The Church Fathers

Fathers in the faith

Paul reminded the Corinthians: "Even if you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel" (1 Corinthians 4:15). Wesley comments that "the relation between a spiritual father and his children brings with it an inexpressible nearness and affection" Wesley. Early Christians called their bishops and teachers fathers in this sense, and by the fourth and fifth centuries councils appealed to the faith of the holy Fathers who had gone before. The Council of Chalcedon (451) begins its confession of Christ "following the holy Fathers" Definition of Chalcedon.

The name usually covers several groups. The Apostolic Fathers, such as Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch and Polycarp, knew the apostles or their first successors. In the second century apologists such as Justin Martyr defended the faith in writings addressed to emperors, and Irenaeus answered the Gnostics (see After the apostles). Then came the great teachers of the age of the councils: Athanasius, Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus and Gregory of Nyssa, John Chrysostom, Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine, Cyril of Alexandria and Leo the Great. Scholars distinguish the Greek Fathers of the East from the Latin Fathers of the West, and usually close the age with Gregory the Great (d. 604) or soon after in the West, and with John of Damascus (eighth century) in the East.

Catholic theology traditionally names four marks of a Father: sound doctrine, holiness of life, the church's approval and antiquity. Influential writers whose teaching was later questioned in part, such as Tertullian and Origen, are therefore often called ‘ecclesiastical writers’ instead. Above all, the Fathers were pastors who read and preached Scripture. The app's Gospel commentary, the Catena Aurea, gathers their comments verse by verse (see also How the Fathers read Scripture).

How the churches read them

Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.

Hebrews 13:7

Every major tradition honours the Fathers, but they weigh them differently. The Catholic Church treats them as privileged witnesses to the apostolic tradition handed down with Scripture, and the Council of Trent (1546) forbade interpreting Scripture against their unanimous consent. The Orthodox churches see following the holy Fathers as the path of right faith, and many Orthodox theologians hold that the age of the Fathers has never closed, since the same Spirit still teaches the church.

The Reformers read the Fathers eagerly. Calvin quoted Augustine more than any other Father, and the Reformers argued that what they taught was not new but the faith of the ancient church. Yet they set the Fathers under Scripture. The Belgic Confession will not compare "any writings of men, though ever so holy" with Scripture Belgic Confession, art. 7, and then confesses:

Therefore, in this point, we do willingly receive the three creeds, namely, that of the Apostles, of Nice, and of Athanasius; likewise that which, conformable thereunto, is agreed upon by the ancient fathers.

Belgic Confession, art. 9

The Fathers also speak to questions on which the churches still differ: the office of bishop, baptism and the Lord's Supper, the honouring of the saints. Catholics and Orthodox find the roots of their practice there, while many Protestants weigh those passages again by Scripture. But the great lines the Fathers drew from Scripture and left in the creeds, such as the Trinity and the two natures of Christ, nearly all churches confess together. Matthew Henry gives a sound rule for reading them: we follow teachers "as far as they follow Christ in faith and practice" Matthew Henry.