{"id":31495,"date":"2019-04-04T18:54:34","date_gmt":"2019-04-04T22:54:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?p=31495"},"modified":"2019-04-04T18:55:38","modified_gmt":"2019-04-04T22:55:38","slug":"in-defense-of-apologetics-theology-thinking-about-both","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/04\/in-defense-of-apologetics-theology-thinking-about-both.html","title":{"rendered":"In Defense of Apologetics &#038; Theology, &#038; Thinking About Both"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-31498 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2019\/04\/BurningBush.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"535\"><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">This was an exchange underneath my article, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncregister.com\/blog\/darmstrong\/does-god-punish-to-the-fourth-generation\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">\u201cDoes God Punish to the Fourth Generation?\u201d<\/a> (<em>National Catholic Register<\/em>, 10-1-18). My critic\u2019s words will be in <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">blue<\/span>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">*****<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">This raises several questions. First, how does this translate into the concept of original sin? All generations were tainted by Adam and Eve\u2019s decision. Their evil choice went way beyond 3-4 generations. The Church teaches that we\u2019re all tainted by it and need baptism to remove it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Original sin is a completely different issue from this one.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Second, why did Mary need to be preserved from original sin so Jesus could be born sinless? If sin is not passed on beyond 3-4 generations, and\/or we are judged by our own sins, why would she have to be sinless? Couldn\u2019t Jesus have been born to a sinful woman and been sin free when judged by His own behavior, as you assert above? The immaculate conception is unnecessary unless sin can be passed from mother to son.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>She didn\u2019t (technically) <em>have<\/em> to be immaculately conceived, as I have written about in this venue:<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncregister.com\/blog\/darmstrong\/was-marys-immaculate-conception-absolutely-necessary\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">\u00a0\u201cWas Mary\u2019s Immaculate Conception Absolutely Necessary?\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Church teaches that Mary\u2019s Immaculate Conception was \u201cfitting\u201d but not strictly necessary. Jesus would have been sinless in any event, being the God-Man.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">I mean no disrespect but I think it\u2019s the height of arrogance to say that God didn\u2019t mean what He said when He spoke directly to Moses about Pharaoh. That\u2019s like saying Jesus didn\u2019t mean what he said when He spoke to Peter about the keys to Heaven and the power to bind and loose. If that is the case, then much of our Catholic theology is suspect. The simple truth is that God can do what He wants. He can harden or soften hearts. He can punish or reward. He can grant power or take it away. He doesn\u2019t need to explain why. See Job for clarification on that point.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>I didn\u2019t <em>claim<\/em> that <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">\u201cGod didn\u2019t mean what He said\u201d<\/span> when Scripture says that He hardened Pharaoh\u2019s heart. This is a gross caricature of my reasoning. Things have to be interpreted according to all relevant Scripture that bears on the topic. If in fact He hardened his heart, and the Bible also says that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, then it seems to be a direct contradiction. I don\u2019t believe it is (since Scripture is God\u2019s inspired revelation). Thus, I believe that the statements about God are most plausibly interpreted in a different (less literal) sense, incorporating the other data.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">This is why theology gives most people a headache. Theologians often explain one problem with some fancy rhetorical footwork but end up causing others. The truthful answer is that we don\u2019t know what all the answers are. God is God and we are not. His ways are not our ways. His mind is so far above ours that we cannot explain it. Oftentimes our worldly explanations provide no comfort, only confusion, when instead we should simply accept and ponder the mysteries of our faith.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Believe me, I know that most people couldn\u2019t care less about theology, and even less so about apologetics. It\u2019s why I can barely make a living, while folks writing trash novels or dealing in smut are living in luxurious mansions. But I do what God has called me to do, and there is such a thing as an apologetics calling, that the Church has sanctioned and encouraged.<\/p>\n<p>You say we should shut our minds down at a certain point and simply accept the mystery. I agree, but it\u2019s a difference of degree. I think there is a lot more thinking that could and should be done before we get to the point of inexplicable mystery. You think this article shouldn\u2019t have been written and does little good.<\/p>\n<p>I obviously think it <em>should<\/em> be published (and so does <em>National Catholic Register<\/em>, or it wouldn\u2019t be here). It deals with a classic objection to Christianity and accusation against God: precisely the sort of thing that we ought to be prepared to explain (1 Peter 3:15).<\/p>\n<p>In fact, this article is a revised version of a reply I made to an atheist who was attacking Christianity and God (with many thousands reading and cheering him on). <strong><em>That<\/em><\/strong> is the time to defend both, wouldn\u2019t you agree? I write primarily for the benefit of Catholics who have sincere questions or difficulties with Catholic teaching: not those who think they know it, so that they need not learn any more, or who think theology is of only limited use at best.<\/p>\n<p>My work in general certainly does some good, by God\u2019s grace, judging by the reports sent to me of multiple hundreds coming into the Church in part because of it (all glory to God as the cause of all changed hearts and lives). I received two such reports in the last week.<\/p>\n<p>So while you may not care much for my writing style or what I write or think about (supposed <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">\u201cworldly explanations\u201d<\/span> and so forth), God somehow uses this poor sinner (and that\u2019s all I am) to bring more people to Him and His Church. That being the case, I will continue to follow my calling, as I have these past 37 years.<\/p>\n<p>God is good! I love sharing His message and that of the fullness of Christianity found in Catholicism with the world. I\u2019m more than happy and willing to take whatever slings and arrows come my way in doing so.<\/p>\n<p>***<\/p>\n<p>(originally 10-3-18)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Photo credit:<\/strong> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">The \u201cburning bush\u201d in which God talked to Moses<\/span> [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.maxpixel.net\/Gospel-Moses-Holy-Spirit-Christ-Bible-God-Jesus-3710692\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Max Pixel<\/a> \/\u00a0<i class=\"icon icon_cc0\"><\/i> <a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/publicdomain\/zero\/1.0\/deed.en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" class=\" decorated-link\">Creative Commons Zero \u2013 CC0<\/a> license]<\/p>\n<p>***<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This was an exchange underneath my article, \u201cDoes God Punish to the Fourth Generation?\u201d (National Catholic Register, 10-1-18). My critic\u2019s words will be in blue. ***** This raises several questions. First, how does this translate into the concept of original sin? All generations were tainted by Adam and Eve\u2019s decision. Their evil choice went way [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":31498,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[2347,258,2332,2333,94,2538,2537,93,2540,2539,1706,2019,345,8293],"class_list":["post-31495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-catholic-apologetics","tag-apologetics","tag-atheism","tag-catholic-apologetics","tag-catholic-apologists","tag-debate","tag-defense-of-christianity","tag-defense-of-the-catholic-faith","tag-dialogue","tag-discussion-ethics","tag-internet-discourse","tag-internet-ethics","tag-lay-catholic-apologetics","tag-secularism","tag-theology"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>In Defense of Apologetics &amp; Theology, &amp; Thinking About Both<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I write mainly for Catholics who have sincere questions or difficulties with Catholic teaching: not those who think they know it, or who think theology is of only limited use at best.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/04\/in-defense-of-apologetics-theology-thinking-about-both.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"In Defense of Apologetics &amp; 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \\\"This Rock\\\" (now called \\\"Catholic Answers Magazine\\\"), \\\"Envoy Magazine\\\" (Patrick Madrid), \\\"The Catholic Answer,\\\" \\\"The Coming Home Journal,\\\" \\\"Gilbert Magazine\\\" (American Chesterton Society), and \\\"The Latin Mass.\\\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \\\"The Michigan Catholic\\\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \\\"Envoy Magazine.\\\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \\\"Catholic Answers Live\\\" (twice), \\\"Faith and Family Live\\\" (Steve Wood), \\\"Kresta in the Afternoon,\\\" \\\"Son Rise Morning Show,\\\" \\\"Catholic Connection\\\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \\\"The Catholics Next Door.\\\" His large and popular website, \\\"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\\\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \\\"Envoy Magazine.\\\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \\\"index\\\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \\\"Surprised by Truth\\\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \\\"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\\\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \\\"The Catholic Verses\\\" (2004), \\\"The One-Minute Apologist\\\" (2007), \\\"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\\\" (2009), \\\"The Quotable Newman\\\" (editor: 2012), and \\\"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\\\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \\\"The New Catholic Answer Bible\\\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \\\"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\\\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \\\"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\\\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \\\"Quotable Wesley\\\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).","sameAs":["https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2331"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}