These Fasting Days must always be announced to the congregation in
Church, the rubric in the Communion Office requiring that "Then the
Minister shall declare unto the People what Holy Days or Fasting
Days are in the week following to be observed."
Fathers, The.--The name used to designate the ancient writers of
the Church. Their writings are of the greatest value as bearing
witness to the N. T. Scriptures and their interpretation, and also
as {109} showing forth the belief and usage of the Church in the
earliest years of its history. (See TRADITIONS, also UNDIVIDED
CHURCH.) The term "Fathers" is generally confined to the writers
of the first five or six hundred years of the Christian Era. They
are usually grouped together according to the period in which they
lived, _e.g._, The _Apostolic Fathers_ are those who lived nearest
to the time, and to some extent contemporary with the Apostles, viz.
St. Barnabas, St. Clement, St. Ignatius, Hermas and St. Polycarp.
Another class is called the _Ante Nicene Fathers_, or those who
lived between the date of St. Polycarp, A.D. 167, and the date of
the Nicene Council, A.D. 325, such as Justin Martyr, St. Irenseus,
Clemens Alexandrinus, Tertullian, Origen, St. Cyprian. A third class
dates from the Nicene Council, such as St. Athanasius; Eusebius, the
Church Historian; St. Cyril of Jerusalem; St. Hilary of Poicters;
St. Basil, the Great; St. Gregory of Nyssa; St. Gregory Nazianzen;
St. Chrysostom, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Leo, who
is commonly regarded as the last of the Fathers, although St.
Gregory of Rome is placed in the List as well as a few later
writers. The above is not a complete list, only a few of the
principal Fathers having been mentioned. It is pointed out in
Milman's "Latin Christianity" that "The Eastern and the Western
Church have each four authors of note, whom they recognize as
Fathers _par excellence_. Those of the Eastern Church are St.
Athanasius, St. Basil, St. Chrysostom and St. Gregory {110}
Nazianzen. Those of the Western Church are St. Jerome, St. Ambrose,
St. Augustine and St. Gregory of Rome,--the Fathers respectively of
her monastic system, of her sacerdotal authority, of her scientific
Theology and of her popular religion."
Feasts or Festivals.--Days set apart for the celebration of some
great event connected with our Blessed Lord or His Saints, also
called Holy Days. The rubric in the Communion Office requires that
each Feast shall be announced to the congregation on the Sunday
preceding the day on which it occurs. They are set forth in a Table
to be found in the introductory portion of the Prayer Book as
follows: