06 — Thecla in the Fathers

The patristic reception of St. Thecla — the place she held in the imagination and the writing of the Fathers, from Methodius’s Symposium to Gregory of Nyssa’s Life of Macrina to Ambrose’s De virginibus — and her role as the patron and pattern of the whole fourth-century ascetic movement.

Files

File	Description
the-patristic-thecla.md	Thecla in the Fathers: the chief speaker of Methodius’s Symposium; Macrina’s secret baptismal name “Thecla” in Gregory of Nyssa; Ambrose’s pairing of Thecla with the Virgin Mary in De virginibus; the ascetic writers.
thecla-and-the-ascetic-movement.md	Thecla as the founding exemplar of consecrated virginity and the ascetic movement; the women who took her as model; the cult and the rise of monasticism.

See Also

• The Title and the Model — Thecla as archetype of the consecrated woman
• Virginity and Martyrdom — the theology the Fathers built around her
• Orthodoxy Guide: The Church Fathers — the patristic context