Father Christopher Rengers - The 35 Doctors of the Church: Revised Edition

Saint Lawrence of Brindisi
The Apostolic Doctor
15591619

NIHIL OBSTAT:

Rev. Joseph Mindling, O.F.M. Cap.

Censor Deputatus

NIHIL OBSTAT:

Reverend Isidore Dixon

Censor Deputatus

IMPRIMATUR:

Most Reverend William E. Lori

Vicar General for the Archdiocese of Washington

Washington, D.C.

November 30, 2000

The Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur are official declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the Nihil Obstat and the Imprimatur agree with the content, opinions or statements expressed.

This is a revised and updated version of the book originally entitled The 33 Doctors of the Church , copyright 2000 TAN Books. It includes a new introduction and two new chapters on St. Hildegard of Bingen and St. John of vila, who were declared new Doctors of the Church by Pope Benedict XVI on October 7, 2012.

Introduction to the Revised Edition; chapter 21, St. Hildegard of Bingen; and chapter 27, St. John of vila, by Matthew E. Bunson, copyright 2014 TAN Books.

All rights reserved. With the exception of short excepts used in articles and critical reviews, no part of this work may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in any form whatsoever, printed or electronic, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Cataloging-in-Publication data on file with the Library of Congress.

ISBN: 978-0-89555-440-6

Library of Congress Control No.: 91-65353

Cover Illustrations: St. John of the Crossanonymous 17th-c. portrait, Carmel of Valladolid; St. Thrse of Lisieuxportrait by her sister Celine, courtesy of Society of the Little Flower, Darien, IL; St. Peter Canisiusportrait by Xavier Dietrich, courtesy of Canisius College, Buffalo, NY. For credits on other cover illustrations, see below or see the credit line on the illustration in the respective chapter.

The following icons have been reproduced in and/or on the cover of this book courtesy of Monastery Icons, Borrego Springs, California (800-729-4952): St. Athanasius (cover and inside) 1989 by Monastery Icons; St. Ephrem (inside) 1982 by Monastery Icons; St. Cyril of Jerusalem (inside) 1994 by Monastery Icons; St. Ambrose (inside) 1991 by Monastery Icons; St. Jerome (cover and inside) 1997 by Monastery Icons; St. Augustine (cover) 1993 by Monastery Icons; St. Cyril of Alexandria (inside) 1989 by Monastery Icons; St. Leo the Great (inside) 1994 by Monastery Icons; St. John of Damascus (inside) 1991 by Monastery Icons.

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Printed and bound in the United States of America.

TAN Books

Charlotte, North Carolina

www.TANBooks.com

2014

To All My Teachers

Beginning with parents and grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends;

On to teachers in kindergarten and in wood-working at public schools in Pittsburgh, PA;

To nuns at grade schools in the Pittsburgh Diocese: St. Josephs, Bloomfield; St. Marys, 46th St.; St. Mary of the Mount; St. Wendelins, Carrick;

To Capuchin Friars at Herman, PA; Victoria, Kansas; Washington, D.C.; and in the novitiate at Cumberland, MD;

To Jesuits and lay teachers at St. Louis University; lay and clergy teachers in Adult Ed at Catholic University;

To teachers for special courses at Hays State, KS and Bowling Green State at Bowling Green, OH; and to the chaplains at the V.A. Hospital, Washington, D.C.;

And all along, to bishops, priests and deacons proclaiming and explaining the Gospel and exhorting us to use the Sacraments and lead a good life;

And to the silent teachers speaking in measured voices from many good booksa long and varied list deserving gratitude for being shapers of mind and heart.

May they rest in peace or continue in life

until we all meet happily in Heaven

with the Doctors of the Church,

those most eminent shapers of minds and hearts in

the Church founded by Jesus Christ.

CONTENTS

The Father of Orthodoxy
c. 297373

Harp of the Holy Ghost
Marys Own Singer
Father of Hymnody
c. 306c. 373

Doctor of Catechesis
c. 315386

The Athanasius of the West
c. 315c. 368

The Theologian
The Christian Demosthenes
c. 329c. 389

Father of Eastern Monasticism
c. 329379

Patron of the Veneration of Mary
c. 340397

Father of Biblical Science
c. 342c. 420

The Golden-Mouthed
Doctor of the Eucharist
c. 347407

Doctor of Grace
Doctor of Doctors
354430

Doctor of the Incarnation
Seal of the Fathers
c. 376444

Doctor of the Unity of the Church
c. 400461

The Golden-Worded
c. 406c. 450

The Greatest of the Great
c. 540604

Schoolmaster of the Middle Ages
c. 560636

Father of English History
c. 673735

Doctor of Christian Art
Doctor of the Assumption
c. 676c. 749

Monitor of the Popes
c. 10071072

Father of Scholasticism
Defender of the Rights of the Church
10331109

The Mellifluous Doctor
Oracle of the Twelfth Century
Thaumaturgus of the West
Arbiter of Christendom
The Last of the Fathers
c. 10901153

The Teutonic Prophetess
Sibyl of the Rhine
10981179

Doctor of the Gospel
Hammer of Heretics
Ark of Both Covenants
11951231

( Albertus Magnus )
The Universal Doctor
c. 12061280

The Seraphic Doctor
c. 12211274

The Angelic Doctor
The Common Doctor
c. 12251274

The Seraphic Virgin
Mystic of the Incarnate Word
Mystic of the Mystical Body of Christ
13471380

Apostle of Andalusia
The Master
14991569

Doctor of Prayer
15151582

Doctor of the Catechism
15211597

Prince of Apologists
Gentle Doctor of The Controversies
15421621

Doctor of Mystical Theology
15421591

The Apostolic Doctor
15591619

The Gentleman Doctor
Patron of the Catholic Press
Everymans Spiritual Director
15671622

Prince of Moralists
Most Zealous Doctor
Patron of Confessors and Moral Theologians
16961787

Doctor of The Little Way of Spiritual Childhood
Doctor of Merciful Love
18731897

PREFACE

O blessed doctor, light of holy Church and lover of Gods law, pray to the Son of God for us.

This antiphonto be recited or sung at the beginning and end of Our Ladys hymn, The Magnificat , during vespers for the feast of a Doctor of the Churchwas one of the distinguishing marks of the common prayers of the Divine Office for such feasts which were introduced into the liturgy by Pope Boniface VIII (12941303) in 1298. The antiphon underscores the connection of a Doctor of the Church with light and love, with Gods law, with the Church and with the Son of God.

Today, the word doctor would probably conjure up in most peoples minds the image of one who is a specialist in caring for physical or mental health. But that was not its original meaning. For one thing, medical practice was not always associated with the term doctor. In the early days of surgery, for example, one went to the barber, the only person in town who had the kinds of instruments needed for those primitive operations. The red and white poles which hang outside barber shops are hold-overs from that earlier time, their medical origins, now mostly forgotten.