Author name: Molly Hostetler

For the launch of our fourth Journey Through Scripture study, The Bible and the Church Fathers, we wanted to do something bigger than we’ve ever done. That’s why we’re not just launching the study online for Lent, we also held a launch party both in person and digitally.

Imagine a young woman who is not very athletic but who sees value in being involved in competitive sports. So, every fall she trains for cross-country races. She exercises and eats the right diet for a runner. She closely follows the directions of her coach.  

It’s finally here! The study that everyone’s been waiting for has arrived: The Bible and the Church Fathers. It makes the perfect study for Lent!

What are the depths of our hidden God into which we are entering when we pray? The greatest saints have not penetrated to the depths of themselves, nor the greatest psychoanalysts, nor the greatest mystics or gurus. When we consider that we are made in the image of God and we have immortal souls, we know we have an infinite capacity.

St. Conrad of Piacenza was an Italian nobleman living in the thirteenth century. He married a noblewoman and lived a life of luxury in his youth. His life was transformed, however, when one day he accidentally caught the forest on fire while hunting. An innocent peasant was blamed and sentenced to death, but Conrad confessed to the fault and gave all his possessions to the poor in recompense. Conrad gave up his life of luxury and joined a group of Franciscan hermits, and his wife joined the Poor Clares.

I went into reading the Apostolic Fathers convinced that they were going to show that the early Church was Calvinist, which was my theological background, but they let me down in a big way. But what they showed me instead was so beautiful: the fullness of truth in the Catholic faith.

Jesus summed up his teaching in a startling and unambiguous call to His followers: “You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt 5:48). Perfect in purity of heart, perfect in compassion and love, perfect in obedience, perfect in conformity to the will of the Father, perfect in holiness—when we hear these words we can be understandably tempted to discouragement, thinking that perfection for us is impossible. And indeed, left to our own resources, it certainly is—just as impossible as it is for rich people to enter heaven, or for a man and a woman to remain faithful their whole lives in marriage. But with God, all things are possible, even our transformation.

The highest form of devotion is actually more than a devotion: Eucharistic adoration. This personal, devotional prayer is also truly a form of liturgical prayer. Because the Eucharist comes only from the Church’s Liturgy, there is always a liturgical dimension to Eucharistic adoration.  

The term “Fundamentalist” has at worst become a term of abuse and at times a term to designate someone who takes traditional religious beliefs, including moral stands, seriously (e.g., those who nowadays consider that homosexual actions are immoral because of what the Scripture says about them are regularly described as Fundamentalists). This latter understanding is vague to the point of confusion, because it would include all orthodox Christians.

The disciples asked the Lord to teach them to pray. In fact, it is the Lord who leads the way every time we pray, and He teaches us how to pray. Without Him prayer is not possible and without Him we would be simply talking to ourselves or talking to nothing.