Reading the Church Father's "Alone"



“We must read the fathers in their context. And they must always be weighed against the Holy Scriptures. The Bible doesn't stand alone, but neither do the fathers either.”
Chuck, from the "Mycopticchurch.com", message board.


I like that quote of Chucks quite a bit. It came at a time when a person was beratting the Coptic stance on birth control. And basically accused us of being too liberal. That person I think was a former Catholic, turned Coptic, and really believes all birth control is a sin. While we believe that it acceptable for "Family planning", but couples shouldn't use it to dispense with having kids altogether. (during the early to mid 50s when the pill came out there was a meeting of the bishops to discuss how the Church should deal with it and that was the outcome, rather than the extreme stance that the Catholic Church took regarding this issue).

Anyway this critic posted a few dozen biting church fathers quotes and did everything but out and out accuse us of apostasy, for taking a more moderate stand on the issue. Which is where Chuck's comment came in, regarding not reading the Church Fathers "Alone", and he dealt with various issues going on regarding that issue.


Anyway on this issue andmany other ones it's very important to not read them "Alone". Besides the sciptures in their Judeo context, I would also other things like Holy Tradition and Canon Law that even the Fathers had to observe. Anyway now with that said, we probably will proceed to discussing Clement of Alexandria tomorrow or the day after.