The first thing one must do before reading a book is to recognize from which library shelf it came—that is, its literary genre. For example, if one is reading a satire one will misunderstand its contents if one takes it for history or...
We come at last to the final adjective in the Creed’s description of the Church: apostolic. The word “apostolic” comes from the Greek word apostello, to send forth. An apostle is one who is sent forth with a mission. Christ Himself was...
Every Sunday we confess in the Creed that we believe in “one, holy, catholic, and apostolicChurch”. But what do we mean when we confess the Church as catholic? For many people the word“catholic” simply means “Roman Catholic”—i.e. the...
Every Sunday we confess in the Creed that the Church is “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic”. But what do we mean when we say that the Church is holy? Obviously it cannot mean that we believe that everyone in the Church is of exemplary...
Every Sunday we confess in the Creed that the Church is “one”—i.e. we confess the unity of the Church of God. But what does this creedal confession mean? In what sense is the Church one? It cannot mean that the one church is made up of...
Every Sunday the Creed is said in Church in which Christians say the words, “I believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church”. It many ways it is an odd thing to say. In the Creed we confess things that are matters of faith,...
In the opening verses of the Book of the Prophet Isaiah we find the following words: “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken: ‘Sons have I reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against Me. The ox knows...
The Hipster Nativity Set is (sadly) back in the news. A year or so ago, some enterprising entrepreneurs created this Nativity set, which includes the traditional figures, but all in a distinctly hipster form. Joseph has a man-bun and is...
You have probably all seen certain pictures of the saints—usually Western pictures—in which all the saints look more or less the same: the same doe-eyes, the same piously folded hands, the same soft, feminine features found on both women...
Finally in our dialogue with our Jewish neighbours we look to the patterns and lessons from Jewish history as interpreted by the Hebrew Scriptures. Thinking about the catastrophe that befell Israel in 70 A.D. when the Temple was...
We continue with our apologetic project of commending the Christian Faith to our Jewish neighbours, and today look at the life of Jesus as the fulfillment of the prophetic elements in the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms (compare Luke...
In the late 1880s, Friedrich Nietzsche published a work entitled, Also Sprach Zarathustra—in English “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”. Zarathustra (more commonly known as “Zoroaster”) was the founder of Zoroastrianism, a dualistic Persian...
In my last blog post I looked at the patristic project of commending the Christian Faith to one’s Jewish neighbour, and concluded that the project, though fraught with potential for misunderstanding, was still worthwhile. Here I would...
I have just finished reading a wonderful book by the late scholar Louis Feldman (d. 2017) entitled Jew and Gentile in the Ancient World: Attitudes and Interactions from Alexander to Justinian. In it, he mentions the patristic attempts to...
Christian baptism is about conversion, as a quick look at the Orthodox liturgical texts reveals. Questions are addressed to the candidate, requiring him or her to renounce Satan, and to seal this renunciation by spitting upon him. Next,...
