Cappadocian Fathers

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Cappadocian Fathers. Three 4th-cent. Christian theologians, Basil of Caesarea, his brother Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus. They were all born in Cappadocia (now in modern Turkey). They were engaged in opposing Arianism after the Council of Nicaea, and were influential in its defeat at the Council of Constantinople in 381. More than this, the Council also canonized their doctrine of the Trinity which defended the deity of the Holy Spirit alongside the Father and Son as three persons in one substance.