The Ecclesiology of the Catholic Epistles

Résumé fourni par la source

Abstract This essay considers three questions: How is the church’s identity depicted in the writings of the Catholic Epistles? What is the work and/or mission of the church in the Catholic Epistles? What, if anything, is indicated or implied about the ordering and structures of the church? The essay considers these questions with regard to each of the seven writings that make up this group of letters. Thus, the inquiry is framed in literary-theological terms and focuses on the presentation of “church” within the letters, rather than dwelling on histories behind the texts. The final section contains a brief reflection on the ecclesiology of the Catholic Epistles in light of their canonical form and placement. Attention is given to an influential, if not also problematic and now somewhat dated, analytical framework for the ecclesiology of these writings, that is, the contested category of “early Catholicism.”

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