The
Fathers of the Church spread the gospel of
Jesus Christ, defended the Church in apologetic writing and fought the many
heresies of the first six centuries of Christianity. These men, also called
Apostolic Fathers, gave special witness to the faith, some dying the death of a
martyr. Like Jesus who referred to Abraham as a spiritual father (Luke 16: 24)
and St. Paul, who referred to himself in the same terms (1 Corinthians 4: 15), the
Fathers were zealous for the word of God. Their writings are a testimony to the
faith of the early Church, yet many Christians are unfamiliar with the work of
Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna, Justin the Martyr,
Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian of Carthage, Athanasius, Ephraim, Cyril of
Jerusalem, Hilary of Poitiers or Gregory the Great to name of few of the early
Fathers. Periodically we will provide biographical information and examples of
the writing of these great men of faith. This page will focus on St. Cyprian of
Carthage.
Caecilius Cyprianus Thascius,
St. Cyprian of Carthage
(200-253 A.D.)
Cyprian was born in Carthage between 200 A.D. and
210 A.D. His parents were wealthy pagans and he did not convert until 246 AD.,
at which time he made a vow of chastity. St. Pontius says he was a dignified but
cheerful man. He was a skilled administrator and a man of great energy and
character. He became Bishop of Carthage in 249 A.D. After the martyrdom of Pope
Fabian during the persecution of the Roman Emperor Decius in 250 A.D., he took
refuge in the hills outside Carthage and wrote letters to his flock. He stood
against heresies at the Council of Carthage in 251 A.D., but disagreed with Pope
St. Stephen over the issue of rebaptism of converted heretics. Cyprian followed
the African custom to consider invalid any baptism conferred by heretical
groups. [The Catholic Church maintains, to the contrary, that if the baptism is
made in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (Mt. 28:19) with the
right intention and using water, that it is valid.] But the dispute was ended by
a renewed Roman persecution, with Pope Stephen being martyred in 256 A.D. and
Cyprian suffering the same fate in 258 A.D. He was the leading African bishop
and the first to suffer a martyr's death.
The Lapsed ( 251 A.D.):
551 [ 15] "The Apostle likewise bears witness and says, "You cannot drink the
cup of the Lord and the cup of devils. You cannot be a communicant at the table
of the Lord and of the table of devils" (1 Cor 10:21) And again he threatens the
stubborn and perverse and denounces them, saying: "Whoever eats the Bread or
drinks the Cup of the Lord unworthily, will be guilty of the Body and Blood of
the Lord" (1 Cor 11:27). [16] But they spurn and despise all these warnings; and
before their sins are expiated, before they have made a confession of their
crime, before their conscience has been purged in the ceremony and at the hand
of the priest, before the offense against an angry and threatening Lord has been
appeased, they do violence to His Body and Blood; and with their hands and mouth
they sin against the Lord [by unworthy reception of the sacrament] more than
when they denied Him."
553
[28]"God cannot be mocked or outwitted; nor can He be deceived by any clever
cunning. Indeed, he but sins the more if, thinking that God is like man, he
believes that he can escape the punishment of his crime by not openly admitting
his crime. . . [29] I beseech you, bretheren, let everyone who has sinned
confess his sin while he is still in this world, while his confession is still
admissible, while satisfaction and remisssion made through the priests are
pleasing before the Lord.
The Unity of the Catholic Church [251/256
A.D.]
555-556
[4]"The Lord says to Peter: 'I say to
you,' He says, 'that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,
and the gates of hell will not overcome it. And to you I will give the keys of
the kingdom of heaven: and whatever things you bind on earth shall be bound also
in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth, they shall be loosed also in
heaven'" (Matt 16: 18-19).
[There are two editions of what follows, the second of which tones down the
first in view of Cyprian's argument with the papacy. Papal primacy is clear in
the first edition written about 251 A.D., but merely implicit in the second
effort written about 255 or 256 A.D.]
First Edition: "And again He says to him [Peter] after His resurrection: 'Feed
my sheep' (John 21:17). On him He builds the Church, and to him He gives the
command to feed the sheep; and although He assigns a like power to all the
Apostles, yet He founded a single chair, and He established by His own authority
a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that
also which Peter was; but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear
that there is but one Church and one chair. So too, all our shepherds, and the
flock is shown to be one, fed by all the Apostles in single-minded accord. If
someone does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still
holds the faith? If he desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built,
can he still be confident that his is in the Church?"
Second Edition: "It is on the one man that He builds the Church; and although He
assigns a like power to all the Apostles after His resurrection, when He says,
'As the Father has sent me, so also do I send you; receive the Holy Spirit: If
you forgive any man his sins, they shall be forgiven; and if you retain any
man's sins, they shall be retained" (John 20: 21-23) Nevertheless, in order that
unity might be clearly shown, He established by His own authority a source for
that unity, which takes its beginning from one man alone. Indeed, the other
Apostles were that also which Peter was, being endowed with an equal portion of
dignity and power; but the origin is grounded in unity, so that it may be made
clear that there is but one Church of Christ. Indeed this oneness of the Church
is indicated in the Song of Songs, when the Holy Spirit, speaking in the Lord's
name, says, 'One is my dove, my perfect one, to her mother the only one, the
chosen of her that bore her." If someone does not hold fast to this unity of the
Church, can he imagine that he holds the faith? If he resists and withstands the
Church, can he still be confident that he is in the Church, when the blessed
Apostle Paul teaches this very thing and displays the sacred sign of unity when
he says: 'One body and one spirit, one hope of your calling, one Lord, one
faith, one Baptism, one God' (Eph 4:4-6). [5] Let no one mislead the brotherhood
with a lie, let no one corrupt the faith by a faithless perversion of the truth.
The episcopate is one, of which each bishop holds his part within the undivided
structure. The Church also is one, however widely she has spread among the
multitude through her fruitful increase. . . . The Church is bathed in the light
of the Lord , and pours her rays over the whole world; but it is one light that
is spread everywhrere , and the unity of her structure is undivided."
Letter of Cyprian to His clergy (250 A.D.)
569
[16(9)2] "Although for lesser sins it is required that sinners do penance for a
just time, after which, according to the rule of discipline, they may come to
confession and, through the imposition of hands by the bishop and clergy, may
receive the right of communication [communion or the eucharist] , now, in an
unpropitious time and while the persecution continues, when peace is not yet
restored to the Church itself, they are being admitted to communication [the
Eucharist], and the offering is made in their name; and not yet having made a
confession of sin, not yet having had hands imposed upon them by the bishop and
clergy, the Eucharist is given to them, in spite of what is written: 'Whoever
shall eat the Bread or drink the Cup of the Lord unworthily, will be guilty of
the Body and Blood of the Lord' (1 Cor 11:27)
Letter of Cyprian to a Certain Cecil [A.D.
?]
581
[63,4] "Also in the priest Melchizedek we see the Sacrament of the Sacrifice of
the Lord prefigured, in accord with that to which the Divine Scriptures testify,
where it says: ‘And Melchizedek, the King of Salem, brought out bread and wine,
for he was a priest of the Most High God; and he blessed Abraham' (Gen
14:18-19). That Melchizedek is in fact a type of Christ is declared in the
psalms by the Holy Spirit, saying to the Son, as it were from the Father:
‘Before the daystar I begot You. You are a Priest forever, according to the
order of Melchizedek' (Psalm 109[110]: 3-4). The order certainly is that which
comes form his sacrifice and which comes down from it: because Melchizedek was a
priest of the Most High God; because he offered bread; and because he blessed
Abraham. And who is more a priest of the Most High God than our Lord Jesus
Christ, who when He offered sacrifice to God the Father, offered the very same
which Melchizedek had offered, namely bread and wine, which is in fact His Body
and Blood!
Other Early Church Fathers and their Testimony