ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores both the legitimate and illegitimate reasons for the Catholic resistance toward millennial eschatologies. It focuses on the issue of supersessionism as a problem in Roman Catholic. The Patristic period saw the formation of a harsh polemic between the Greek-inspired Gentile Christians, and the Torah-observant rabbinic Judaism that transpired after the destruction of the Jewish Temple by the Romans. The Christian "reign" with Jesus Christ is to be marked by its character as a reign of martyrs and oppressed saints. Millenarianism is a reversal of the totalization that occurs in pre-millennial history as a result of the majority Christian eschatological and ecclesiological understanding that the future kingdom of God has been made historical and "incarnated" in the Church.
