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The citations presented here document the widespread belief in the prayers/intercessions of angels and saints for believers on earth. All emphasis will be mine. Shepherd of Hermas (AD 89-145) Chapter 4 I prayed him much that he would explain to me the similitude of the field, and of the master of the vineyard, and of the slave who staked the vineyard, and of the sakes, and of the weeds that were plucked out of the vineyard, and of the son, and of the friends who were fellow-

In this post I will be citing a few sources regarding the status of St. Hippolytus, whether he was a bishop of Rome or of some other See, and if at Rome then whether he indeed was in actuality an antipope who set himself in opposition to the Roman bishop. All emphasis will be mine. I begin with what Eusebius and Jerome wrote about him: 2. Among these Beryllus has left us, besides letters and treatises, various elegant works. He was bishop of Bostra in Arabia. Likewise a

I upload the following post by Thomas V. Mirus: The First Antipope . The first four of the six popes covered in this installment found themselves in conflict with a priest named Hippolytus, the most brilliant intellectual of the Roman Church at the time. Hippolytus would become the first antipope in the history of the Church, plaguing three successive papacies with his schism. Yet his story has a happy and even poetic ending. 15—St. Zephyrinus (198-217) The previous install

The quotations from St. Augustine are taken from On the Trinity , Book 1 . Augustine will cite texts such as 1 John 5:20, where Jesus is called the true God and eternal life, to prove that Christ is one divine Person who operates in/by/through two natures since he is the God-Man. He will explain that Jesus, by virtue of becoming Man, not only became lesser than the Father and the Spirit, but also became lesser than himself. St. Augustine employs Philippians 2:5-8 to show that

The quotations from St. Augustine are taken from On the Trinity , Book 1 . The beloved saint will show that the words of our Lord Jesus in Mark 13:32 do not imply that the Son was ignorant of the Day or Hour, but that he chose to veil that knowledge for the express purpose of not making it known to his disciples. Augustine then quotes the Apostle Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 2:2 to explain that not knowing can and often does refer to not making something known to others. All

The quotations from St. Augustine are taken from On the Trinity , Book 1 . The blessed saint will cite texts such as 1 Timothy 6:13-16 and apply that to the Trinity. In so doing, he identifies the only God of the passage as the Trinity. Augustine also applies 1 John 5:20 to the Son, which describes Christ as the true God and eternal life. He will even cite 1 Cor. 8:6 to prove that the Father and Son together brought all creation into existence. All emphasis will be mine. Ch

I post here the commentary of the blessed St. Cyril of Alexandria on John 14:28 where he plainly states that the Father was greater than the Son only because of the Son’s Incarnation and descent to the earth to humble himself by becoming a slave. The saint refutes those heretics who used this verse to prove that the Father is a greater divinity than the Son. All emphasis will be mine. If ye loved Me, ye would have rejoiced, because I go unto the Father; for My Father is gre

In this post I will quote from a few fathers and saints of the Church whom all believed that the reason the Son honored the Father as his God is because of the Incarnation, as a result of the eternal Word becoming flesh and taking on a human nature. All emphasis will be mine. Hippolytus 60. To grasp this divine mystery we must see the God in Him without ignoring the Man ; and the Man without ignoring the God. We must not divide Jesus Christ , for the Word was made f

The quotations referenced here are taken from The Apostolic Fathers, Volume II: Epistle of Barnabas. Papias and Quadratus. Epistle to Diognetus. The Shepherd of Hermas , edited and translated by Bart D. Ehrman, and published in 2003 by Harvard University Press . All emphasis will be mine. Epistle of Barnabas 5 This is why the Lord allowed his flesh to be given over to corruption, that we might be made holy through the forgiveness of sins, which comes in the sprinkling

The following citations are taken from The Apostolic Fathers, Volume I: I Clement. II Clement. Ignatius. Polycarp. Didache, edited and translated by Bart D. Ehrman, and published in 2003 by Harvard University Press. All emphasis will be mine. Polycarp 2 Therefore, bind up your loose robes and serve as Gods slaves in reverential fear and truth, abandoning futile reasoning and the error that deceives many, and believing in the one who raised our Lord Jesus Christ from the

According to the Authorized King James Version (AV), Christians are to confess their faults to each other: “ Confess your faults (paraptoma) one to another , and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” James 5:16 Other translations, however, render the Greek term as sins: “ Therefore acknowledge ye each to other your sins , and pray ye each for other, that ye be saved [Therefore acknowledge ye one to

The following is taken from EWTN’s article which can be accessed here: Sacrament of Penance in the Early Church . Author: Fr. William Most SACRAMENT OF PENANCE IN THE EARLY CHURCH 1. Epistle of Pope St. Clement, probably c 95 AD: 51.3: "For it is good for a person to confess his transgressions and not to harden his heart." COMMENT: This could mean only generally admitting faults, or a liturgical Confiteor. 2. Didache 14, perhaps between 100 and 150 AD: "And on the Lor

The following has been adapted from the Catholic Answer’s article, which can be accessed here: What the Early Church Believed: Confession . Over time, the forms in which the sacrament of confession has been administered have changed. In the early Church, publicly known sins (such as apostasy) were often confessed openly in church, though private confession to a priest was always an option for privately committed sins. Still, confession was not just something done in silence t

In the epistle of James, believers are commanded to confess their sins to one another in the context of receiving forgiveness of those transgressions and/or healing from any illnesses that may have resulted from those sins: “Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises. Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the pr

The Apostle Paul taught that the day will come when the Lord Jesus will physically descend from heaven in order to raise the dead and judge all mankind. Paul affirmed that this is the day when Christ will either reward men with everlasting life and glory, or wrath and everlasting destruction. I cite all the verses where the inspired Apostle states this. All biblical references will be from the Legacy Standard Bible (LSB). “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance,

John in Revelation speaks of the second death, which is the everlasting destruction that individuals experience after being cast into the lake fire: “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death .” Revelation 2:11 Authorized King James Version (AV) “And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of

I will be posting the verses, which Christians have historically appealed to as proof that God’s Wisdom is a divine Hypostasis or Person who became embodied in Jesus Christ. These were the texts that the early Church pointed to as indicating that Jesus Christ is God’s eternal, uncreated Wisdom Incarnate. I start off with the following where Wisdom is said to do what YHWH does, namely, pour out the Holy Spirit and answer prayers: “Wisdom shouts in the street, She gives for

REFUTING ANOTHER MUHAMMADAN OBJECTION Muslim polemicists such as Hamza Abdul Malik appeal to the following passage to refute the Christian belief that Jesus is the Lord God Almighty who became man: “And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord ( to Kyrio ) ; (as it is written in the law of the Lord ( Kyriou ) , Every male that openeth the womb shall be called holy to the Lord

In this post I will cite the statements of various textual critics, theologians and/or scholars in respect to Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1 and the Deity of Christ. Specifically, I will be quoting these authorities to see whether they were aware of the particular Greek construction, which Granville Sharp in 1798 wrote about, concerning the use of the definite article in texts that focus on the divinity of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Sharp discovered that whenever two s

I will be quoting from the Epistle of Barnabas , which is a letter attributed to Paul’s companion that was composed somewhere between the middle and latter part of the first century AD. It contains a lot of allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament commandments and events, which the author connects to Christ, his commandments, and the Church. All emphasis will be mine. Genesis 1:26 & Jesus Christ: God’s Co-Creator Chapter 6. The sufferings of Christ, and the new co