Talk:Church Fathers

I am very sure that being a saint is a prerequisite for being a Church Father. This looks like WO/Anglican/RC content. Anyone want to weigh in? Eish (talk) 20:01, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

This is not something where we have a canonical or dogmatic definition setting forth elements to being a "church father." If you look at Pomazansky's Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, for example, he has an appendix of "Fathers and Teachers of the Church" that are cited in the text. This contains some of individuals that are not saints, but whose writings were influential in the early church and not yet tainted by their errors, even though they may have later drifted into heresy. It's not an ecclesiastical title, so I think the usage is dependent greatly on context. I'd never call Origen or Tertullian a "Church Father" in a homily, but if we were in a class examining writing of the early Fathers, we'd be remiss to ignore their existence, particularly as some of their early writings were sound. --Admin (talk) 14:42, 30 March 2024 (UTC)