timelines can force people to reset their clocks. Particularily Anglicans … whose church is imploding at current time.

 

[Bluegoat]

Where should we start ?

Then they should joint the Church. A division is a schism, a rift, … not pleasing to God. The Church started 300 years before the Catholic Bible was canonized.

A picture says a lot … timelines can force people to reset their clocks. Particularily Anglicans … whose church is imploding at current time.

You are assuming that they are wrong if you tell them to join the Church. You can’t argue their position is incorrect by assuming yours to be true, it is a basic logical fallacy. Aristotle goes into it in some detail, or even Wikipedia for that matter.

I don’t think I mentioned Anglicans at all.

Why don’t the Catholics, then, suck it up and join the Orthodox, who they are in schism from? Or am I assuming the Orthodox are correct?