Alex Fogleman
2023 Year in Review

2023 in Review: John Behr on theological anthropology; Michael Cameron on Augustine; Catechesis and Liturgy at Iona House with the Anglican Catechist Training School; Curtis Freeman's Pilgrim Journey; Hanna Lucas' Sensing the Sacred; Alex Fogleman's Knowledge, Faith, and Early Christian Initiation.

2023 Year in Review
Alex Fogleman
Knowing God in Patristic Catechesis

Rowan Williams has famously written that theology as a discipline is “perennially liable to be seduced by the prospect of bypassing the question of how it learns its own language.” My hope is that this project offers a picture of early Christian catechesis that helps us remember, quite literally, how early Christian theology learned its own language. What it means to know God is inseparable from the ways in which such knowledge is experienced; medium and message are tightly linked. In studying early Christian catechesis, we observe how knowing God belongs within a set of ecclesial practices in which the meaning of knowledge and faith are found in – and founded upon – Jesus Christ. Advancing from faith to understanding, from belief in God to the knowledge of eternal wisdom, begins and ends with Christ.

Knowing God in Patristic Catechesis
Book Excerpt
Alex Fogleman
Catechized by a Peculiar People

David Lyle Jeffrey on his baptism in the Scottish Baptist Church in rural Canada: “A feature of baptism in our tradition that I continue to value is that it makes you think about the meaning of it quite a lot, both before and after the experience. One of the questions that friends would ask me is, “Do you feel any different?” My Catholic friends especially, since they had the luxury of having just a few drops on their heads when they were too young to remember, wanted to know. Actually, I did feel different, though not perhaps in quite the way they may have expected. It wasn’t euphoric. Rather, I felt as though I had entered into the community of grownups in some way.”

Catechized by a Peculiar People
Alex Fogleman
Catechesis and Trinity, Part III: Living the ...

Nicholas Norman-Krause on the Trinity and the Moral Life: “Moral life is not, first and foremost, obedience to a moral law instituted by a distant Lawgiver, but participation in the Triune life by means of deification and sanctification. Law certainly has its place within this Trinitarian moral vision. But, as we will see, law hangs together with other crucial moral concepts within a broader vision of Christian discipleship, of drawing near to the Father, through the Son, by the Holy Spirit.”

Catechesis and Trinity, Part III: Living the Trinity
Alex Fogleman
Catechesis and the Trinity, Part II: Praying ...

Nicholas Norman-Krause on the Trinity and Prayer: “the Lord’s Prayer is only fully intelligible when understood within a larger Trinitarian account of our participation in the divine life. By the Holy Spirit, we are united to Christ, adopted into his sonship, and so enabled to address his Father as ours. And thus, to pray the Lord’s Prayer is to come to participate in the Triune life of God. For this reason, reflection on the Trinity properly belongs to the catechesis of prayer in general, and to the study of the Lord’s Prayer in particular.”

Catechesis and the Trinity, Part II: Praying the Trinity

Augustine

Knowing God in Patristic Catechesis

Knowing God in Patristic Catechesis

Rowan Williams has famously written that theology as a discipline is “perennially liable to be seduced by the prospect of bypassing the question of how it learns its own language.” My hope is that this project offers a picture of early Christian catechesis that helps us remember, quite literally, how early Christian theology learned its own language. What it means to know God is inseparable from the ways in which such knowledge is experienced; medium and message are tightly linked. In studying early Christian catechesis, we observe how knowing God belongs within a set of ecclesial practices in which the meaning of knowledge and faith are found in – and founded upon – Jesus Christ. Advancing from faith to understanding, from belief in God to the knowledge of eternal wisdom, begins and ends with Christ.

The Catechist as Historian

The Catechist as Historian

A review of Mark Noll, David Komline, and Han-luen Kantzer Komline’s Turning Points: Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity, 4th ed. (Gand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2022): “The book remains—in substance and style—a gift to Christian pastors, teachers, and lay persons who want to understand the Christian past better and in ways that can inspire thoughtful Christian living.”

Mystery of Light: Augustine's Christmastide Catechesis

Mystery of Light: Augustine's Christmastide Catechesis

St. Augustine on the Sacrament of Christmas: “Because even the day of his birth contains the mystery of his light. That, you see, is what the Apostle says: ‘The night is far advanced, while the day has drawn near; let us throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us walk decently as in the day’ (Rom. 13:12-13). Let us recognize the day and let us be the day. We were night, you see, when we were living as unbelievers. And this unbelief, which had covered the whole world as a kind of night, was to be diminished by the growth of faith. That is why, on the day we celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, the night begins to be encroached upon, and the day to grow longer.”

Recent Books on Patristic Catechesis

Recent Books on Patristic Catechesis

The patristic catechumenate has been the subject of several monographs over the past few years—and mostly, it seems, not for any interest in renewing contemporary catechesis but as an interesting historical subject in its own right. New Testament and Early Christian scholars are realizing—even apart from its significance for the church today—that catechesis was central to early Christianity. Here are summaries of five books from the past decade on patristic catechesis/catechumenate: Daniel Schwartz’s Paideia and Cult; Benjamin Edsall’s The Reception of Paul in Early Christian Initiation; David Voprada’s Quodvultdeus: A Bishop Forming Christians in Vandal Africa; and Matthieu Pignot’s The Catechumenate in Late Antique Africa; Donna Hawk Reinhold, Christian Identity Formation According to Cyril of Jerusalem.

The Joy of Teaching

The Joy of Teaching

Augustine on the “cheerful giving” of catechesis: “Our greatest concern is how to make it possible for those who catechize to do so with joy (gaudens). For the more they succeed in this, the more appealing they will be. For if God loves a cheerful giver (2 Cor. 9:7) in matters of material wealth, how much more is this true in matters of spiritual wealth? But for such cheerfulness (hilaritas) to be present at the opportune time depends on the compassion (misericordiae) of the one teaching.”

What is a Monk?

What is a Monk?

Greg Peters draws on Augustine, Cassian, and Pseudo-Dionysius to show that, although “monasticism is associated historically with celibacy and other forms of asceticism (such as poverty, stability, and unwavering obedience), single-mindedness is another consistent element of monasticism, and the one that seems to be more essential in the earliest tradition . . . . Thus, to be a monk is to be one, not divided; to be unified in one’s goal of coming into union with God. Though many believers live in a multitudinous manner, a μοναχός will set herself apart by living simply and singly. A monk is single-minded.”

Barking Against the Truth: Augustine as Catechumen

Barking Against the Truth: Augustine as Catechumen

How Ambrose helped Augustine find it harder to disbelieve Christianity:

This ability to “make it harder to disbelieve” is an important catechetical task. Yes, the catechist aims to build up and edify new believers. The catechist explains and initiates others into the basic elements of doctrine, spirituality, and ethics. And yet the catechist does this work without presuming that everyone is “already there.” In a catechetical context, there will be many who, like Augustine the catechumen, are not quite convinced of the Christian faith, even if they no longer hold to any of the alternatives. Creating an atmosphere in which the truth of the Christian faith can be “recognized” by these kinds of people is an important function of catechesis, one that catechists would do well to cultivate.