Don't miss this week's Catholic Carnival here. It's a roundup of Catholic posts from throughout the blogosphere, so you're likely to find something of interest. And it's available as a podcast as well - I believe the first time for a Catholic Carnival.
God bless,
Jay
I was recently emailed this and thought it made a wonderful Easter post:
"The Cross had asked the questions; the Resurrection had answered them.
The Cross had asked the question: How far can Power go in the world? The Resurrection answered: Power ends in its own destruction, for those who slew the foe lost the day.
The Cross had asked: Why does God permit evil and sin to nail Justice to a tree? The Resurrection answered: That sin, having done its worst, might exhaust itself and thus be overcome by Love that is stronger than either sin or death.
Thus 'there emerges the Easter lesson that the power of evil and the chaos of any one moment can be defied and conquered, for the basis of our hope is not in any construct of human power, but in the Power of God Who has given to the evil of this earth its one mortal wound-- an open tomb, a gaping sepulchre, an empty grave.'
...Whence shall come our hope for the Church? It will not come from the world, for if the world loved the Church, the Church would be no salvation to the world. If it were not hated, it would be weak. It is only because the fires of its Truth are blinding evil eyes and convicting them of sin and judgment, that the world vainly tries to put them out. And though the world is tearing up all the photographs and blue-prints of a society and a family based on the moral law of God, be not disheartened. The Church has kept the negatives..."
I hope you have a wonderful Easter! Christ is Risen, let us rejoice in Him!
God bless,
Jay
The oddest offshoots of the protestant revolution are the churches that simply invent a religion and try to tie it to Christianity. The theology has very little to do with true Christian worship, but by including "Christianity" in part of the name, they can attract a following of believers - sometimes a huge following.
If you look at the timeline since the protestant "reformation" there is a clear trend. You start with one offshoot from the Catholic Church: the Anglicans. From there division begins to shatter the Anglican communion into two, then five, then hundreds of churches, all with a slightly different theological bent. As the division increases, these small churches get further and further from the Truth. In our day we have the "non-denominational" church, which basically means the pastor is following whatever whim moves him this week, so the theology becomes changeable and unclear. I read this definition of a system of theology recently:
Black theology refuses to accept a God who is not identified totally with the goals of the black community. If God is not for us and against white people, then he is a murderer, and we had better kill him. The task of black theology is to kill Gods who do not belong to the black community. . . . Black theology will accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in Black Power, which is the power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at their disposal. Unless God is participating in this holy activity, we must reject his love.
The answer is simple: nothing. In fact, this definition is a form of self-worship, since the minister and followers attempt to "kill Gods who do not belong to the black community." First, this implies that either there are many "gods" or none (God is an illusion that we shape). Second, it implies that we have control over God, rather than the other way around. Third, if Christ died today (Good Friday), this definition accepts that God only died for black people, not for white.
Don't get stuck on this definition: there are white racist churches out there as well. The point is that without explicit protection from Jesus Christ, theology tends toward a god that we control. A god that is small, obedient, and doesn't ask the hard things from us. Thankfully I'm Catholic and I have the promise of Jesus Christ that my Church will never fall into this trap and never fail. But I have to pray for those who invent their own religion: may the scales of arrogance fall from their eyes. And may they accept in faith that God is real and Jesus loves every single one of us.
My prayers are with you on Good Friday.
God bless,
Jay
This is a special posting from a reader of our site named Robert Wolfe who has been doing prison ministry for years (and working with non-Catholics). Over time he developed a document that he could give to explain his Catholic faith in a rational, Biblical way. I asked if I could post it on our site and he generously agreed, so I'm posting it here.
There is also a MS Word version of the file in two formats:
Foundations of our Faith for Protestants and Foundations of our Faith for Catholics. The difference is that the Catholic version includes quotes from Popes and Catholic spiritual writers over time.
Without further adieu, here is the document: Foundations of our Faith: A Bible-based Defense of Truth, the Church, and the Dogma of Faith:
Necessarily, the foundation of Christian faith is truth. Faith based on untruths would be a false faith or no faith at all. It should be apparent that absolute moral truth exists and can be known because it is impossible that God, in His perfect justice, would establish requirements for the salvation of men and fail to provide a way for those requirements to be known infallibly. Yet Christians do not agree on these requirements. The purpose of this booklet is to encourage discussion on the faith, but fruitful discussion on matters of faith cannot proceed until agreement is reached on how to know the truth, especially the truth about what we must do to be saved. Therefore, this booklet reviews what the bible says about discerning truth and the Church's role in that discernment. It concludes with quotations from early Christian writers concerning the Church and its role in our salvation.
TRUTH EXISTS
We are assured that truth exists. Jesus said to the Jews who followed him:
John 8:32 You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.
Jesus also said to Pilate:
John 18:37-38 37... for this was I born, and for this came I into the world; that I should give testimony to the truth...38Pilate saith to him: What is truth?
Jesus gave no answer to Pilate, but He said to Thomas:
John 14:6 I am the way, and the truth, and the life;
God Demands Truthfulness
Proverbs 12:22 Lying lips are an abomination, to the Lord [an abomination is an object of great hatred].
Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and injustice of those men that detain [suppress, in KJV] the truth of God.
Psalm 5:7 thou wilt destroy all that speak a lie.
The bible is full of these admonitions for truthfulness and against lies. See also Psalms 15:1-3 and 145:18, Zach. 8:16, Eph. 5:8-10 and 6:12-14, 1 Cor. 5:8, 1Tim. 2:1-4, 2 John 1-6, 3 John 3-4, James 3:13-15, and many others.
GOD HIDES THE TRUTH FROM THOSE WHO DO NOT LOVE IT
God hides the truth from those who do not love the truth given by the leaders of His Church and allows them to believe what is false.
Rom. 11:7-8 7That which Israel sought, he hath not obtained: the election [elect, RSV] hath obtained it, and the rest have been blinded: 8As it is written: God hath given them the spirit of insensibility: eyes, that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, until this present day. [See Isaiah 6:9 for the Old Testament verse Saint Paul is quoting. See also Is. 6:10, which says, "Blind the heart of this people, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes: lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and be converted, and I heal them."]
Rom. 11:9-10 9And David saith: ... 10 Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see [see Psalm 68:24 for the Old Testament verse Saint Paul is quoting. Psalm 68 is the messianic Psalm prophesizing the passion of Jesus].
Saint Paul quotes Isaias and David to show that God blinds and withdraws His grace from those who refuse to acknowledge the truth, allowing them to believe falsehood. Jesus Himself confirmed the same to His disciples:
Luke 8:9-10 9And his disciples asked him what this parable might be. 10To whom he said: To you [the leaders of His new Church] it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to the rest in parables, that seeing they may not see and hearing may not understand. And again St. Paul says:
2 Cor. 4:2-4 2But we renounce the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness nor adulterating the word of God: but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience, in the sight of God. 3And if our gospel be also hid, it is hid to them that are lost, 4In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of unbelievers, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not shine unto them.
2 Thess. 2:8-11 8And then that wicked one shall be revealed: whom the Lord Jesus shall kill with the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: him 9whose coming is according to the working of Satan, in all power and signs and lying wonders: 10And in all wicked deception to them that perish: because they receive not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. Therefore God shall send them the operation of error, to believe lying: 11that all may be judged [condemned] who have not believed the truth ....
Saint Paul is speaking about the anti-Christ and all deceivers preceding the anti-Christ. The Bible here says that God will hide the truth from those who do not love and believe it and will thus allow them to condemn themselves. Why does God do this? Because He wills that the truth should be known for all time through the leaders of His Church, as we shall now show from the Bible.
