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St. Ignatius of Antioch
00:19:29
A Father of the early Church, St. Ignatius of Antioch is an incredible model of Christian discipleship. He is also one of Dr. Ben Akers' favorite saints. Sit down with Dr. Ben Akers and Taylor Kemp as they discuss this remarkable bishop, who died a martyr for his fidelity to Christ.
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This episode is brought to you by our friends at the Jesuit Refugee Service. They work in 58 countries accompanying and serving forcibly displaced people, providing life changing emergency assistance, education, mental health support and more to millions each year. Get to know their work, visit jrsusa.org agustin.
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You're listening to a podcast on Catholic Saints. This podcast is produced by the Augustine Institute, an apostolate helping Catholics understand, live and share their faith.
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Hello everyone and welcome to Catholic Saints. My name is Taylor Kemp. I am the director of Formed and.
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With me is Dr. Ben Akers, Chief content officer here at the Augustine Institute.
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C
Yes, and today we are talking about St. Ignatius, Ignatius of Antioch. Dr. Akers, what do we need to know about St. Ignatius of Antioch?
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A
Many things. We're not going to cover all the things in our short 18 minute episode, but I just want to say he's one of my favorite saints. One of my favorite saints of all time. He's a model of Christian discipleship. His martyrdom becomes kind of a manual for martyrdom is how one Christian writer put it. But he's an early church father.
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C
Yep.
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Okay, so he's also a doctor of the church.
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C
Okay, so he died. What we know about him biographically is he died around 107. So we're talking very early.
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Exactly. So possibly birth date. Around 30.
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C
Wow.
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We know from St. John Chrysostom, who is a bishop in Antioch. So he's Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop, later St. John Chrysostom. Many, you know, a couple hundred years later said that Ignatius of Antioch had the see was bishop for 40 years in Antioch.
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C
That's a long time.
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Count that back.
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C
Yeah.
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Eusebius is the early church historian. He says that ignatius is the third bishop of Antioch. Do you know who the first bishop of Antioch is?
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No.
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St. Peter. So think of Acts, St. Peter the apostle. So in Acts chapter 11, when the apostles, you know, apostles are scattering, they're going different places.
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Yep.
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Peter goes to Antioch.
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I remember that.
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He goes to Antioch. Antioch is the first place where they're called Christians. Christians. Very good. And it's interesting. Ignatius is going to be the first Ignatius of Antioch is going to be the first one to use the word Catholic for church. So Antioch is famous for that first time place called Christian, first time called Catholic. So Eusebius tells us that Peter is the first bishop of Antioch. Evodius, who we don't know anything about, is the second bishop. And then Ignatius is the third bishop.
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C
So how do we know anything about Ignatius? He's so old.
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How do we. Yeah, so Eusebius is a early Christian writer. He wrote what's called the history of the Church. And he tells us different stories about the lives of the apostles, some stories that aren't in Scripture. So he tells us stories about Saint John the Apostle and the evangelist and what the end of his life looked like. But he also tells us what's happening in the first couple hundred years after Jesus, death, resurrection.
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And then we also know a little bit more, just rather than just being told about him. We have some.
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Exactly right. Exactly. We have seven letters that Ignatius writes to people and also churches on his way to death in Rome. So he's in Syria, so he's in Asia Minor, and he's heading over towards Rome to face the lions and be martyred. And he writes these seven letters. So we actually have handwritten letters that.
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C
Yeah, you can find these. You're holding a book there.
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Yeah, this is Early Christian writers. So it has other writers in it as well. But you can find this on newadvent.org is a website you can have that has free resources to find these letters. And it's interesting. One of our favorite saints is St. John Henry Carnal Newman. He says about these seven letters of Ignatius, that all of Christian theology in outline form can be found in seven letters.
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C
I remember in the graduate school here learning that all of theology, the seeds of all theology, can be found in St. Paul's letters. And then I remember hearing that all of theology can be found in St. Ignatius. I was like, that is so cool. That's amazing.
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A
What's neat about Ignatius is that he's very, as you mentioned, St. Paul, he's very Pauline. So you can actually see that the way he's thinking about Christ, the way he's thinking about God and the way he's thinking about the church is very Pauline in its nature.
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C
Okay, very nice. So we have these seven letters. So what are some of the themes or where should we begin when we are talking about these letters that we have from him?
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So he is called by Pope Benedict xvi, referred to him as the Doctor of unity. And he means unity not only among the church, but he also means union with Christ. So he's a doctor. That describes mystical unity. And what does that mean? It means that the more that we as Christian disciples are configured to Christ, the more we're going to imitate Christ. And the more we imitate Christ, the more that actually builds up the bonds of communion among Christians living together.
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C
Yeah, and it's a perfect image of the ecclesial understanding of Christ is the Head and the church is the body. And so, like, to be united deeper with the head is to be closer to the body in a sense. So that makes. Yeah, perfect sense.
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So configuration to Christ means also dedication to Christ's body, the church.
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Yeah, yeah, right. You can't have one without the other.
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So some of the firsts that we see in his writings, he's the first, as I mentioned, to call it the Catholic Church. Some beautiful images, if you're into music and you love musical images. He will describe the unity among believers and believers with the hierarchy, the bishop and the deacon and the priest, in terms of musical imagery. So he'll talk about as a chorus and that there's different instruments. It sounds very Pauline, where Paul says, we can't all be the leg, we can't all be the hand. You have to have different members with one body. What Ignatius does is takes that image and uses it in terms of a orchestra. So we can't all play the violin, we can't all play certain instruments, but we all play the instrument that we are given and we serve our role in the church and that gives honor to the Lord.
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C
Yeah. And together you can make this great symphony. And like with Paul's imagery of a body, you need all of it for the body to function or else the body doesn't work. So that's really beautiful. I want to ask a little bit about. You mentioned the hierarchy. So you mentioned bishops, priests. So is that something that we would find in his letters? Because that seems to me significant, being he is so early and that you don't exactly find in the New Testament, like completely clearly demarcated.
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Yeah, you see, like episcopoi. So like overseer, which we translate bishop. And the same with his letters. So he will actually use the term bishop. He'll actually say where the bishop is, there is the Catholic Church. So that's how important. That's important emphasis he puts on the structure of the church. He says it has to be a community of believers gathered around the bishop. And being obedient to the bishop and the bishop is a sign of unity. So back to the unity theme. And his unity is not. And leadership is not to lord it over others, but actually to serve his flock as a shepherd. And this is what Ignatius was excited about, was that he could actually serve as a witness to his flock and the entire church of laying down his life for the sheep and martyrdom.
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C
It's a beautiful image. And with the bishops, there's really. You have to have some principle of unity, right? Like, you can't just go out and everybody kind of figures it out as you go. And So I think St. Ignatius of Antioch understood like, no. As Christianity, because it's so early Christianity is starting to spread. They don't. It's not like everybody has the Scriptures. It's not like the Mass has even, like, spread far and wide yet. And so when you have people and you're wondering, like, how do I know that I'm united with the universal, the Catholic Church, as you pointed out that he speaks about, it's like, you have to be around the bishop, because as Christ sends out the apostles and the bishops are the successors of the apostles, there has to be this link, this going out that retains or protects really, the unity of faith. And so he's like, you have to be with the bishop, which just is very important. And it's a miracle that this has continued on through today. It's the coolest thing. Like, I remember when I was coming into the church and they pulled up the line of the popes from Rome, and we actually have a documented line from St. Peter all the way to today. And it's because, well, how else would you ensure that, like, the same message was passed down unless you can see this lane? And I was like, oh, my gosh, that's the most sensible thing. And I love that this was like, a problem already. Like, and Saint Ignatius of Antioch is saying, this is how, you know, you have to be with the bishop.
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A
That's right. So don't go rogue. And we're going to. You know, I'm going to have a conversation later with Dr. Sehorn for the feast day of Pope St. Clement and similar. When he writes a letter to the Corinthians, he's like, they kicked out their bishop because they didn't like him for some reason.
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And he said, well, sometimes.
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Right. And they disagree. And he said, you can't do that.
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Yeah.
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This is a divinely inspired and instituted office that you need to respect.
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Yep. Right. And it's. Yep. That's really great. So, okay, so what else can we learn from him?
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Yeah, so we have. So he mentions bishop, he mentions priests, he mentions deacon. So we already see these offices established. We see them in the New Testament, but we also this that quickly we have attestation that Ignatius is saying, you know, that this is just a given in the Church this early. That's one of the things. The other thing is, one of those great teachings that he has is with regards to the Eucharist, and he'll use phrases in his letters, like, I want to eat the flesh of Christ in the Eucharist. I want to drink his blood. So, you know, proving that there is belief in the real presence of Christ, body, blood, soul and divinity present in the Eucharist in the first century.
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C
Yeah. Which is amazing. And I feel like it's a gift of God's providence that we still have these writings to show that this was the faith of the early Church.
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A
No, when you're reading this, when Protestants read this and even Newman say, you get surprised how Catholic these letters are. And again, as I mentioned, he's the first one to use the word Catholic, which just means universal with regards to the Church.
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C
I definitely want to talk about his letter to. Is it Polycarp or.
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He does have a letter to Polycarp.
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So Polycarp, which one is the letter about his martyrdom?
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That's to Rome. He mentions in each of those. But one of the things that. But since you mentioned Polycarp, this is the Polycarp. That is, we have a famous martyrdom of Polycarp. His description of his martyrdom. But this is the Polycarp that knew St. John, St. John the Evangelist.
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It is amazing.
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So Polycarp knew St. John the Evangelist. Polycarp knew Ignatius of Antioch. There was a legend, seems to be just a legend, that the nickname that Ignatius had was Theophorus, which means God born or God picked him up. So some attributed it to that he was a little child in Mark 9 that Jesus picks up and says, unless you become like this little child. So idea that he was picked up by Christ, you know, probably just a legend, but interesting. His nickname was Theophorus.
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C
That's cool. I remember in his. When he's talking about his martyrdom. So I don't know if this is Polycarp or the Smyrnans or whichever group, but I remember being struck at how much he. So he's going to Rome. He knows he's about to be fed to animals and that he's going to die. And he says many things that. Many of which we should talk about, but one of them is he makes this connection with the Eucharist where not only did Christ give the model for martyrdom, in the Book of Revelation, Christ is called the first witness to shed his blood. So Christ gives the model of martyrdom, but then he speaks of martyrdom in this very eucharistic way, not only in that Christ was the first one to give his life, but also that the Eucharist is the remembrance of this. And then the Eucharist is what gives him the power to do such a thing.
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You know, exactly. It is from his letter to the Romans and where he says, I am his wheat, I am Christ's wheat, ground fine by the lion's teeth, to be made purest bread and bread for Christ. And so the idea is that he sees his death in terms of the Eucharist, and he will be ground by lion's teeth. That's how he's going to suffer his martyrdom. But what's interesting when he talks about that this becomes, as I mentioned, the manual for martyrs in the sense of, do martyrs begin to see their life as conformed to Christ's life and their death conformed to his death? We see that already in Acts of the Apostles with Stephen, where there's many parallels between his death. Father, forgive them. They don't know what they do. And we start to see in the martyrs of the early Church how their martyrdom is conformed to the life of Christ. And they see it in the sense with regards to the Eucharist of Christ gave his body and blood for the life of the world. I, too give my.
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Participate in that.
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Participate in that redemptive suffering and sacrifice for the life of the world. And this is actually, you know, when we start this connection between the Eucharist and martyrdom is this is one of the reasons why the early Church and, you know, churches have a relic, a piece of a saint, usually a martyr that's in the altar. So every altar that's consecrated has saint relics in it. And for most of the Church's history, a martyr's relic in particular, because that is the way that you show your most conformity to Christ, the way that Ignatius.
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C
And it bears fruit. Right?
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And it bears fruit. The way that Ignatius puts it, just after that line I just quoted, he says, when there's no trace of my body left for the world to see, then I shall truly be Jesus Christ's disciple.
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Wow.
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So he's seeing his terms of his following Christ in terms of following all the way to the cross.
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C
And it, like, proves, in a sense, like, his conformity to Christ, his fidelity to Christ. There's just an incredibly striking passage in here that I remember where he's. He's like, pleading with the Roman. He's writing this letter to the Romans. He's pleading with them not to stop, don't get in the way of my martyrdom.
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A
Which is interesting because so it seems as if he was. So. He was really, truly afraid that when he'd get to Rome because he was such a well known bishop that someone would, like, someone would pay off the guard and he'd escape, you know, they'd let him out and he wouldn't be able to give his witness because he saw that. No, I really do. So he's writing to the Romans saying, but please don't do what you think is charity towards me, is not charity at all. And this is the same letter. This is the first stage of my discipleship. No power, visible or invisible, must grudge me coming to Jesus Christ. Fire, cross, beast, fighting, hacking, quartering, splintering of bone, mangling of limb, even the pulverizing of my entire body. Let every horrid and diabolical torment come upon me, provided only that I can win my way to Jesus Christ. He says, I know in your. You think you're gonna help me by giving me. But he's like, no, no, I want to prove that I'm a disciple by suffering for him.
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C
Whenever I read some of this stuff or other writings from the lives of the saints that are about that, that are about like the embracing of the cross, right? Embracing suffering, going to martyrdom, and you're just like, oh my goodness, like I'm not there. I always have to remind myself like, this is a, this comes, this is a supernatural thing that's going on in these, in these witnesses, these saints, and given it at a particular time to prepare them. And I'm like, okay, like if this ever be called upon, like the Lord will provide the grace. We have to say yes to such a thing. But you're just like, oh my gosh, like, this is unbelievable. And then I'm always like, lord, thank goodness that you've given us the saints as these witnesses. Because they. Christ forges the path and he is the path to the Father and he shows us the way in which we are to live. And then the saints are kind of like constant reminders that it's possible.
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Yes.
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You're like, yes. Like, okay. Like this man chose it. So too can I. With the Lord's grace. So it's just, it's amazing. Like you read that and it's just so powerful and it's just so not of this world.
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It's amazing what he ends. So and he does get to give the witness of his life. So at the end of his journey, he. They bring him in the last day of the games in Rome. The cigarette Sigalluria. The last days of the, of the games. And they bring him in and they release two lions and they do pulverize him and eat him. And it's interesting. They said this is the golden legend. So the golden Legend is a 12th century document Retells some of these stories and it adds fantastical details. But one of the fantastical details it adds, I think, is fantastic in that they said that when he gives up his spirit, it smelled as if there was baking bread. And then the games end. He gives his witness, his disciples come and they take his bones and they bring him back to Antioch. So much so that St. John Chrysostom in the 4th century is like his bones. Right here we know we have his bones. And where do they end up today? Actually, they're in St. Clement's Church in Rome. So if you actually have been to Rome on a pilgrimage, Pope St. Clement's Church, San Clemente in Italian, he's buried under the high altar there. So he's brought back to Rome and you can visit him today.
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C
What an amazing, amazing church, Father. Church fathers are great. It's the best.
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No. So I would encourage. So what's the takeaway for us is the closer we are to Christ, the closer we are to others that are also Christ's disciples. So dedication and consecration to Christ allows us to work for the horizontal unity among Christian brothers and sisters. The more we're focused on Christ, almost like a, you know, think of a triangle. So the closer you are, we're heading towards the apex of the triangle, which is Christ. The closer we start to get to.
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C
One another and then. Sorry, no.
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So, no. So if we. If you have conflicts that work, if you have conflicts in your family, pray together. It might be the. Pray for that person. It's not the thing that you want to do or feel like doing, but it's the thing that you need to do. And that's actually what will solve the issues.
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C
Yep. And I. And I love that. Martyr means witness. And that for St. Ignatius, like, you look at this man, he was. What did you say he was a bishop for 40 years or something. And so, like, he would. I mean, I'm sure he was a great bishop. Like, I'm sure he would have inspired many people, done many great things for the city of Antioch to spread the Christian faith and support people. And when his time had come, his time had come, and the Lord had him give his ultimate witness with his life. And I feel like another takeaway is for us to be faithful to the place the Lord has given us or placed us and to give a faithful witness in that walk of life that we are in, whether that's at work, being a mom or a dad or a friend or a mentor, like whatever it may be, and then to always know that it is a supreme gift of the Lord to allow us to offer our lives in conformity with Christ on the cross for the salvation of souls and for our own sanctification. So he's it's just a great story. I mean, he's an incredible saint that it is a joy to reflect on.
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His Feast Day is October 17th, so if you'd like to celebrate his October 17th, you'll see him in Christian art with images of usually a lion at one's head and one at his feet in icons. Beautiful image. And I really do encourage you to look up online newadvent.org and you can actually find his seven letters and read them. They're a short read. They're maybe 20 pages in here, but great spiritual reading.
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C
Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us. Get Formed.
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Get watching.
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B
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