Hail, Saintly Bishop and Father of the Church

St. Irenaeus was born in Smyrna (today part of Turkey) in 130 AD and became Bishop of Lyons, France in 178.  Irenaeus strove by his writings, most significantly in his great work “Against Heresies,” to defeat the Gnostic heresy.  Considered the first great Western ecclesiastical writer and theologian, Irenaeus emphasized the unity of the Old and New Testaments, the distinction of Christ’s human and divine natures, and the value of tradition.  Instrumental in establishing the canon of scripture, by offering careful arguments for or against the inclusion of books which until Irenaeus’s time were regarded informally as inspired scripture.  St. Irenaeus died in 202 AD, according to some traditions as a martyr, and is a Father of the Church.  His tomb and relics were destroyed by Calvinists in 1562 AD.

The following is taken from “Against Heresies:”

“Since therefore we have such proofs, it is not necessary to seek the truth among others which it is easy to obtain from the Church; since the apostles, like a rich man [depositing his money] in a bank, lodged in her hands most copiously all things pertaining to the truth: so that every man, whosoever will, can draw from her the water of life. Revelation 22:17  For she is the entrance to life; all others are thieves and robbers. On this account are we bound to avoid them, but to make choice of the thing pertaining to the Church with the utmost diligence, and to lay hold of the tradition of the truth.”