Product Description

Very often in the history of Christianity, "reformers", by whatever name, have aspired to return to "the early Church". The Church of their own day, for whatever reason, fails to live up to what they think Christianity should be: in their view there has been a falling away from the beautiful ideals of the early Church.

Kenneth Whitehead shows in this book how the early Church has, in fact, not disappeared, but rather has survived and persisted, and is with us still. "Reformers" are not so much the ones needed by this Church as are those who aspire to be saints—to follow Christ seriously and always to fulfill God's holy will by employing the means of sanctification which Christ continues to provide in the Church.

Whitehead shows how the visible body which today bears the name "the Catholic Church" is the same Church which Christ established to carry on and perpetuate in the world his Words and his Works—and his own divine Life—and to bring salvation and sanctification to all mankind. Despite superficial differences in certain appearances, the worldwide Catholic Church today remains the same Church that was originally founded by Jesus Christ on Peter and the other apostles back in the first century in the ancient Near East. The early Church, in other words, was always!—nothing else but—the Catholic Church.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #412838 in Books
• Published on: 2000-10
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 334 pages

Customer Reviews

A dramatic and accurate view of the Early Church
This book's focus is on the Early Catholic Church and covers five primary areas in five huge chapters (the book itself is a soft covered book of over 300 pages). The topics covered are 1. The Church of the Apostles, 2. The Church of the Early Church Fathers, 3. The Church of the First Four Great Councils, 4. The Primacy of Rome in the Early Church and 5. The Early Church Was the Catholic Church.

This book is an excellent read, some of it being in story form which makes it an easier and more interesting read than some other apologetic material. It is strongly rooted in history, presenting historical facts to prove that the Catholic Church of today is a direct descendent of the Early Church of the time of the Apostles.

I would recommend this book for anyone who is involved in Catholic Apologetics, or who would like to learn more about the Early Church. It draws upon a huge source of early Church literature, it develops a very interesting picture of the Early Church and ties them all together to give us the Catholic Church we have today.

The Development of theOne, Holy, Catholic & Apostolic Church
Mr. Whitehead provides a convincing case that the early Church was indeed the Catholic Church. Although lacking in footnotes or endnotes, Whitehead adequately describes his sources for his material. Further, he offers a fair critique of many of his sources in both their weaknesses and strengths.

To understand Whitehead's approach, the reader should have an understanding of the development of doctrine for the "kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed - when it is full grown, it becomes a tree."

In its essence, doctrine is not corrupted simply because it develops. Earch Church history is replete with instances whereby the early Church came to understand revelation largely as a result of reproofing heresies that developed in the early Church.

Whitehead's theme is largely developed on the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. Because doctrine develops as men gain a greater understanding of revelation (the Trinity is an excellent example) Whitehead does not make the mistake of arguing that what we know as the papacy today was fully understood or developed in the first four centuries of the Church. However, he provides a highly convincing argument that all the elements of what the Catholic Church claims were there from the beginning and accepted by the universal Church, both East and West.

For anyone seeking to understand the early Church, or the Catholic case for the papacy, this is an excellent resource. Following a read of this work, I encourage the reader to read the source documents themselves.

Highly recommended reading!

Destined to be a classic despite bias reviews of it
Keneth Whitehead historically based apologetic work on the early church, uses history to show the early church was in fact the Catholic church in all essential respects. I am writing this review to show how previous reviewers that maligned this book, on the basis of lacking footnoting is total bogus and has more to do with their own biases. I'm a former Graduate student in Political Science at the University of Central Oklahoma. Political Science scholarship often used Parethical text citation instead of footnoting. While it is true Mr. Whitehead's book does not use footnoting, his sources are well documented.
The structure of the book is composed of four chapters and a conclusion.
Chapter One is "Church of the Apostles". I hardly think footnoting is necessary when quoting the Apostle Paul the author merely documents this as (1 COR 10:17). Anyone even remotely familar with the Bible can recognize this.
Chapter two is the "Church of the early Fathers" in which sources are identified in the text such as the classic historians like Eusebius Ecclesiastical History and early church fathers such as Ignatius. Ignatius only wrote seven letters around 107 A.D which are well known even among Protestants, and the book identifies which letter he is quoting from in each case. Anyone with even most limited knowledge of early church fathers can look up the author's references. Similarly when Emperor Constantine Edict of Milan is quoted from, the parethical reference is sufficient.
Chapter three is on the "Church of the Four Great Councils"
It includes lengthly quotes from Great Church council offical documents. Consider on Pg. 84 of this book being reveiwed, the author quotes a statement made by the Arian Emperor Constantius in 355 A.D as saying "take my will for a canon". This source is cited in the text as (St. Athanasius, History of the Arians, 33). There are many similar examples to this one. This argument about footnoting to attack this book is totally bogus and without foundation. It is made by people with their own biases and agendas.
The reason is clear. The final chapter of book and much of the meat of the book on the "Primacy of Rome" in the early centuries is filled with historically damaging information. In particular, the documentary evidence is overwhelming (w/ Page Numbers!) of Eastern Christianity putting themselves to writing in Ecumenical councils recognizing the formal primacy of the Bishop of Rome despite what they and Protestants assert today.