…and I am equally certain that I do. God will let us know later.I am quite certain that you do not. The truth, as given it by Jesus through the Apostles, has been deposited in the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is the deposit of the Truth and the faith for 2000 years. This cannot be refuted or proven otherwise. Many have tried and all have failed. Jesus has promised to protect His Church and He has done so.
PAX DOMINI
Shalom Aleichem
How can you when you refuse to accept the truth of true Christianity?
I am rereading all of Justin’s readings and other ECF currently. You will not find the earliest Church Fathers’ writings in support of the Trinity. They simply omit talking about it. In the Ante-Nicene Fathers, St. Clement, Polycarp, Ignatius, Barnabas, Papias, and Justin Martyr all do not come close to explaining Ousia or mentioning. Several of them are quite clear in defining separate persons, but there is no essence that binds them into One God. It is not a topic for them.
No, I would not use that terminology. I suspect that I personally make a very strong effort in these types of discussions to not use broad generalizations. When discussing truth we have to exert the most effort possible to speak clearly and accurately. After all, we are talking about eternal truths that lead one into a fullness of truth. Do you understand what I am trying to say?
Javl, you have to be careful when discussing truth with LDS. They build their testimony of Jesus Christ and their beliefs on what they profess to be the witness of the Holy Spirit. This personal revelation is what they believe the truth of the Jesus’ Church was built upon in Matt 16:16-19 and not Peter.How can you when you refuse to accept the truth of true Christianity?
PAX DOMINI
These are good examples of discipline for those who reject the teachings of the Church. The LDS may see this from their perspective and Catholics view it from their own perspective. The passage from Matthew 18:17 is interesting but seems to apply to members of the Church who have gone astray. In the Catholic perspective this would apply more to Protestants than Mormons. So how do you know from this that Protestants are Christians?
So you could have just as truthfully said, “Steve, you would be very hard pressed to have Irenaeus viewed as a Trinitarian based upon his writings.”
I would think it would depend on who I have talking to and what the subject was; and when deciding to jump in the middle of a conversation I would point out the side with more truth before getting into specifics. Would you say the ECF thought of Father, Son, Holy Spirit as the one same God or as three separate Gods? Which has more truth?
I do not have to be careful for I know of what I speak. The Holy Spirit does not say one thing for one and the opposite for another. He, as God, is not the author of confusion. I believe in the Jesus of the Bible and not the Jesus of the LDS, which is man made. Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to guide the Church which has been in evidence for 2000 years.The Catholic Church, and the Catholic Church alone, is the deposit, guardian, and teacher of the truth as given it by Jesus and taught by the Apostles and their successors. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, and I’ll keep saying it: It cannot be proven other wise. Many have tried and have failed. Doing so is an exercise in futility. Jesus made a promise and He has kept it.
I understand and respect the depths of your beliefs, Javi.How can you when you refuse to accept the truth of true Christianity?
PAX DOMINI
Shalom Aleichem
…Sh’ma O Yisroel, Adonai eleyenu, Adonai Echod…
Trying to find the ECF writings of essence as proof of the Trinity would be like looking for writings of transubstantiation as proof of their belief in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Looking for an explanation instead of the belief itself. Yes, it doesn’t seem like they cared too much about the hows and whys of what they believed.
Stephen,
The scriptures clearly discuss the three persons (God, Son, & Holy Spirit), but it also discusses them being the same. Jesus was God. Essence is more the ‘how,’ and not the ‘what’ God is. It starts to answer the question: How are God, Son, Holy Spirit the same? Trying to explain something they didn’t believe would have been a waste of time. An understanding of essence is not required to believe God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit are the same. Christians have always believed they were the same it just took 300 years to explain it.
"Our teacher of these things, born for this end, is Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, the procurator in Judea in the time of Tiberius Caesar. We will prove that we worship Him reasonably; for we have learned that He is the Son of the True God Himself, that He holds a second place, and the Spirit of Prophecy a third. For this they accuse us of madness, saying that we attribute to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all things: but they are ignorant of the mystery which lies therein." (Justin The Martyr - First Apology, 148-155 AD)
Stephen,
You almost proved my point by using the explanation instead of the belief.
The beliefs were there in 33AD. The explanations and deeper understanding took some time.
There were always those who held to Trinitarian doctrines. However, there were a host of competing doctrines about the nature of God. At this time the church was not centralized and local bishops held sway in each respective city. For this reason you find regions supporting one doctrine and other regions conflicting doctrines. The Great Councils helped to centralize the Church and Bishops began to more closely follow in teaching and doctrine.
The Father isn’t the Son…
Explain Ousia.
“Ousia” is not referring to the “Personhood” of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Olson, in his book “The Story of Christian Theology” states this: