Church Matters: Retrieving the Great Tradition

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Chur ch Mat ter s : Ret r i ev i ng the Great Trad i t i on

You should baptize in this way. Having recited all these things, baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit in running water. But if you have no running water, use other water and if you cannot use cold water, use warm. If you have neither, then pour water on the head three times in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. ~ Didache 7

B. Enemies faced from the outside of the ancient body

1. Heresies

a. Manicheanism: teachings of Mani (216-276), dualistic vision of light and darkness, salvation through denial, celibacy

b. Neoplatonism: “reabsorption into the divine essence”; through meditation and other disciplines, we attain to spiritual union with the one

c. Gnosticism: reached its height in the 2nd century: a dualistic view of reality, belief in a supreme God who is totally remote from the physical world, with material world being evil, immaterial being good; asserted that Jesus only appeared in a body

2. Persecutions

a. Jewish-Christian division: regarded as a sect of Judaism, but later split through intense opposition, conflict

b. Roman persecution: although left alone in the first decades after Christ’s ascension (viewed as a Jewish sect) as it grew was viciously persecuted by Nero (late 60s), Diocletian being the most cruel (early 300s)