Articles by Bruce Strom

About Bruce Strom
I was born and baptized and confirmed as a Lutheran. I made the mistake of reading works written by Luther, he has a bad habit of writing seemingly brilliant theology, but then every few pages he stops and calls the Pope often very vulgar names, what sort of Christian does that? Currently I am a seeker, studying church history and the writings of the Church Fathers. I am involved in the Catholic divorce ministries in our diocese, and have finished the diocese two-year Catholic Lay Ministry program. Also I took a year of Orthodox off-campus seminary courses. This blog explores the beauty of the Early Church and the writings and history of the Church through the centuries. I am a member of a faith community, for as St Augustine notes in his Confessions, you cannot truly be a Christian unless you worship God in the walls of the Church, unless persecution prevents this. This blog is non-polemical, so I really would rather not reveal my denomination here.
Civil War and Reconstruction

Civil War Struggle Through Paintings

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General Winfield Scott, brilliant strategic general and hero of the Mexican War, served under seven Presidents, but in the 1860’s he was in his seventies, and was so obese that he had to be hoisted on and off his horse with a crane. But he was still a sharp general, and his “Anaconda Plan” was the strategy that would win the war, and this Great Snake picture was printed in the newspapers across the country. 1861. This plan called for a naval blockade that strangled the commerce of the Confederacy, the Union forces seizing control of the Mississippi River, then Union forces marching through the heart of the Confederacy. General Scott predicted that 300,000 soldiers would be needed to defeat the Confederacy, which was less than half the size of the eventual Union Army, but it was shocking numbers at the beginning of the war, when the Union Army had fewer than twenty thousand soldiers. […]

Civil Rights

Ida B Wells, Journalist, Brave Woman, and Anti-Lynching Crusader

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Historically, lynchings were justified by the myth that black men were eager to rape white women, and that white womanhood needed to be protected. Spurred by her knowledge of the details of this lynching of a dear friend, Ida B Wells started to research the history of other lynchings, discovering that for most lynchings had no connection to any intimate acts, and where there was intimacy, the white woman consented, which was so repugnant that it enraged white men of the day. […]

Ladder of Divine Ascent

St John Climacus: Ladder of Divine Ascent, Step 5, Repentance, and Perseverance of Winston Churchill

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Repentance is not merely a quick apology to St John Climacus. Repentance is not quick in the Ladder of Divine Ascent. The first four rungs, where we renounce the world, detach ourselves from worldly things, become an exile and pilgrim from the affairs of the world, and with daily discipline internalize God’s will in holy obedience, these first four rungs prepare us for the rung of repentance. Repentance is more an attitude and a process than an event. An attitude of humility and repentance will prepare us for the slow ascent up the remaining twenty-five steps of the Ladder of Divine Ascent. Without daily heartfelt repentance we cannot continue the climb to a godly life. […]

Civil Rights

Comparing Martin Luther King’s Letter From the Birmingham Jail with Hannah Arendt’s The Banality of Evil

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Many Americans are either unaware or do not want to make the connection between the Jim Crow system of racial segregation and the Nazi ideology of the master race. In fact, the Jim Crow statutes enforcing segregation was used as precedents by the Nazi lawyers drafting the Nuremberg Jewish Race Laws soon after the Adolph Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933. […]

Book Reviews and Miscellaneous

Book Reviews on Apostolic and Early Church Fathers

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These quick book reviews include links to our YouTube videos and blogs on the Apostolic and Early Church Fathers, plus related topics. We will also discuss how to read ancient works, and the problems scholars face when translating ancient works, and the 38-volume set of the writings of the Ante-Nicene, ante meaning before, Nicene, and Post-Nicene Church Fathers, translated into English. […]

Early Church Writing

St Irenaeus On Heresies, Eusebius and Modern Scholars, and Catholic Catechism

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Eusebius explains, “Irenaeus, whose name means ‘peaceable’ and who by temperament was a peacemaker, pleased and negotiated for the peace of the churches.” There was a dispute between Bishop Viktor of Rome and the Asian dioceses over the length of a church fast, he was threatening excommunication over this dispute. Irenaeus interceded, arguing that “the dispute is not only about the day, but also about the actual character of the fast.” He pointed out the variations were differences in practice extending back to their forefathers. Although they had their differences, “they all lived in peace with one another, and so do we: the divergences in the fast emphasizes the unanimity of the faith.” […]

Civil Rights

Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, After Slavery as an Abolitionist

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Frederick Douglass remembers, “In the South I was a slave, thought of and spoken of as property,” as chattel, like talking livestock. “In the Northern states, a fugitive slave was hunted like a felon, to be hurled into the terrible jaws of slavery, doomed by an inveterate prejudice against color,” “shut out from cabins on steamboats, refused admission to respectable hotels, caricatured, scorned, scoffed, mocked and maltreated by anyone with a white skin.” […]

Book Reviews and Miscellaneous

Book Reviews, Reform Councils of Trent and Vatican II, and Vatican I

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IMHO, you cannot truly understand the modern Catholic Church without reading William O’Malley’s histories of Trent and Vatican II. O’Malley argues that Vatican II restated the theology of Trent, countering the notion that Trent was a reactionary rather than a reforming council. This polemic view of Trent was influenced by the fact that the Vatican had closed the archives of the Trent Council until early in the twentieth century. […]

Greek and Roman History

Mighty Deeds of Theseus, First King of Athens, in Plutarch’s Lives

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Theseus and Romulus both built mighty cities, Athens and Rome, both are warriors sprung from the gods, “both stand charged with the rape of women, neither could avoid domestic misfortunes nor jealousy at home.” Youtube video for this blog: https://youtu.be/jOgNKSf9IT4 YouTube script with book links: https://www.slideshare.net/BruceStrom1/mighty-deeds-of-theseus-first-king-of-athens-in-plutarchs-lives Plutarch passes down us […]

Book Reviews and Miscellaneous

Book Reviews, Commentaries of Torah and Talmud, Medieval Rabbis and Modern Rabbis and Scholars

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We encourage Christians to study the moral lessons of the Torah, we do not hold to the dual-covenant belief that the laws in the Torah have been superseded. St Irenaeus in his influential work, On Heresies, teaches us that the moral laws of the Torah are still binding on Christians, and that the dietary and festival laws that have been superseded can be read as teaching moral lessons allegorically. […]