As a Protestant, I worshipped in a “Bible Church” that taught “what the Apostles taught.” I firmly believed this, as do most evangelical Protestants. However, my world began to change radically when I started actually reading the early Church Fathers and was surprised to learn that they unanimously believed and worshipped like the Catholic Church continues to do today.
Who are the Early Church Fathers and why they matter
The immediate successors of the original Apostles are called the “Apostolic Fathers.” For example, Clement of Rome was a disciple of the Apostle Peter. Likewise, Ignatius of Antioch was a disciple of the Apostle John. Apostolic Fathers, then, had direct interfaces and interactions with various original Apostles. Other “Church Fathers” or “Fathers of the Church” are those that lived immediately after the original Apostles through the first eight centuries. These Fathers of the Church were theologians, writing about early Church life, worship, faith, and practice as it was handed-down from Christ to the Apostles. “Fathers” in the faith are familiar in the Bible. Think about Abraham. He was a “spiritual father” (Luke 16: 24) and the Apostle Paul said, “in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel” (1 Cor 4: 15). Many Church Fathers were Bishops of the Church, for example: Clement was Bishop of Rome, Ignatius was Bishop of Antioch, and Ambrose was bishop of Milan. The early Church Fathers play an absolutely vital role in helping us recognize the Church that Jesus established in Matthew 16:18 in the 1st century, and, which God continues today! These early Church Fathers would find modern Protestantism completely foreign to their faith and the Bible!
Listen to a few of the early Church Fathers
Clement of Rome (d. 100 AD) on Apostolic Succession:
Similarly, our Apostles knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be dissensions over the title of bishop. In their full foreknowledge of this, therefore, they proceeded to appoint the ministers I spoke of, and they went on to add an instruction that if these should fall asleep, other accredited persons should succeed them in their office.
Ignatius of Antioch (d. 110 AD) on Apostolic Authority:
In his Letter to the Smyrnaeans, Ignatius writes, “You must all follow the bishop as Jesus Christ follows the Father, and the presbytery as you would the apostles. Reverence the deacons as you would the command of God. Let no one do anything of concern to the Church without the bishop. Let that be considered a valid Eucharist which is celebrated by the bishop, or by one whom he appoints. Wherever the bishop appears, let the people be there; just as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church.
Cyril of Jerusalem (d. 386 AD) on Peters Apostolic Primacy and the Holy Eucharist:
The Lord is loving toward men, swift to pardon, but slow to punish. Let no man, then, despair of his own salvation. Peter, the first and foremost of the Apostles…
In the power of the same Holy Spirit, Peter, both the chief of the Apostles and the keeper of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, in the name of Christ healed Aeneas the paralytic at Lydda…
For just as the bread and the wine of the Eucharist before the holy invocation of the adorable Trinity were simple bread and wine, but the invocation having been made, the bread becomes the Body of Christ, and the wine the Blood of Christ…
Ambrose of Milan (d. 397 AD) on the Immaculate Conception of Mary:
Lift me up not from Sara but from Mary, a Virgin not only undefiled but a Virgin whom grace has made inviolate, free of every stain of sin.
John Chrysostom (d. 407 AD) on Oral and Written Tradition handed-down:
So then, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions that you were taught, whether by word, or by letter of ours.” From this it is manifest that they did not deliver all things by letter, but many things also unwritten, and in like manner both the one and the other are worthy of credit. Therefore let us think the Tradition of the Church also worthy of credit. It is a Tradition, seek no farther.
Jerome (d. 420 AD) on Peter’s Authority:
I think it my duty to consult the chair of Peter, and to turn to a church whose faith has been praised by Paul… My words are spoken to the successor of the fisherman, to the disciple of the cross. As I follow no leader save Christ, so I communicate with none but your blessedness, that is with the chair of Peter. For this, I know, is the rock on which the church is built!
Augustine of Hippo (d. 430 AD) on the Holy Eucharist (Real Presence of Christ):
That Bread which you see on the altar, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the Body of Christ. That chalice, or rather, what is in that chalice, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the Blood of Christ.
What you see is the bread and the chalice; that is what your own eyes report to you. But what your faith obliges you to accept is that the bread is the Body of Christ and the chalice is the Blood of Christ.
John of Damascus (d. 749 AD) on the Holy Eucharist (Real Presence of Christ):
The Bread and the Wine are not a type of the Body and Blood of Christ—perish the thought! — but the deified Body Itself of the Lord, since the Lord Himself has said: “This is My Body.” He did not say a type of His Body, but His Body; nor a type of His Blood, but His Blood…
The Inevitable and Intellectual Honesty
The list of quotes from the early Church Fathers supporting the Catholic Church’s faith and practice is inexhaustible. When I was an evangelical Protestant digging through the early Church Fathers, it was unescapable that the early Church was much closer to the Catholic Church than anything found in my Baptist or non-denominational church! Whether I looked at apostolic succession, apostolic authority, St. Peter’s primacy, the Holy Eucharist, Mary, Oral and Written Tradition, salvation, prayer, fasting, discipleship, sacred icons or anything else, I simply could not avoid the massive amount of Biblical and historical evidence affirming the apostolic Catholic Church. Remembering John Henry Newman (an Anglican convert to Catholicism) who said, “to be deep in history, is to cease to be Protestant” we can see why — when we are honest about what the early Church believed and practiced – the Catholic Church emerges as the apostolic Church established in Matthew 16:18.
Books that helped me
I found these books to be outstanding sources on the early Church and Church Fathers!
Faith of the Early Fathers, Vol 1., by William A. Jurgens
Faith of the Early Fathers, Vol 2., by William A. Jurgens
Faith of the Early Fathers, Vol 3., by William A. Jurgens
The Fathers Know Best, by Jimmy Akin
Early Christian Writings: The Apostolic Fathers, by Andrew Louth
The History of the Church: From Christ to Constantine, by Eusebius and Louth
Troy
