Don't you think it's a little bizarre that if the return of Christ took place in AD 70, that the early church fathers didn't mention it?
I guess you missed what these guys said then?:
Origen - Against Celsus | John | Matthew "I challenge anyone to prove my statement untrue if I say that the entire Jewish nation was destroyed less than one whole generation later on account of these sufferings which they inflicted on Jesus. For it was, I believe, forty-two years from the time when they crucified Jesus to the destruction of Jerusalem."
Chrysostom - Homilies on
Matthew 24 "Was their house left desolate? Did all the vengeance come upon that generation? It is quite plain that it was so, and no man gainsays it."
Chrysostom - St. Chrysostom's Liturgy "Having in remembrance, therefore, this saving commandment and
all those things which have come to pass for us: the Cross, the Grave, the Resurrection on the third day, the Ascension into heaven, the Sitting at the right hand,
and the second and glorious Coming"
There are also writings from the likes of Polycarp, Ignatius, Iraneaus, Justin Martyr etc., who all speak of the return of Christ in a future tense. These were all well known and respected Christian believers, alive at the very time preterists teach Jesus returned in judgement, and yet none of these faithful brothers, some who were even martyred for the faith, acknowledge what preterism teaches to be true.
It is misguided to claim the "entire early church missed it, nor acknowledged preterist truth"
The ECFs recognized:
(1) that the great tribulation is passed, transpiring at AD 66-70
(2) that AD 70 involved a coming of Jesus Christ in judgment
So, while they did not establish a biblically consistent preterism, they were far more preteristic in their understanding of eschatology than most modern futurists. The fact is that the ECFs had their hands full with formulating a consistent Christology (the nature of Christ and the Trinity), and didn't spend as much time formulating an orthodox, systematic eschatology. We know that the ECFs had mostly assigned
Matthew 24 to the past, (In fact, if you take all of the ECF's different preteristic beliefs and cobbled them together as one, you basically arrive at the Full preterist position) and the Protestant Reformers had a majority view that all
Matthew 24 was fulfilled in the first century.
Call me skeptical, but I think that I for one will stand on the testimony of those guys, rather than listen to the concoctions of a few guys with too much time on their hands, writing about 1500 years or so after the event.
That's an erroneous statement. It is
the apostles that placed the fulfillment of most or all of
Matthew 24 in their generation (Matt 24:34/23:36), and they consistently spoke of the fall of Jerusalem as the imminent day of judgment of their times (Lk 21:22, Mt 23:33-24:34; Mt 21:40-45; Lk 19:40-44). This was the desolation of which it was said: "the end of all things is at hand" (1 Pet 4:7); "in a very short while he who is coming will come an will not delay" (Heb 10:37); "the time is short" (1 Cor 7:29); "there are now many antichrists by which we know it is the final hour" (1 Jn 2:18-19); "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show...the things which must soon take place...for the time is at hand" (Rev 1:1,3); "the coming of the Lord is near...behold, the Judge is standing right at the door (Jas 5:8-9); "salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is near" (Rom 13:11-12); "this generation shall not pass away till all these things be fulfilled" (Mt 24:34).
It was the biblically-and-historically illiterate Irvingites and Darbyites of the early 1800s that created the fanciful and superstitous eschatology popularized in the Left Behind series--including the infamous "pre-trib Rapture" mythology.
Your #1 reason for rejecting the preterist view on the TIMING of the return of Christ appears to be your desire to "stand on the testimony of fallible church tradition."
In Contrast, I stand upon infallible Holy Scripture, and Apostolic testimony as to the timing of the return of Christ, and that means the first-century.
(And yes, the Irony of a Catholic admonishing a Protestant to "stick to scripture over Church tradition" is not lost on me)