ECF's did they follow current doctrine?

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Hi guys! been awhile since i’ve been here, wanted to ask what you thought? I’ve been working my way through their writings, and I sure see a big difference between your current doctrines and theirs… It seems maybe ignatius and polycarp are the closest and the rest would seem to be considered heretical; by nowaday standards…
What say you???
 
Hi guys! been awhile since i’ve been here, wanted to ask what you thought? I’ve been working my way through their writings, and I sure see a big difference between your current doctrines and theirs… It seems maybe ignatius and polycarp are the closest and the rest would seem to be considered heretical; by nowaday standards…
What say you???
I think we’ll need some examples…
 
Here is a link to the early Church Fathers from right here in the Catholic Answers Library. Looks like more than Ignatius and Polycarp, assuredly.

catholic.com/library/fathers_know_best.asp
“The early Christians were quick to spot new heresies. In the third century, Sabellius, a Libyan priest who was staying at Rome, invented a new one. He claimed there is only one person in the Godhead, so that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are all one person with different “offices,” rather than three persons who are one being in the Godhead, as the orthodox position holds.”

A most difficult concept. The "Shema’ “Sh’ma Y’Israel, Adonai Elohenu Adonia Ecad” Hear oh Israel the Lord our God the Lord is One! This prayer is said at least 3 times a day. Duet 6:4 I’ll have to take Sabellius’ side more then the opposition. The idea of 3 “persons” is against Scripture, rather it’s one God with 3 natures…
 
Hi guys! been awhile since i’ve been here, wanted to ask what you thought? I’ve been working my way through their writings, and I sure see a big difference between your current doctrines and theirs… It seems maybe ignatius and polycarp are the closest and the rest would seem to be considered heretical; by nowaday standards…
What say you???
Would be good if you could point out specifics , and one at the time so that the discussion does not go all over the place if possible (perhaps this is hopeful thinking it almost never happens).

…OOPS YOU ARE TOO QUICK BIT ME
 
Catholic scripture twisting pages? LOL, it’s from this site’s own Library. Well, so I’ll cut and paste, Mary and the saints, here you go:

Hermas

“[The Shepherd said:] ‘But those who are weak and slothful in prayer, hesitate to ask anything from the Lord; but the Lord is full of compassion, and gives without fail to all who ask him. But you, [Hermas,] having been strengthened by the holy angel [you saw], and having obtained from him such intercession, and not being slothful, why do not you ask of the Lord understanding, and receive it from him?’” (The Shepherd 3:5:4 [A.D. 80]).

Clement of Alexandria

“In this way is he [the true Christian] always pure for prayer. He also prays in the society of angels, as being already of angelic rank, and he is never out of their holy keeping; and though he pray alone, he has the choir of the saints standing with him [in prayer]” (Miscellanies 7:12 [A.D. 208]).

Origen

“But not the high priest [Christ] alone prays for those who pray sincerely, but also the angels . . . as also the souls of the saints who have already fallen asleep” (Prayer 11 [A.D. 233]).

Cyprian of Carthage

“Let us remember one another in concord and unanimity. Let us on both sides [of death] always pray for one another. Let us relieve burdens and afflictions by mutual love, that if one of us, by the swiftness of divine condescension, shall go hence first, our love may continue in the presence of the Lord, and our prayers for our brethren and sisters not cease in the presence of the Father’s mercy” (Letters 56[60]:5 [A.D. 253]).

Anonymous

“Atticus, sleep in peace, secure in your safety, and pray anxiously for our sins” (funerary inscription near St. Sabina’s in Rome [A.D. 300]).

“Pray for your parents, Matronata Matrona. She lived one year, fifty-two days” (ibid.).

“Mother of God, [listen to] my petitions; do not disregard us in adversity, but rescue us from danger” (Rylands Papyrus 3 [A.D. 350]).

Methodius

“Hail to you for ever, Virgin Mother of God, our unceasing joy, for to you do I turn again. You are the beginning of our feast; you are its middle and end; the pearl of great price that belongs to the kingdom; the fat of every victim, the living altar of the Bread of Life [Jesus]. Hail, you treasure of the love of God. Hail, you fount of the Son’s love for man. . . . You gleamed, sweet gift-bestowing Mother, with the light of the sun; you gleamed with the insupportable fires of a most fervent charity, bringing forth in the end that which was conceived of you . . . making manifest the mystery hidden and unspeakable, the invisible Son of the Father—the Prince of Peace, who in a marvelous manner showed himself as less than all littleness” (Oration on Simeon and Anna 14 [A.D. 305]).

“Therefore, we pray [ask] you, the most excellent among women, who glories in the confidence of your maternal honors, that you would unceasingly keep us in remembrance. O holy Mother of God, remember us, I say, who make our boast in you, and who in august hymns celebrate the memory, which will ever live, and never fade away” (ibid.).

“And you also, O honored and venerable Simeon, you earliest host of our holy religion, and teacher of the resurrection of the faithful, do be our patron and advocate with that Savior God, whom you were deemed worthy to receive into your arms. We, together with you, sing our praises to Christ, who has the power of life and death, saying, ‘You are the true Light, proceeding from the true Light; the true God, begotten of the true God’” (ibid.).

Cyril of Jerusalem

"Then [during the Eucharistic prayer] we make mention also of those who have already fallen asleep: first, the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs, that through their prayers and supplications God would receive our petition . . . " (Catechetical Lectures 23:9 [A.D. 350]).

Hilary of Poitiers

“To those who wish to stand [in God’s grace], neither the guardianship of saints nor the defenses of angels are wanting” (Commentary on the Psalms 124:5:6 [A.D. 365]).
 
Mary and saints part 2

Ephraim the Syrian

“You victorious martyrs who endured torments gladly for the sake of the God and Savior, you who have boldness of speech toward the Lord himself, you saints, intercede for us who are timid and sinful men, full of sloth, that the grace of Christ may come upon us, and enlighten the hearts of all of us so that we may love him” (Commentary on Mark [A.D. 370]).

“Remember me, you heirs of God, you brethren of Christ; supplicate the Savior earnestly for me, that I may be freed through Christ from him that fights against me day by day” (The Fear at the End of Life [A.D. 370]).

The Liturgy of St. Basil

“By the command of your only-begotten Son we communicate with the memory of your saints . . . by whose prayers and supplications have mercy upon us all, and deliver us for the sake of your holy name” (Liturgy of St. Basil [A.D. 373]).

Pectorius

“Aschandius, my father, dearly beloved of my heart, with my sweet mother and my brethren, remember your Pectorius in the peace of the Fish [Christ]” (Epitaph of Pectorius [A.D. 375]).

Gregory of Nazianz

“May you [Cyprian] look down from above propitiously upon us, and guide our word and life; and shepherd this sacred flock . . . gladden the Holy Trinity, before which you stand” (Orations 17[24] [A.D. 380]).

"Yes, I am well assured that [my father’s] intercession is of more avail now than was his instruction in former days, since he is closer to God, now that he has shaken off his bodily fetters, and freed his mind from the clay that obscured it, and holds conversation naked with the nakedness of the prime and purest mind . . . " (ibid., 18:4).

Gregory of Nyssa
“[Ephraim], you who are standing at the divine altar [in heaven] . . . bear us all in remembrance, petitioning for us the remission of sins, and the fruition of an everlasting kingdom” (Sermon on Ephraim the Syrian [A.D. 380]).

John Chrysostom

“He that wears the purple * . . . stands begging of the saints to be his patrons with God, and he that wears a diadem begs the tentmaker [Paul] and the fisherman [Peter] as patrons, even though they be dead” (Homilies on Second Corinthians 26 [A.D. 392]).

“When you perceive that God is chastening you, fly not to his enemies . . . but to his friends, the martyrs, the saints, and those who were pleasing to him, and who have great power [in God]” (Orations 8:6 [A.D. 396]).

Ambrose of Milan

“May Peter, who wept so efficaciously for himself, weep for us and turn towards us Christ’s benign countenance” (The Six Days Work 5:25:90 [A.D. 393]).

Jerome

“You say in your book that while we live we are able to pray for each other, but afterwards when we have died, the prayer of no person for another can be heard. . . . But if the apostles and martyrs while still in the body can pray for others, at a time when they ought still be solicitous about themselves, how much more will they do so after their crowns, victories, and triumphs?” (Against Vigilantius 6 [A.D. 406]).

Augustine

“A Christian people celebrates together in religious solemnity the memorials of the martyrs, both to encourage their being imitated and so that it can share in their merits and be aided by their prayers” (Against Faustus the Manichean [A.D. 400]).

“There is an ecclesiastical discipline, as the faithful know, when the names of the martyrs are read aloud in that place at the altar of God, where prayer is not offered for them. Prayer, however, is offered for the dead who are remembered. For it is wrong to pray for a martyr, to whose prayers we ought ourselves be commended” (Sermons 159:1 [A.D. 411]).

“At the Lord’s table we do not commemorate martyrs in the same way that we do others who rest in peace so as to pray for them, but rather that they may pray for us that we may follow in their footsteps” (Homilies on John 84 [A.D. 416]).

“Neither are the souls of the pious dead separated from the Church which even now is the kingdom of Christ. Otherwise there would be no remembrance of them at the altar of God in the communication of the Body of Christ” (The City of God 20:9:2 [A.D. 419]).*
 
St Ephraem, Nisibene Hymns, 27 (Died 373 AD)

Quote:
“ Truly you, Lord, and your mother are the only ones who are beautiful, completely so in every respect; for, Lord, there is no spot in you, nor any spot at all in your mother. Even my babes are hardly similar to these two pulchritudes!”

St. Jerome, The Perpetual Virginity of Blessed Mary, Chap 21 (340 AD – 420 AD)

Quote:
“We believe that God was born of the Virgin, because we read it. That Mary was married after she brought forth, we do not believe, because we do not read it. Nor do we say this to condemn marriage…for virginity itself is the fruit of marriage…You say that Mary did not continue a virgin: I claim still more, that Joseph himself on account of Mary was a virgin, so that from a virgin wedlock a virgin son was born”

Origen (185-232 AD) calls her worthy of God, immaculate of the immaculate, most complete sanctity, perfect justice, neither deceived by the persuasion of the serpent, nor infected with his poisonous breathings (“Hom. i in diversa”)
 
Well I know Origen thought of Mary as Immaculate (at work so all I can go is by my memory for now)
Origen on her sinlessness;
“While if by those ‘who were without sin’ he means such as have never at any time sinned,-for he made no distinction in his statement,-we reply that it is impossible for a man thus to be without sin. And this we say, excepting, of course, the man understood to be in Christ Jesus, who ‘did no sin.’…God has not been able to prevent even in the case of a single individual, so that one man might be found from the very beginning of things who was born into the world untainted by sin…For in the connected series of statements which appears to apply as to one particular individual, the curse pronounced upon Adam is regarded as common to all (the members of the race), and what was spoken with reference to the woman is spoken of every woman without exception.” - Origen (Against Celsus, 3:62, 4:40)

“Origen insisted that, like all human beings, she [Mary] needed redemption from her sins; in particular, he interpreted Simeon’s prophecy (Luke 2, 35) that a sword would pierce her soul as confirming that she had been invaded with doubts when she saw her Son crucified.” (J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines [San Francisco, California: HarperCollins Publishers, 1978], p. 493)
 
Here are some articles:
newadvent.org/fathers/3007.htm
newadvent.org/fathers/0832.htm

Why the motivation behind your question: “ECF’s did they follow current doctrine?”
The motivation is this I was falling into the “catholic doctrines/ways of men” based on seeing some ECF writings given by you guys then I started reading more into it, it made me say whaaat… There isn’t alot of truth when people use ECF’s to sell there point of Roman Catholocism as they repeatedly contradict it’s doctrine.
 
Origen on her sinlessness;
“While if by those ‘who were without sin’ he means such as have never at any time sinned,-for he made no distinction in his statement,-we reply that it is impossible for a man thus to be without sin. And this we say, excepting, of course, the man understood to be in Christ Jesus, who ‘did no sin.’…God has not been able to prevent even in the case of a single individual, so that one man might be found from the very beginning of things who was born into the world untainted by sin…For in the connected series of statements which appears to apply as to one particular individual, the curse pronounced upon Adam is regarded as common to all (the members of the race), and what was spoken with reference to the woman is spoken of every woman without exception.” - Origen (Against Celsus, 3:62, 4:40)

“Origen insisted that, like all human beings, she [Mary] needed redemption from her sins; in particular, he interpreted Simeon’s prophecy (Luke 2, 35) that a sword would pierce her soul as confirming that she had been invaded with doubts when she saw her Son crucified.” (J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines [San Francisco, California: HarperCollins Publishers, 1978], p. 493)
St. Thomas Aquinas, and St. John Chrysostom also fought with the question of the Immaculate Conception of Mary and her sinlessness. These saints I mentioned, and Origen did not possess the truth on this matter. Their private interpretations were wrong. Not every utterance of the ECFs is infallible. It is The Church, as a whole, in communion with the Bishops and the Holy Father, that have this authority that Christ Jesus gave them.

Furthermore, the majority of the ECFs support the dogma of Mary Immaculate Conception that the Church declared, formally, in 1942.

All this goes to show is that The Church is not one man’s view or take on things. These men were not perfect, nor their teaching on this matter.

God Bless.
 
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