This conversation was between myself and one of the most eminent scholars in the early church fathers, a man who also happens to be my father: Dr. Marcellino D’Ambrosio “The Greyer” as we call him. He was the valedictorian of Catholic University of America, he holds a PHD in Theology, is currently is professor at Catholic Distance University and is a renowned speaker. He runs Crossroads Initiative, which started out doing youth and young adult ministry as a rock band in the 80’s, and that is transmuted into an organization dedicated to helping the world rediscover the adventure of the Christian faith.
We asked him to come onto the podcast because, one of the major conversations happening in the group and in the Church at large is centered around the question: How should we deal with secular, pagan culture?
Implicit in this question is another. There is this tension between tradition and creativity: how do we value the treasures of the church that we know and love, while at the same time valuing and adapting to modern secular culture for the sake of innovation? This tension is especially present when we grapple with conversations about liturgy. For those of us that are grappling with questions of how how do we integrate cultural art with our Catholic heritage, I wanted to bring Dr. Italy onto the cast so that we could talk about how the early church approached these questions. The conversation was deeply enlightening.