Honors Theology 11 – Study Guide – Mid Term Exam

Chapter 1 – Jesus Christ and the Founding of the Church

  1. The Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles and Disciples at Pentecost made them confident heralds of Jesus as the Christ.
  2. A vicar is one who acts one the place of another. As the rock upon whom Christ promised to build his Church, St. Peter stands in the place of Christ on earth.
  3. Christ’s Birth in a humble stable is a message of peace, simplicity, material poverty, spiritual abundance, God’s love, and sacrifice.
  4. Gospel means “good news.”
  5. Infallibility means the Church is incapable of formally teaching error in matters of Faith
  6. Durability of the Church means she will last until the end of time
  7. The Church has a visible and an invisible dimension.
  8. The Church is a visible, hierarchical society like any other human organization, but she also has an invisible, spiritual dimension; her teaching and governing authority comes under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
  9. The Church is ONE because she because she professes one Faith in one God, led by the Pope and the Bishops in union with him.
  10. The Church is HOLY because her founder, Jesus Christ, is holy; she is the means to grow in holiness for her members.
  11. CATHOLIC means the Church is for all people everywhere in the world, in every age, and in every culture.
  12. APOSTOLIC means the Church is built on foundation of the Apostles, her faith and governance.
  13. St. Paul was different from most of the Apostles who were mostly fishermen, he was well educated in the Jewish Law and Sacred Scripture.
  14. St. Paul has been recognized by the Church as the greatest disciple of Christianity after Jesus himself.
  15. Christ made the Apostle St. Peter Head of the Church.
  16. Apologetics is a branch of theology that defends and explains the Christian religion against objectives.
  17. Greek for witness, a martyr bears the highest witness to Christ by dying for the Faith.
  18. Martyrs strengthened and edified other Christians and deeply affected many pagans.
  19. Papacy is the Vicar of Christ as instituted by Jesus who holds the responsibility and supreme authority for guiding the Church.
  20. Church History is the history of the Church, the record of the life of Jesus, the actions of men, and the guiding light of the Holy Spirit acting in the Church.

Chapter 2 – Persecution of “The Way” and Heresies

  1. In the beginning, the Roman rulers considered the Christians to be a small sect of schismatic Jews.
  2. Nero showed his evil character even before his persecution of the Christians by murdering his mother; renounced and slandered his wife before having him beheaded and forced Seneca, the noble statesman, to commit suicide.
  3. Nero intended to seize private property in the center of Rome to build himself a new palace. Nero was rumored to have set the fire to clear the buildings.
  4. Voxpopuli means the voice of the people during the time of the early Church often meant ignorant, mob actions, especially those taken against Christians.
  5. Christians were accused by the people of not sacrificing to the pagan gods. Christians were accused of being irreligious and atheistic.
  6. Nero’s principle was Christiani non sunt: Let the Christians be exterminated.
  7. Nero’s fate of committing suicide, after being alienated by Roman aristocracy for the murder of his mother and wife.
  8. St. Ignatius of Antioch was an important writer because of his direct contact with the Apostles Peter and John with gave his writings a special authority.
  9. Hadrian’s Rescript ruled mobs should not be able to take the law in their own hands to murder Christians and Christians should only be persecuted for actual violations of the common law instead of solely for being Christian.
  10. Heresy is refusal to accept one or more truths of Faith which are acquired by Catholic belief.
  11. St. Irenaeus fought heresy by systematically describing her origin and history of each heresy, contrasting its false claims against the true Faith.
  12. Gnosticism is derived from the Greek word gnosis (knowledge). The name refers to one of the principle tenets of this multifaceted heresy, that salvation may be achieved through knowledge.
  13. Ruler Decius identified Christians as anyone who refused to offer sacrifice and they would be sent into exile or put to death and lose all of his or her property.
  14. The Church suffered a double loss with Christian who were faithful and were martyred as well as those who apostatized.
  15. The Edict of Milan restored all property taken by the empire from the Church and granted Christians the right to worship in freedom. It legitimized the Church for the first time since Nero’s decree had outlawed the Church in AD 64.
  16. The central tenet of Docetism was Jesus only appeared to be human and did not actually suffer the pain of crucifixion and death. Someone else miraculously switched places with Christ just before the crucifixion.
  17. The four common characteristics of the Fathers of the Church are orthodox in doctrine, holy had notoriety, and lived in the early centuries.
  18. The Council of Nicaea declared Christ is of the same essence as the Father.
  19. In his early life St. Augustine was attracted by both lust and heresy. He had a concubine with whom he had a son out of wedlock. He became a member of a heretical sect.

Chapter 3 - Light in the Dark Ages

  1. There is no clear date for the fall of the western half of the Roman Empire because it was a gradual collapse and not a one day fall.
  2. The Romans and the barbarians had one thing in common with respect to human rights, both were brutal and violent.
  3. The Romans would invite barbarian tribes to settle along the frontiers of the Roman Empire in exchange for conscripts for the Roman armies and to increase the declining population of the Empire.
  4. The Germanic people who settled in Gaul (modern-day France) were the Franks.
  5. The most successful Germanic tribe were the Vandals.
  6. Huns were a powerful nomadic people of unknown ethnic origin who invaded Europe ca. 375.
  7. Monasticism is a way of life in which one leaves the everyday world to live a life of self-denial and prayer in order to devote his or her whole life to God.
  8. Christian monasticism is unique because its aim is the imitation of Christ.
  9. There are two chief types of monasticism are eremetical monasticism and cenobitical monasticism.
  10. Eremetical monasticism, one lives alone as a hermit.
  11. Cenobitical monasticism, one lives with others in a community.
  12. Pope St. Gregory I was called the Great because of missionary successes and his care for the poor.
  13. St. Benedict gained a reputation as a miracle worker when he lived as hermit in a cave.
  14. Others joined St. Benedict for his reputation of sanctity.
  15. St. Benedict founded twelve monasteries and placed a superior to head each one.
  16. The Rule of St. Benedict was adopted by virtually all monasteries in the medieval period.
  17. Monks took the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
  18. A vow is solemn promise made voluntarily by a person of reason, to practice a virtue or perform a specific good deed.
  19. The essentially divides the schedule of the monk into four parts: Chanting the psalms and reciting pray in community; private prayer and scripture reading; physical labor; and eating and sleeping.
  20. According to Muhammad, the Koran is a dictation of the words of the Archangel Gabriel.
  21. Allah is the Arabic word for God.
  22. Islam means submission and refers to submission to the will of God.
  23. Islam is important to the study of the history of the Catholic Church. Islam is a monotheistic religion whose history is linked with the Arab, Asiatic, African and European peoples, and many wars were fought between Christians and Muslims.
  24. St. Patrick was from Roman Britain. He was kidnapped by Irish pirates and spent his youth as a slave in the northwest of Ireland.
  25. After St. Patrick escaped and returned to his family, a vision called him to return to Ireland. He soon began to study for the priesthood.
  26. Irish monasticism followed the Eastern tradition, in which monks practiced severe asceticism, producing spiritual athletes who could endure any hardship.
  27. Irish monasteries were the intellectual centers of Europe because their monastic scriptoria and libraries saved a great deal of the Greco-Roman literary tradition, including the ability to read classical Greek.
  28. St. Bede popularized Dionysius Exiguus’s BC/AD system of calculating years.
  29. St. Bede wrote the first English history, which portrays the Catholic Church as the center of the development of English culture.
  30. An icon is a stylized two-dimensional portrayal of Christ, the Virgin Mary, one of the saints, or a scene from the Gospels.
  31. An icon-breaker believes it is wrong to have or produce images of Christ and the saints, most often because it is supposedly against the First Commandment.
  32. Charlemagne’s reign was evidence of his devout Catholic faith.
  33. Charlemagne showed his devotion to the Faith in his public and private life.
  34. In Charlemagne’s public life modeled civil legislation on the laws of the Church, he tried to reform the clergy, establish new dioceses, and raised the funds to support them.
  35. In his private life, Charlemagne lived the Faith, prayed, fasted and read the Bible daily.

Chapter 4 – Collapse, Corruption, and Reform in Europe and the Church

  1. The two factors that contributed most to the difficulties and corruptions within the papacy in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries were: the domestic strife among emperors, Popes, and Roman nobility; and the foreign invasions.
  2. Feudalism was a system that developed to organize the politics, economy, and social life of Medieval Europe. Based on a relationship between wealthy, landowning lords and the common villagers, farm-workers, it was a relatively simple arrangement in which the commoners would pay the landowner in labor services in return for the lord’s military protection.
  3. Crusade from the Lain word crux (cross) refers to wars of a religious character.
  4. Crusaders fought Muslims and Albigensian heretics.
  5. The first crusades did not have the support or leadership of any kings because they were either opposed to the Pope or excommunicated.
  6. Cistercians, so called “White Monks” after the color of their habits, the order was founded by the Cluniac monk, St. Robert of Molesme.
  7. Cluny, city east-central France which gave birth to monastic reform in 910. The first abbey began with twelve monk committed to renewing the rule of St. Benedict.
  8. Ideals of the reforms at Cluny were a universal Church within a political framework and the inherent dignity of the human person.
  9. The Cluniac monks lived the Benedictine rule, focused on individual growth in holiness, lengthened devotions, decreased manual labor and renewed their commitment to chastity.
  10. Emperor Otto I, The Great, founded the Holy Roman Empire.
  11. The Holy Roman Empire gave temporal protection and the Church recognized the emperor.
  12. Inquisitor, special judges appointed by the pope during the Inquisition who examined and judged the doctrinal opinions and moral conduct of suspicious individuals.
  13. Lay Investiture, the appointment of bishops and abbots by secular rulers, often in exchange for temporal protection.
  14. Military Order, arising out of the necessity of defending the Holy Place in Palestine as well as the pilgrims who traveled there, these orders combined both military and religious life, emphasizing dedication, discipline and monastic organization.
  15. The Military Orders consisted of The Knights Templar, the Hospitalers, and the Teutonic Knights.
  16. The Knights Templar full name was the Poor Brothers of the Temple of Jerusalem.
  17. St. Bernard of Clairvaux wrote the rule for the Templars which was based on the Cistercian Rule.
  18. The Templars were not afraid of martyrdom because they were fighting for Christ.
  19. The Templars aided the development of capitalism by establishing a banking system that was the forerunner of banking families.
  20. The Knights Hospitalers were well named because they began an order dedicated to caring for sick pilgrims.
  21. Today the Hospitalers are called the Knights of Malta and do philanthropic work.
  22. During the 7th to 10th centuries secular authorities were able to commit greater abuses because they were stronger and the Popes’ moral voices were weak.
  23. Abuses committed by bishops and abbots during the 7th to 10th centuries included receiving extra sources of income, and some married and bequeathed their offices to their sons.
  24. Nepotism, from the Italian nepete “nephew” and Latin nepos “grandson.” The appointment of family members to important positions of authority.
  25. Simony, the selling of ecclesiastical offices, pardons, profits of either secular or spiritual leaders.
  26. Vicar of Christ, title used by Pope Innocent III rather than the earlier title Vicar of St. Peter. It was built on the understanding of the pope as the representative of Christ himself.
  27. Viking invasions lasted nearly three centuries.
  28. The strategy of the Norsemen employed in their attacks, was to appear out of nowhere, attack, plunder, kidnap and then disappear.
  29. The defense of monks against the Vikings was to build found towers to protect them and whatever valuables they could fit inside.