“Can Christians and churches be catholic and Reformed?” This is the opening question of Michael Allen and Scott Swain’s celebrated work Reformed Catholicity. In this paper I will argue that Jacobus Arminius is a Reformed Catholic. He viewed himself as a Reformed theologian within the broad tradition of the church catholic. He handled the fathers in a manner consistent with the Reformers by marshalling the church fathers and their creeds and councils to demonstrate the antiquity and catholicity of his theological positions, while affirming the Reformation doctrine of sola Scriptura.
Extensive research has been done on patristic ressourcement within other 16th and 17th century Protestant theologians (e.g. Wolfgang A. Bienert, “The Patristic Background of Luther’s Theology,” Lutheran Quarterly 9.3 (1995): 263–79; Anthony Lane, John Calvin, Student of the Church Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI.: Baker, 1999); Andrew P. Klager, “Balthasar Hubmaier’s Use of the Church Fathers: Availability, Access and Interaction,” Mennonite Quarterly Review 84.1 (2010): 5–65.; Phyllis Rodgerson Pleasants, “Sola Scriptura in Zürich?” The Free Church and the Early Church, ed. D.H. Williams (Grand Rapids, MI, 2002.) However, there is a lacuna of research into Arminius’s appropriation of the fathers. This gap in scholarship accompanies a shortage of literature on the work of Arminius generally. Much scholarship centered on Arminianism does not deal directly with Arminius’s writings, but rather with those of his successors (the Remonstrants), or even later claimants to his positions (e.g., Wesleyan Arminians.)
While some work has been done analyzing Arminius’s reception of Augustine, (Goudriaan, Aza. “‘Augustine Asleep’ or Augustine Awake”? Jacobus Arminius’s Reception of Augustine.” Arminius, Arminianism, and Europe, eds. Th. Marius van Leeuwen, Keith D. Stanglin, and Marijke Tolsma (Leiden: Brill, 2009), research still needs to be done regarding his retrieval of other fathers, and the early creeds and councils. Given the burgeoning interest in Arminius across evangelicalism today, an examination of Arminius’s retrieval of patristic sources enhances conversations concerning evangelicalism and Reformed catholicity. This essay will contribute to the field in unique ways by bringing together the scholarly conversations surrounding Arminius with the growing field of Reformed retrieval and catholicity.