Book Review: The Fathers Know Best

 "The Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth it is this, and Protestantism has ever felt it so; to be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant" 

--John Henry Newman

My most recent pick for the reviewer program at The Catholic Company was The Fathers Know Best by Jimmy Akin, well known Catholic apologist from the National Catholic Register, Catholic Answers and Catholic radio.  I was thrilled to see it listed in their newest offerings and expected an excellent reference book citing quotes from the Early Church Fathers.   What I received in the mail was much, much more.  

Similar to other books in my library, Mr. Akins divides the quotations attributed to the Church Fathers by topic.  This section is found in Part Two, the largest portion of the book.  Topics in Part Two are: God, Creation, The Sources of Faith, The Church and the Pope, Morality, Sacraments and Worship, Mary, the Saints, the Miraculous and The Last Things.  Topics are further broken down into subtopics, some of which cover the so-called hot topics of the day: female ordination, the permanence of marriage, contraception and sterilization and abortion.  I would consider this portion the go-to section for those engaging in apologetics or wishing to better understand why Catholics believe what they do.  

Lastly, but most interesting to this apologist wannabe, Part One is a refreshing addition to what can be a very repetitive study in other books covering the teachings of the Early Church Fathers.  Often missing from other books, Mr. Akin concisely explains where the writings of the Fathers came from and explains the relationship between the Magisterium and the Fathers' teachings.  He then includes maps of various regions where they lived and preached.  Brief biographies shed light on some lesser known ECFs and refresh the memory about more familiar names.  Closing out Part One of the book, additional writings which are referred to are explained and early heresies and schisms are explained.  While reading through the section on heresies, I was struck by how many of them are quite visible in society (and sadly, sometimes in our own Church) today.  

The Fathers Know Best is undoubtedly an essential book for learning about the early Church and how deeply Scriptural the Church yesterday and today truly is.  

Who started your church?

Thanks to:  Catholics Come Home Blog  and St. Charles Borromeo Church

Both fully Divine and fully Man, Jesus Christ founded the Catholic Church.  One can trace the Church quite easily back to her origin nearly two thousand years ago.  When people leave the Church founded by Christ because they don't like something a Church representative said, did, a look given, the lack of charity displayed by so-called Catholics or any other host of excuses -- they are not leaving an organization.  They are leaving Christ.  Guided by the Holy Spirit, and with Christ present in the Sacraments, the Church continues on with imperfect human beings left to run the day to day operations.  Most who have gone before us have honored the Church, many have fallen short.  Just as Moses, St. Peter and Noah were imperfect, God chooses human beings to do His work on earth with His guidance. 

Moses was not a good speaker and lacked confidence in his abilities to lead the chosen people.  St. Peter denied Christ just as Christ said he would.  Noah was found drunk and naked by his sons.  Do any of these men fit the human image of perfection?  No, far from it.  Yet, God chose these people for His reasons to do His work.  What do they have that people who leave the Church do not have?  Faith.  Repentance.  Loyalty.  Love.  Clarity.  Our Biblical fathers did not look about to blame humans who messed things up.  They looked heavenward without hesitation.  They longed to do one thing:  God's will. 

So if you, or someone you know has left the Church Christ founded, who started your church?

History Unveiled: Papal Bull Threatening Luther With Excommunication

Copyright © Archivio Segreto Vaticano

THE BULL «EXSURGE DOMINE» BY LEO X
WITH WHICH HE THREATENS TO EXCOMMUNICATE MARTIN LUTHER
Rome, 1520 June 15^th

^{From the Vatican (No longer) Secret Archives:}

The copy of the long text of the bull, on which, as well as Leo X, also Giovanni Eck and the Cardinals Benedetto Accolti and Giulio de’ Medici (the future Clement VII) worked on it, is found in the register of Pope Medici, mainly at his eighth and ninth year of papacy (Reg. Vat., 1160, ff. 251r-259v). The originals that were sent had an unfortunate destiny and were nearly all destroyed; as everyone knows, when Luther received the bull he burnt it on 10th December 1520 at Wittenberg, along with the books of canon right, a clear sign of his rebellion against Rome.

With the Bull Exsurge Domine, where Luther’s name is repeated several times, Leo X condemns the 41 propositions or errors, drawn from the works of the Saxon monk, such as «vel hereticos, vel falsos, vel scandalosos, vel piarum aurium offensivos, vel simplicium mentium seductivos»; the propositions that were condemned regarded the «fides fiduciosa», the justification, the grace, the ecclesiastic hierarchy, the efficacy of the sacraments, the purgatory, repentance, the indulgencies and the original sin. The Pope ordered all the Christian faithful to not keep, read, defend or print Martin Luther’s books that contained these errors, moreover he exhorted them to burn them publicly. With regard to the innovator of Eisleben, for whom the Pope declared he had worked very hard (Quod vero ad ipsum Martinum attinet - bone Deus! - quid praetermisimus, quid non fecimus, quid paterne caritatis omisimus ut eum an huiusmodi erroribus revocaremus?), it was announced that he would have been excommunicated, if he had not made an act of obedience within 60 days from promulgation of the Bull in Germany.