to the sources...

Welcome to “To the Sources!”

“To the Sources” comes from “ad fontes” - a Renaissance and Reformation phrase.  For many Renaissance thinkers and artists, “ad fontes”captured their ideal of advancing a renewed culture (renaissance means re-birth) by returning “to the sources” of western civilization – Greece and Rome.

The Reformers similarly had a sense of moving forward by retuning “to the sources.”  Luther, Calvin, and others did not want to re-invent but to re-form the Church.  Rather than returning to the foundations of western civilization, the Reformers returned to Scripture and the Church Fathers.  What emerged was not an archaic faith from long ago, but a revitalized Christianity – resuscitated by the generations of the faithful.

Today, and in fact every age, is a time to live faithfully with God.  With all the complexities of our world, all the modern innovations, we are tempted to relegate our long and rich history as something irrelevant, but that would ignore the reality to which those who have gone before us witness.  In the wisdom of our fathers and mothers let us return “to the sources.”

“Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.”

                        - Jeremiah 6:16

Mark VanderWerf

date last updated 07.20.2006 | hosted by ipowerweb