Memorial of Saint Athanasius, Bishop and Doctor of the Church

Clement of Alexandria:

The vine produces wine as the Word produces blood, and both are drunk for the health of men and women—wine for the body, blood for the spirit.

Cyril of Alexandria:

For it is his Holy Spirit who has united us with the Savior Christ since connection with the vine produces a choice of those things that belong to it. And our connection with the vine holds us fast. From a firm resolve in goodness we proceed onward by faith and we become his people, obtaining from him the dignity of sonship.… He says that he is a vine, the mother and nourisher, as it were, of its branches. For we are begotten of him and in him, in the Spirit, to produce the fruits of life. read more