The Teachings of the Church Fathers [Paperback]

John Willis (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2002

The Fathers of the Church have been a vital source of wisdom and inspiration for countless saints, popes, peasants, and converts throughout the history of the Church. In this powerful one-volume library, Father Willis presents more than 250 selected doctrinal topics in an exhaustive selection of writings from the major sources of the Fathers. He lets the Fathers speak for themselves on a wide variety of spiritual themes.

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Ignatius Press (October 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0898708931
• ISBN-13: 978-0898708936
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #694,044 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

55 of 56 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What Did the Early Christians Believe?, November 12, 2002

By 

Terrence J. Sexton "Terrence Sexton" (USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Teachings of the Church Fathers (Paperback)

Do you ever find yourself puzzling over the correct interpretation of a scripture passage? It seems that for every chapter and verse there are a myriad of views as to what the words actually mean. How wonderful it would be to go back to the early Christian community and find out what the men and women who knew Jesus and his disciples actually believed.

This excellent book is the next best thing to time travel. Willis studied the writings of the first Christians and records for us verbatim what these people actually believed and taught about Christianity. There is no cant or spin in this book; it is simply a categorical arrangement of the actual words of the early Christian fathers.

Readers can judge for themselves what constitutes authentic Christian belief after studying what our ancestors in faith believed. Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox alike will find this book a valuable reference tool. It is both a concise one volume reseource for the ordinary reader and a springboard for those wanting to do in-depth patristics research.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very good resource, January 4, 2006

By 

Discerning Reader (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Teachings of the Church Fathers (Paperback)

This is a great resource for any serious student of the Scriptures. It is easy to use and organized by doctrine. If you want to see what the fathers said about all the Christian doctrines then this book is for you. Some have written that it was biased towards Romanism. I found that it is not, and the author makes that point in the introduction. For example, when it comes to purgatory, he merely quotes the fathers on it. He does not add any of his own Roman views on this but merely quotes what was written. So I checked myself on what he quoted from St. Augustine and it was a direct quote from the City of God. The differences in the fathers comes between the Latin and Greek fathers, not a difference between Roman and Protestant. Protestants may find this book foreign because Protestant doctrine is foreign to Ancient Church doctrine (but that's another story). Highly recommended.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Back to the Future, June 6, 2006

By 

Labarum (Philadelphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Teachings of the Church Fathers (Paperback)

With the growing awareness among Protestants of the writings of early Christians, there is also a bewilderment among many as to the claims various Christians make about these writings. Exactly what did they teach anyway? John R. Willis gives a very useful tool for the beginner in arranging quotes from the Church Fathers on various questions relating to doctrine and practice in the early Church.

To his credit, he does not try to "spin" the material. Although as a Catholic, he is interested in support for the Roman position, he merely gives the Roman position and then lists quotes he believes support that view. The quotes are not mere sentences but more extensive passages so that we have some idea of context.

For Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican Christians, there is little there that would come as a shock. The early Christians worshipped liturgically with the Eucharist as the center of their Christian life and a belief in some form of the Real Presence in the Sacrament. The office of bishops in Apostolic succession was universal and there was devotion to Mary and other faithful departed. It all sounds rather waht we think of as "Catholic."

As for the things that would separate Catholics from other traditionally minded Christians (e.g., the papacy, certain Marian beliefs), we may question whether the evidence is universal or whether the quotes even support what Willis contends. In the earlier case, there is a marked reliance on Latin fathers who developed a theology divergent with the East and in the later case there are quotes that do not seem to prove what Willis wishes them to prove. A case in point are the quotes used to support the "Holy Spirit procedes from the Father and the Son." The phrase "and the Son" was added to the Creed by the West but the quotes given seem to support the earlier view still held by the Orthodox Church. Still, the case can be made that there was some level of support for the more unique Roman contentions even if it was primarily in the West.

It must also be pointed out that as an apologetic tool, Willis is not primarily focused on differences between Catholics and Orthodox or even Catholics and Anglicans. The main divide here is between Catholics and Evangelical Protestants. From that perspective, there can be little doubt the Church of the patrisitic period was far closer in faith and practice to Rome than modern Evanglical Protestantism even if the match is not perfect.

As many Evangelicals are looking back to the early centuries of Christianity for a way out of the banality that affects much of their movement, there is a question as to where that path will lead. Willis in The Teachings of the Church Fathers attempts to frame patristic quotations to make a case for that future leading to Rome. Whether he has been entirely successful or not, he has supplied an indispensible reference tool for further study.