Church Matters: Retrieving the Great Tradition

Session 1: The Apostolic Age, the Ancient Church, the Apologists, and the Great Tradition 21

c. “If a branch is broken from a tree, it cannot bud; if a stream is cut off from its source, it dries up. . . . Nor can he who forsakes the church of Christ attain to the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger, he is an enemy. Without the church for your mother, you cannot have God for your Father” ( The Unity of the Church 5, 6).

7. Eusebius of Caesarea: the father of Church history, born in the 260s, most known for his History of the Church which traces the progress of the Church from earliest times to 324

8. “It was in response to such heresies that the early church produced the canon (or list of books) of the New Tes tament, the creed that is usually called “the Apostles’ Creed,” and “the doctrine of apostolic succession” (Justo L. Gonzalez, Church History: An Essential Guide . Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996, p. 29).

B. The Council of Nicea (The Nicene Creed) (325)

1. Arius and fallacious claims about the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth

a. He brought a radical monotheism to faith, concluding that the Father alone is God.

b. Argued that the Father created the universe through the Son, who himself was a creature, not God: “We are persecuted because we say that the Son had a beginning . . . and likewise because we say that he is made out of nothing.”

c. Arius serves as the forerunner of the teaching of the Jehovah’s Witnesses.