Sayings of the Fathers of the Church (3 vols.)

by Edward Condon; Mike Aquilina; Kevin M. Clarke

Publisher:

Catholic University of America

, 2018–2021

Overview

Featuring a wide range of scholars compiling material from our acclaimed Fathers of the Church volumes, each title will be devoted to a few specific areas of theology. The volumes included cover the seven deadly sins, angels and demons, the Mass, and Mary.

Key Features

• Addresses common quetions about the seven deadly sins
• Takes readers step by step through the Mass, from the Sign of the Cross through the Dismissal
• Features a wide range of scholars compiling material from the acclaimed Fathers of the Church volumes

Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell

• Editor: Edward Condon
• Series: Sayings of the Fathers of the Church
• Publisher: Catholic University of America Press
• Publication Date: 2019
• Pages: 144

Catholic University of America Press is proud to present the second volume in its new Sayings of the Fathers of the Church Series. Featuring a wide range of scholars compiling material from our acclaimed Fathers of the Church volumes, each title will be devoted to a few specific areas of theology. The inaugural volume covered The Seven Deadly Sins, and future volumes are planned to focus on Angels and Demons, the Mass, and Mary.

Nothing has the power to inspire, or terrify us like the unknown. Life after death is the perhaps the greatest unknown that confronts mankind. But the wisdom of the Church, especially in the teachings of the Church Fathers, reminds us that we know a great deal about what awaits us at the end of life.

What the Church knows about the four last things—death judgment, heaven, and hell--is essential for helping on the way of the pilgrimage of life. The teachings of the Fathers, far from sating our curiosity, serve to increase the power of heaven to inspire us, and of hell to terrify.

In this volume, canon lawyer and writer Edward Condon compiles a book full of wisdom and compelling insights. More than anything, the Fathers warn us that our life is short, and the reckoning for how we have lived it eternal. The urgency of the Church’s message, brought to life in the sayings of the Fathers, comes to remind us of our true calling and inheritance in baptism, and of the richness of the heavenly reward, which is not so much the fruit of our efforts on Earth but the fulfillment of God’s promise of love to us. The terror of hell is not the threat of the dictator, but a dire warning of the true scope of our freedom as children of God.

This book, rich with the traditional teachings of the church, will guide and inspire readers as they continue their life journeys, which have a beginning but no end.

Christian wisdom views all things sub specie aeternitatis, ‘in the perspective of eternity,’ for all reality has its beginning in God and its final destiny in him. The Word of God, in fact, trains the human mind and heart to understand our days on earth as a pilgrimage to eternal life and ultimately to ‘new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells’ (2 Pt 3, 13). In a secularist and materialist culture that views everything in terms of the here and now, there is a desperate need to restore the true perspective of eternal life. Edward Condon has provided a most sure and efficacious tool in restoring and keeping a right view of things by collecting the sayings of the Fathers of the Church, those most authoritative interpreters of the Word of God, regarding the last things. I commend most highly his work, even as I am most grateful to him for it.

—Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke

Edward Condon is a practicing canon lawyer and an editor for The Catholic News Agency. C.C. Pecknold is associate professor of systematic theology at The Catholic University of America.

The Holy Mass

• Editor: Mike Aquilina
• Series: Sayings of the Fathers of the Church
• Publisher: Catholic University of America Press
• Publication Date: 2021
• Pages: 120

The Catholic University of America Press is proud to present the third volume in its Sayings of the Fathers of the Church series. Featuring esteemed scholars and writers compiling material from our acclaimed Fathers of the Church volumes, each title is devoted to select areas of theology. The inaugural volumes covered the Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things, and now we turn to The Holy Mass.

The documents of early Christianity are rich in mentions of the Mass and its component parts. Sometimes they’re detailed descriptions, sometimes quick allusions. In this volume Mike Aquilina, a popular author on early Christianity, takes readers step by step through the Mass, from the Sign of the Cross through the Dismissal, illuminating the way with the words of the Fathers. Along the way readers encounter familiar rites, words, and gestures, but also familiar complaints — about long homilies, bad singing, liturgical abuses, and distracted congregations.

The Holy Mass is divided into chapters based on the parts of the Mass known to modern Catholics of the Roman Rite. The Mass did not follow this sequence through the entirety of the era of the Fathers. Gregory the Great moved the position of the Lord’s Prayer. There were geographic variants for the placement of the Sign of Peace. Some ancient liturgies lacked a specific penitential rite—though all the liturgies had a penitential dimension to their prayers.

Mike Aquilina’s introduction provides historical context and describes the rich development of the liturgy through the Church’s first few centuries. A foreword by Thomas Weinandy, a member of the Vatican’s International Theological Commission, speaks of the relevance of this material for worshipers today.

Mike Aquilina has done it again! Adding a new volume to his series of books based on patristic sources, Mike has once again brought the wisdom of the ancient church to the forefront to help contemporary readers understand the riches of the Catholic faith, this time in reference to the holy Mass. The book is concise and eminently readable. Catholics who already love the Mass will find these historic insights to be a source of faith development and personal spiritual growth. For other readers, not yet familiar with Catholic liturgy, this collection of historic references will illustrate how and why the Mass has been at the center of Catholic life from the very beginning.

—Thomas J. Tobin, Bishop of Providence

Mike Aquilina is s a popular author working in the area of Church history, especially patristics, the study of the early Church Fathers. Thomas G. Weinandy is an American Roman Catholic priest and a leading scholar, as well as a member of the International Theological Commission.

The Seven Deadly Sins

• Editor: Kevin M. Clarke
• Series: Sayings of the Fathers of the Church
• Publisher: Catholic University of America Press
• Publication Date: 2018
• Pages: 240

The Seven Deadly Sins is the inaugural volume in a new series from the Catholic University of America Press. This series will feature a wide range of scholars compiling material from the Fathers of the Church series to focus on a specific area of theology. Forthcoming titles will focus on Death, Judgement, Heaven and Hell, and Angels and Demons, with others to be announced shortly.

Sacred Scripture did not neatly list the seven deadly sins, so where did this tradition come from? Unsurprisingly, it can be traced back to the Church Fathers. But were there eight or seven? In a sense, the answer is “both.” The tradition of the capital sins has a rich development in the patristic era, not only in the presentation of the list of vices but in the preaching and teaching of the early shepherds of the Church. So how do the capital sins spawn other vices in the soul? How does one cultivate the virtues that heal the soul from those vices? How are gluttony and lust related? Is sadness really a vice? How is vainglory different from pride? What role does almsgiving have in soothing the passion of anger? The Fathers of the Church answer these questions and more in this volume.

The capital vices are the gateway drugs to countless sins. The path of the book descends through the vices, culminating with their queen ruler, pride. The words of the Fathers will assist the reader in being more realistic about the attacks upon the soul. The text should also be edifying and medicinal. Since each chapter begins with vice and ends with virtue, one’s path through the chapters represents a sort of ascent out of vice and into the freedom of the virtues. The text gives special attention throughout to the thought of Augustine of Hippo, Evagrius of Pontus, John Cassian, Gregory the Great, and Maximus the Confessor.

The Seven Deadly Sins offers an illuminating survey of the Church Fathers’ wisdom on the capital vices that have burdened us since time immemorial, but also their wisdom on the virtues we need to cultivate to counter those vices. The reader will find both an unsettling diagnosis in these pages and a reassuring remedy!

—Curtis A. Martin, Founder and CEO of FOCUS

Kevin Clarke is Assistant Professor of Sacred Scripture at St. Patrick’s Seminary and University in Menlo Park, Calif., where he teaches Scripture and patristics.