"GREGORY, in Hom. 10: ... But far be it from the minds of the faithful to believe that there is such a thing as fate.
AUGUSTINE, De Civ. Dei V, I: For men when they hear of fate, understand it according to the common meaning of the word, that is, the significance of the position of the stars, such as it is at the conception or birth of someone: which some presumed to exclude from dependence on the will of God, and these should be avoided by the ears of all [...] Some however claim that this power was given to the stars from the supreme majesty of God. Such a notion offers offence to God, in whose most glorious counsel, they would have it believed, are decreed the most horrid crimes, which if any earthly power had decreed them, it would have been destroyed by the common consent of men.
CHRYSOSTOM, Hom. 2 in Op. Imp.: If therefore any one should commit a murder, or an adultery, through the direction of the stars, great indeed is the evil of the stars but greater would be His who made the stars. For since God can foresee all future events, if such great evil was to be wrought through the stars, it must be that if He did not amend them, He is not good; if He wished to amend them, but could not, He is not omnipotent. If it depends on the stars, whether we be good or bad, then the good we do must not be praised, nor the evil blamed; since neither act depends on our will. Why should I be blamed for my evil acts, since I committed them not of my own will, but from necessity? The very commandments of God, that men shall not sin, or His exhortations to do good, come to nothing in this foolishness. For who would command or exhort another that he do not evil from which he cannot turn aside? Or that he seek after some good to which he can never attain?
GREGORY NYSSA, Phil. Bk. 6, I: All talk is foolish, according to which all things that are, are determined by fate. It makes an end of Providence and the divine goodness, since, to such people, man is but the instrument alone of heavenly rotation. By this they say man is moved to action, not alone in his memebers, but even in the thoughts of his soul. And those who say this destroy both the nature that is ours, and the order of Providence; and this is nothing else than to overthrow everything. Where then is our free will? That which is in us must be free.
AUGUSTINE, City of God, Bk. 5, 6: But it is not wholly incorrect to say that the influence of the stars has power to bring about certain effects, but in bodies only, as we see the seasons varied by the solar risings and settings, and that certain kinds of things, as shell-fish, and the wondrous tides of the ocean, change with the waxing and waning of the moon; but not that the wills of men are subject to the stars. Bk. 5 Ch. I: But if the stars are said to portend rather than cause things, why is it that there is such diversity in the life of twins, in their actions, fortunes, deeds, callings, honours, and all such things pertaining to human life, so that strangers are often more like them in these things than the twins are to each other, separated though they be from each other by but a tiny interval of time, and conceived in the same moment?
Bk. 5 Ch. 2: What do they attempt to make of this small interval of time between the birth of twins? Is it in proportion to the diversity that is found in their wills, in their actions, their characters and circumstances? Some however call by the name fate, not the constitution of the stars, but the series and the connection of all causes, which they attribute to the will power of God. If anyone therefore attributes human events to fate, because he calls by the name of fate the will and power of God, let him withdraw from this opinion, let him correct his tongue, since the word fate is employed by those who use it, to mean the position of the stars. Chap. 9: Hence we do not give the name of fate to the will of God, unless we understand fate to be derived from fari to speak, for it was written: God hath spoken once, these two things have I heard, that power belongeth to God, and mercy to thee, O Lord (Ps. lxi. 12). So we should not strive and contend with them as to the meaning of the word.
AUGUSTINE, Contra Faust. II, 5: If we however do not subject the beginnings of even one man to the fate of the stars, so that twe may vindicate the freedom of the will from all compulsion, how much the less are we likely to believe that His earthly Birth was subject to the disposition of the stars, Who is the eternal Creator and Lord of the whole universe? Accordingly, that star which the Magi saw did not have dominion over Christ, New-Born according to the Flesh, but rather obeyed Him in witness. Neither was it of those stars which, from the beginning of creation, followed the order of their motion in accordance with the law of their Creator; but a new star that appeared at this wondrous birth from a Virgin, which rendered the service of its function to the Magi who were seeking Christ; since it went before them, lighting them on their way until it led them to the place where the Word of the Lord lay, an infant. But what astrologers so subject the fate of men new born to the stars as to declare, that at the birth of any given man a certain star forsakes its appointed course and continues onward towards the one just born? For they are rather of opinion that the lot of those who are born is bound to the course of the stars, not that the order of the stars can be changed upon the birth day of a man. And so if that star were one of those that pursue their allotted course in the heavens, how could it decree what Christ when born shall do, which, at the birth of Christ, is itself bidden to depart from its accustomed course? If, however, as is more likely, a star which before was not, now arose to point the way to Christ, then Christ was not born because it was there, but it came forth because Christ was born. If we must speak of fate, then rather let us say, not that the star was Christ’s destiny, but that Christ was the destiny of the star. Since He was to it, not it to Him, the cause of its rising.
CHRYSOSTOM, Hom. 3 in Matt.: It is not the function of astronomy to know from the stars who are born, but rather, as some of them tell us, to foretell, from the hour at which they were born, that which will happen to them. But these men did not know the time of His birth, so that they could from that point foretell His future from the movement of the stars; rather the contrary. They say therefore: “We have seen His star.” GLOSS: That is, His personal star; for He created this star for the purpose of His own manifestation."
CALL TO ACTION: Recognize the vast difference between “astronomy” and “astrology,” and that the world is not controlled by fate, but by God’s Divine Providence!
Source: "The Sunday Sermons of the Great Fathers," Volume II; Feast of the Epiphany - Catena Aurea, pages 199-202; Henry Regnery Company (copyright 1958); Imprimatur: E. Morrogh Bernard, Vic. Gen. Westmonasterii; Nihil Obstat: Hubertus Richards, S.T.L., L.S.S., Censor Deputatus
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