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Catecharium

The Epistle of Ignatius to the Ephesians

Chapter 5

3 sections

Ignatius of Antioch

Transcribed from a dated scan; artifacts may remain. Edition notes

For if I in a short time gained such fellowship with your bishop as was not human but spiritual, how much more do I count you blessed who are so united with him as the Church is with Jesus Christ, and as Jesus Christ is with the Father, that all things may sound together in unison!

Let no man be deceived: unless a man be within the sanctuary he lacks the bread of God, for if the prayer of one or two has such might, how much more has that of the bishop and of the whole Church?

So then he who does not join in the common assembly, is already haughty, and has separated himself. For it is written “ God resisteth the proud : ” let us then be careful not to oppose the bishop, that we may be subject to God.

Trans. Kirsopp Lake, The Apostolic Fathers, Volume I (Loeb Classical Library), 1912. Public domain.

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