Church & History

Stephen K. Ray was raised in a devout, loving Baptist family. His father was a deacon and led Bible studies. Steve himself was very involved in the Baptist Church as a teacher of Biblical studies, and he lectured on a wide range of topics. When a best friend, an Evangelical pastor, converted to the Catholic Church, Steve and his wife Janet decided to investigate the claims of the Catholic Church, taking a thrilling journey back in time that would eventually change their lives forever. After hundreds of hours studying the Bible and the writings of the early Church, they were convinced that the Roman Catholic Church was the Church founded by Christ, and they were received into the Church on Pentecost Sunday in 1994. In this book, with no rancor toward his Evangelical roots, Ray shares with the reader their exhilarating discoveries. He traces their initial hostility toward the Catholic Church, their passionate research and the discovery of the historical Church, quietly waiting to be rediscovered. He convincingly lays out the issues that carried them over the "uncrossable chasm" into the Catholic Church. Thoroughly documented with over 400 footnotes, Crossing the Tiber contains an extensive compilation of biblical and patristic quotations and commentary on the issues of Baptism and the Eucharist, as well as a thorough analysis of Sola Scriptura and Tradition. Ray takes you back to the first four centuries of the Church to discover the early Church - was it like today's Protestantism in theology and practice, or was it Catholic? Discover the unbiblical and unhistorical nature of the "Bible-only" argument. Discover the uniform consistency of the Catholic teaching on Baptism and the Eucharistfrom Scriptures and the Church Fathers.