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Music is the most effective delivery system for feelings—love, joy, sadness, glory. The early Church Fathers knew that music also has power over minds, and they used that power to maximum effect, writing hymns through which the early Christians would learn, retain, and spread the Gospel message. In How the Choir Converted the World, best-selling…

The early Church faced its share of villains—persecutors like Nero and Julian, heretics like Marcion and Arius. And what good were they? Plenty, say the Church Fathers. The threat of persecution made Christians strong and bold. As noted author Mike Aquilina demonstrates in Villains of the Early Church: And How They Made Us Better Christians,…

“You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me.”—John 5:39 It takes some real imagination to go back fifteen or twenty centuries to an age when ordinary people didn’t have Bibles. But if we don’t put in that work, we’ll misunderstand…

When we survey the history of the Faith, it is undeniable that the lands of northern Africa were profoundly influential in the development of early Christianity. The faith arrived early in Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, Libya, and the territories we now call Eritrea, Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. African Christians made decisive contributions in theology, liturgy, biblical…

What did the first Christians believe about the Eucharist? How did they follow Jesus’command, “Do this in remembrance of me?” How did they celebrate the Lord’s Day? What would they recognize in today’s Mass? The answers may surprise you. In The Mass of the Early Christians, author Mike Aquilina reveals the Church’s most ancient Eucharistic…

Drawing again from the deep well of the Fathers’ wisdom, bestselling author Mike Aquilina has compiled a year’s worth of reflections on the Nine Choirs of Angels. A Year With The Angels invites you to discover the authority and strength of the Heavenly Host. Angels embody virtues, graces, and knowledge of the Truth because they stand…

We hear often that “the word of God is living and effective” (Heb 4:12). But what does that really mean for our day-to-day lives? A Joyful Noise reveals how the Psalms, sung by everyone from King David to Jesus to the Early Church Fathers to your church choir, are deeply rich and meaningful for our…

For the Church Fathers, friendship was at the heart of the Gospel. It was the way to salvation and the most effective means of evangelization. God had taken flesh in order to befriend mankind. Jesus had called his Apostles friends. The first Christians, in turn, spread salvation through friendships of their own. Evangelizing the world…

“Whenever you enter a town and they receive you, eat what is set before you; heal the sick in it and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’” —Luke 10:8-9 When Jesus sent seventy disciples on ahead of him, part of their mission was to heal the sick. In fact,…

“Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!” Mike and Terri Aquilina offer a rich array of evidence for the emotional, physical, spiritual, and psychological importance of breastfeeding. Drawing on everything from Scripture and the Church Fathers to modern medical journals and Pope John Paul II, they posit that “breastfeeding…