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Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell
Sayings of the Fathers of the Church
Sayings of the Fathers of the Church
Edited by Edward Condon
Foreword by Chad C. Pecknold
Imprint: Catholic University of America Press
Catholic University of America Press is proud to present the second volume in its new Sayings of the Fathers of the Church Series. Featuring a wide range of scholars compiling material from our acclaimed Fathers of the Church volumes, each title will be devoted to a few specific areas of theology. The inaugural volume covered The Seven Deadly Sins, and future volumes are planned to focus on Angels and Demons, the Mass, and Mary.
Nothing has the power to inspire, or terrify us like the unknown. Life after death is the perhaps the greatest unknown that confronts mankind. But the wisdom of the Church, especially in the teachings of the Church Fathers, reminds us that we know a great deal about what awaits us at the end of life.
What the Church knows about the four last things--death judgment, heaven, and hell--is essential for helping on the way of the pilgrimage of life. The teachings of the Fathers, far from sating our curiosity, serve to increase the power of heaven to inspire us, and of hell to terrify.
In this volume, canon lawyer and writer Edward Condon compiles a book full of wisdom and compelling insights. More than anything, the Fathers warn us that our life is short, and the reckoning for how we have lived it eternal. The urgency of the Church’s message, brought to life in the sayings of the Fathers, comes to remind us of our true calling and inheritance in baptism, and of the richness of the heavenly reward, which is not so much the fruit of our efforts on Earth but the fulfillment of God’s promise of love to us. The terror of hell is not the threat of the dictator, but a dire warning of the true scope of our freedom as children of God.
This book, rich with the traditional teachings of the church, will guide and inspire readers as they continue their life journeys, which have a beginning but no end.
Edward Condon is a practicing canon lawyer and an editor for The Catholic News Agency. C.C. Pecknold is associate professor of systematic theology at The Catholic University of America.
"Christian wisdom views all things sub specie aeternitatis, ‘in the perspective of eternity,’ for all reality has its beginning in God and its final destiny in him. The Word of God, in fact, trains the human mind and heart to understand our days on earth as a pilgrimage to eternal life and ultimately to ‘new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells’ (2 Pt 3, 13). In a secularist and materialist culture that views everything in terms of the here and now, there is a desperate need to restore the true perspective of eternal life. Edward Condon has provided a most sure and efficacious tool in restoring and keeping a right view of things by collecting the sayings of the Fathers of the Church, those most authoritative interpreters of the Word of God, regarding the last things. I commend most highly his work, even as I am most grateful to him for it."
~Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke