2019-07-20T19:36:28-04:00

Last updated on: July 20, 2019 at 7:36 pm   By

[Bob Seidensticker’s words will be in blue]

Former Presbyterian, Bible-Basher Bob’s blog, Cross Examined contains (according to the “About” page) “roughly a million words in more than a thousand posts” and a “quarter-million comments.” He advertises his efforts as “an energetic but civil critique of Christianity.” But the blog  is anything but “civil”: as a glance at any of his endless comboxes will prove. Here (as an altogether typical example) is the feeding frenzy on his site where I was the specific target.

He directly challenged me to answer his arguments, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He also made a general statement on 6-22-17: “Christians’ arguments are easy to refute . . . I’ve heard the good stuff, and it’s not very good.” He added in the combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” 

Again, Bob mocks some brave Christian (who dared show up in his toxic, noxious environment), in his comboxes on 10-27-18: “You can’t explain it to us, you can’t defend it, you can’t even defend it to yourself. Defend your position or shut up about it. It’s clear you have nothing.” And again on the same day: “If you can’t answer the question, man up and say so.” And on 10-26-18: “you refuse to defend it, after being asked over and over again.” And again: “You’re the one playing games, equivocating, and being unable to answer the challenges.”  

Bob virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. I was happy to comply, so he came onto my site, but it was clear early on that he had no interest in genuine dialogue, so he was banned as a sophist troll, and I explained exactly why I banned him. Lest his atheists buddies think that this alone proves that I am the coward, he later banned me on his site, simply for disagreeing.

I ban, on the other hand, when people violate my simple rules for civil discussion. It’s a completely different rationale. Bob is still fully able to see all of my posts about him, and to reply on his own site. Banning on Disqus has no effect on any of that.

After Bob challenged me, I decided that enough was enough and that I would reply at great length. I’m always one to oblige people’s wishes if I am able, so I decided to do a series of posts.  Thus, I have now posted 32 critiques of his nonsense: written from August through October 2018, and the last two in April 2019.

And there will be more, if he writes something different about the Bible or Christianity; if he dredges up some semi-semi-semi quasi-“original” chestnut of anti-Christian polemics (many of his posts simply recycle the same old anti-Christian lies).

And guess how many times he has counter-responded to my 32 in-depth critiques, goaded on by he himself? You guessed right: zero, zilch, nada, nuthin’ . . . He hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply. His cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds.

It’s part of my job as a Catholic apologist, to examine the arguments (real or imagined) of atheist anti-theist polemicists, to see whether they can hold water. Not all (probably not even a majority of) apologists deal with atheist polemics or tackle the issues regarding science and its relationship to Christianity, and philosophy of religion. I do.

It’s largely thankless work, and few (on either side) seem to care about it, but someone’s gotta do it. On my site, one can learn how to counter and dismantle atheist arguments. And it is revealed how very weak they are. Don’t let the anti-theist atheist routine of blithely assumed intellectual superiority fool you. Anyone can talk a good game. But backing it up is often another story altogether.

I also specialize in critiques of atheist “deconversion stories.” Atheists and agnostics attempt to give (public) reasons why they should have left Christianity. I (likewise, publicly) show how they are inadequate and insufficient reasons.

And Bible-Basher Bob Seidensticker is Example #1 of this illusory facade of superiority. Imagine an idyllic vision of rational argument, where atheists seriously and amiably engage with Christians (minus all the usual mockery and tribalist cheerleading combox insult-fests, on both sides). Ol’ Bob doesn’t want any part of that. It would shatter the fairy tale of invulnerability that he makes up for his fan club and clones who sop up his every utterance as if they were GOSPEL TRVTH.

Bottom-line: can a person back up what they are arguing, against scrutiny and examination? Bob apparently cannot (he certainly will not), and so I can only conclude that he is an intellectual coward, who lacks the courage of his convictions (which — I freely grant — are sincerely held). Here is the complete list of my 32 posts contra Bible-Basher Bob:

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The usual nonsense and obfuscation in the combox commenced soon after this post went up:

Catherwood the butler:  So you’ve banned Bob Seidensticker from your blog, while he hasn’t banned you from his, yet he’s the intellectual coward?

Me: I’m banned on his blog (have been since August 2018; I just confirmed it over there, that it is still in force), and I was for simply disagreeing (as I mentioned in the post). I was in a good discussion with a reasonable and civil atheist there at the very time I was banned. But he was banned because he was being a sophist and a troll (as I carefully explained at length in a post).

1. He challenged me (back when I was still allowed to comment on his site) to refute his anti-Christian bilge (after I banned him).

2. I have now done so 32 times on as many topics.

3. He hasn’t uttered one peep in reply. That’s why he is a coward.

4. He can see my critiques (he can see this very post) and he is free to counter-reply to them on his blog. Being banned for trolling has nothing whatsoever to do with either of those things.

5. But again, he does NOT do so. Why? I have drawn my own conclusion as to the reason . . . If you or anyone have a better one, I’m all ears.

*

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Photo credit: OpenClipart-Vectors (10-21-13) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]
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2019-07-23T11:22:29-04:00

Last updated on: July 23, 2019 at 11:22 am   By

[see the Master List of all twelve installments]

Paolo Pasqualucci (signer of three of the endless reactionary-dominated “corrections” of Pope Francis), a Catholic and retired professor of philosophy of the law at the University of Perugia, Italy, wrote “‘Points of Rupture’ of the Second Vatican Council with the Tradition of the Church – A Synopsis” (4-13-18), hosted by the infamous reactionary site, One Peter Five. It’s an adaptation of the introduction to his book Unam Sanctam – A Study on Doctrinal Deviations in the Catholic Church of the 21st Century.

Pope Benedict XVI, writing as Cardinal Ratzinger, stated that the authority of Vatican II was identical to that of the Council of Trent:

It must be stated that Vatican II is upheld by the same authority as Vatican I and the Council of Trent, namely, the Pope and the College of Bishops in communion with him, and that also with regard to its contents, Vatican II is in the strictest continuity with both previous councils and incorporates their texts word for word in decisive points . . .

Whoever accepts Vatican II, as it has clearly expressed and understood itself, at the same time accepts the whole binding tradition of the Catholic Church, particularly also the two previous councils . . . It is likewise impossible to decide in favor of Trent and Vatican I but against Vatican II. Whoever denies Vatican II denies the authority that upholds the other two councils and thereby detaches them from their foundation. And this applies to the so-called ‘traditionalism,’ also in its extreme forms. Every partisan choice destroys the whole (the very history of the Church) which can exist only as an indivisible unity.

To defend the true tradition of the Church today means to defend the Council. It is our fault if we have at times provided a pretext (to the ‘right’ and ‘left’ alike) to view Vatican II as a ‘break’ and an abandonment of the tradition. There is, instead, a continuity that allows neither a return to the past nor a flight forward, neither anachronistic longings nor unjustified impatience. We must remain faithful to the today of the Church, not the yesterday or tomorrow. And this today of the Church is the documents of Vatican II, without reservations that amputate them and without arbitrariness that distorts them . . .

I see no future for a position that, out of principle, stubbornly renounces Vatican II. In fact in itself it is an illogical position. The point of departure for this tendency is, in fact, the strictest fidelity to the teaching particularly of Pius IX and Pius X and, still more fundamentally, of Vatican I and its definition of papal primacy. But why only popes up to Pius XII and not beyond? Is perhaps obedience to the Holy See divisible according to years or according to the nearness of a teaching to one’s own already-established convictions? (The Ratzinger Report, San Francisco: Ignatius, 1985, 28-29, 31)

For further basic information about the sublime authority of ecumenical councils and Vatican II in particular, see:

Conciliar Infallibility: Summary from Church Documents [6-5-98]

Infallibility, Councils, and Levels of Church Authority: Explanation of the Subtleties of Church Teaching [7-30-99]

The Bible on Papal & Church Infallibility [5-16-06]

Authority and Infallibility of Councils (vs. Calvin #26) [8-25-09]

The Analogy of an Infallible Bible to an Infallible Church [11-6-05; rev. 7-25-15; published at National Catholic Register: 6-16-17]

“Reply to Calvin” #2: Infallible Church Authority [3-3-17]

“On Adhesion to the Second Vatican Council” (Msgr. Fernando Ocariz Braña, the current Prelate of Opus Dei, L’Osservatore Romano, 12-2-11; reprinted at Catholic Culture) [includes discussion of VCII supposedly being “only” a “pastoral council”]

Pope Benedict on “the hermeneutic of reform, of renewal within continuity” (12-22-05)

The words of Paolo Pasqualucci, from his article, noted above, will be in blue:

*****

11.  In the Decree On Religious Liberty Dignitatis Humanae (DH), a concept of “religious liberty” is affirmed which does not seem to distinguish itself from the secular concept of the same, which is the fruit of the idea of tolerance, the origins of which are in Deism and the Enlightenment. Such a concept appears not to conform to the doctrine of the Church and is a harbinger of indifferentism and agnosticism.

My friend and fellow Catholic apologist Tim Staples thoroughly disposes of this in an excellent article, “Religious Liberty” (Catholic Answers, 1-9-15):

Our Lord himself removed all doubt concerning man’s freedom when he revealed that as God from all eternity he willed to gather “Jerusalem” as his own, but they refused him:

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often I would have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not (Matt. 23:37)! . . . 

The claim is made that . . . the Council contradict[s] earlier Magisterial teachings of the Church that condemn “religious freedom,” and so, must be considered heretical.

And one can certainly see how a surface reading of Magisterial statements . . . could be so construed . . . Pope Leo XIII, in his Encyclical Letter, Libertas, 42, June 20, 1888, is also used to this end:

From what has been said it follows that it is quite unlawful to demand, to defend, or to grant unconditional freedom of thought, of speech, or writing, or of worship, as if these were so many rights given by nature to man. For, if nature had really granted them, it would be lawful to refuse obedience to God, and there would be no restraint on human liberty. It likewise follows that freedom in these things may be tolerated wherever there is just cause, but only with such moderation as will prevent its degenerating into license and excess. And, where such liberties are in use, men should employ them in doing good, and should estimate them as the Church does; for liberty is to be regarded as legitimate in so far only as it affords greater facility for doing good, but no farther.

Two points in Response

1. These declarations of the Holy See [Dave: he had also cited Pope Gregory XVI’s Encyclical Letter, Mirari Vos, from 1832] condemn an absolute religious freedom that casts off all constraints of Natural Law and Church authority. This is essentially different from what DH is speaking about. Notice, DH 2 includes key phrases like, ”within due limits,” and “provided that just public order be observed,” to emphasize limitations on religious liberty. There is not even a hint of its approval of what Pope Gregory XVI called “indifferentism,” or what Pope Leo XIII called “unconditional freedom…”

2. The Council Fathers were careful to define what the Church means by “religious freedom” in the context of DH.

This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power…

By “religious freedom,” the Council meant men “are to be immune from coercion.” This is absolutely consonant with Catholic teaching.

And notice as well the Council spoke of the evil of coercion by human power. This in no way means man is not bound by God’s law, or by divine authority. That was not even a consideration here. In other words, Vatican II is not presenting a “right to error,” or a “right to blaspheme.” It is presenting a negative right—a right to not being coerced.

And this is not to say God, or any divine authority, coerces either when it comes to man responding to God’s gracious invitation to come to him. God has given man freedom to either choose him or reject him, as I said above. But it is to emphasize the context of DH. The fathers of the Council were responding to the problem of earthly despots or any political authority that would attempt to coerce with regard to matters religious.

Fr. Brian W. Harrison has also again done excellent work in refuting this objection to Dignitatis Humanae, in his tour de force article, “Dignitatis Humanae: a Non-Contradictory Doctroinal Development” (Living Tradition; Roman Theological Forum, March 2011). I shall cite it at length (I won’t indent: everything below are his words; footnotes incorporated in green):

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As is well known, the perception that the doctrine enshrined in these magisterial documents, and indeed, in the Church’s universal and ordinary magisterium since the patristic era, is irreconcilable with that of DH has been a major factor in the SSPX’s continued resistance to Vatican Council II. . . .

I. First of all, certain important hermeneutical distinctions need to be kept in mind:

(a) between Church doctrine (teaching proposed as true for all times and places) and Church law or prudential policy judgments (adaptable according to different historical/cultural circumstances).

(b) between a Vatican II Declaration such as DH and more authoritative conciliar documents, such as Dogmatic Consti­tutions. Conciliar declarations (of which there are two others, Nostra Aetate and Gravissimum Educationis, on inter-religious dialogue and Catholic education respectively) are not meant to be read as if they proposed universal, timeless and unchangeable doctrine from start to finish. All three of them begin with a few basic general doctrinal principles of this sort, and then go on to lay down practical norms and other comments that the Church considers appropriate as present-day applications of, and reflections on, those principles.

(c) between affirming a right to do X and affirming a right to immunity from coercion in doing X. In a purely juridical or legal document setting out only what is and is not to be prohibited and punished by human positive law, this distinction would be inapplicable, even meaningless. But in a theological, doctrinal document such as DH, which in the first place considers moral rights and duties, and only secondarily their implications for human law codes, the distinction is crucial. DH carefully specifies that what it affirms as the natural right to religious freedom is only the second kind of right. A theological affirmation that there is a human right to do X simply means that X is itself a kind of action which is objectively morally upright and justifiable – one that does not, as such, deserve censure or disapproval from either God or man. But to affirm a right to immunity from human coercion in doing X – that is, a right not to be prevented by human authority from doing X – does not necessarily imply that X is objectively good behavior. It is simply a reflection of the important distinction between sin and crime; that is, it recognizes the limited jurisdiction of government when it comes to penalizing the errant behavior of citizens. St. Thomas recognized long ago that it is not the function of human law (civil authority) to outlaw and punish any and every kind of sin.3

[Cf. Summa Theologiae, Ia IIae, Q. 96, a. 2.]

And he answered negatively the question as to whether Muslim or Jewish parents could justly be prevented by Catholic governments from teaching their children their respective non-Christian religions. (In practice, of course, such prevention would mean removing these children from their parents’ custody altogether.) Aquinas said this would be unjust, because the right of a father over his family in this case prevails against the alleged right of government to intervene in favor of the true religion.4

[Cf. Summa Theologiae, IIa, IIae, Q. 10, a. 12.]

Does that mean St. Thomas is saying or implying that there exists a “right to teach one’s children false doctrine” – doctrine contrary to the revealed truths such as the Incarnation and Trinity? Not at all. There is only a right not to be prevented by government from doing so.

[. . .]

(d) Finally, we need to avoid the fallacy of assuming that if we say a government should tolerate a certain activity, we are implying or presupposing that it has a right, in justice, to repress that same activity if it wishes to do so. Again, in a purely juridical document, that right might perhaps be implied. But not in theological discourse, in which the first of the above propositions by no means entails the second. In the context of such discourse, saying that a ruler tolerates activity A simply means that, while disapproving of A, he decides not to repress it even though he disposes of enough physical force (police or military), and perhaps the permission of his country’s existing positive law, to do so. Whether or not he would also have the right (in the sense of the moral authority) to repress A is a distinct question. In some cases he would, in others he wouldn’t. So critics of Vatican II are setting up a false dichotomy when – as often happens – they claim to discern an implicit contradiction between DH’s language of “rights” in civil society for those practising various different religions and the traditional papal language that spoke of mere civil “tolerance” for non-Catholic religious activity. The distinction made in (c) above also needs to be kept in mind here. It follows from all this that the respective concepts of having a right not to be prevented by the State from carrying out religious activity A (which is the language of DH), and of being tolerated by the State in carrying out A (the language of the pre-conciliar magisterium) are not at all logically incompatible. And precisely because they are compatible, it would not be oxymoronic to combine the conciliar and pre-conciliar ways of speaking in one expression, affirming that persons can sometimes have a natural “right to be tolerated” by government in carrying out A.

II. Note also that, according to DH 1, the religious freedom affirmed in this document leaves “intact”, or “whole and entire” (Latin integram) the “traditional Catholic doctrine concerning the moral duty of individuals and societies toward the true religion and the one Church of Christ”. Now, the word “societies” here certainly includes civil or political communities as such. This was clarified in words that were personally approved and mandated by Pope Paul VI, and then read out by the relator (official spokesman for the drafting committee) to the assembled Fathers who were about to vote on this final draft of DH. The relator told them that this and other last-minute additions to the text were a response to the concerns expressed by some Fathers about apparent doctrinal inconsistency between the declaration they were being asked to approve and “ecclesiastical documents up till the time of the Supreme Pontiff Leo XIII”, especially the “insistence” of these documents on “the moral duty of public authority (potestas publica) toward the true religion”. The relator then pointed out to the Fathers that the revised text, by virtue of the final amendments to articles 1 and 3, “recalls [this duty] more clearly”. As a result, he said, “it is manifest that this part of the doctrine has not been overlooked”.5

[“. . . ex quo patet hanc doctrinae partem non praetermitti” (Acta Synodalia, IV, VI, 719).]

Therefore, any interpretation of DH that has it contradict the doctrine of previous popes cannot reflect the mind of the Church as to the true meaning of the Declaration.

III. Keeping in mind the preceding hermeneutical criteria, we can now set out very briefly a case for non-contradiction. Two of the three doctrinal propositions of DH in its key paragraph (article 2, paragraph 1) are not usually contested by the declaration’s traditionalist critics. These brethren are troubled little, if at all, by the Council’s vindication of immunity from human coercion for non-Catholics in their private religious activity, or by its assertion that no one is to be coerced into acting against their conscience in religious matters. What troubles these critics in DH #2 is its teaching that, “within due limits”, no one may be prevented from acting publicly in accord with their conscience in religious matters. This assertion, they claim, is unorthodox and irreconcilable with previous papal teaching, in spite of its recognition that the right to such freedom for public activity is not unlimited.

Now, taking into account the elaboration of those “due limits” which we find in article 7 of the Declaration, this controverted teaching of DH can be synthesized as the following proposition:

P: It is unjust for human authority (Catholic or non-Catholic) to prevent people from publicly acting in accord with their conscience in religious matters, unless such action violates legal norms, based on the objective moral order, that are necessary for safeguarding: (a) the rights of all citizens; (b) public peace; and (c) public morality. (These three factors are said to make up collectively “the basic component of the common good”, otherwise termed “a just public order”. It is important to be aware that DH defines “public order” in terms of these three.)

Now, if indeed P contradicts traditional Catholic doctrine in the way critics of Vatican II claim it does (i.e., by allowing too much civil freedom in religious matters) then the pertinent traditional doctrine would have to have been the following:

P1 It is sometimes just for human authority (Catholic or non-Catholic) to prevent people from publicly acting in accord with their conscience in religious matters even when such activity does not violate any of the three general norms (a), (b) and (c), specified in P.

But P1 was not in fact the Church’s traditional doctrine. It cannot be found – in those words or others implying the same thing – in the pre-conciliar magisterium, ordinary or extraordinary. For the popes of earlier times who sometimes exhorted Catholic rulers to repress all public manifestations of non-Catholic religions would certainly have answered affirmatively, had they been asked whether such manifestations violated one or more of the three norms set out in proposition P above. (We will return to this point below.) Ergo, DH does not contradict the Church’s traditional doctrine.

[. . .]

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which can be seen as giving us an authentic commentary on the meaning of DH, reinforces this by asserting, with a footnote reference to Leo XIII’s encyclical Libertas, that “[t]he right to religious liberty is neither a moral license to adhere to error, nor a supposed right to error” (#2109).

[. . .]

Indeed, other approved traditional theologians (e.g., Suárez, Von Ketteler, and even Pope Gregory the Great) foreshadowed Vatican II to some extent by saying that Catholic civil authorities are obliged by the requirements of justice(not merely of prudence) to tolerate the worship of at least unbaptized monotheists – mainly Jews and Muslims – carried out in synagogues, mosques, or other places of public worship.6

[According to such theologians, neither civil nor ecclesiastical Christian authorities have any jurisdiction over the unbaptized in their religious activities, as long as these do not include practices contrary to what is knowable by reason and natural law, such as idolatry and polytheism. The Jews were considered ‘off limits’ for Christian authorities for an additional reason, namely, that their providential continued existence as a distinct religious community left them as living witnesses – independent of, and even hostile to, the Church herself – to her own historical origins and to the historical truth of both Old and New Testaments.]

[. . .]

Vatican II’s position is not so liberal as to deny that under certain past circumstances, the public manifestation of erroneous religious ideas and practices could have been, as such, a justly punishable threat to the common good of society (that is, it would jeopardize the rights of other citizens, and/or public peace, and/or public morality).

In short, the pre-conciliar and conciliar doctrines respectively are not so ‘absolute’ as to exclude and contradict each other. The perennial common thread in the Church’s doctrine, from ancient times until now, has been that, on the one hand, those persons outside the Church, especially those presumed to be invincibly ignorant of the truth of Catholicism, have a right to some degree of civil religious freedom (e.g., at the very least, non-Christians should never be coerced into baptism and Church membership, and should enjoy civil freedom to teach their religion privately to their own children), but that on the other hand, the State also has the right to impose some limitations on the spread of harmful and dangerous ideas in the interests of the common good of society. So there are two poles here, ‘positive’ and ‘negative’, that need to be kept in equilibrium: respect for erring consciences (toleration) and the need to prevent the spread of the most dangerous propaganda.

The difference between old and new has basically been a gradually changing emphasis in the Church’s position. Traditionally she emphasized more the ‘negative’ end of the spectrum – the State’s right to repress error; and from the mid-20th century on, she emphasizes more the human person’s right to immunity from coercion. Changes of emphasis, however – even to the extent of making the rule what was once the exception – are not contradictions. What we have here, rather, are changing prudential judgments as to where to find the right balance between necessary freedom and just restraint.

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Photo credit:  Burning of Jan Hus at the stake, from Matthäus Merian (1593-1650), Historische Chronica…, Frankfurt am Main 1630 [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2020-02-16T10:57:09-04:00

Last updated on: February 16, 2020 at 10:57 am   By

Documented Conversions or Reversions in Part Due to My Work (Completely Caused by God’s Grace)

All glory to God always, for everything. We are just vessels, if He uses us to spread the message to someone else: one sinning beggar sharing spiritual food with other beggars. It all goes back to God and His grace in the end. No one can do the slightest good thing without it. Praise Him! If someone asks me why I do apologetics, this is one major reason. Another is to help Catholics be confident and informed in their faith and to know why they believe what they believe, so they can in turn share it with others.

The following excepts (below the five asterisks) are drawn from my collections of unsolicited correspondence or public comments: Feedback Comments on My Writing From Catholics: 1997-2001, and Feedback Comments on Dave Armstrong (Catholics: 2002 – ).

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You know, in your heart of hearts, that this fella [yours truly], uh, bless his soul, has no idea what he’s talking about. He’s read some books, but the important foundational stuff that allows you to actually make sense out of all that stuff, he’s clueless; he has no idea what he is talking about, but he writes constantly! (Anti-Catholic Reformed Baptist apologist Rt. Rev. Bishop “Dr.” [???] James White, Dividing Line webcast, 4-20-04)

Dave Armstrong (a self-proclaimed Catholic apologist). (Anti-Catholic Reformed Protestant polemicist James Swan, 4-3-09)

This is a big difference between DA and I. I’ve never been bored. I actually have a job, . . . On the other hand, I think DA considers sitting up in his attic tapping away on a computer all day an actual job. Oh that’s right, he’s a professional Catholic apologist.  (James Swan, 7-17-09)

. . . self-styled career apologists . . . (Catholic Scott Eric Alt [see #100 below], 7-2-19)

*****

1) I am a former Protestant minister of 15 years and am now a Catholic . . . Your site has a wealth of truth that helped me in my conversion to Catholicism. (1-24-98)

2) I just wanted to thank you for your efforts on your web page and in talking to me personally. I . . . will be received into the Church this Easter. Your web site really facilitated much of my research into the Catholic Church. (2-9-98)

3) I am immensely grateful for your web site. It is a veritable treasure of mentally stimulating material . . . For twelve years I served as a pastor in the Free Methodist Church of North America . . . To abbreviate, I will be received into the Catholic Church this Easter vigil . . . Again, Dave, I so deeply appreciate the wealth of material you have provided. (3-24-98)

4)  Thank you for your site. I am a cradle Catholic who has been Baptist (SBC) for 10 years. It now seems as if the RCC is more biblical than the Protestant denominations . . . I really didn’t even know there were Catholics out there like you. (3-24-98)

5) After returning to Christ as a Southern Baptist, my searching has led me back to the Mother Church in which I was raised. Your site has been helpful in that journey. (8-10-98)

6) Between Scott and Kimberly Hahn’s book and now finding your incredible web site, [my husband] is moving closer and closer to a decision . . . I wanted to let you know that all your hard work is making a tremendous difference in the life of someone else. (10-3-98)

7) You have an AWESOME website. You’ve helped me so much this past year. Much of the stuff on your site helped me convert to the Faith as well. (1-12-99)

8) I feel greatly in debt to you; you (and your site) were the “good samaritan” that helped me on that road back home. Thanks. (1-27-99)

9) My brother was attending a Protestant church and he came up with all the Protestant arguments you know so well. Then I found your site and e-mailed him a whole slew of your writings. Now, he’s arguing against Protestants, not with them. (2-27-99)

10) I just wanted to thank you for helping to bring about my reception into the Holy Catholic Church. Without your efforts and the wealth of information you’ve made available, I doubt that I would have been received into the Church this past Easter. I can tell you that every possible question I could conceive of asking, was answered on your website. (4-11-99)

11) I wanted to also thank you for your ministry, . . . on behalf of my husband . . . I provided him with your website and the Hahns’ book to reassure him about my choice . . . He was baptized, confirmed and received his first Communion Easter Vigil. Your website was of tremendous help to him, both in making this decision and in answering the questions (some challenges, I think) from loved ones and friends who questioned our choices. (4-14-99)

12) Your Biblical Evidence site really was one of the most powerful influences of my decision to re-embrace Catholicism and I don’t think I could be grateful enough. (5-2-99)

13)  I cannot tell you enough how much it and your writings have helped in my journey back into the Catholic Church. (8-16-00)

14) I was raised Catholic, but drifted away when I went to college. But thanks to the many great Catholic apologetics sites on the WWW, I have returned to the Church as a full member. Needless to say, the very broad and deep resources on your site played a major role in getting all this straightened out. (8-23-00)

15) I found your website about six months ago and have been reading a lot of your writings, which have been instrumental in my
conversion and in my understanding of Catholic doctrine. (9-9-00)

16)  A very close friend of mine recently became a Catholic (last Easter in fact). He was previously Youth Minister in a Baptist Church – so his journey to the Catholic Church entailed many questions/study about the Church. Being able to draw on your resources helped me to answer the many questions he had. (10-9-00)

17) I had been desperately trying to convert my Catholic friends . . . I could generally beat them in argument, but in my fervor to do more and more research I came across your webpage. I read just about every single word on your webpage, and, long story short, I was received into the Catholic Church Easter 2000 . . . I really think that your writings were absolutely instrumental in my conversion. (7-24-01)

18) Your website is excellent. Indeed, I was received into full communion with the Catholic Church this past Easter in large part because of your wonderful apologetic enterprise. (8-13-01)

19) I wanted you to know that your work has been a great aid in my decision to become Catholic (from a Baptist background). (9-21-01)

20) I have decided to join the Catholic Church . . . The materials on your website helped me along immensely. (11-9-01)

21) I have been a regular visitor to your web site for over two years now. I have used it as my primary source on information on Catholicism, and because of it, I am now attending RCIA sessions. (11-29-01)

22) I have been inspired by your writings and you have been instrumental in my decision to join the holy Catholic Church . . . my greatest thanks from the bottom of my heart. (11-29-01)

23) I feel like I know you . . . You have brought me back, and by extension, many others with whom I have taught with your information. You have been an instrument of Christ in my life, and I thought you should know. (12-6-01)

24)  Your website has helped me immensely, and any amount of money could never repay my debt to you. Your writing and exegesis was instrumental in my conversion to the faith (I will be confirmed this Easter!). (12-10-01)

25) Your website helped me immensely while I was considering converting to the Church. (12-10-01)

26) I have recently reverted back to the Catholic church, and much of the intellectual conversion was a direct result of your web pages (of course, we both know that God was involved, too…). (12-14-01)

27-30)  I just wanted to let you know that partially as a result of your strong witness for His Church, I and my family (wife, who was RC and became an Evangelical before we ever met, and two daughters aged 7 and 10) are going to be received into the Church this Easter, God willing. Her parents, both staunch Catholics from the Emerald Isle, are extremely happy about this as well as many of her relatives who have been praying for us. (12-24-01)

31) Your writings were very instrumental in my conversion. When I first felt leanings towards the Church, I came across your web site and was immediately absorbed. It was not long before I became convinced of the Catholic position. (12-26-01)

32) Your work was instrumental in my reversion from Evangelicalism. Without your website I wouldn’t have had any clear understanding of the differences and errors inherent in Evangelicalism. (12-28-01)

33) I really want to thank you for helping bring me back to the Church. I had been away from the Church for 19 years . . . During that time I was involved in the New Age, Buddhism, the Episcopalian church, and even the occult . . . In March 2001 I started frequenting your site and read many of the articles. Shortly after that I went to confession and started changing my life. I am now a practicing Catholic, following all the Catholic teachings, including Natural Family Planning. (7-29-02)

34) On 1st of December this year I intend (God willing) to be received into the Catholic Church. This is due in no small part to an extensive perusal of your site! (11-19-02)

35-36) I and my wife entered the Catholic Church a year ago, and your website was part of that. It was particularly useful after we announced our decision to my wife’s staunchly Protestant family. (1-22-03)

37) I just wanted to write you to tell you what a help your web-site has been to me on my journey of faith . . . I thought I had already arrived at the truth in the Eastern Orthodox Church. One of the issues that prompted my questioning was contraception; reading your section on this issue, and few other moral issues, I realized this issue in particular was no minor, “just-between-you-and-the-priest”, kind of thing. What was wrong for roughly two thousand years, is equally wrong today . . . Your web-site helped me to learn the TRUTH of the Catholic faith. (4-26-03)

38) I am a recent convert to Catholicism from Protestantism (just last week at the Easter Vigil, actually) and I wanted to thank you. One of the first things I read when I began my investigation into the Catholic faith back in August of 2002 was your article 150 Reasons Why I am a Catholic, and I found it very intriguing and inspiring. It definitely encouraged me to read more articles and books about Catholicism. So, once again, I wanted to say thank you. (4-27-03)

39-40) I started becoming hungry to find out about the Catholic Church. I had the Internet at the time, so I went in the search engine and typed ‘Catholic Church’ and came upon a most fabulous and exhaustive website on the Catholic faith Biblical Evidence for Catholicsm! It answered all my questions! I was soooo happy while discovering the beauty and richness of the Catholic faith I would cry while reading the hundreds of articles!!! Then I went to Mass one Sunday morning (on Palm Sunday 2000) after 15 years’ absence. I was just soooo moved during Mass, it was incredible. I cried during the whole Mass, . . . My husband became curious of the Catholic faith and would ask me what I had read on the wonderful website. Two months after I had started going to Mass, he joined me. (7-20-03)

41) I used your site a great deal in converting to the church, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for all your work. (8-13-03)

42) About two-and-a-half years ago, while I was still in college, I first visited your site out of curiosity concerning how in the world Catholics defend their “unbiblical” doctrines. Because of a random search I came to your 150 Reasons Why I’m A Catholic page and needless to say I was shocked. The way you defended Catholic doctrine in short logical points with scriptural support sent me into a theological tailspin. I closed the browser quickly, but I was still left with those Bible verses and kept wondering how in the world I had missed the verses you pointed out. Well, after about two years of study, graduation, a move to Northern Michigan and lots of painful discoveries of inadequate Protestant interpretations and counter-arguments, I finally decided to join the Catholic Church. In fact, I will be starting RCIA next week thanks in large part to your web site (and, of course, God’s grace). Once again thank you very much. (8-28-03)

43) I’ve said before that I owe my conversion in large part to your website. You’ve blessed me and my family so much. I only wish I could offer you something more besides kind words and prayers. (9-9-03)

44) Thank you for your site; it has been a great help to me in coming into the True Faith. (10-13-03)

45) I wanted to tell you that I am now a Catholic, as of a Nov 11th. It mostly due, in order of impact, to 1) your amazing website, 2) the Coming Home Network, and 3) Scott Hahn’s conversion story. Thank you so much for all you do. Your wonderful website had just a huge influence on me during my journey to the Church, which lasted 14 months. I really can’t thank you enough for your apostolate. Your website helped to make a Catholic out of me, and for that I will be forever grateful to you. (11-17-03)

46) On April 19 2003 during the Easter Vigil Mass at St. Thomas More University Parish in Bowling Green, Ohio I was received into the Catholic Church!!! Thanks again so much for letting God use you to help me along the way to where I am now! Your website, your books, and your links and references were probably the most significant resources in pointing me to the truths of the Catholic Church. (12-2-03)

47) My wife and I were received in 2002 into the Catholic Church (formerly Southern Baptist), and your writings (including the Surprised by Truth testimony) have been a great inspiration to me, and VERY educational. (12-10-03)

48) Dave’s Biblical Evidence for Catholicism web site and his friendship were among the factors that helped my inquiry and my eventual Tiber crossing. I can testify to his friendship with non-Catholic Christians personally; we built a good friendship when I was Anglican. He has always treated me with respect, never was he arrogant, triumphalistic or anything like that. (1-30-04)

49) Your website has been invaluable to my journey into the Church. I am to be received this April. Your website was the first Catholic apologetics material I ever read. Without sounding like I’m kissing up, thank you for being so detailed and deep. Many other apologists are too simplistic to get to the roots. You get to the root of error and axe it. (2-11-04)

50) I wanted to send a short letter of thanks for the work that you do. I just became a Catholic at Easter Vigil, after growing up as a Pentecostal in the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, and much of my decision, and the information for that decision, was from your website. (4-18-04)

51-54) Thanks for your great work. Your website was instrumental in my family’s conversion to the Church. We have begun sending your apostolate a monthly check. (4-22-04)

55) Dave Armstrong’s site is one of the best I have found on the internet. His site began my conversion process nine months ago, and here I am a Catholic. (6-23-04)

56) Dave Armstrong’s website was integral to my becoming RC. After attending a Catholic retreat with some of my Baptist friends, and attending a mass at a monastery, I became very interested in the Catholic Faith. I used his website to study things like Marian doctrines and the Eucharist – my main issues I had to deal with before attending RCIA. (6-23-04)

57) Dave’s website has also helped me a great deal. His articles answered many of my questions and were instrumental in my conversion process from the Evangelical church. His Catholic knowledge, reason and logic are impeccable. (6-23-04)

58) Thanks so much for the tremendous work you do for the Church. You played a huge role in my leaving sedevacantism and extreme traditionalism. (5-2-05)

59) Having been raised in a protestant family and seeking God’s Will for me, I have been led to the Catholic Church. Your testimony is helping me and your writing is providing much reassurance. (12-18-05)

60) I began doing research. And I ended up where I thought I’d never end up in a million years – I decided today to become a full-fledged Catholic. And your apologetics had a lot to do with this. Thanks so much for enlightening me. I’m truly indebted to you. (1-23-06)

61-62) We are so grateful for your ministry and how the Lord has used the giftings He has given you to change our lives forever. (January 2006)

63-64) With your help, careful, prayerful, consideration of all the facts, and a whole lot of Grace, my wife and I will be going through the Rite of Election this coming March 5. (2-2-06)

65-69) I have finally made the announcement publicly that my family and I have left Protestantism and are Catholic. Your ministry was (and is) instrumental in our growth in faith. (2-3-06)

70) I just wanted to thank you for your work. I will be entering the Catholic Church this Easter Vigil (from a Protestant background.) (3-6-06)

71) I’ve read A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, and it’s in the process of converting my Baptist girlfriend as we speak! Thanks so much for what you do. (3-10-06)

72) It would be a great honor to have you attend my Ordination Mass. Your witness of the Catholic faith was an important part of my conversion. I will continue to thank God for the Spiritual direction you gave to me. (former Anglican priest, 3-19-06)

73) I have many of your books. They have helped me return to the Church. Great stuff! (5-5-06)

74) I wanted to let you know that your website was very helpful to me in my journey to the church. I was received into the church last month after five years of intense study and prayer. I was an evangelical campus minister before resigning that position due to my increasing Catholic convictions. (5-7-06)

75) Your articles have played a very important role in my recent conversion from Reformed Presbyterian to Catholic. I was received into the Church this past week. (5-12-06)

76) I recently was received into full communion with the Catholic Church after being an evangelical Protestant all my life, and your blog and apologetics writings were essential to me during the period in which I was examining the Church’s teachings. Your site, more than any other resource, had clear, understandable defenses for Catholic doctrine and practices. In particular, you deserve the credit for my ultimate decision to join the Catholic Church rather than the Orthodox Church. (6-26-06)

77) I was a campus minister for eight years before being received into the Church in April. Your website had a big influence in my coming to see the truth of the Catholic Church. (9-2-06)

78) I am currently going to RCIA and renewing my faith in the Catholic Church. I was raised Catholic but have been away for more years than I care to admit. I came across your website in the process of doing some research on questions I had and it has truly been a blessing. I now spend each day eating lunch at my desk just so I can visit your website and learn more about the faith I choose. (9-20-06)

79) Your apologetics ministry has been extremely influential to me over the past three years or so. Your irenic presentation coupled with your voluminous knowledge played no small part in my decision to convert to Catholicism from my former strongly Calvinist beliefs. Your works have helped me to better articulate the glorious truths of our holy Catholic faith. (9-21-06)

80) I just want you to know how much your website has helped me understand the Catholic faith! I was Protestant, Pentecostal to be exact, so the transition into the CC was major!! Your biblical proofs have helped ground me in my faith. (5-5-08)

81) Thanks a lot for your website. Because of your work, the work of Peter Kreeft, and other Catholic apologists I am currently in the process of conversion from Baptist to Catholicism. (10-8-08)

82) I recommended one of Dave Armstrong‘s books, saying that his blog was instrumental in bringing me into the Church. (6-9-13)

83) I will be received into the Catholic Church on June 29. Your blog, your posts here [Facebook], have helped me find my way. Thanks. (former Methodist pastor, 6-16-13)

84) Dave you were key to my initial seeking and conversion. (11-18-13)

85) A National Catholic Register article about your conversion inspired me to send you a long overdue thank you for your apologetics apostolate. As a high school agnostic searching for the truth, your website was decisive in my decision to be baptized, confirmed and receive first Holy Communion the Easter Vigil of 2003. Ten years later, I have gained a degree from Christendom College, become a professed religious with the Legion of Christ and am currently studying in Rome for the priesthood. From the bottom of my heart, I thank you for an apostolate that truly changed my life. (7-2-13)

86) Back when it was just a website, Dave’s work was instrumental in my conversion. (7-4-13)

87) Mr. Armstrong’s work was instrumental in keeping me Catholic back in 1997 when I had a “crisis of faith”.  (7-9-13)

88) I’ve followed [your blog] for years.  In fact, it did play a part in my conversion process, along with other apologist web sites and resources.  I was formerly an evangelical Protestant who did mission work and teaching ministry.  I went to Bible college and seminary. (11-22-13)

89) That website helped in my conversion to the Catholic Faith. (11-25-13)

90-91) I am a former Evangelical (and a former fan of James White) who came into the Catholic Church this past year. Thanks for all your writings – they were very helpful to me and my wife on our journey. (12-24-13)

92) I just wanted to thank you for your blog and its predecessor. Biblical Evidence for Catholicism was instrumental in helping me come back to the Church after a nine-year absence. Without you, I might not still be Catholic today. (2-2-14)

93) Thanks for all your effort to demonstrate the biblical nature of Catholicism. Your book, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, was the first book I read when I had come to the conclusion I needed to enter the Church. (5-31-14)

94) In February, I was received into full communion with the Church (having been a Methodist), and your writings were extremely helpful along the way. You have helped me a great deal. (7-1-14)

95) I love reading your books: practical and easy to read. I consider you an important factor in my conversion. (11-23-14)

96) Your writings played an important role in my conversion to the Catholic faith in an overtly secular country [Germany]. (12-31-14)

97-98) I think your posts are always full of common sense (something many people are missing) and your Catholicism posts on your blog were instrumental in our conversion three years ago. (1-7-15)

99) Your work has been monumental in my journey home! Your contribution to the world of apologetics has been immeasurable. (1-9-15)

100) Biblical [Defense of Catholicism] was one of the key books that pushed me along during my conversion. I was so “biblically” skeptical of ever becoming Catholic that no “hack” would have possibly convinced me. (Scott Eric Alt, 1-9-15)

101) Great book [The Catholic Verses]! I loved every page and it helped me to find the fullness of truth in the Catholic Church. (1-22-15)

102) I will be received into the Church at Saturday’s Easter Vigil Mass. Thanks for helping me to understand and defend Catholic teaching. (3-31-15)

103) Your website back in the day was the main thing that brought me back to the Catholic Church. (4-9-15)

104) Dave Armstrong was instrumental in my return home to the Church. I’m thankful for that. (5-8-15)

105)  I have been a fan of your works for years. It was very instrumental for me on my journey to cross the Tiber. Thank you for all of the work that you do. (5-26-15)

106) Before I was Catholic (entered in April 2007) I hated your site… so much logical truth that I couldn’t argue with — but it helped me convert eventually… so, thanks for being out there!  (5-29-15)

107) Thank you for helping me into coming back to the Faith. (6-13-15)

108) I just want you to know Dave that last week I returned to the Catholic faith after leaving 30 years ago. I had purchased a few of your other books including [A] Biblical [Defense of] Catholicism and [100 Biblical Arguments Against] Sola Scriptura and Biblical Catholic Apologetics, which I directly attribute to my return to the Church. When I realized I didn’t have to “check out” intellectually to accept the Catholic Church, it changed me. Thank you for what you did for my life in Christ. (7-10-15)

109) God bless your work Dave. You helped me on the way from Protestantism to Holy Mother Church and God has used you to protect me from falling over to the radtrad webs. (7-11-15)

110) Your work initially got me questioning my own beliefs about my faith as a Protestant (an evangelical Anglo-Catholic). I’m now at a stage where the ducks are virtually all lined up in a row and I am wanting to convert officially. (7-13-15)

111-112) [Your] writings were instrumental to our coming home. (7-20-15)

113-116) Your blog was key in my conversion- and that of my whole family! You may not know the full effect you have had until heaven. (7-30-15)

117) Your writings were very helpful when I struggled with the apparent contradictions between Lutheranism and the Fathers, and prompted my break with the Reformation. (9-17-15)

118-123) Count my husband and me among the converts helped and convinced by your books [formerly Baptist]. Oh and our four children — count them. Our whole household converted. (12-3-15)

124) You were the one that knocked down my final objections regarding Marian doctrines allowing me to be confirmed 12 years ago. (12-6-15)

125) You were one of the primary sources responsible for my conversion. (12-6-15)

126) I am from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. I grew up in an Adventist family, but I have been through a conversion to Catholicism process the last two years. Your testimony and Mr Scott Hahn’s testimony have been crucial to me. (12-12-15)

127) [In 2011 I] started investigating Catholic apologetics seriously online (including your site). It was finally the conviction that they early Church was Catholic that convinced me, and everything else poured in with that. I was confirmed this Easter. I still remember that Biblical Evidence was the first place I ever read what Catholics really believe and where I read intelligent debates between Catholics and Protestants. It planted a seed that took about twenty years to sprout, but it finally did! So, if you want to be encouraged, please do! (1-9-16)

128-129) I wouldn’t be Catholic if it weren’t for Dave making me curious about Catholicism! Thanks Dave! I’ve been home since 1996, along with my husband and lots of friends that could really be credited to Dave! (2-8-16)

130) A big thank you because your book on sola Scriptura was one of the first I bought, and helped me out tons when coming back to the faith after studying with Jehovah’s Witnesses, and helped me defend against people who hold that view. (3-13-16)

131) You have been instrumental in my return to Catholicism and in keeping my faith strong as I continue in ministry. (3-31-16)

132-136) Dave, your stuff was instrumental in my own conversion. I was a Protestant minister for about 12 years and came into the Church in 2007 along with my family. (3-31-16)

137) Dave, your work has been helpful in helping me come into the Catholic Church. Apologetics is no doubt one of the most important ministries of the Church — where would any of us be without it? (3-31-16)

138-139) Your writings were very instrumental in helping my wife and I come back to the Catholic Church. Since then we have brought others to the Catholic Church. Keep up the good work. (5-29-16)

140) Your old site and A Biblical Defense of Catholicism were both very helpful in my conversion five years ago, and I’m grateful for the work that you do. (5-31-16)

141) It was thanks to the American apologists (Scott Hahn, Peter Kreeft, Marcus Grodi and the CHN, not to mention Dave Armstrong and Bishop Barron) that I found the way of Catholicism. I was a fervent Protestant. (7-9-16)

142) Dave Armstrong’s work was probably, after grace, the single biggest factor in my conversion to Catholicism. (8-18-16)

143) Dave, I want to  thank you for saving my soul. I became a sedevacantist [one who denies the validity of the sitting pope] last year and after reading your syllabus of traditionalist errors I saw my error and realized, to my delight, that I was wrong. (8-24-16)

144) You and several other convert authors were immensely helpful with my own conversion in my late fifties. Your Biblical Defense of Catholicism was the very first book read. (9-30-16)

145) Your books have given the words and the guidance to my deepest feelings, on my path back to my Catholic faith. I am home. (5-17-17)

146-152) Your work was one of the core reasons my wife and I became Catholic six years ago. I can say with confidence that without that conversion, I wouldn’t have my 5 beautiful children, and now I am watching the faith blossom in their lives. (9-25-17)

153) I was baptized Catholic, raised Protestant, became an atheist; I will say that apologists, including those at Catholic Answers and Dave Armstrong, were crucial in my faith going from being an atheist to a very religious Roman Catholic. (2-15-18)

154) I once again find myself indebted to friend and sometimes foe Dave Armstrong. A few years ago, Dave invited me to be part of an online dialogue between Latin Catholicism and Eastern Catholicism as Orthodoxy in communion with Rome. I had first met Dave online during the rise of the Catholic apologetics movement in the 1990s. Dave’s work was instrumental in drawing me back to full communion with Rome; first as a Pentecostal, and second as an adherent to a particular branch of Latin traditionalism that at the time mistrusted the Second Vatican Council and the Roman Pontiffs elected following the council. To this end, I am forever grateful to Dave for helping me understand the beauty and necessity of full communion with the Roman Catholic Church. (Pete Vere, 3-23-18)

155) Dave, I just wanted to thank you for your interactions with me when I was a young man, and to let you know that I am going to be received into the Roman Catholic Church on the Vigil Mass for the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord next month. There was a whole litany of events that led me to the Church, but I think that, over the years, just reflecting on how badly I lost this particular debate on Baptismal Regeneration [dated 3-13-02] gradually led me to the truth on that doctrine, and then one by one the other dominoes fell. I really have to give the bulk of the credit to St. Therese of Lisieux and to the Church Fathers for bringing me into the Church, but your contribution was important as well, because you planted a seed that sprouted years down the line. (12-18-18)

156) I spent several years in the dark spiral of radical reactionaryism and sedevacantism. Your books were instrumental and pivotal in helping me see the light. (7-3-19)

***

Photo credit: Dave Armstrong: May 2000 (age 41).

***

 

2021-11-22T13:58:52-04:00

Last updated on: November 22, 2021 at 1:58 pm   By

From my 2012 book, Mass Movements: Radical Catholic Reactionaries, the New Mass, and Ecumenism , [follow the link for book and purchase information; only $2.99 as an e-book), pp. 135-153.

*****

[based on real dialogues; my opponents’ words are accurately paraphrased and italicized, and in blue. Some are radical Catholic reactionaries, some not]

New Introduction (6-2-19)

This incident, which occurred on 14 May 1999, when Pope St. John Paul II received some Muslim dignitaries, greatly scandalized the traditionalists of that time, the radical Catholic reactionaries, and many plain old orthodox Catholics who are not in either of those camps. It remains a live issue today: almost exactly twenty years later. Hence, the latest fashionable reactionary book, Infiltration, by Taylor Marshall (May 2019) takes a swipe at the late great pope:

Pope John Paul II scandalized the world when a photo surfaced of him kissing the Koran on 14 May 1999. . . . The Catholic patriarch of Babylon Raphael Bidawid was present for the meeting and [described] . . . what had transpired at this photographed meeting: “At the end of the audience the Pope bowed to the Muslim holy book the Koran, which was presented to him by the delegation and he kissed it as a sign of respect.” The Koran explicitly states that Jesus Christ is not the Son of God and that the Trinity is a false doctrine. How a pope of the Catholic Church could kiss the scriptures of Islam is unimaginable. (chapter 26)

I engaged in many vigorous debates with traditionalists (or reactionaries, depending on exactly what they believed) shortly afterwards. Some of them were fairly close friends of mine. I wanted to bring back this compendium of those dialogues, included in my second book about radical Catholic reactionaries, precisely because Taylor Marshall has again brought it to the attention of multiple thousands of people.

If you are someone who can’t conceive or imagine in your wildest dreams any possible orthodox Catholic defense of this action by Pope St. John Paul II, then this article is for you. Agree or disagree (but especially the latter), it will “stretch” and challenge you, maybe make you squirm a bit. You’ll be encouraged to think in ways that maybe you have never considered before.

I’m not a modernist. I absolutely detest it and have a web page that refutes it. I am not an indifferentist as regards other religions. I believe all that Holy Mother Church teaches.

I’m rock-solid orthodox. I adhere (as does Vatican II) firmly to “no salvation outside the Church.” I have no particular fondness or love for Islam. I am a strong proponent of liturgical reverence and tradition (attended Latin Mass for 25 years). None of those rationalizations can explain away what I write below, so don’t go there. It won’t end well for you, believe me. This is simply an honest disagreement. I have thought quite a bit about this, and analyzed it, precisely because I myself was challenged in debate to do so. But if you want to discuss my arguments here, feel free!

I also wanted to “revisit” this debate and discussion as a way of pointing out that severe and prolonged, passionate papal criticism is nothing new at all. It was going on full strength twenty years ago and earlier. I have often noted how those who are the loudest today in condemning Pope Francis for this, that, or the other (almost always wrongheadedly and on specious grounds, as I have personally discovered, because I have defended the Holy Father scores of times), are the same folks who were condemning Pope St. John Paul II back in 1999.

They hounded him all the way up to his death six years later, as some sort of crazy old loose cannon. Robert Sungenis argued with a straight face that he was supposedly a universalist (which I shot down). How soon we forget! I haven’t, because I was there, as a Catholic apologist, defending the Holy Father.

The traditionalists and reactionaries loved Pope Benedict XVI with a passion, and his pontificate was sort of their “new springtime.” They liked him because he talked a lot about liturgy (though they completely misrepresent his famous “banal” statement), allowed the Tridentine Mass to be more widely celebrated, and fought the theological liberals. But he, too, had another dreaded, despised, vastly misunderstood Assisi ecumenical conference. And then he resigned, and has refused to trash-talk his successor (as was so devoutly wished for!).

They have (like spurned lovers) become more and more disgruntled and disenchanted with him ever since that time, up to and including reactionary muckraker Michael Voris sinfully speculating that he exaggerated his illness in order to resign, which act was an abandonment of his flock and even “immoral.”

Nowadays, who is defending Benedict’s Summorum Pontificum (2007): which allowed the Old Mass to proliferate? Well, it is people like me! In 2014, I debated Peter Kwasniewski, a prominent reactionary today. He rejects that document, that reactionaries adored when it came out. I defend it. The reactionaries continue to “diss” and spurn The German Shepherd. I love and admire and respect him as much as I always have. Many reactionaries twist and turn with the wind and change colors like chameleons.

But I am the same, and am as consistent as I have ever been. I don’t follow the spirit of the age (zeitgeist), but rather, the Church and the [Holy] Spirit of the Ages. I’m not trying to be fashionable or chic or popular. I’m trying to proclaim and defend the truth, as guided by Holy Mother Church.

Anyway, we see that the previous two popes have both taken their lumps from the reactionary crowd, and not a few legitimate traditionalists too. It didn’t start with Pope Francis, and it won’t end with his death. It’s a misguided, unsavory spirit of grumbling, complaining, gossiping, detraction, naysaying. It’s always been poison: all the way back to the rebellious Jews in the wilderness. St. Paul repeatedly, vigorously condemns it. I will continue to expose and decry it, as long as I write (which will be till I drop).

I dedicate this article to the open-minded folks out there who refuse to judge and condemn human beings (let alone popes) at the drop of a hat. Give it a read; see what you think. I’m always open to further dialogue with people who are able to do it (i.e., with substance, constructively, and charitably, minus all personal attacks and ad hominem).

*****

The traditionalist objection is not that the pope was a secret Muslim, or that he apostasized. We regard the act as a highly imprudent thing to do: a thing leading to scandal; giving “proof” evangelicals who could have “photographic proof” that the pope was the antichrist and other such silly things.

But step back for a moment and consider this argument. Why was it so supposedly scandalous that he did this? Why would anti-Catholic types of Protestants think that it was such a terrible thing or conclude that the pope was the antichrist because of it?

Well, it’s because they assume that by doing it he was giving carte blanche approval to Islam. But this is exactly what is ridiculous to conclude, because clearly he does not or did not agree with everything in Islam. Nor did he think all religions are equal. It was a conciliatory, ecumenical gesture, meaning, “I respect all that is true in Islam, and it does contain much truth.” One has to take a sensible view of the event in light of what the Church teaches and what Pope St. John Paul II believed.

Catholics are routinely falsely accused of all kinds of things. What are we supposed to do? Venerating a saint through a statue is considered idolatry, as is the Eucharist itself (the Lutherans call the Mass “Baal-worship” in their confessions!). The Mass has been compared to Golden Calf worship. If we modified everything because the ignorant and misled don’t or won’t understand it, we’d have little of true theology left. This argument amounts to a distinction without a difference:

1) Why was it bad for Pope St. John Paul II to kiss the Koran?

2) Because it was imprudent and gave scandal.

3) But why would it be considered scandalous?

4) Because folks might think he was accepting all of Islam, including those elements where Catholics clearly disagree with Islam (e.g., the Trinity and incarnation and redemption), or some part of it, and then he would be like the antichrist, etc.

5) But we can accept true parts of overall false belief-systems and these things (Trinity, etc.) are clearly the things that any sensible, reasonably informed person would know that John Paul II and the Church would not ever deny.

6) Therefore the act must have meant something else.

7) And reasonably informed people could figure that out without being scandalized and horrified, in ignorant, idle speculation.

8) But nevertheless many people, including an untold multitude of reactionaries were and are immensely scandalized.

9) Why? Again, it must be because they accept fallacies such as the examples noted in #4, to some degree.

10) But #4 was not the reason for the objection, in #2.

11) This is self-contradictory.

12) Therefore, the entire objection to the act must be discarded as incoherent. One must correctly understand the intent of the act, within the existing backdrop of Catholic belief. If that is done, the objection from “imprudence” vanishes into thin air. There will always be people who misunderstand somewhat complex issues and acts. We cannot dumb down everything we do because of that.

He could have expressed love for and respect for that which is true in Islam without doing a dumb thing like that.

But doing this was precisely one way of showing love and respect that should not have been so maligned, if folks would simply try to sensibly reason through the thing in the first place. Who’s to say that other acts would not have been equally condemned, within the framework of massive reactionary miscomprehension of Catholic ecumenism? Whatever he would have done would have been lambasted. This act was particularly blasted because it had a strong visual component.

If we kiss an eccentric, sometimes sinful, and estranged aunt, does this imply that we agree with everything and anything (or even very much) about her? No, clearly not. Does it imply that all aunts are exactly the same in our estimation, and that we have equal affection for them all (to follow the analogy of all religions being equally valid)? No, of course not.

The Koran is no different. It’s making a mountain out of a molehill, and it’s all based on fallacy and profoundly muddled thinking. It’s basically, as I see it, an emotional reaction to a visible thing that was elevated to a symbol of all that is supposedly wrong with the Church today (in the eyes of reactionaries who so often make out that they know better than the Church). But since the premises underneath such detestation are thoroughly false and able to be exposed as such, this conclusion collapses under its own weight.

Numerous martyrs through the ages were killed because they wouldn’t become Muslims or (in some cases) kiss the Koran. Is it not massively contradictory and indefensible for the pope to act as he did, with the message it conveys?

This is a false equation; hence, shabby reasoning. Obviously, in a martyr situation, the Catholic is being urged to show by some sign that they renounce Christianity and accept Islam; failing to do so, they are killed. That was not the case with Pope John Paul the Great. He was making a conciliatory gesture. No one was threatening him with his life or suggesting that he deny his own faith. He voluntarily did this. So it is apples and oranges. Some outward characteristic is seized upon and and a bogus equivalence is implied that doesn’t apply.

The Koran cannot be completely true, and our Bible completely true (for they contradict each other): as a purely logical question.

Of course it contains much error, but it also contains much truth, too. For example, Muslims regard Jesus as a prophet. That’s a lot better than the Jews have historically thought. They think he was a liar, false prophet, and false messiah. Muslims revere the Blessed Virgin Mary far more than Protestants do. And for them she is the mother of a prophet, whereas for Protestants she is the mother of their Lord and Savior. But they still honor her more than they do.

Observant Muslims still have lots of children and do not contracept, whereas Protestants contracept by the hundreds of millions. Faithful Muslims are pro-life, have a proper view of the sinfulness of sexuality outside of marriage, and do not have the huge problem with, for example, pornography, as we do in the west. Millions of Protestants and Catholics do not practice traditional sexual morality.

There is plenty of truth in this religion (and plenty of hypocrisy and sinfulness in how we Christians practice ours). But all our friend can see is falsehood and wickedness in Islam and its holy book.

Kissing the Koran sends a message that Islam is the equal of Christianity. He himself didn’t believe that and was probably just trying to offer a sign of respect. But the action says it.

This shoddy argument is a textbook case of the fallacious chain of logic I illustrated above in my 12-point “flow chart”. Let me analyze it a little differently this time (a variation on a theme):

1) The pope in all likelihood had no bad intent; he was probably just trying to show respect.

2) Intelligent, informed observers (like our friend) can figure this out, and know that the pope did not intend to send a message that Islam is equal to Christianity in truth.

3) Yet less informed, ignorant people who don’t know what Catholics teach about the One True Faith will nevertheless get this impression.

4) So it is a scandal to do what ignorant people don’t grasp, but what intelligent people do grasp. Thus, we must never do such things. We must dumb down our faith and actions to the lowest common denominator (clueless people who can’t interpret acts within their larger contexts and frameworks of previously established truths).

5) Therefore, we cannot believe in the communion of saints, papal infallibility, the Immaculate Conception, the Assumption, penance, purgatory, transubstantiation, infused justification, prayer for the dead, original sin, even trinitarianism and the divinity of Christ, etc., because lots of ignorant and misinformed people do not understand them, and it causes scandal.

6) Ergo, Catholicism and for that matter, Nicene Christianity, are false, because they cause scandal among those who don’t comprehend them. We can’t do or believe what causes scandal, and that includes all of Catholicism that is different from Protestantism and non-Christian religions, and all of larger Christianity that is incomprehensible to outsiders.

Huh?! There’s the reductio ad absurdum, folks: the ridiculous conclusion that follows logically from premises that one’s dialogical opponent holds. The false premise is clearly #4: the notion that one mustn’t do an act that informed folks know doesn’t mean what ignorant people take it to mean: because the ignorant will be scandalized. If we accept this, the absurd conclusion follows. Therefore, we reject the premise in #4 as false, and the objection to kissing the Koran (closely scrutinized, according to what its own proponents say about it) collapses.

I think far too many people are hyper-critical of Pope St. John Paul II. I don’t think it’s that difficult to give him the benefit of the doubt when we don’t understand something that he does. You cite the pope’s words in his book about Islam, but then (apparently) draw the conclusion that he contradicted himself. I don’t do that at all. I reason that since he has expressed himself about it (and the Catholic view is clear, anyway), then the kiss obviously was not meant in a sense of total agreement. I interpret the act in terms of the rest of what we already know. I don’t conclude that he must therefore be an indifferentist and a liberal.

We mustn’t have a zeal at all costs to defend the pope as if he were utterly incapable of acting scandalously. I agree that the kiss didn’t signify total agreement. But it was scandalous due to the likelihood that it would be widely misunderstood.

This is a serious charge. Let me make a series of analogical arguments (my favorite kind). See what you think of this: Are not a lot of things in the Catholic Church gigantically misunderstood? If we stopped doing and believing things for that reason, we could do little except be “mere Christians” and “skeletal Christians,” as I like to call a certain sort of minimalistic, least-common-denominator sort of Christianity. The Marian doctrines are severely misunderstood.

Should we, then, not proclaim them, and refuse to participate in Marian devotion? Should we totally rule out the possibility of the pope defining Mary-Mediatrix for that reason (and I speak as an “inopportunist” myself, though I accept the doctrine). And you know that Jesus was often misunderstood. One could make a similar argument of, “why did Jesus do that?” — say, forgiving the adulteress, or turning the tables in the Temple — “It was terrible PR…,” etc.

The Koran doesn’t deserve to be kissed in the first place. It has within its pages many falsehoods and even blasphemous teachings.

You have agreed that a kiss didn’t suggest carte blanche approval, so again, it would merely mean acceptance of those things which are true in the Koran, per Vatican II directives on ecumenism, and John Paul II’s many comments in this vein. In other words, his actions have to be interpreted in light of his overall teaching, and that of the Church, as crystallized especially in Vatican II.

But I argued that the act suggested a wider approval (even though not meant) to lots of people who aren’t equipped to make very fine distinctions that you have to draw in order to defend it.

And that’s why I introduced the analogy of doctrine which is misunderstood by the masses also. A full-blown Mariology (even already defined Marian doctrines) “suggests” a bunch of false ideas to a bunch of folks, too. And it does no matter how many times it is explained.

It’s also difficult to determine exactly what such a kiss means. We Catholics see books kissed when the Gospels are read in church. But if this instance doesn’t mean the same thing, what does it mean?

What I said above; just as kissing the ground or perhaps a dignitary (in some cultures) does not mean total approval of that person or his country either. If it did, then there could be scarcely little diplomacy at all, could there? If every handshake, hug, or kiss meant what you have to imply for your argument to succeed, we would never end any wars (by diplomatic means) or have any treaties. Did the pope shake hands with Castro when he visited Cuba? I assume that he did. I doubt that I could have done so myself, but then I am not a world leader, whose job requires such delicate gestures at times, for the sake of peace, unity, and understanding.

What if the Holy Father had incensed the Koran?

Incensing doesn’t have any analogy outside of the liturgy (save for perhaps Satanic rituals?), whereas kissing does.

The kiss had the potential of scandalizing the faithful as well as the ignorant. Why do it at all? It was imprudent and highly confusing. We don’t have a way of knowing what such a gesture that we see in the Mass means in another context. What else would be analogous to it?

Well, I will kiss my own book when I finally see it in print… [this was written in 1999]. Seriously, though, it is conceivable that one could kiss a book in a variety of contexts, such as finding an ancient manuscript, or an author-signed copy of some significant literary piece, or the long-lost diary of a deceased loved one, etc.

I agree that the liturgical analogy would probably first come to mind, for anyone familiar with Christian liturgy, but I have said all along that this particular gesture had to be understood in the context of Vatican II, Catholic teaching in general, and John Paul’s writings. It would be wonderful if every single thing we did or said was perfectly understood by everyone, but this isn’t possible.

Kissing a letter is usually in a context of the letter-writer being near and dear to someone’s heart. Is that what was conveyed about the Koran?

We’ve already gone through what I think he meant.

Very few would think that shaking hands with Castro implies agreement with Communism.

I wouldn’t be so fast to conclude that. Look, e.g., what is written about the Concordats with the Nazis (Hitler’s Pope and all that rotgut). Many people assume that all diplomacy (and, for that matter, ecumenism) is a manifestation of inherent corruption, compromise, or conspiracy.

Hardly anyone will interpret it according to your take.

Again, I think you vastly exaggerate. I agree that my explanation requires some analysis, thought, and “fine distinctions,” but then I think that is how Catholicism is in general. It is a thinking man’s religion, highly nuanced and multi-tiered, not a simpleton’s, sloganistic religion, like fundamentalism, or Jehovah’s Witnesses. This is part of its glory, in my opinion. How many of the “masses,” e.g., understood the importance of homoousion or the debates over the will / wills of Christ, or about iconoclasm or the filioque? Not many, yet these were central issues of ecumenical councils.

Ecumenism is complex and much misunderstood as well. It is somewhat of a “tricky business” (in the right sense). We see that from the fatuous objections to it, from otherwise very thoughtful and intelligent people (I think of R.C. Sproul and the ECT agreements in particular).

Such an act 1) keeps the ignorant in their ignorance, 2) comforts and aids enemies of the faith, and 3) demoralizes the faithful. This gesture most naturally implies the meaning given it in the only context in which it occurs, the liturgy. It’s an uphill battle to deny that it’ll be interpreted in light of the established meaning of the gesture in the liturgy. This makes it an especially imprudent act.

You have articulately stated your case. I remain unpersuaded. I think that the burden is on you at this point is to tell me what you think the Holy Father meant when he did this; what his intent was, and the prudential calculation he made. You argue that it is so obviously scandalous, etc. Are you determined to assert that this pope, the head of the Church, the vicar of Christ, was so obtuse and “out of it” that he could perform an act that you and some others immediately find intrinsically unwise, one that aids the enemies of the Church, and “demoralizes the faithful,” etc. — that he could perform this and not see what you see so clearly?

The choices are few at this point (the inner logic of your claim confines you): either he was so dense that these factors never entered his mind, or he knew full well the scandal it would bring about, and did it anyway, or he is a dupe of the liberals, or one himself, determined to corrupt — indeed betray — the Church. You say it is such a terrible thing, so tell me what you think was going through his mind when he did it? Are you prepared to maintain that the pope, who — I think it is indisputable — has attained a sublime level of spirituality, did this with scarcely any thought as to consequence; in fact, engaged in an act of wanton irresponsibility and outrageousness?

My view, on the other hand, is entirely different. Assuming, as I do, that the pope knows far more than I do, that he is led by the Holy Spirit, for the purpose of guiding the Church in a singular fashion, and that his record more than amply bears this out, I interpret the act within the backdrop of all else that he has done, and in light of Vatican II and Church teaching. I don’t have a problem with this particular gesture (aside from agreeing that it would be helpful for him to explain it in more detail), but even if I did, I can’t imagine bringing forth the accusations that you have brought to the table. I find them, frankly, rash and somewhat extreme.

My opinion is that the Holy Father knew full well what he is doing, that he exercised due prudence, and that he obviously thought the gesture (like Assisi) was more than worth the misunderstanding that might arise from it (I have already discussed how Jesus was so misunderstood: this is no novel concept in Christianity). And even if I were perplexed and aggravated and “demoralized” by this, I would give the pope the benefit of the doubt as to prudence and propriety, because I trust him, and the God who leads him and grants him the necessary charisms to lead the Church. I would far more readily question my own understanding, rather than the pope’s supposed terrible lack of judgment.

I find your scenario (irregardless of the feasibility of mine) utterly implausible. What it would lead someone to believe about the character of this pope stretches credulity to the breaking point, in my opinion. Or perhaps you will submit as an explanation that he might be senile? His recent writings do not support that conclusion. Quite the contrary!

True, I would find that substantially more strange if he had incensed the Koran (interesting hypothetical). I guess we just have a different interpretation and reaction. I continue to maintain that the misunderstandings will occur no matter what, per my analogical examples. I do agree, however, that it would be helpful to explain these things in detail, so as to put to rest some of the murmurings and confusion. We do agree to that extent.

I’m glad to hear that you think further explanation is warranted.

As for prudence, that is a judgment call, and though it might be a close call in this case, I say the pope is in a better position to determine that than you or I. God sees absolutely everything and how it works together; the pope sees quite a bit more than the rest of us, in terms of earthly authority and spirituality. It’s a relative thing in that sense.

Muslims were happy to see it, of course. But what does it say to them? Will they draw all these fine distinctions you propose?

Every Muslim knows that Catholicism disagrees with their doctrine! That doesn’t take much knowledge.

I think they will respond like many others have, and think that Catholic doctrines are no longer believed. It fosters indifferentism. It is the ones less educated that the pope should be all the more careful not to mislead.

To extend your principle, are we to go back to refusing to ever associate with Protestants or pray together, etc. (the usual status quo, pre-Vatican II), because all this implies indifferentism, and is misinterpreted, and exploited by the liberals for their own insidious ends? I think not. The Church has grown in its approach, and we cannot go back to the “fortress mentality” which reigned for hundreds of years, as an overreaction to the onslaught of Protestantism, the “Enlightenment,” and modernism.

We are strong and confident enough to readily and gladly agree with true aspects of our opponents’ beliefs, while continuing to strongly disagree with others. I, for one, am very happy that this change has occurred. It underlies and supports much of my own longstanding evangelistic and apologetic approach, and I think it is far more biblical (and effective) than the other “triumphalist” and fundamentally “hyper-defensive” perspective.

These things will always be misunderstood by some, even many, and yes, even among the faithful. You and I know that Vatican II was a good thing, and that it brought about needed changes. But how many “men on the street” have the slightest inkling as to the nature of the spiritually beneficial developments of Vatican II? Even otherwise orthodox and informed Catholics have silly and stupid, caricatured ideas of what the council was about, as if it were solely responsible for the modernist crisis in the Church.

If they can’t figure it out, do you expect Joe Public or the cafeteria or nominal Catholic to do so? And that brings me back to my constant claim: that Catholicism is almost never simple to understand, and that this is not something unusual, or something which should alarm or surprise us.

Surely the pope must have known that his action would be used to promote an indifferentism that it was his duty to guard against.

But all ecumenism does that in many minds, as I have repeatedly observed. There is no easy way out. A certain mindset will never understand ecumenism and attempted unity / brotherhood — while not compromising principle.

The early heretics provide a certain imperfect analogy. One could cite, e.g., earlier fathers whose take on Christology more approximated the Monophysites than the Chalcedonians. The Church took a stand in 451 and was rejected by the many non-Chalcedonian strands of Christianity. Obviously, the Church thought it was worth it. Likewise, many Christians were turned off by Trent, and it hardened their resistance. They misunderstood it too, no doubt. In any event, it made them resolved to remain Protestants.

Vatican I (1870) alienated the Old Catholics (not to mention the Orthodox) because it defined papal infallibility. Not direct analogies, I know, but I am trying to show that there are never easy solutions, where the masses are concerned. In a very real and tragic sense (but unavoidably), there are always inevitable “losses” whenever a stand is taken by the Church at all.

We are now “standing” for ecumenism with much more emphasis, per another ecumenical council. And there are casualties in that scenario. It’s too bad. But what are we to do? Go back to the “fortress”? Jesus lost many disciples, too, when He explained the Holy Eucharist in graphic detail (John 6). Was He, too, providing aid and comfort to the enemy: since many of these souls may have subsequently been lost? The Judaizers were lost not much later, and so on with all heretics throughout history. I think you ask for the impossible.

You spoke of underlying principles which you are fighting for, which explained your vigor of argument. I appreciate and respect that, and I know that you have only the most honorable of motives. I would hope that the same applies to me, too. I see principles, also, behind all of these things, so that my argument is about far more than one gesture, which so offends you.

With no explanation whatsoever given, how can we know what this action was intended to mean?

Short of a specific explanation (which I agree would be helpful), I still say that Vatican II and other teachings on ecumenism and comparative religion should suffice for someone who truly wants to know beyond the rumor-mongering or trivial level. I see a lot of parallelism with Mariology. One could find a thousand statements in Marian devotion which (isolated and taken out of context) sound blatantly idolatrous (e.g., the line “our sweetness, our hope” in the Hail Holy Queen). They must be understood in the overall context of a Mariology thoroughly grounded in a Christological milieu.

Likewise with ecumenism: very much so. Every conciliatory and “unitive” act must be understood within the prior assumption of theological and philosophical differences. These are presupposed throughout, whereas in indifferentism they are cast to the wind. True, the outsider can’t always know this from observation, but truth is sometimes complex; what can I say? Catholicism requires thought. There is no way out of it. We are often pilloried and slandered. You know which state of affairs more closely approximates that of our Lord Jesus Himself.

I submit that the pope knew full well the potential for scandal among some, but did a “prudential calculation” and thought it worth it, for the good that would come from it in the ecumenical / diplomatic sense. What I have a very hard time with is the idea that the pope does something scandalous or flat-out stupid without apparently giving it much thought at all, as if he is an irresponsible old man, a loose cannon, so to speak: oblivious to circumstance and the perception of others. Pope John Paul II is an extremely wise and holy man, and I don’t believe for a second that he doesn’t carefully consider everything that he does.

I certainly agree that he’s not a subversive or a simpleton. But I can’t figure out how to defend his kissing of the Koran.

Well, I’ve given it my best shot. If nothing else, maybe at least you will see how it possibly could be defended, whether or not I persuade you.

Luther judged the Church and the pope of his time in this fashion. People make those sorts of arguments with God, too. How does God regard that? He makes His views known in no uncertain terms at the end of the book of Job. If people treat God in that fashion, then surely they will treat the earthly head of the Church in the same fashion. But that doesn’t make it right or proper or pious.

When popes have been rebuked by saints in the past (rightly so) it was due to far more weighty matters than being “scandalized” by the ecumenical gathering at Assisi, or a gesture of respect and conciliation towards Muslims. The tacit assumption that we have the right to rebuke popes, therefore this is such an instance, falls flat, I think. This is not at all such an instance, in my opinion.

The pope also kisses the ground in America, I believe, and other countries when he enters them. Does that mean he sanctions abortion or the presidency of Clinton, with all that it represents? Clearly not. These are diplomatic gestures, out of charity and good will, not exhaustive doctrinal agreement.

Kissing the ground of a country is understood (being happy to be there). No one thinks it means agreement with all that goes on in the same country. But kissing a sacred book means to venerate it (and even worse: this is reserved for the Gospels in the Mass).

I don’t accept your analogy as a valid or plausible one. Why is it unreasonable or improper for me to make the analogy to kissing the ground (with all that that means and doesn’t mean), while it is reasonable for you to make an analogy to kissing the gospels in the Mass? I would maintain that the more fitting or obvious analogy is to another country, since we are dealing with another religion, and indeed another supposed “revelation.” Meeting with Muslims is nothing like a Mass at all.

The act simply can’t mean what you think it means (for many people) if one knows anything about Catholic theology. I say the problem resides in the ignorance of theology and Catholic ecumenism, not in the pope’s supposed imprudence.

But who is to decide these things? Must we judge the pope’s actions in such a wholly subjective fashion? I think that in all such instances the benefit of the doubt must be given the pope — if nothing else, simply by virtue of his exalted office (and our own lowly position in the Church and overall scheme of things).

But beyond that, Pope St. John Paul II is not only just a pope; he is an extraordinary pope: quite possibly only the third pope to be proclaimed “Great.” All the more reason to assume he has good reasons for what he does (or at least that the reason is not simplistic and trivial, in any event).

I submit that those who understand the liturgy would be more likely to understand the Church’s position on ecumenical gestures and agreements, and to have read Vatican II. I think they would be less likely to interpret the pope’s action here in such a “hostile” or “judgmental” manner.

So it merely means, “I agree with what is true in the Koran, but not with what I think is false”?

Basically, yes. What else could it possibly mean? Assuming this is what he meant, that would be scarcely more than Vatican II has already stated.

Isn’t that tautological?

No, it is a truism (within the context of Catholic ecumenical theology). You are the one claiming that it might imply indifferentism in the minds of weak observers. But applying that result to the intrinsic nature of the act is as fraught with difficulties as the position that Vatican II is inherently modernist and heterodox.

How would we know that the pope hadn’t changed his mind about Islam?

Why do some Catholics eat meat on Fridays now? And how can they call priests “father”? And how can the pope wear his regal regalia, when Christ was poor? And how can the Church be so wealthy, with starving people? And there is “one mediator.” And Christ is killed at every Mass, etc., etc., ad nauseam. I’m supposed to determine matters of principle based on how the ignorant will react? That would make me a politician, a used car salesman, or a sideshow barker, not a Christian apologist!

Who cares what they think (in terms of ultimate decisions and the adoption of beliefs)? We make our case as intelligently and simply and charitably as we can: let the chips fall where they may. Christianity is not a game of PR. I constantly fought that in evangelical ranks. The lack of it in Catholicism was yet another thing which really attracted and impressed me.

Are you happy that the pope made such an “ecumenical” gesture or do you think he shouldn’t have done so?

I trust that he thought it was of spiritual and (inter-religious) relational benefit, or else he wouldn’t have done it. That is how I would put it. I don’t wish he wouldn’t have done it, due to this trust, and acknowledgment of his lofty office, even though I wouldn’t have done it. But that’s part of the point: who am I, anyway? We should be extremely slow to judge a pope. I don’t think any of the saints who have done so throughout history would disagree with that for a second.

You act as if every charitable gesture has to be exhaustive in explanation all by itself. That is unreasonable and impossible. You require far too much. The Church has already spoken on these matters, and anyone who truly desires to know what she has said, can go and find out for themselves.

I see no good outcome at all from this action.

What if it (theoretically) stopped a war? Would that be a valuable end? Would you rather be a Crusader going in to do battle with Muslims, or a St. Francis of Assisi, who tried to talk to them, did miracles, and profoundly impressed Muslims in so doing? An easy choice for me….

I just think you are reading far more into this act than is necessary. And that is how you should argue it to outsiders. Tell them that instead of seeking to find contradictories here, they should give the benefit of the doubt and think in terms of harmony with Catholic ecumenism in general. I find no difficulty doing that myself, I don’t feel that I am playing word games, or rationalizing, or special pleading.

In fact, much the same occurs with the Bible. As you well know, many agnostics and others casually assume that the Bible contains contradictions (the Old Testament “god” is evil,” etc.). They assume that as if it were beyond all dispute, but we believe (know?) that it is perfectly able to be harmonized, by virtue of a deeper understanding of theology, exegesis, and hermeneutics. I say that with a deeper understanding of ecumenism, the current “difficulties” vanish. Explain it to the people who are “scandalized,” yes. But inherently wrong or even imprudent? No.

Would you defend his actions if he had incensed the Koran?

This is beside the point because my argument wasn’t — strictly speaking — that liturgical gestures cease to have that connotation altogether when performed elsewhere, but rather, that certain gestures (in this case, a kiss) have a wider “application” than just the liturgy, so that the analogy to the liturgy is not “exclusive.”

Genuflecting, for example (apart from the sign of the cross) is similar to curtseying or bowing before a king. There is overlap. I would agree with you that it would be good for him to explain the action to the very people who are likely to misunderstand it, but even so I don’t say the action itself was necessarily wrong or even imprudent.

We Catholics always talk about how popes are infallible, not impeccable, but when it is a pope in our own time we tend to lose that theoretical perspective and often try to defend everything said or done, even when it is unwarranted.

That’s not how I am approaching this. My contention is that this action was not imprudent (let alone sinful), but rather, vastly misunderstood. And I wonder why that is. I don’t believe it is that difficult to figure out. You imply that Vatican II forbids ecumenical-type gestures towards the Muslims. How, then, do you explain Nostra Aetate 3? It states in part:

The Church has also a high regard for the Muslims. They worship God… They strive to submit themselves without reserve to the hidden decrees of God… The sacred Council now pleads with all to forget the past [i.e., the armed conflicts, etc.], and urges that a sincere effort be made to achieve mutual understanding….

I have tried to show [more on this below] that the council did clearly permit such activities. Why is it not possible that the pope was simply acknowledging in a dramatic fashion, the good things we recognize in Islam, such as those above, and others listed in the same passage? We don’t hold that Islam is evil through and through.

Vatican II set the parameters of ecumenism.

Yes. I already cited a passage from it, regarding the Muslims. Here are three more statements from Nostra Aetate (Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions):

The Church, therefore, urges her sons to enter with prudence and charity into discussion and collaboration with members of other religions. (2)

The sacred Council now pleads with all to forget the past, and urges that a sincere effort be made to achieve mutual understanding; for the benefit of all men, let them together preserve and promote peace, liberty, social justice and moral values. (3)

Since Christians and Jews have such a common spiritual heritage, this sacred Council wishes to encourage and further mutual understanding and appreciation. This can be obtained, especially, by way of biblical and theological enquiry and through friendly discussions. (4)

***
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2021-11-22T13:57:37-04:00

Last updated on: November 22, 2021 at 1:57 pm   By

Dave Gass was an evangelical pastor for some forty years. He took to Twitter recently [but he has now restricted access] — starting on 4-30-19 — in order to proclaim that he had forsaken Christianity. I make replies to his claims below. His words will be in blue. I have no beef with him saying he’s sorry to his former congregants, etc., and so I will not critique those sorts of statements; only reasons he gives for his decision.

*****

For those of you who want to yell at me, that’s fine. I know that many will call me an apostate, say I was never really saved, that I was a wolf in sheeps clothing, and that a hotter hell awaits me. And to you I say I love you. My heart is tender toward you.

No one can definitively know those things. Even John Calvin taught that no one knows for sure who is among the elect. We know from the Bible (i.e., those of us who accept its inspiration and status as a revelation) that there is such a thing as a wolf in sheep’s clothing. We can’t know for sure if Dave is or was that. He is an apostate, which means, former Christian or one who has rejected Christianity. That’s uncontroversial.

Most Christians throughout history have believed that one can fall from grace or salvation; can lose salvation. I believed that as an evangelical, and I do now as a Catholic. So I need not deny that Dave was ever a Christian. I assume that he truly was one. There is also a real hell that awaits those who know that God exists and that Christianity is true, and who reject both. We can’t know for sure that Dave is headed for this hell. He may be; he may not be (he could return to faith again, for all we know).

Nor do I have to “yell” at him.  My job as a Christian apologist is (for others’ sake) to demonstrate how nothing he says refutes Christianity or provides sufficient warrant for him to forsake the faith, and (for his sake) to charitably try to persuade him of his errors, if he is willing to listen.

Eventually I pulled the lever and dropped the bomb. Career, marriage, family, social standing, network, reputation, all gone in an instant. And honestly I didn’t intend to fully walk away, but the way the church turned on me forced me to leave permanently.

Well, I would have to know more about the details of how “the church turned on” Dave, to make an informed comment.

I was a part of a system that enslaves people, and I was both a slave and a slave driver. We called chains freedom, and misery happiness. We had impossible standards that we could not meet so we turned the attention on others so the spotlight wasn’t on our own inadequacies.

That’s an extraordinary accusation to make, and it does not describe true Christianity or the best that can be found in Christianity. It’s ridiculously broad and thus has little meaning. For those who don’t like God’s laws and moral precepts, I suppose it would feel a bit like being a slave. But the question then becomes: why don’t they like them? What is it about God’s revelation and Christian teaching that is so terrible, so as to feel oppressive rather than freeing? A simple broad statement like this has little content to examine.

I agree that Christian standards are impossible to meet: under our own power. This is precisely why we have grace and the Holy Spirit to give us the power and ability to abide by Christian teachings. All Christians agree on that. But if those are spurned (which are the result of sin and rebellion, or false premises leading to an intellectual rejection), then this would be a serious problem, and we wouldn’t be able to live out the faith. Dave wants to blame God and the Christian system for that shortcoming. I would tend to suspect that the root of the problem lies somewhere in him.

I learned that love is real. That acceptance is possible. That life is vibrant and full. But the church burdens people with fear, shame, and guilt, all for the purpose of maintaining control. I now see the church as a system perfectly curated to control people and culture.

Again, such super-broad statements are difficult to critique, or for Dave to prove. On the surface, they appear to me to be over-emotional and irrational. The last sentence seems to come right out of standard anti-theist-type atheist talking points. “We are what we eat.” If Dave started reading anti-theist polemics, then he would start to change his thinking, until one day everything just snapped, and he felt that atheism was more plausible than Christianity.

There are millions of us who have found an inner peace and joy and fulfillment in Christianity that we have fond nowhere else. We’re happy. We have no reason to leave. Quite the contrary. Our experience is not Dave’s. I was a practical atheist / non-practicing Christian / occult enthusiast for ten years. I certainly was nowhere near as happy and personally fulfilled as I have been since committing my life to Jesus. Dave has his experience; we have ours.

During this time I also found something amazing: I found a handful of people who were more Christian than any Christian I had ever met – and they weren’t Christian. I found love in places where love wasn’t supposed to exist. I found acceptance among people who were godless.

One can find good people in any belief-system. I suppose this would also entail defining what Dave thinks is “Christian” and “love.”

Eventually I could not maintain the facade anymore, I started to have mental and emotional breaks.

And how is that all God’s fault, or Christianity’s fault? It’s not specific enough. It just sounds like atheist talking points and saying what his new “choir”: the atheists –, love to hear.

My internal stress started to show in physical symptoms. Being a pastor – a professional Christian – was killing me.

There are many possible reasons for that: none of which necessarily stem from God or Christianity, rightly understood. He could have gotten a raw deal from certain Christians, who sinned and mistreated him. Maybe he was in the wrong profession in the first place, which would be highly stressful. We don’t have enough information. But a certain number of Christian sinners don’t disprove Christianity at all, just as the atheists (at least the ones politically to the left) always tell us that Stalin and Mao and Marxist atheism doesn’t mean that all atheists or Marxism / Communism are that way. 

This massive cognitive dissonance – my beliefs not matching with reality – created a separation between my head and my heart. I was gaslighting myself to stay in the faith.

Once again it’s too vague to be able to critique. He has to offer objective and not just subjective reasons at some point.

I spent my entire life serving, loving, and trying to help people in my congregations. And the lies, betrayal, and slander I have received at the hands of church people left wounds that may never heal.

What happened? But even if terrible things did happen and he was wronged, this is no disproof of Christianity or God. It’s proof that Christians are sinners like everyone else and capable of great sin: which is what Christianity taught all along.

And the entire system is rife with abuse. And not just from the top down, sure there are abusive church leaders, but church leaders are abused by their congregants as well.

And there is nary a ray of light or hope anywhere in the whole system? He expects us to believe that this is true of the entirety of a billion Christians? If it were truly that bad he would have never devoted 40 years of his life to the pastorate. That would only have proven that he was virtually self-deluded and acting irrationally the whole time: if we accept his report of universal sin and drudgery and bondage and cruelty, etc.

All the while, the experience I had within the church was that a lot (granted, not all) people use the church for power and influence. Many involved people in churches use it as their small kingdom for personal control and ego.

This is better: finally a qualification. Some Christians do indeed fall into those sins, and others don’t do this. Of course it’s patently obvious that any large social group will have good- and bad-behaving people in it. All this amounts to saying, then, is “there are good and bad people on the earth, and I’ve personally run across a lot of bad ones.” We already knew that. So his claim is that other huge social groups are exponentially better than Christian ones? I don’t think so. That’s just not reality or the real world.

An inescapable reality that I came to was that the people who benefited the most from organized religion were the fringe attenders who didn’t take it too seriously. The people who were devout were the most miserable, but just kept trying harder.

That’s the exact opposite of my experience and that of millions of other Christians, and also the opposite of many secular social studies showing that the most devout, observant Christians are happier and more fulfilled: even including their sexual and marital happiness. That ain’t just Christians saying it (what we would expect): it’s social science.

I traveled on speaking teams, preached to thousands of teenagers at a time, wrote blogs, was published, formed curriculum, taught workshops, was an up-and-comer reforming my denomination. The whole time hoping at some point it would click, and become true for me.

So he did all this for forty years, not believing it was true? That would be deceptive. It sounds like he was trying to coast along on his own power, and this is precisely what Christianity itself teaches is impossible (that would be the heresy of Pelagianism, or salvation by our own self-generated works, apart from the grace that alone can enable good works and salvation). Something’s gotta give there. But he was responsible for actually believing what he was teaching others, instead of playing some game of going through the motions (and getting paid by his congregants). If that’s the sort of “dual life” that he has been leading all these years, I can certainly see how he could grow tired of it.

But the blame lies on him, not God, or the Christian system. He wants to blame God. No one forced him at gunpoint to be a pastor or to do all this stuff. I do what I do as an apologist (in some form for 38 years now) because I absolutely love it and  believe 100% in what I am doing, and believe with every fiber of my being that God called me to it. I don’t have to pretend that I am something I am not.

I pastored mega churches & tiny churches. I did college ministry, camp ministry, youth ministry, music ministry, preaching ministry, church planting – everything in the church except work in the nursery. And what I saw was people desperate for the system to work for them.

Yeah, he did a lot of stuff. Jesus said there were people who did all kinds of things and called Him “Lord, Lord” yet were never among His flock to begin with. We don’t know if Dave is in that category, but it’s not an impossibility. All those ostensibly good works and sacrificial service don’t necessarily prove anything. And was it truly out of love? St. Paul observed:

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. [2] And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. [3] If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 

My devoutly christian parents were abusive,

Was that God and Christianity’s fault, or theirs?

my marriage was a sham,

Was that God and Christianity’s fault, or his and/or his wife’s?

prayer was never answered, miracles were never performed. People died, children rebelled, marriages failed, addictions occurred – all at the same rate as non believers. The system just doesn’t work.

That was his experience. It is not that of many millions of Christians. Just in my own family,  my wife and I and our oldest son Paul have all experienced healing. 

In 40 years I never witnessed a single event that was supernatural. Not one. Time and again I watched people die of cancer. I did funerals for 47 people from the age of 4 to 96. I prayed in faith with hundreds of people for healing to no avail. god didn’t answer prayers.

So what does this prove? People die; therefore, Christianity isn’t true? How much longer was the 96-year-old supposed to live, in order for Dave to believe that it wasn’t God’s fault that he or she died? It becomes absurd . . . Miracles are always very rare by nature. But they do exist. And there is plenty of documentation for them: some of which I have written about.

The more I read and studied the scriptures the more questions I had. Literally from the first chapter to the last, so many problems. And the more I learned about how the scriptures were canonized, the less I could believe in the “inerrancy” model that I had to espouse.

At last he finally provides some objective reason for his apostasy. The atheists can provide hundreds of supposed biblical contradictions. I’ve dealt with dozens of them, and they are uniformly unimpressive. But if one keeps reading their stuff along those lines, one will tend to start believing it. Loss of faith has to be coddled and cultivated. It’s a long process.

I’ve written about canonization, and see nothing in that process that would be a knockout punch against biblical inspiration or Christianity.

I devoured all the “christian apologetics” books that came out, and none of them answered my questions regarding the nature of god and the problems I found within the Scriptures. I found these books to be trite, dismissive, and full of pseudo science and evidence.

None of them helped in the slightest. They were complete bunk, and anti-science to boot. This is becoming ludicrous and ridiculous. It’s the refuge of the person who has few effective arguments, to make absurd generalizations of this sort.

I was fully devoted to studying the scriptures. I think I missed maybe 12 Sundays in 40 years. I had completely memorized 18 books of the bible and was reading through the bible for the 24th time when I walked away.

Yeah, we know . . . already answered.

As an adult my marriage was a sham and a constant source of pain for me. I did everything I was supposed to – marriage workshops, counseling, bible reading together, date nights every week, marriage books – but my marriage never became what I was promised it would be.

But that wasn’t Dave’s fault at all. After all, he did all he could! Much easier to blame God and one’s faith community, isn’t it?

I was raised in a hyper-fundamentalist family, and it felt good to be in a system that promised all the answer and solutions to life. The problem is, the system didn’t work. The promises were empty. The answers were lies.

Ah, now we may finally have gotten to the real root of the problem. I have long noted how so many atheist deconverts were from a fundamentalist background. They then equate fundamentalism with all of Christianity. In fact it is an anti-intellectual, stunted fringe offshoot of one portion (evangelicals) of a minority (Protestantism) of all Christianity (which also includes Catholicism and Orthodoxy). It ain’t the whole ball of wax. And I get sick and tired of folks who leave this system, pretending that it represents Christianity as a whole. It does not.

***

While I was writing this — almost finished –, Dave restricted access to his Twitter account to followers only. I saw that he had mentioned that he read Greek philosophy early on and that the seeds of doubt planted “never went away.” This was exactly my point. He never fully believed in Christianity, yet he was willing to be in that system as a pastor, supported financially by those who did believe. So maybe they found out at length this two-faced, intellectually dishonest existence he had been leading, and were not pleased, and some (being flawed human beings, as we all are) acted sinfully, and maybe others simply rebuked him; but he took all of it as sinful, traitorous treatment.

And so he rejects the Christian community as a whole. It sure sounds like sour grapes: he wants to blame them and God and the Bible (and fundamentalism) for many things which were in fact his fault. I’m just going by his own report and making conclusions: admittedly speculative, but not, I don’t think, beyond possibility or plausibility.

But once again, we see nothing compelling whatsoever here to lead anyone else to believe that Christianity must be false, and that God doesn’t exist. I see a lot of griping, grumbling, blame-shifting, broad-brushing, straw men, and rationalizing self-justification. He never believed in it the entire time; hence, he wrote: “The whole time hoping at some point it would click, and become true for me.”

So now he offers up atheist talking points and preaching to the atheist choir (who predictably respond with their droning, clone-like “rah-rahs”). He will get plenty of praise and adulation there, and if this is what he seeks, then he’ll be happy as a pig in mud. We all love to be admired and acclaimed, don’t we? But it’s not the lasting, inner peace and joy and fulfillment that true, full-bodied Christianity offers: Christianity that he never seems to have either understood or experienced, because he was within mere fundamentalism, and tried to do things on his own power, minus the Holy Spirit and grace, which is how God always intended it to be.

May he yet discover true Christianity and the true God by God’s grace.

***
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Practical Matters: Perhaps some of my 3,900+ free online articles (the most comprehensive “one-stop” Catholic apologetics site) or fifty books have helped you (by God’s grace) to decide to become Catholic or to return to the Church, or better understand some doctrines and why we believe them.
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Photo credit: [Max Pixel / Creative Commons Zero – CC0 license]

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2019-04-20T13:42:04-04:00

Last updated on: April 20, 2019 at 1:42 pm   By

Atheist and anti-theist Bob Seidensticker, who was “raised Presbyterian”, runs the influential Cross Examined blog. He asked me there, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He also made a general statement on 6-22-17: “Christians’ arguments are easy to refute . . . I’ve heard the good stuff, and it’s not very good.” He added in the combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” 

Such confusion would indeed be predictable, seeing that Bob himself admitted (2-13-16): “My study of the Bible has been haphazard, and I jump around based on whatever I’m researching at the moment.” I’m always one to oblige people’s wishes if I am able, so I decided to do a series of posts in reply. It’s also been said, “be careful what you wish for.”  If Bob responds to this post, and makes me aware of it, his reply will be added to the end along with my counter-reply. If you don’t see that, rest assured that he either hasn’t replied, or didn’t inform me that he did. But don’t hold your breath.

Bob (for the record) virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. But by 10-3-18, following massive, childish name-calling attacks against me,  encouraged by Bob on his blog (just prior to his banning me from it), his opinion was as follows: “Dave Armstrong . . . made it clear that a thoughtful intellectual conversation wasn’t his goal. . . . [I] have no interest in what he’s writing about.”

And on 10-25-18, utterly oblivious to the ludicrous irony of his making the statement, Bob wrote in a combox on his blog: “The problem, it seems to me, is when someone gets these clues, like you, but ignores them. I suppose the act of ignoring could be deliberate or just out of apathy, but someone who’s not a little bit driven to investigate cognitive dissonance will just stay a Christian, fat ‘n sassy and ignorant.” Again, Bob mocks some Christian in his combox on 10-27-18: “You can’t explain it to us, you can’t defend it, you can’t even defend it to yourself. Defend your position or shut up about it. It’s clear you have nothing.” And again on the same day: “If you can’t answer the question, man up and say so.” And on 10-26-18: “you refuse to defend it, after being asked over and over again.” And again: “You’re the one playing games, equivocating, and being unable to answer the challenges.” Bob’s cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds. He still hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply to — now — 31 of my critiques of his atrocious reasoning.

Bob’s words will be in blue. To find these posts, word-search “Seidensticker” on my atheist page or search “Seidensticker Folly #” in my sidebar search (near the top).

*****

In his article, 9 Tactics Christians Use to Dismiss Bible Embarrassments (2-9-19) Bible-Bashing Bob plays the game of pretending that a logical contradiction is not what it is (“A = not A”). Anyone can go look up the definition of logical contradiction. Check out, for example, “Logical Consistency and Contradiction,” by philosopher G. Randolph Mayes. I’ve written several papers devoted specifically to bogus claims about alleged biblical “contradictions” which in fact, are not at all:

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Atheist Inventions of Many Bogus “Bible Contradictions” [National Catholic Register, 9-4-18]
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Bob specializes in inventing this very thing. He glories in it. And, as we shall see, he proudly immerses himself in outright lies and falsehoods and absurdities in this present paper, where he reveals himself to be an open, brazen sophist and literally an enemy of logic. Let’s now look at his “reasoning”:

Tactic 1: Technically, it’s not a contradiction

This excuse splits hairs about the word “contradiction.”

This is very clever, but at bottom is pathetic and intellectually dishonest. Bob appears to think that if one can’t prove that an actual (dictionary / classical logic definition) contradiction is present, then all they have to do is redefine what a contradiction is in the first place. Thus, Bible-Bashing Bob plays the game of pretending that the Christian use of the actual definition of “contradiction” is supposedly “splitting hairs”. We’re the ones parsing and redefining and playing with definitions, and engaging in sophistry, you see, not Bob! He projects what he in fact is doing onto the Christians who defend the Bible against outrageous and false attacks. The real definition of “contradiction” is transmogrified into hair-splitting / Bill Clinton “depends on what is is” pseudo-reasoning and ex post facto rationalization.

A contradiction, they’ll say, is a sentence X that clashes with a sentence not-X, and nothing less precise will do. The two statements must directly and unambiguously contradict each other.

Yes, of course. In other words, a contradiction must be what a contradiction is, according to classical logic. A = A. But Bob objects to this. He wants to pretend that instances of non-contradiction are, in fact, contradiction.

They might apply this to the number of women at the empty tomb. Each gospel identifies a different number of women. For example, John says that it was Mary Magdalene, but Luke says Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James “and the other women.” Apologists will defend the Bible by saying that John didn’t say Mary and only Mary was there, so it’s not a contradiction—at least not technically.

Now his game is to equate alleged fine “technical” distinctions as to the nature of contradictions and to object to the identification and proof of contradiction not being present as merely technical: as if it is not what it is.

This approach might work if the question of women at the tomb were the only problem, but there’s much more than that.

Here’s the key to his whole ridiculous analysis. Because he and other Bible skeptics have difficulty in proving actual biblical contradictions (by the dictionary definition of the word), what they do is collect a multitude of pseudo-contradictions which are not logical contradictions at all, and then rant and carry on that there are just so “many“!!! What he neglects to see is that a pack of 100 lies is no more impressive or compelling than one lie. A falsehood is a falsehood. If a hundred proposed biblical contradictions are all refuted and shown to not be so, then the ones who assert them have not gained any ground at all. They haven’t proven their case one iota, until they prove real contradiction.

And, of course, apologists always resolve the contradiction in favor of their conclusion, which is a supernatural fantasy that is about as far-fetched as it is possible to be. . . . 

Well, we are obviously defending the Bible and Christianity and have our bias, just as the Bible skeptic also is biased in the other direction. But we need not necessarily assume anything (by way of theology) in order to demonstrate that an alleged biblical contradiction is not present. That’s simply a matter of classical logic and reason. One need not even believe in “biblical notion X” in order to argue and assert that opponent of the Bible A has failed to establish internal inconsistencies and contradictions in the biblical account involving biblical notion X. One simply has to show how they have not proven that a contradiction is present in a given biblical text. I’ve done this many times in my previous 31 refutation of Bob’s nonsense.

While you’re haggling with them over the definition of “contradiction,” the Bible problem is ignored, which they count as a win.

Again, we are applying the accepted secular definition. Bob wants to pretend it isn’t what it is, so he can claim that there are numerous “biblical contradictions” which in fact do not exist because the fallacies and errors of the skeptical analysis have been exposed for what they are. Thus he very cleverly (but deceitfully) acts as if the definition of “contradiction” is some mysterious, controversial thing, that Christians spend hours and hours “haggling” over. It’s not. It’s very straightforward and it ain’t rocket science.

If something isn’t contradictory, it’s not a “Bible problem” in the first place. But Bob can’t accept that. He must have at his disposal a catalogue of hundreds of “Bible problems” so that he can pretend that he has an impressive, insurmountable overall case. This has been standard, stock, playbook atheist and Bible skeptic tactics for hundreds of years. They keep doing it because it works for those who are unfamiliar with critical thinking and logic (and the Bible). But the problem is that it’s intellectually dishonest.

Bob then gives a prime example of how he tortures texts (two biblical Gospel accounts of the same general events) into alleged “contradictory” status simply because they differ from each other in non-contradictory ways:

What does “contradiction” mean?

To remember how we evaluate contradictions in everyday life, suppose you’re a newspaper editor. Matthew and Luke have been assigned to the Jesus beat—this is such an important story that you want two journalists working on independent articles—and they drop off their stories (their respective gospels) on your desk. How satisfied would you be?

Not very. You’d call them back and tell them to try again. This isn’t merely Luke having the Parable of the Prodigal Son but Matthew omitting it, and Matthew having the Parable of the Unmerciful Servant but Luke omitting it. Space is limited, and those editorial decisions are understandable, but it’s more than that. Did wise men visit the baby Jesus, or was it shepherds? Was Jesus whisked off to Egypt for his protection or not? Did the dead rise at the crucifixion, who first witnessed the empty tomb, and how many angels were at the tomb? Matthew and Luke disagree on each of these and more. In common parlance, these are contradictions. Relabel the problem if you want, but don’t dismiss it.

Again, it’s utterly irrelevant what “common parlance” holds as to the definition of “contradiction.” All that matters is the standard accepted secular / philosophical definition. If contradictions are actually massively present in the biblical text, then Bob wouldn’t have to play dishonest mind games, messing around with the definition so he can force the square peg of his stupid, failed arguments (that I have refuted now 31 times) into the round hole of a “logical contradiction.”

He can reel off 179 alleged / claimed contradictions (as all Bible skeptics love to do: the mere “appearance of strength”). This proves absolutely nothing because any chain is only as good as the individual links. Each one has to be proven: not merely asserted, as if they are self-evidently some kind of insuperable “difficulty.” 100 bad, fallacious arguments prove exactly nothing (except that the one proposing them is a lousy arguer and very poor at proving his or her opinions). When we actually examine Bob’s arguments individually, we find that they are abominable and pathetic. I’ve done this, myself, probably more than anyone, so I know what I’m talking about, and anyone can go read my refutations of his nonsense.

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Photo credit: Pinocchio; Schwerdhoefer (8-22-15) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2019-02-28T17:25:47-04:00

Last updated on: February 28, 2019 at 5:25 pm   By

This is an exchange I had with a woman (presumably Protestant) — words in blue –, who was objecting to my dialogue on baptism (incidentally, the Protestant in that dialogue from 2002 recently became a Catholic).

*****

It is important to share the fullness of Christian truth (as we Catholics believe it to be), so that all others may also share in its blessings. The motive is love, not a sort of “we know everything and you are stupid” mentality. Catholics believe that Protestants are brothers in Christ, part of the Body of Christ, and in possession of much Christian truth indeed.

Individual Protestants often put Catholics to shame in many respects. I love and greatly respect Protestants. I used to be in their number (an evangelical) and I know what was in my own heart, and the high spiritual quality of serious Protestants.

Should we not go and spread the gospel to those who do not know Christ’s love?

Both are important. I do both, as an apologist and evangelist. I don’t see why we have to pit them against each other.

How sad is the Father that his children fight over semantics?

It’s not just semantics. It’s about one of the central rites of the Christian faith (i.e., baptism), which in the Bible is directly connected to regeneration and salvation itself. Paul in the Bible assumes that all of the faith is very important.

Why is there not room to agree to disagree?

We can disagree charitably. But what no one can do is rejoice that there is contradiction among Christians, because that means that there is necessarily falsehood somewhere, and we all agree that that is not a good thing. Atheists (with whom I have had scores of dialogues) bring this problem and difficulty up all the time, believe me. Paul speaks of “one Lord, one faith, one baptism.” Our task is to discover what that one faith is, in all its particulars, rather than be complacent about massive contradictions among competing Christian groups.

All Christians have beliefs. If we truly believe what we do, we will want to share it with others, and we are commanded to do so. The problem today is that folks too often believe there is no one truth, or that truth is relative; thus, one belief is as good as another, and if we dare to say someone is wrong, we are supposedly automatically “intolerant.”

That’s not the biblical view; nor the historic Christian view (Protestant, Catholic, or Orthodox).

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(originally 4-30-15)

Photo credit: Luis Miguel Bugallo Sánchez (Lmbuga) (4-5-17). West facade of Notre-Dame de Paris in 2017 [Wikimedia Commons / Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license]

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2019-02-22T13:14:28-04:00

Last updated on: February 22, 2019 at 1:14 pm   By

This is a discussion with Gavin G. Young, who recently wrote of himself:  “I am an ex-Christian. I am now an atheist and scientific naturalist and in most respects I am also now a secular humanist.” It originated in the blog combox of my paper, Atheists, Miracles, & the Problem of Evil: Contradictions.

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When atheists talk science, no miracles are permitted or even imaginable.

But when they talk problem of evil or getting evidence for God that even they will accept, the more miracles the merrier: we are supposed to think that God should perform literally millions of miracles in order to stop all suffering and make His existence manifest to one and all: no doubt whatsoever.

To put it another way, in effect the atheist argues (in self-contradiction):

A) You Christians believe in miracles, which are unproven and irrational and contrary to science; therefore I reject your belief-system.

B) If your God doesn’t perform many miracles in order to alleviate human suffering, either this proves he doesn’t exist, or that he is evil and/or weak and ineffectual.

A contradicts B (claims of miracles are a disproof of Christianity / miracles are required to prove Christianity’s God). Yet atheists habitually make or simultaneously assume both arguments. It’s illogical, irrational, and most unfair as a critique. The atheist can’t have it both ways and remain logically consistent.

There isn’t really a contradiction in what atheists are claiming. Point A says there’s no scientific evidence for the existence of miracles and thus miracles don’t happen, but since Christianity says that miracles happen, then the lack of evidence of miracles [evidence that should be there if Christianity is true in its claims about the Christian god] is evidence against the existence of the god of Christianity. Point B says that since miracles don’t happen then a loving all-powerful all-knowing type of god doesn’t exist, but most Christians believe that their god is loving, all powerful, all-knowing. Thus the god that those Christians believe in doesn’t exist.

My point (B) was that atheists demand that God perform miracles in the case of human suffering, and if He doesn’t, He doesn’t exist. They also demand them in the case of proving His existence; i.e., He has to perform some extraordinary miracle like writing “John 3:16” in the stars; then the hardened, cynical atheist will submit in dust and ashes (God having “performed” according to the all-knowing epistemological requirement of the wise atheist). So it’s an odd situation, whereby atheists 1) state that miracles are categorically impossible, yet 2) they demand this very thing as virtually the only means by which they can be brought to belief in God (and then reject it when it happens).

From the Christian, biblical point of view, it is recognized that human excessive disbelief and skepticism (of the hardened, rebellious type) will not be overcome even by a miracle:

Luke 16:29-31 (RSV) 29] But Abraham said, `They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ [30] And he said, `No, father Abraham; but if some one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ [31] He said to him, `If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if some one should rise from the dead.’”

Defining miracles as impossible (which is extremely difficult to do, logically or philosophically) is the key to why atheists almost never come to belief. The prior assumption determines what they will accept, so that even when a miracle is documented and presented to them, they dismiss it because they have already concluded that miracles are absolutely impossible.

I think this is some of what Jesus hit upon in the statement above: nonbelievers reject revelation; therefore they will even reject a miraculous rising from the dead. In other words, nothing is good enough for them. They will reject what even they themselves claim is the thing that will convince them.

I agree with some of what you said in reply to my post. Many atheists, myself included, do expect for evidence to be provided before they and me will be believe in a god. As Carl Sagan said (I paraphrase because I don’t know the exact wording for certain) ‘Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.’ I and many other atheists don’t want to be credulous, we don’t consider blind faith to be a virtue. Before I had become an extremely convinced atheist I prayed to the biblical god saying “God if you exist please provide me with evidence of your existence, evidence of the sort that you know (if you exist) will convince me.”

In the prayer I also said to the god that according to the Bible when a man made a request to Jesus to perform a miracle (to end the demon possession of his son), the scripture passaged hints that the man didn’t believe that his son would be healed but that his request was granted anyway. For it says (Mark 9:24 [NASB] “Immediately the boy’s father cried out and said, “I do believe; help my unbelief.” ” Jesus then said the man’s son was healed. I applied that scripture to my situation and said “God, help me in my unbelief like the Bible says the other man was”. In other words I made clear that even though I didn’t believe god existed, my lack of belief should not be used as a reason for god (if he existed) to not grant my prayer request for evidence.

Furthermore in the Gospel of/(according to) John, scripture says that Thomas said he wouldn’t believe that Jesus was resurrected, unless Thomas was provided with specific evidence. According to the account Jesus then offered the evidence to Thomas (extraordinary evidence of the extraordinary claim that Jesus was resurrected). Then Thomas said he believed and John 20:29 KJV says “Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”

Exodus gives an account in which the Bible claims that Yahweh God (Jehovah God/the LORD) said that if certain miracles would be performed then certain people would believe (though the account also says they might not initially believe based upon some of the initial miracles) and the god offered to perform those miracles through Moses as evidence. See Exodus chapter 4. Note the following portion of it from the Exodus 4:1-10 [ASV]:

4 And Moses answered and said, But, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice; for they will say, Jehovah hath not appeared unto thee. 2 And Jehovah said unto him, What is that in thy hand? And he said, A rod. 3 And he said, Cast it on the ground. And he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from before it. 4 And Jehovah said unto Moses, Put forth thy hand, and take it by the tail (and he put forth his hand, and laid hold of it, and it became a rod in his hand); 5 that they may believe that Jehovah, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath appeared unto thee. 6 And Jehovah said furthermore unto him, Put now thy hand into thy bosom. And he put his hand into his bosom: and when he took it out, behold, his hand was leprous, as white as snow. 7 And he said, Put thy hand into thy bosom again. (And he put his hand into his bosom again; and when he took it out of his bosom, behold, it was turned again as his other flesh.) 8 And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe thee, neither hearken to the voice of the first sign, that they will believe the voice of the latter sign. 9 And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe even these two signs, neither hearken unto thy voice, that thou shalt take of the water of the river, and pour it upon the dry land: and the water which thou takest out of the river shall become blood upon the dry land. 

There is also the account mentioned in 1 Kings chapter 18. Verses 36-40 (ASV):

36 And it came to pass at the time of the offering of the evening oblation, that Elijah the prophet came near, and said, O Jehovah, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and that I have done all these things at thy word. 37 Hear me, O Jehovah, hear me, that this people may know that thou, Jehovah, art God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again. 38 Then the fire of Jehovah fell, and consumed the burnt-offering, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. 39 And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, Jehovah, he is God; Jehovah, he is God. 40 And Elijah said unto them, Take the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape. And they took them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there.

Thus according to some parts of the Bible Yahweh/Jehovah and Yeshua/Jesus are willing to provide evidence, even miracles – even extraordinary ones, to help people believe, that Yahweh and Jesus did sometimes provide such evidence and that as a result some people believed. Thus atheists are only asking for the type of evidence that the Bible itself says God and Christ provided in the past.

Dave, regarding your comment of saying some atheists say that god “has to perform some extraordinary miracle like writing “John 3:16″ in the stars; then the hardened, cynical atheist will submit in dust and ashes”, the Bible actually says that at some point a miracle of such magnitude would happen. The atheists you refer to are only saying that they require something of magnitude of what the Bible itself says will happen (though according to the Bible many seeing it will mourn) will be needed to convince them. I am referring to “the sign of the Son of Man” and accompanying signs; see Matthew 24:29-31 (NASB):

29 “But immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 30 And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. 31 And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

I don’t say with 100.0000% certainty that miracles never happen (though my degree of certainty is now extremely close to 100%), but rather that since there is no good evidence for them (like there is no good evidence for the existence of Santa Claus, a being that is claimed to have magical/supernatural powers) it is reasonable to conclude they don’t happen (and one would have justification in believing they don’t happen) and that I thus don’t believe they happen. But I have ideas of what I would consider a confirmed miracle and if such happened then I would believe that the supernatural exist. And if it were a certain type of miracle (and could be confirmed by scientifically), then I would be convinced that the biblical god exists. In other words I remain open to new evidence. I test from time to time my assumptions and conclusions to see if a viewpoint/belief of mine is in error. Another way of saying it, is I believe provisionally and to an extremely high degree of confidence that miracles don’t happen and that no theistic god exists, but I still remain open to future evidence showing that I am wrong.

I never received any evidence that convinced me the biblical god (God the Father) nor the heavenly Christ Jesus (as opposed to a historical human Jesus who was called the Christ) exists, despite requesting such evidence (I prayed both to Yahweh and to Jesus – and even to a generic [unknown god] in case someone other than Yahweh and Jesus is a real god). I also don’t believe Satan, angels, demons, Zeus, Aphrodite, Hathor, nor any other spirit beings (including spirits of the dead) exist, nor Santa Claus, magical elves, gremlins, etc.

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Thanks very much for your long and meaty comment. This is good to discuss.

Thus according to some parts of the Bible Yahweh/Jehovah and Yeshua/Jesus are willing to provide evidence, even miracles – even extraordinary ones, to help people believe, that Yahweh and Jesus did sometimes provide such evidence and that as a result some people believed. Thus atheists are only asking for the type of evidence that the Bible itself says God and Christ provided in the past.

That’s quite true. But the very fact that it was “sometimes” means that there are also times when He does not. So this means that sometimes God wants someone to come to Him whether there is physical / empirical evidence (not the only kind there is) or not: that He can reach them through other means. But human free will dictates that some people will not believe in Him, anyway, and sometimes despite miracles. As you note, He appeared to Doubting Thomas and offered proof, but He also noted at the same time that it was more blessed for folks to believe without the proof of miracle and an extraordinary post-Resurrection of Jesus.

Thus, you might be (from our perspective) in the category of person for whom God will not perform a miracle, for whatever reason (only He knows). The biblical record is mixed, and you can’t argue from it that it is normative for God to appear every time an atheist demands Him to (or else he will refuse to believe or state that he is unable to). It’s not normative. Miracles (by definition) are always rare and the exception to the usual course of events.

Yes, the Second Coming will be an event that everyone sees. But by then it’ll be too late if a person hasn’t repented. As you cited, He will at that time gather His elect, who freely accepted His grace and became His disciples.

That’s why, in the next chapter (25), starting at verse 31, it’s the great judgment scene of the sheep and the goats. The people aren’t judged based on whether they responded to the obvious fact that He appeared in His Second Coming. They are judged based on how they treated the poor and unfortunate (25:35-45). That’s got nothing to do with seeing a miracle. It comes from the inside: the knowledge of right and wrong that God put into our conscience. We know what is right, and can either choose to act accordingly or rebel against it and end up damned (25:46).

You say you are open to the possible evidence of an extraordinary miracle which would make you believe. I believe you. I have no reason to doubt your report. But I take a step back and examine the underlying premise (being the relentless Socratic that I am). What makes you think that God is bound to such a request from you (as if there is no other possible way to come to believe in Him), or that He should fulfill it? You tried to argue that the Bible indicates it, but it does only on some occasions. There is no indication that this will always be the case.

The same Bible (St. Paul) also states in Romans 1:19-20 that everyone knows that God exists just by looking at His creation. Therefore, in the biblical view every person knows there is a God. It may be buried down deep, but they know. At least that’s what we believe about it. Obviously, you disagree, but that’s why we’re talking: seeking better understanding of our views.

So I submit that is why God doesn’t (usually) bow to these requests from atheists to perform some huge miracle sufficient to break down their resistance. I could see God saying, “you’re not fooling anyone: least of all Me. You already know that I exist, so why do you play this game of demanding a sign as “proof” for what you already know?”

That’s why Abraham said (as reported by Jesus, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if some one should rise from the dead” (Lk 16:31, RSV). In other words, inspired revelation was sufficient. But if someone rejected that, then they would also reject someone rising from the dead as an equally unsatisfactory proof. They will simply deny that it happened (just as nonbelievers do with regard to Jesus’ own Resurrection). I think Jesus was partially alluding to Himself in this story and how many wouldn’t believe in Him even after He rose from the dead.

I have written a post about the medically documented cures at Lourdes. I highly doubt that you will accept any. You’ll find a way to dismiss any and all of them. Or maybe you won’t, and it’ll be your time to cease disbelieving and to enter into the joy of His grace and fellowship (I hope so). Further evidences of miracles are presented in another post.

As for the usual stock comparison of belief in God to “Santa Claus, magical elves, gremlins, etc.”: that is easily responded to, and I have, in this fashion:

[G]iven the fact that many thousands of philosophers, theologians, and scientists have believed in God, but not in Santa Claus, it’s rather silly to put God and Santa Claus in the exact same epistemological boat. There is a plain, obvious difference there. It’s a reason to more closely consider theistic arguments, not a proof in and of itself of God’s existence.

No matter how many atheists are also prominent in philosophy and science does not overcome my point, which is that the sharp folks who believed in God did not place Santa Claus in the same category of likelihood. That goes against your breezy, casual claim that the two beliefs were equivalent and equally compelling (which is, not at all). (God: Is He No More Believable than Santa Claus?)

In another paper I wrote:

[M]any many great thinkers and philosophers have accepted and built up theism and theology, whereas there is no “tooth fairyology” or “leprechaunology.” . . .

Of course we deny that there is no evidence or justification or warrant for our beliefs. I compiled the various different arguments in hundreds of links, so people like you can peruse them if you wish. I have collected seven lengthy collections of links:

*
Cosmological Argument for God (Resources)

Teleological (Design) Argument for God (Resources) 

Ontological Argument for God (Resources) 

15 Theistic Arguments (Copious Resources)

Science and Christianity (Copious Resources)

Atheism & Atheology (Copious Resources)

God: Historical Arguments (Copious Resources) 

The evidences and arguments are there for anyone who wishes to read them. But you can bring the horse to water; you can’t make it drink.

When the atheist claims there is no evidence whatsoever and no reason to be a Christian, then I produce this. . . .

Like I said, if there were well-established academic fields of “tooth fairyology” or “leprechaunology” then the argument might have some weight. But since there are not . . .

I’ll say again what I have stated over and over: the presence of a long and noble history of theistic thought among philosophers goes to show (I think) that theism as a worldview is vastly different in kind from “tooth fairyism” and “leprechaunism” (infinitely more substantiated academically and philosophically); not that theism is true (the latter would be the ad populum fallacy). . . .

This is what I strive to get atheists to see regarding Christianity. We utilize reason; we love reason; we love science; we love evidence. We don’t espouse blind faith, but rather, a rationally informed faith, not inconsistent at all with either reason or science. We’re not against any of those good things. We simply come to different conclusions than atheists do. (Dialogue with an Atheist on “Tooth Fairyology” vs. Theology)

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Photo credit: Doubting Thomas, by Guercino (1591-1666) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2019-02-05T13:07:38-04:00

Last updated on: February 5, 2019 at 1:07 pm   By

This is an installment of a series of replies (see the Introduction and Master List) to much of Book IV (Of the Holy Catholic Church) of Institutes of the Christian Religion, by early Protestant leader John Calvin (1509-1564). I utilize the public domain translation of Henry Beveridge, dated 1845, from the 1559 edition in Latin; available online. Calvin’s words will be in blue. All biblical citations (in my portions) will be from RSV unless otherwise noted.

Related reading from yours truly:

Biblical Catholic Answers for John Calvin (2010 book: 388 pages)

A Biblical Critique of Calvinism (2012 book: 178 pages)

Biblical Catholic Salvation: “Faith Working Through Love” (2010 book: 187 pages; includes biblical critiques of all five points of “TULIP”)

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IV, 18:3-4

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Book IV

CHAPTER 18

OF THE POPISH MASS. HOW IT NOT ONLY PROFANES, BUT ANNIHILATES THE LORD’S SUPPER.

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3. Impiety of the Mass continued. 2. It overthrows the cross of Christ by setting up an altar. Objections answered.

*

Another iniquity chargeable on the mass is, that it sinks and buries the cross and passion of Christ. 

To the contrary, the cross and passion of Christ are the very essence and focus of the Mass. It is beyond strange that Calvin cannot grasp this. Apparently his either/or mentality simply can’t handle such a sublime concept.

This much, indeed, is most certain,—the cross of Christ is overthrown the moment an altar is erected. 

How odd, then, that Paul casually assumes the continued existence of altars among Christians (1 Cor 10:14-21), and that altars are mentioned in the New Testament in other places (apart from the many mentions of altars in heaven), as well:

Hebrews 13:9-12 Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings; for it is well that the heart be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited their adherents. [10] We have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat. [11] For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp. [12] So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.

Therefore, if the cross is overthrown by an altar, then the New Testament is against the cross. Far more plausible is a state of affairs whereby Calvin has grossly misunderstood New Testament teaching; otherwise, Christianity (all Christianity: not just Catholicism) and the Bible alike are a mess of abominations and contradictions.

For if, on the cross, he offered himself in sacrifice that he might sanctify us for ever, and purchase eternal redemption for us, undoubtedly the power and efficacy of his sacrifice continues without end. 

Exactly!

Otherwise, we should not think more honourably of Christ than of the oxen and calves which were sacrificed under the law, the offering of which is proved to have been weak and inefficacious because often repeated. 

They are not hearkening back and making present one supreme, sublime sacrifice, as the Mass does.

Wherefore, it must be admitted, either that the sacrifice which Christ offered on the cross wanted the power of eternal cleansing, or that he performed this once for ever by his one sacrifice. 

We agree that He performed it once, forever. That is Catholic teaching. We believe that the sacrifice is eternally present, because it was an act of God, Who is outside of time, as well as an act of man. That’s why Jesus appears even in heaven as a slain lamb.

Accordingly, the apostle says, “Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” Again: “By the which act we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Again: “For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.” To this he subjoins the celebrated passage: “Now, where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.” The same thing Christ intimated by his latest voice, when, on giving up the ghost, he exclaimed, “It is finished.” 

Catholics disagree with not one iota of this. Calvin is simply ignorant, and mistakenly thinks that we do. Again, he quixotically wars against a straw man. One would think he would get tired of all that wasted energy after a while. But the demands of sophistry and misrepresentation overcome any possible fatigue for him.

We are accustomed to observe the last words of the dying as oracular. Christ, when dying, declares, that by his one sacrifice is perfected and fulfilled whatever was necessary to our salvation. To such a sacrifice, whose perfection he so clearly declared, shall we, as if it were imperfect, presume daily to append innumerable sacrifices? 

They are not innumerable sacrifices, but one and the same, brought to us, transcending time (as God does). But there is indeed a NT motif (above all, in Paul) of our participating in His sacrifice, too, which is not dissimilar to the notion of the Mass:

Romans 8:17 and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

2 Corinthians 1:5-7 For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. [6] If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. [7] Our hope for you is unshaken; for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

2 Corinthians 4:10-11 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. [11] For while we live we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Galatians 6:17 Henceforth let no man trouble me; for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.

Philippians 3:10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

Colossians 1:24 Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church,

2 Timothy 4:6 For I am already on the point of being sacrificed; the time of my departure has come.(cf. 2:10)

1 Peter 4:13 But rejoice in so far as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

Calvin himself elsewhere applies the above teachings to a type of participation in the cross: a thing not all that different from what Catholics believe regarding the Sacrifice of the Mass:

[B]y fellowship with him he mortifies our earthly members that they may not afterwards exert themselves in action, and kill the old man, that he may not hereafter be in vigour and bring forth fruit. An effect of his burials moreover is that we as his fellows are buried to sin. For when the Apostle says, that we are ingrafted into the likeness of Christ’s deaths and that we are buried with him unto sin, that by his cross the world is crucified unto us and we unto the world, and that we are dead with him, he not only exhorts us to manifest an example of his death, but declares that there is an efficacy in it which should appear in all Christians, if they would not render his death unfruitful and useless. Accordingly in the death and burial of Christ a twofold blessing is set before us—viz. deliverance from death, to which we were enslaved, and the mortification of our flesh (Rom. 6:5; Gal. 2:19, 6:14; Col. 3:3). (Inst., II, 16:7)

Calvin also shows that he comprehends a large part of the Catholic understanding of the importance of the Mass: the centrality of the cross and Jesus’ sacrifice:

Nor is this to be wondered at; for, as another Apostle declares, Christ, “through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God,” (Heb. 9:14), and hence that transformation of the cross which were otherwise against its nature. But that these things may take deep root and have their seat in our inmost hearts, we must never lose sight of sacrifice and ablution. For, were not Christ a victim, we could have no sure conviction of his being . . . our substitute-ransom and propitiation.  (Inst., II, 16:6)

Since the sacred word of God not only affirms, but proclaims and protests, that this sacrifice was once accomplished, and remains eternally in force, do not those who demand another, charge it with imperfection and weakness? 

Certainly. But since we don’t “demand” another, we are not guilty of this outrageous presumption.

But to what tends the mass which has been established, that a hundred thousand sacrifices may be performed every day, but just to bury and suppress the passion of our Lord, in which he offered himself to his Father as the only victim? Who but a blind man does not see that it was Satanic audacity to oppose a truth so clear and transparent? 

More nonsense based on the same tragically clueless understanding of the Catholic doctrine . . .

I am not unaware of the impostures by which the father of lies is wont to cloak his fraud—viz. that the sacrifices are not different or various, but that the one sacrifice is repeated. Such smoke is easily dispersed. 

Yes, exactly (to the last sentence). So we have the spectacle of Calvin setting up the straw man of Catholics supposedly sacrificing Jesus over and over. He bashes that, then he steps back and admits that Catholics don’t actually believe what he has just (rightly) demolished. But then he dismisses the Catholic explanation with virtually no argument, as “smoke” deriving from the devil.

Rather than bash a straw man and dismiss the actual Catholic argument, Calvin ought to interact with our real arguments. But he’d rather “refute” fictional opponents. It looks more impressive — to the inattentive reader, that is, who hasn’t perceived the folly of his disgraceful methods of “disputation.”

The apostle, during his whole discourse, contends not only that there are no other sacrifices, but that that one was once offered, and is no more to be repeated. 

We agree! What is so difficult for Calvin to grasp in this? There is either one sacrifice or there are many. We agree with Calvin and Protestants that there is but one. We contend that the Sacrifice of the Mass is included in the one: it transcends time. It is not an additional sacrifice. That means (agree with us or disagree) that we do not hold to “many” sacrifices. Calvin claims that we do because he defines our self-understanding according to his cynical, prejudiced, anti-Catholic pseudo-understanding of what we believe.

But we can’t redefine other people’s positions. We can honestly disagree, of course, but that gives us no right to caricature other beliefs and pretend that the caricature is held by those with whom we disagree. That is what makes a mockery of true dialogue.

Calvin’s problem remains having to explain the references to the “table of the Lord” in Paul: to altars. Altars make no sense in his paradigm, because he thinks they are opposed to the cross of Christ. He also has to explain why Jesus is described repeatedly in Revelation as a “Lamb” — long after His crucifixion and resurrection and ascension and glorification (once, even as “a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain” — Rev 5:6).

He has to explain also how it is that an act of God (the crucifixion: an act of Jesus Who is God as well as man) could be in time. So how does he explain all this? Or does he even try? Once again, the Catholic view takes in and incorporates all of the Bible: not just the passages that teach one aspect of a multi-faceted truth or state of affairs.

But Calvin, when various of his arguments are taken together (along with related Scripture), actually proves by his own reasoning the possibility and plausibility of the Sacrifice of the Mass. It can be demonstrated as following, or at least not being at all inconsistent with, his own premises. Here is how it works:

1) What God decrees, and His acts (and one may contend that for God, these are one and the same), are from God’s perspective outside of time, or decreed from eternity, because He is outside of time. They may intersect with history and be in time in that sense, from our perspective, but for God they are timeless and “present”:

When we attribute prescience to God, we mean that all things always were, and ever continue, under his eye; that to his knowledge there is no past or future, but all things are present, and indeed so present, that it is not merely the idea of them that is before him (as those objects are which we retain in our memory), but that he truly sees and contemplates them as actually under his immediate inspection. This prescience extends to the whole circuit of the world, and to all creatures. (Inst., III, 21:5)

Should any one object, that in this there is nothing to prevent the same Christ who redeemed us when condemned from also testifying his love to us when safe by assuming our nature, we have the brief answer, that when the Spirit declares that by the eternal decree of God the two things were connected together—viz. that Christ should be our Redeemer, and, at the same time, a partaker of our nature, it is unlawful to inquire further. He who is tickled with a desire of knowing something more, not contented with the immutable ordination of God, shows also that he is not even contented with that Christ who has been given us as the price of redemption. (Inst., II, 12:5)

Isaiah 46:9-10 remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, [10] declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, `My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,’

Lamentations 2:17 The LORD has done what he purposed, has carried out his threat; as he ordained long ago,

Lamentations 3:37 Who has commanded and it came to pass, unless the Lord has ordained it?

2) It was God Who died on the cross, since Jesus Christ is true God and true man; therefore, the sacrifice of the cross was undertaken by God (the Son) Himself, and God (the Father) decreed this from eternity:

It deeply concerned us, that he who was to be our Mediator should be very God and very man. If the necessity be inquired into, it was not what is commonly termed simple or absolute, but flowed from the divine decree on which the salvation of man depended. What was best for us, our most merciful Father determined. Our iniquities, like a cloud intervening between Him and us, having utterly alienated us from the kingdom of heaven, none but a person reaching to him could be the medium of restoring peace. But who could thus reach to him? Could any of the sons of Adam? All of them, with their parents, shuddered at the sight of God. Could any of the angels? They had need of a head, by connection with which they might adhere to their God entirely and inseparably. What then? The case was certainly desperate, if the Godhead itself did not descend to us, it being impossible for us to ascend. Thus the Son of God behoved to become our Emmanuel, the God with us; and in such a way, that by mutual union his divinity and our nature might be combined; otherwise, neither was the proximity near enough, nor the affinity strong enough, to give us hope that God would dwell with us; so great was the repugnance between our pollution and the spotless purity of God. (Inst., II, 12:1)

Finally, since as God only he could not suffer, and as man only could not overcome death, he united the human nature with the divine, that he might subject the weakness of the one to death as an expiation of sin, and by the power of the other, maintaining a struggle with death, might gain us the victory. Those, therefore, who rob Christ of divinity or humanity either detract from his majesty and glory, or obscure his goodness. (Inst., II, 12:3)

Ephesians 3:8-11 To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, [9] and to make all men see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things; [10] that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places. [11] This was according to the eternal purpose which he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord,

2 Timothy 1:9 who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not in virtue of our works but in virtue of his own purpose and the grace which he gave us in Christ Jesus ages ago,

3) The sacrifice of Jesus on the cross was decreed from eternity:

We know well why Christ was at first promised—viz. that he might renew a fallen world, and succour lost man. Hence under the Law he was typified by sacrifices, to inspire believers with the hope that God would be propitious to them after he was reconciled by the expiation of their sins. Since from the earliest age, even before the Law was promulgated, there was never any promise of a Mediator without blood, we justly infer that he was destined in the eternal counsel of God to purge the pollution of man, the shedding of blood being the symbol of expiation. Thus, too, the prophets, in discoursing of him, foretold that he would be the Mediator between God and man. It is sufficient to refer to the very remarkable prophecy of Isaiah (Is. 53:4, 5), in which he foretells that he was “smitten for our iniquities;” that “the chastisement of our peace was upon him;” that as a priest “he was made an offering for sin;” “that by his stripes we are healed;” that as all “like lost sheep have gone astray,” “it pleased the Lord to bruise him, and put him to grief,” that he might “bear our iniquities.” After hearing that Christ was divinely appointed to bring relief to miserable sinners, whose overleaps these limits gives too much indulgence to a foolish curiosity. (Inst., II, 12:4)

Acts 4:26-28 The kings of the earth set themselves in array, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’ — [27] for truly in this city there were gathered together against thy holy servant Jesus, whom thou didst anoint, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, [28] to do whatever thy hand and thy plan had predestined to take place.

1 Corinthians 2:2, 6-8 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. . . . [6] Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. [7] But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glorification. [8] None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

Ephesians 1:5-12 He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, [6] to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. [7] In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace [8] which he lavished upon us. [9] For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ [10] as a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. [11] In him, according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will, [12] we who first hoped in Christ have been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory.

1 Peter 1:18-20 You know that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your fathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, [19] but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. [20] He was destined before the foundation of the world but was made manifest at the end of the times for your sake.

4) The future can be made, in a sense, “present” to us in prophecy, and in a broader sense, in written revelation itself, since the God Who communicates it to us through a prophet is outside of time, and the future is already present to Him:

Isaiah 42:9 Behold, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth I tell you of them.

Isaiah 44:7-8 Who is like me? Let him proclaim it, let him declare and set it forth before me. Who has announced from of old the things to come? Let them tell us what is yet to be. [8] Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? . . .

Isaiah 45:21 . . . Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the LORD? . . .

Isaiah 48:3 The former things I declared of old, they went forth from my mouth and I made them known; then suddenly I did them and they came to pass.

Isaiah 48:5 I declared them to you from of old, before they came to pass I announced them to you,

Sirach 42:19 He declares what has been and what is to be, and he reveals the tracks of hidden things.

Sirach 48:25 He revealed what was to occur to the end of time, and the hidden things before they came to pass.

Acts 2:17 And in the last days it shall be, God declares, . . .

Acts 3:21 whom heaven must receive until the time for establishing all that God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old.

Acts 15:18 says the Lord, who has made these things known from of old.’

5) Moreover, God has the ability to allow human beings to be “present” at events from another time, such as St. John’s revelation (the entire Book of Revelation). Therefore, He can just as easily decide to make the cross present to Christians, even though to us it is a past event.

6) Therefore, the sacrifice of the cross can be made present to us in the Sacrifice of the Mass, by God’s design and power, and this all follows from explicit arguments from Calvin himself, following his own premises. The timelessness of the Mass is indicated by continued biblical references to the “table of the Lord,” altars, and the Lamb (Jesus). Continued sacrifice in the New Covenant can only refer to Jesus’ death on the cross (especially in light of the book of Hebrews).

7) Moreover, references to Jesus as a perpetual high priest (not just a temporary one at the time of His crucifixion: see especially Heb 7:23-25 below) suggest that the sacrifice is timeless or ongoing: the same notion entailed in the Sacrifice of the Mass:

Hebrews 2:17-18 Therefore he had to be made like his brethren in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make expiation for the sins of the people. [18] For because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.

Hebrews 3:1 Therefore, holy brethren, who share in a heavenly call, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession.

Hebrews 4:14-15 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. [15] For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Hebrews 5:5-6 So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, “Thou art my Son, today I have begotten thee”; [6] as he says also in another place, “Thou art a priest for ever, after the order of Melchiz’edek.”

Hebrews 5:10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchiz’edek.

Hebrews 6:17, 20 So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he interposed with an oath, . . . [20] . . . Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest for ever after the order of Melchiz’edek.

Hebrews 7:14-17 For it is evident that our Lord was descended from Judah, and in connection with that tribe Moses said nothing about priests. [15] This becomes even more evident when another priest arises in the likeness of Melchiz’edek, [16] who has become a priest, not according to a legal requirement concerning bodily descent but by the power of an indestructible life. [17] For it is witnessed of him, “Thou art a priest for ever, after the order of Melchiz’edek.”

Hebrews 7:21-28 Those who formerly became priests took their office without an oath, but this one was addressed with an oath, “The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, `Thou art a priest for ever.'” [22] This makes Jesus the surety of a better covenant. [23] The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office; [24] but he holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues for ever. [25] Consequently he is able for all time to save those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. [26] For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, blameless, unstained, separated from sinners, exalted above the heavens. [27] He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people; he did this once for all when he offered up himself. [28] Indeed, the law appoints men in their weakness as high priests, but the word of the oath, which came later than the law, appoints a Son who has been made perfect for ever.

Hebrews 8:1-3 Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, [2] a minister in the sanctuary and the true tent which is set up not by man but by the Lord. [3] For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; hence it is necessary for this priest also to have something to offer.

Hebrews 9:11 . . . Christ appeared as a high priest. . .

Hebrews 10:21-22 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, [22] let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

The more subtle try to make their escape by a still narrower loophole—viz. that it is not repetition, but application. But there is no more difficulty in confuting this sophism also. For Christ did not offer himself once, in the view that his sacrifice should be daily ratified by new oblations, but that by the preaching of the gospel and the dispensation of the sacred Supper, the benefit of it should be communicated to us. 

But the “oblations” are not new; that is the whole point. Calvin hasn’t refuted anything: he has caricatured, and then asserted circular propositions without argument. He hasn’t seriously considered all of the relevant Bible data to be brought to bear.

Thus Paul says, that “Christ, our passover, is sacrificed for us,” and bids us “keep the feast” (1 Cor. 5:7, 8). The method, I say, in which the cross of Christ is duly applied to us is when the enjoyment is communicated to us, and we receive it with true faith.

Right there is the Sacrifice of the Mass in a nutshell, yet Calvin misses it!:

1 Corinthians 5:7-8 Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed. [8] Let us, therefore, celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

John Wesley commented on 5:8 (Wesley’s Notes on the Bible): “Here is a plain allusion to the Lord’s supper, which was instituted in the room of the passover.” That is the essence of the Mass: “Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us, therefore, celebrate the [Lord’s supper].”

4. Other objections answered.
*
But it is worth while to hear on what other foundation besides they rear up their sacrifice of the mass. To this end they drag in the prophecy of Malachi, in which the Lord promises that “in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering” (Mal. 1:11). As if it were new or unusual for the prophets, when they speak of the calling of the Gentiles, to designate the spiritual worship of God to which they call them, by the external rites of the law, more familiarly to intimate to the men of their age that they were to be called into the true fellowship of religion, just as in general they are wont to describe the truth which has been exhibited by the gospel by the types of their own age. 

Fair enough, but I would reply by asking, “what are they offering?” It is true that metaphors and symbols are often used in Scripture, but this instance does not appear to be an instance of that. The surrounding context seems quite literal. If so, it doesn’t work very well to all of a sudden go to a metaphorical interpretation of verse 11. Malachi 1:7 is about “offering polluted food upon my altar.” Verse 8 condemns offering blind, lame, and sick animals. This is real stuff; real corruptions of religious rites, not metaphor. Malachi 1:10 continues in this vein:

Oh, that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire upon my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, says the LORD of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand.

Malachi 1:12 contrasts a bad offering with a good one:

But you profane it when you say that the LORD’s table is polluted, and the food for it may be despised.

Verses 13 and 14 continue on with the theme of the Lord’s displeasure over improper offerings. Therefore, I submit that Calvin’s lame counter-interpretation falls flat: a victim of the context and type of literature involved.

Thus they use going up to Jerusalem for conversion to the Lord, the bringing of all kinds of gifts for the adoration of God—dreams and visions for the more ample knowledge with which believers were to be endued in the kingdom of Christ. The passage they quote from Malachi resembles one in Isaiah, in which the prophet speaks of three altars to be erected in Assyria, Egypt, and Judea. First, I ask, whether or not they grant that this prophecy is fulfilled in the kingdom of Christ? Secondly, Where are those altars, or when were they ever erected? Thirdly, Do they suppose that a single temple is destined for a single kingdom, as was that of Jerusalem? 

No, we suppose that a single sacrifice on the cross is made present by a Last-Supper-derived observance of the Sacrifice of the Mass, wherever it occurs.

If they ponder these things, they will confess, I think, that the prophet, under types adapted to his age, prophesied concerning the propagation of the spiritual worship of God over the whole world. This is the answer which we give them; but, as obvious examples everywhere occur in the Scripture, I am not anxious to give a longer enumeration; 

Too bad: all of those scriptures (so Calvin claims) but alas, they are so “obvious” that Calvin withdraws from us the unutterable joy of being fed his infallible oracles. What a huge loss . . .

although they are miserably deluded in this also, that they acknowledge no sacrifice but that of the mass, whereas in truth believers now sacrifice to God and offer him a pure offering, of which we shall speak by-and-by.

There are other offerings beside the Mass. We don’t have to deny that, but of course Calvin has to play the tiresome “either/or” game and deny the Mass, in the face of much biblical indication.

***

(originally 12-9-09)

Photo credit: Historical mixed media figure of John Calvin produced by artist/historian George S. Stuart and photographed by Peter d’Aprix: from the George S. Stuart Gallery of Historical Figures archive [Wikimedia Commons / Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license]

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