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Episode 8 – Celsus – Villains of the Early Church with Mike Aquilina
Mike Aquilina discusses the second-century pagan intellectual Celsus, a formidable critic of early Christianity whose work unintentionally preserved valuable insight into the objections Christians faced in the ancient world. Celsus was a serious compiler of knowledge who treated Christianity alongside medicine, law, and agriculture, largely because the Church had become impossible to ignore. Drawing heavily from hostile sources, he misunderstood core Christian claims such as the Trinity, the virginal conception, and the role of women in the Church, often filtering them through the cultural and “scientific” assumptions of his time. These critiques, though flawed, are historically important because they reveal how Christianity challenged deeply held norms of Greco-Roman society, especially regarding monotheism, human dignity, and the equal worth of men and women.
The major arguments raised by modern critics of Christianity are often recycled versions of ancient claims, already addressed by early thinkers like Origen and St. Augustine. Rather than seeing intellectual challenges as threats, Mike Aquilina frames them as occasions for growth in understanding, prayer, and maturity. It draws parallels between knowing God and knowing a loved one: surface-level claims lose their power when grounded in lived relationship. Science and faith are not rivals; in fact, Christian ideas about creation, reason, and order laid foundations for scientific progress. We ought to seek thoughtful answers, cultivate a disciplined life of prayer, and allow challenges to deepen one’s relationship with Christ rather than weaken it.
Discerning Hearts Reflection Questions
- How does learning about ancient critics of Christianity help me better understand and trust the development of Church teaching today?
- In what ways do my own cultural assumptions shape how I hear or judge the claims of the Christian faith?
- How do intellectual challenges to Christianity invite me to grow in humility rather than defensiveness?
- What practices help me distinguish between surface-level knowledge about God and a lived relationship with Him?
- How does the Church’s historical engagement with science inform the way I approach modern scientific questions?
- When confronted with difficult teachings, do I seek deeper understanding through prayer, study, and tradition?
- How can time spent in prayer strengthen my ability to respond calmly and faithfully to doubts or criticisms?
An excerpt from Villains of the Early Church
“The man’s name was Aulus Cornelius Celsus, and he was one of those remarkable people who seem to know a little bit about everything. Today we remember him most as a physician, because the main work of his that survives is a treatise on medicine; but that book was actually part of a book on practically all the world knowledge that Celsus had put together. He dealt with law, war, politics, farming, and other subjects as well. And if he knew as much about them as he did about medicine, Celsus must have been a one-man Wikipedia.
The fact that Celsus was so insatiably curious about so many things may be why he bothered to try to learn about the Christians. They were a phenomenon to be studied. But his studies did not go so far as to ask the best authorities on the subject—the bishops and teachers he might have found if he had looked around. Instead, he seems to have relied on what he heard secondhand. That was probably because, although he was a scientist, Celsus was, like any good educated man in the Roman Empire, a snob first and foremost.”
Aquilina, Mike. Villains of the Early Church: And How They Made Us Better Christians. Emmaus Road Publishing. Kindle Edition.
You can find the book on which this series is based here.
For more episodes in the Villians of the Early Church podcast visit here – Villains of the Early Church – Discerning Hearts Podcast
Mike Aquilina is a popular author working in the area of Church history, especially patristics, the study of the early Church Fathers.[1] He is the executive vice-president and trustee of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, a Roman Catholic research center based in Steubenville, Ohio. He is a contributing editor of Angelus (magazine) and general editor of the Reclaiming Catholic History Series from Ave Maria Press. He is the author or editor of more than fifty books, including The Fathers of the Church (2006); The Mass of the Early Christians (2007); Living the Mysteries (2003); and What Catholics Believe(1999). He has hosted eleven television series on the Eternal Word Television Network and is a frequent guest commentator on Catholic radio.
