CHURCH FATHERS

CHURCH FATHERS. An important identification for Orthodox theology and life, the fathers and mothers of the Church are related to Holy Tradition, that is, the transmission of the Holy Spirit (qq.v.) from one generation to another. In classical Western Christian historiography, the “Age of the Fathers” signifies the early centuries of the Church, from about A.D. 100 to the close of antiquity, that is, the 7th c. in the West and the 8th c. (Joh n of Damascus [q.v.]) in the East. While the centuries that saw the Ecumenical Councils (q.v.) in the Orthodox Church are singularly important, every generation is felt in some sense to “father” the Church for the generation succeeding it. Thus, a Gregory Palamas in the 14th c. is as much a Church Father as a Joh n Chrysostom in the 4th c. or a Maximus the Confessor (qq.v.) in the 7th c. The life in Christ, in the words of Symeon the New Theologian (q.v.), is a single continuum, “a flame,” handed down through the generations from one illumined soul to those who come after. There are, to be sure, those who stand out particularly in this chain of saints, the “fathers” par excellence, in particular those who contributed significantly to the Church’s central doctrinal affirmations. For example, those cited above are frequently listed as “the Fathers” with Irenaeus, Athanasius, the Cappadocians, etc. (qq.v.); but it will not be only and always the ancients whom contemporary believers have in mind. To limit the fathers to one era alone would be tantamount to limiting the Holy Spirit-to denying the living and creative Spirit who is the Church’s very life.