Biblical Evidence for Catholicism

Books by Dave Armstrong: Biblical Evidence for the Communion of Saints

2012-02-11T19:50:00.000-05:00

[completed and published at Lulu on 11 February 2012: 152 pages]

[purchase info. at the bottom of the page]

TABLE OF CONTENTS
[linked excerpts are not absolutely identical with the final product]

Dedication (p. 3)

Introduction (p. 5)

The Communion of Saints and Invocation and Intercession of the Saints

1. Reply to Objections to the Catholic Conception of the Communion of Saints (p.11)

2. Samuel the Prophet Appearing to Saul as an Argument for the Communion of Saints (p.19)

3. Biblical Data Regarding Communication from God and Ghosts in Dreams (p. 25)

4. Invocation of the Saints: Essentially Different from Magic and Necromancy (p. 37) [read portion]

5. Biblical Indications of Invocation of Angels for Intercessory Purposes (p. 47) [read online]

Veneration of Saints and Angels

6. Biblical Evidence for the Veneration of Saints and Imitation of Holy Persons as Models (p. 57)

7. Explicit Biblical Evidence for the Veneration of Angels and Men as Direct Representatives of God (p. 63)

8. Analogical Biblical Argument for Veneration of Saints and Angels from the Disapproval of Blasphemy of the Same (p. 69) [read online]

Images, Alleged Idolatry, “Controversial” Devotional Practices, and Relics

9. Exposition on the Veneration of Images, Iconoclasm, and Idolatry (p. 75)

10. Biblical Evidence for Praying to and Worshiping God While Bowing or Kneeling Before a Statue of a Creature Made by Human Hands (p. 83)

11. Biblical Examples of Worship of God via an Image (Pillar of Cloud, Burning Bush) (p. 89) [read online]

12. The Bronze Serpent as an Illustration of the Proper and Improper (Idolatrous) Use of Images (p. 91)

13. The Biblical Rationale for Crucifixes (p. 95)

14. Biblical Reflections on the Sacred Heart and Immaculate Heart Devotions (p. 101)

15. Biblical Evidence for Relics (p. 107)

Purgatory and Prayer for the Dead

16. A Fictional Dialogue on Purgatory (p. 113) [read online]

17. Biblical Indications of Purgatory in Matthew 5, Romans 8, and 1 Corinthians 3 (p. 117) [read portion]

18. Onesiphorus: the Dead Man that St. Paul Prayed for (p. 127)

19. 1 Corinthians 15:29 and "Baptism for the Dead": What Does it Mean? (p. 131)

Penance and Mortification

20. A Biblical Defense of Penance as Analogous to Prayer and Grace (p.135)

21. Biblical Support for Physical, Penitential Mortification (p. 141)

* * *

INTRODUCTION

This volume consists entirely of papers, essays, and dialogues originally posted on my website and blog (both named Biblical Evidence for Catholicism): written between 1995 and 2011. These have been edited, revised, and combined in various ways, in order to clarify the thoughts, eliminate any repetition, and maximize the impact of the arguments.

Most of the queries that I originally responded to came from our Protestant brethren in Christ. These occurrences afforded me the opportunity to defend and clarify what Catholics believe with regard to the communion of saints, why we do, and to demonstrate that Catholic beliefs are in harmony with both Holy Scripture and the beliefs of the early Church.

I have written extensively on the biblical basis of the Catholic understanding of the communion of saints, purgatory, and penance in my books published by Sophia Institute Press: A Biblical Defense of Catholicism (pp. 101-165), The Catholic Verses (pp. 127-179), The One-Minute Apologist (various chapters), and Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths (pp. 239-252; 353-379).

This work might, therefore, be considered a supplemental or complementary treatment of various specifics of the overall topic, though many aspects previously dealt with in my other books will be presently touched upon, and this book has enough “new” subject matter to stand on its own right, apart from the others. The relationship of the Bible and Catholic doctrine is the greatest single emphasis of my own apologetic endeavors.

It is my sincere hope and prayer that my own ruminations along these lines may be of some benefit to others, and both edifying and educational.

* * *

BACK COVER

The front and back covers were designed by Dave (with help from wife Judy) Armstrong.

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Purchase Options:

Paperback (special low price: $13.95) from the Lulu book page

Part of 15-for-$24.95 e-book package deal [SOON]

Uploaded on 11 February 2012.

***

The ePub Revolution in Bookselling / Availability of My Books in ePub and Kindle / Act Quickly to Obtain the Great Savings on Books to be Discontinued in the Upcoming New Package Deal

2012-02-06T16:01:00.001-05:00

I am making plans for a new spectacular package deal of my e-books: mostly in ePub format: that can be read on all kinds of mobile devices: iPad, iPod, iPhone, Blackberry, etc. It's better and more versatile than PDF (the current offer). Perhaps this accounts for sagging e-book sales as of late. More and more people are reading in this format, as opposed to PDF and the even more archaic Word / .doc.

20 of my books are now available on Amazon Kindle (mostly for just $4.99) and eleven as ePubs at Lulu (keep scrolling to find them) and twelve at Barnes and Noble (Nook), but my package deal will beat those prices (per book) by about 82%. I give you the dramatic sales prices (that's my part of the "deal"). I hope those of you who haven't purchased my book deal (currently 21 for $40 but about to be revised) will consider doing so, because the income from those is crucial to my budget, and with no middle man (other than a $70 provider fee for the selling website), I make a good profit. That's your part of the deal!

Word to the wise: many books currently in the package deal (including several "major" ones) will not be part of the new revised deal, so if you'd like to get all the books currently offered (at about $1.90 / book), you'll have to act quickly. I always have advertised it as a limited-time deal. I can't keep practically giving away my books indefinitely. But on the other hand, the market determines much and I need to generate more income (my perpetual cross to bear). See my books / sales page to purchase the existing package deal (if you want to learn more about any of the books), or go right to Payloadz to purchase.

I keep my prices as low as I possibly can, when I am in control of my own publishing. Last night I finished my latest book: Classic Catholic Biblical Apologetics: 1525-1925. It's 246 pages long and I sell the paperback for only $15.95. Please consider purchasing some of my books. It's my primary income, and I am a full-time apologist / author. Thanks for reading!

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Books by Dave Armstrong: Classic Catholic Biblical Apologetics: 1525-1925

2012-02-06T03:21:00.002-05:00

[completed and published at Lulu on 6 February 2012: 246 pages]

[purchase info. at bottom of page]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dedication (p. 3)

Introduction (p. 5) [read below]

Bibliography and Abbreviations (p. 9) [see below]

Brief Descriptions of Apologists (p. 15) [read below]

Classic Biblical Apologetics Listed by Scripture Passages (p. 27)

Index of Scripture Passages (p. 233)

Index of Topics (p. 241)

* * *

INTRODUCTION

The present volume came about as a result of reflection upon two great loves of mine: biblical apologetics in defense of the Catholic faith, and compilations of great historical Catholic quotations and arguments. My overwhelming methodological emphasis, as a full-time apologist these past ten years, is on the former, as is readily seen in the titles of many of my books, such as A Biblical Defense of Catholicism (Sophia Institute Press, 2003), The Catholic Verses (Sophia, 2004), and Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths (Sophia, 2009). My website (now a blog) online since 1997, is entitled “Biblical Evidence for Catholicism.”

Also among my books are compilations of the quotations of Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman and G. K. Chesterton: The Quotable Newman (Sophia, 2012) and The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton (Saint Benedict Press, 2009).

As I pondered these two strains of what I like to do, writing-wise, I developed a desire to start compiling some historic Catholic apologetics that centered on biblical argumentation, as a counter to the Protestant emphasis (sola Scriptura), and came up with the idea of “post-Protestant Catholic biblical apologetics” that could be collected from online versions (a lot less typing!), since it is all public domain material.

In this way I could continue working in both areas that I really enjoy, all in one new project; and complement the quotations I have already collected. Cardinal Newman mostly concentrated on Anglicanism, insofar as he wrote (relatively little) about comparative exegesis, whereas Chesterton didn’t write biblical apologetics much at all, and was far more interested in opposing the ideas of secularism and agnosticism and dealing with Protestantism from a cultural and historical standpoint.

The person I initially had in mind when pondering this book, was St. Francis de Sales, whose Catholic Controversy is a wonderfully insightful exercise in biblical apologetics, specifically against Calvinists (multiple thousands of whom he won back to the Catholic faith through his tireless efforts). This great saint and apologist will be cited frequently in this book (probably more than any other).

All in all, I shall cite twelve classic Catholic authors, and categorize the arguments or biblical commentary in order of the biblical books. Multiple topics often appear under one Bible passage, and the Index of Topics at the end (69 total) is very handy to locate various subjects. 228 biblical passages are featured (including 50 from the Old Testament).

Only excerpts that utilize directly biblical argumentation will be used. And all or virtually all references to Catholic magisterial sources will be omitted, so that Protestant readers can observe Catholic arguments solely devoted to the text of the Bible: whether positively presenting a Catholic position, or opposing an erroneous Protestant doctrine allegedly supported by the same Bible.

I hope and pray that readers will enjoy discovering and learning from this wonderful treasure-trove of historic Catholic apologetics, as much as I enjoyed locating these precious gems and compiling them in some kind of accessible order.

I intend for this book to be a very practical aid in apologetic outreach, and a reference source. It is essentially a “Classic Catholic Apologetic Commentary”: but devoted to the post-Protestant period up through the early 20^th century, rather than the patristic period, or the age of St. Thomas Aquinas and the Scholastics, as we often see in other similar works. Perhaps it can fill a certain “time period” void in the apologetic literature.

* * *

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND ABBREVIATIONS

[chronologically by death dates of the primary authors; sources will be indicated in the text by the abbreviated name of the author and number of book corresponding to those below, with page number also]

[Linked works (by title) are available to read online in their entirety, or in a few cases, to a great extent]

St. Thomas More (1478-1535) [More]

[1] Sir Thomas More: A Selection from His Works, as Well in Prose as in Verse (edited by W. Jos. Walker; Baltimore: Fielding Lucas, Jr., 1841)

[2] Life and Writings of Sir Thomas More: Lord Chancellor of England and Martyr Under Henry VIII (edited by Thomas Edward Bridgett; London: Burns & Oates, 1891)

[3] The Wisdom and Wit of Blessed Thomas More (edited by Thomas Edward Bridgett; London: Burns & Oates, 1892)

[4] Thomas More (Christopher Hollis; Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company, 1934)

[5] Erasmus, Tyndale, and More (William Edward Campbell; Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company, 1949)

[6] The Essential Thomas More (edited by James J. Greene and John P. Dolan; New York: Mentor-Omega Books, 1967)

Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536) [Era.]

[1] Erasmus-Luther: Discourse on Free Will (edited and translated by Ernst F. Winter; New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., Inc., 1961)

[2] Collected Works of Erasmus, Vol. 76: Controversies (Hyperaspistes; edited by Charles Trinkaus; translated by Peter Macardle and Clarence H. Miller; University of Toronto Press, 1999)

Francisco Suárez (1548-1617) [Suar.]

[1] Defense of the Catholic and Apostolic Faith Against the Errors of Anglicanism (translated by Peter L. P. Simpson, 2011; online)

St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) [FdS]

[1] The Catholic Controversy (translated by H. B. Canon MacKey; third revised edition, London: Burns & Oates, Ltd. / New York: Benziger Brothers, 1909)

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) [Pas.]

[1] Miscellaneous Writings (translated by M. P. Faugère; London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1849)

[2] Thoughts [Pensées] (translated by W. F. Trotter, c. 1910; reprinted by New York: E. P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1958)

Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (1627-1704) [Bos.]

[1] An Exposition of the Doctineof the Catholic Church in Matters of Controversy (London: Keating, Brown and Co., 1813)

[2] A Conference on the Authority of the Church (with Calvinist Minister John Claude; Baltimore: John Murphy, 1842)

[3] The History of the Variations of the Protestant Churches, Vol. 1 (New York: John Doyle, 1842)

[4] The History of the Variations of the Protestant Churches, Vol. 2 (Dublin: Richard Coyne, 1829)

Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman (1802-1865) [Wise.]

[1] Lectures on the Doctrines and Practices of the Roman Catholic Church (London: J. S. Hodson, 1836)

[2] Sermons on Our Lord Jesus Christ and on His Blessed Mother (Dublin: James Duffy, 1864)

William Bernard Ullathorne (1806-1889) [Ull.]

[1] The Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God: An Exposition (London: Richardson and Son, 1855)

Robert Hugh Benson (1871-1914) [Ben.]

[1] The Religion of the Plain Man (London: Burns & Oates, 1906)

[2] The Friendship of Christ (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1912)

[3] Spiritual Letters of Monsignor R. Hugh Benson to One of His Converts (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1915)

James Cardinal Gibbons (1834-1921) [Gib.]

[1] The Faith of Our Fathers (Baltimore: John Murphy Company, 93^rd revised and enlarged edition, 1917)

Ferdinand Prat, S. J. (1857-1938) [Prat]

[1] The Theology of St Paul, Vol. 1 (translated from the 11^th French edition by John L. Stoddard; Westminster, Maryland: The Newman Bookshop, 1952; originally 1923)

[2] The Theology of St Paul, Vol. 2 (translated from the 10^th French edition by John L. Stoddard; Westminster, Maryland: The Newman Bookshop, 1952; originally 1923)

Karl Adam (1876-1966) [Adam]

[1] The Spirit of Catholicism (translated by Dom Justin McCann; Garden City, New York: Doubleday Image, 1954 [originally 1924] )

* * *

BRIEF DESCRIPTIONS OF APOLOGISTS

[mostly from Wikipedia and the 1910 Catholic Encyclopedia]

St. Thomas More (1478-1535)

English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist; counselor to King Henry VIII of England and, for three years, Lord Chancellor. He wrote his famous political commentary Utopia in 1516, and tracts in opposition to the teachings of Martin Luther and William Tyndale. More refused to accept Henry VIII as Supreme Head of the Church of England: a status the king had been given by a compliant parliament through the Act of Supremacy of 1534. He was imprisoned in 1534 for his refusal to take the oath required by the First Succession Act, because the act disparaged the power of the Pope and Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon. In 1535, he was tried for treason, convicted on perjured testimony and beheaded. Many historians argue that his conviction for treason was unjust, and even among some Protestants his execution was viewed as heavy-handed. Erasmus saluted him as one “whose soul was more pure than any snow, whose genius was such as England never had.” Jonathan Swift said he was “the person of the greatest virtue this kingdom ever produced”. G. K. Chesterton wrote that “he may come to be counted as the greatest Englishman, or at least the greatest historical character in English history.” And Winston Churchill stated that he “stood forth as the defender of all that was finest in the medieval outlook.” The Catholic Church beatified him in 1886 and declared him a saint in 1935.

Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)

Dutch Renaissance humanist, Catholic priest, and perhaps the foremost humanist and most eminent Catholic Bible scholar of his time. Using humanist techniques for working on texts, he prepared very important and historically influential new Latin and Greek editions of the New Testament, and wrote influential works such as The Praise of Folly, Colloquies, and Enchiridion militis Christiani, (Handbook of the Christian Soldier). Erasmus always remained committed to reforming the scandals and moral lapses among Catholics from within, rather than splitting from it; accepted and defended the Church’s teachings, and was an obedient son of the Church: contrary to what many seem to think. In this respect, one is reminded of similar false rumors that have always swirled around Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman. Erasmus had been somewhat sympathetic to Martin Luther at first (and was even thought by many to be among his party) but quickly grew disenchanted with him and his movement, once he saw the direction it was heading, and the heretical and schismatic tendencies within it. Hence, on 6 September 1524, he wrote to Luther’s close friend and eventual successor, Philip Melanchthon:

I know nothing of your church; at the very least it contains people who will, I fear, overturn the whole system and drive the princes into using force to restrain good men and bad alike. The gospel, the word of God, faith, Christ, and Holy Spirit – these words are always on their lips; look at their lives and they speak quite another language.

His famous defense of free will (De libero arbitrio) was produced in 1524 and Luther responded with his Bondage of the Will the next year, along with the inevitable avalanche of personal insults. Erasmus replied in turn, in 1526 with his sharply critical -- but reasoned and controlled -- Hyperaspistes (A Warrior Shielding a Discussion of Free Will against The Enslaved Will). In 1533 he penned the treatise On Mending the Peace of the Church. Erasmus was heartbroken and perhaps crushed irreparably by the martyrdom of St. Thomas More, with whom he was very close. He died almost exactly a year later.

Francisco Suárez (1548-1617)

Spanish Jesuit priest, philosopher and theologian, one of the leading figures of the School of Salamanca movement, and generally regarded among the greatest scholastics after Thomas Aquinas. He wrote on a wide variety of subjects, producing a vast amount of work (his complete works in Latin amount to twenty-six volumes). Suárez’ writings include treatises on law, the relationship between Church and State, metaphysics, and theology. He is considered the godfather of International Law and his Disputationes metaphysicae were widely read in Europe during the seventeenth century. Suárez was regarded during his lifetime as being the greatest living philosopher and theologian, and given the nickname Doctor Eximius et Pius. After his death his reputation grew still greater, and he had a direct influence on such leading philosophers and great thinkers as Hugo Grotius, René Descartes, and Gottfried Leibniz. Suárez tried to reconcile the doctrine of predestination with the freedom of the human will by saying that the predestination is consequent upon God's foreknowledge of the free determination of man's will, which is therefore in no way affected by the fact of such predestination, maintaining that, though all share in an absolutely sufficient grace, there is granted to the elect a grace which is so adapted to their peculiar dispositions and circumstances that they infallibly, though at the same time quite freely, yield themselves to its influence. This mediating system was known by the name of "congruism."

St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622)

Bishop of Geneva. He worked to convert Protestants back to Catholicism, and was an accomplished preacher. He is known also for his writings on the topic of spiritual direction and spiritual formation, particularly Introduction to the Devout Life, and Treatise on the Love of God. St. Francis was known as a friend of the poor, a man of almost supernatural affability and understanding. He instituted catechetical instructions for the faithful, both young and old, made prudent regulations for the guidance of his clergy, and carefully visited the parishes scattered through the rugged mountains of his diocese. He reformed the religious communities. His goodness, patience and mildness became proverbial. He was a notably clear and gracious stylist in French, Italian and Latin. His Catholic Controversy (heavily featured in the present volume) originally consisted of leaflets he wrote as a young priest (27-29 years old) that the zealous missioner scattered among the inhabitants of Le Chablais in the beginning, when these people did not venture to come and hear him preach. They form a complete proof of the Catholic Faith. In the first part, he defends the authority of the Church, and in the second and third parts, the rules of faith, which were not observed by the heretical ministers. The primacy of St. Peter is amply vindicated. After four years of distributing these pamphlets, almost the entire population of Le Chablais (72,000) returned to the Catholic faith, after 60 years of adhering to Calvinism. His work in Catholic apologetics represents some of the most cogent arguments against Protestantism that has ever been written: perhaps unequaled to this day. He was canonized in 1665 and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1877.

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

Mathematician, physicist, inventor, and Catholic philosopher. Pascal's earliest work was in the natural and applied sciences where he made important contributions to the study of fluids, clarified the concepts of pressure and vacuum, wrote in defense of the scientific method, and laid down the basis of hydraulics. He invented the mechanical calculator, and helped create two major new areas of research: projective geometry and probability theory: strongly influencing the development of modern economics and social science. Following a mystical experience in late 1654, he had his "second conversion", and devoted himself mostly to philosophy and theology. His two most famous works date from this period: the Lettres provinciales and the Pensées. The latter (unfinished at his death) was to have been a sustained and coherent examination and defense of Catholic Christianity, with the original title Apologie de la religion Chrétienne ("Defense of the Christian Religion"). It is hailed as a landmark of French prose. He had elaborated an outline, and at intervals during his illness he jotted down notes, fragments, and meditations for his book. What Pascal's plan was, can never be determined, despite the information furnished by Port Royal and by his sister. It is certain that his method of apologetics must have been at once rigorous and original; no doubt, he had made use of the traditional proofs — notably, the historical argument from prophecies and miracles. But as against adversaries who did not admit historical certainty, it was stroke of genius to produce a wholly psychological argument and, by starting from the study of the human soul, to arrive at God. Malcolm Muggeridge wrote of it: “I consider that it was a beneficient, if not miraculous, circumstance that Pascal was unable to proceed beyond the notes . . . Like a sublime kaleidoscope, Pascal presents us with thought after thought, all shining with truth as they come in mint condition from his brilliant mind” (A Third Testament; New York: Ballantine Books, 1976 , 60-61).

Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (1627-1704)

Bishop of Meaux and theologian, renowned for his sermons and other addresses. He has been considered by many to be one of the most brilliant orators of all time and a masterly French stylist. He tried to win back the Huguenots to the Catholic Church. In 1668, he converted Turenne; in 1670, he published an Exposition de la foi catholique (An Exposition of the Doctine of the Catholic Church in Matters of Controversy), so moderate in tone that adversaries were driven to accuse him of having fraudulently watered down the Roman dogmas to suit a Protestant taste. Finally, in 1688, his great Histoire des variations des Églises protestantes (The History of the Variations of the Protestant Churches): perhaps the most brilliant of all his works, appeared. Few writers could have made the justification controversy interesting or even intelligible. His argument is simple: without rules, an organized society cannot hold together, and rules require an authorized interpreter. The Protestant churches had thrown over this interpreter; and Bossuet showed that, the longer Protestantism endured, the more the various sects within it varied on increasingly important points. The book is an encyclopedia history of such alterations of dogma. But for Bossuet and Catholics, "the truth which comes from God possesses from the first its complete perfection", and from that it follows that variations means theological errors, since there are so many contradictions or omissions of legitimate apostolic tradition handed down through history. The Catholic Encyclopedia regards him as the greatest orator “who has ever appeared in the Christian pulpit — greater than Chrysostom and greater than Augustine; the only man whose name can be compared in eloquence with those of Cicero and of Demosthenes.”

Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman (1802-1865)

First Archbishop of Westminster. He attained distinction in the natural sciences as well as in dogmatic and scholastic theology; also in Syriac and other Oriental studies. Wiseman's lectures on the relationship between religion and science were praised even by a critic as stern as Andrew Dickson White. In his highly influential A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, White wrote that "it is a duty and a pleasure to state here that one great Christian scholar did honour to religion and to himself by quietly accepting the claims of science and making the best of them. . . . That man was . . . Cardinal Wiseman. The conduct of this pillar of the Roman Church contrasts admirably with that of timid Protestants, who were filling England with shrieks and denunciations." He was also noted as a linguist — "he can speak with readiness and point", wrote Cardinal Newman of him some years later, "in half-a-dozen languages, without being detected for a foreigner in any one of them". In 1835 he began a course of lectures, addressed alike to Catholics and Protestants, which at once attracted large audiences, and from which, wrote a well-qualified critic, dated "the beginning of a serious revival of Catholicism in England." He wrote, in the summer of 1839, a famous article in the Dublin Review, about St. Augustine and the Donatists, that drew a parallel between the Donatists and the Tractarians (Oxford Movement) with a convincing logic that placed many of the latter, in Newman's famous words, "on their death-bed as regarded the Church of England." Newman himself had been profoundly troubled by the article, and it largely initiated his journey to the Catholic Church. He wrote on 5 January 1840 (to J. W. Bowden): “Indeed he has fixed on our weak point . . . It is plainly necessary to stop up the leak in our boat which he has made, if we are to proceed.” Wiseman worked unceasingly to promote a cordial understanding between new converts and “old English” Catholics, and to make the Oxford neophytes at home in their new surroundings. Not only by personal intercourse with his fellow-countrymen, but by his frequent appearances on the lecture-platform, he did much to influence public opinion in favour of Catholics. His graceful eloquence, genial personality, and sympathetic voice and manner, enhanced the impression wrought by his intimate knowledge of the various subjects with which he dealt. His delivery was fluent and his style brilliant, and characterized by a command of poetic imagery in which probably few public speakers have surpassed or equaled him. His death evoked expressions of general sympathy from men of every class and every creed; and the practically unanimous voice of the press testified to the high place he had won for himself in the respect and affections of his fellow-countrymen.

William Bernard Ullathorne (1806-1889)

Benedictine monk and Bishop of Birmingham. His father was a direct descendant of St. Thomas More. He worked as a missionary in Australia for seven years. In 1870 he attended the Vatican Council. He lived to see his diocese thoroughly organized, with many new communities of men, the most famous of which was Cardinal Newman’s Congregation of Oratorians at Edgbaston. During his thirty-eight years tenure as bishop 67 new churches, 32 convents and nearly 200 mission schools were built. His chief written works are: The Endowments of Man (London, 1880); Groundwork of Christian Virtues (1882); Christian Patience (1886).; The Immaculate Conception (1855); History of Restoration of English Hierarchy (1871); The Döllingerites (1874); Answer to Gladstone's 'Vatican Decrees' (1875); and a large number of sermons, pastorals, pamphlets, etc.

Robert Hugh Benson (1871-1914)

Benson was educated at Eton College and then studied classics and theology at Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1895, he was ordained a priest in the Church of England by his father, Edward White Benson, who was the then Archbishop of Canterbury. His father died suddenly in 1896 and he was sent on a trip to the Middle East to recover his own health. While there, he began to question the status of the Church of England and to consider the claims of the Catholic Church. On 11 September 1903, he was received into the Catholic Church. He was ordained as a Catholic priest in 1904, and declared a monsignor in 1911. Benson was a prolific writer, in various genres, such as historical and science fiction, children’s books, devotional works, plays, poetry, and apologetics. His titles in the latter category included The Religion of the Plain Man (1906), Paradoxes of Catholicism (1913), Christ in the Church: A Volume of Religious Essays (1911), and Non-Catholic Denominations (1910). He became the most popular Catholic novelist in England. A lecture he gave at the University of Notre Dame during a visit in 1914 was described in the Notre Dame Scholastic (25 April 1914) as follows: “Father Benson's address was remarkable for the same facility of expression, cogency of reasoning, and forcefulness of phrasing, that have so characterized his novels and essays . . . He is a pleasing and powerful speaker, his reasoning being flawless and his presentation of fact lucid and unmistakable. He held the undivided attention of his audience throughout, sustaining interest rather by the charm of a magnetic personality and a virile argument than by rhetorical artifice or forensic sensationalism.”

James Cardinal Gibbons (1834-1921)

Bishop of Richmond from 1872 to 1877, and Archbishop of Baltimore from 1877 until his death in 1921. Gibbons was elevated to the cardinalate in 1886, the second American to receive that distinction. His vicariate in 1868, the entire state of North Carolina, had fewer than seven hundred Catholics. In his first four weeks there, Gibbons traveled almost a thousand miles, visiting towns and mission stations and administering the sacraments. He also befriended many Protestants, and preached at their churches. Gibbons made a number of converts, but finding the apologetical works available inadequate for their needs, he determined to write his own; Faith of Our Fathers (first edition, 1876) would prove the most popular apologetical work written by an American Catholic. He was an acquaintance of every president from Andrew Johnson to Warren G. Harding and an adviser to several of them. From 1869 to 1870, Gibbons attended the First Vatican Council and voted in favor of papal infallibility. He played a key role in the granting of papal permission for Catholics to join labor unions. His other writings included Our Christian Heritage (1889), The Ambassador of Christ (1896), Discourses and Sermons (1908), and A Retrospect of Fifty Years (1916). Gibbons’ style was simple but compelling. In 1917, President Theodore Roosevelt hailed Gibbons as the most venerated, respected, and useful citizen in America. In his later years he was seen as the public face of Catholicism in the United States, and on his death was widely mourned. H. L. Mencken, who reserved his harshest criticism for Christian ministers, wrote, in 1921 after Gibbons' death, “He was a man of the highest sagacity, a politician in the best sense, and there is no record that he ever led the Church into a bog or up a blind alley.”

Ferdinand Prat, S. J. (1857-1938)

Professor of Scripture, philologist, exegete, consultant to the Pontifical Biblical Commission, and editor of the Etudes Bibliques. Many of the Commission’s decisions regarding modernism, leading up to its condemnation in 1907, were prepared in part by Fr. Prat. He served all through World War I as a chaplain, and his heroism and bravery under fire won him the coveted Cross of the Legion of Honor. His work, Jesus Christ, His Life, His Doctrine and His Work (1933; English translation, 1950), is regarded by many biblical scholars as the best life of Christ in existence. What might be called the culmination of his life’s work is The Theology of St. Paul, a studious, thorough, and enlightening work, published between 1908 and 1923. It has been translated into many languages. Even today, the formulas given by Fr. Prat can help non-specialists to grasp the originality of the Pauline texts, and he provided in its pages a very helpful definition of biblical theology: “Its duty is to collect the results of exegesis, . . . Exegesis studies particular texts, but does not trouble itself overmuch about their mutual relations. Its method is that of analysis. Biblical theology adds to analysis synthesis, for it must verify the results of the exegesis which has preceded it, before employing them to reconstruct a system, or, rather, a line of thought. . . . We may say, therefore, that biblical theology ends where scholastic theology begins, and begins where exegesis finishes.” Other volumes of his include The Bible and History, The Ten Commandments (both 1904), Origen, Theologian and Exegete (1907), and The Theology of St. John (1938). He also wrote over a hundred articles in biblical, scientific, and theological journals.

Karl Adam (1876-1966)

German priest (originally from Bavaria) and professor of theology: including moral and dogmatic theology. His books include: Tertullian's Concept of the Church (1907), Eucharistic Teaching of St. Augustine (1908), Christ Our Brother, The Son of God, Roots of the Reformation, and One And Holy. He is best known for his 1924 work, The Spirit of Catholicism. It has been translated into French, Spanish, English, Italian, Portuguese, Polish, Dutch, Hungarian, Latin, Chinese and Japanese, and is still in print today. It was written to provide a calm, dispassionate, clearly written consideration of the fundamental concepts of the Catholic faith which would explain to all, Catholic and non-Catholic alike, exactly what the Catholic Church is, and is widely regarded as one of the finest introductions to the Catholic faith written in the 20th century. His writings have all revolved around the necessity for an understanding of our relationship with Christ Himself with particular stress on the doctrine of the Mystical Body. In 1934 he delivered a denunciation of the so-called German religion in an address on "The Eternal Christ". This led to serious threats from the Nazis, but he held firm. Fr. Adam particularly specialized in St. Augustine’s theology, and had a great love for tradition and the Church fathers. His style captivated both readers and audiences, and he had great influence on Protestants, since he was concerned with ecumenism as well as apologetics. For years he worked tirelessly for a union of Christian faiths in one faith. This theme runs through all of his books. Fr. Adam loved young people and had an appealing personality, with a keen sense of humor. His house was open to all and his charity was well known.

EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK

Lesser-Known Biblical Passage on the Papacy (Luke 12:41-44) [from St. Francis de Sales; Facebook]

St. Francis de Sales' Argument Against Total Depravity and for the Indefectibility of the Church, from the Psalms

St. Francis de Sales' Argument for the Indefectibility of the Church (Acts 20:28) [Facebook]

Argument for the Papacy from the Analogy of Abraham [from St. Francis de Sales; Facebook]

Erasmus vs. Luther and Calvin (Free Will / Meritorious Works / Total Depravity) [Facebook]

Erasmus on the Perspicuity of Scripture and Circular Protestant Reasoning [Facebook]

Bishop Bossuet: Great Comment on the Visible Church, With Sinners in It [Facebook]

Bishop Bossuet on Luther's Contradictions Regarding Assurance of Salvation vs. Non-Assurance of Repentance [Facebook]

Zwinglians and Calvinists Correctly Argued Over Against Luther, that if "This is My Body" is Taken Literally, Catholic Transubstantiation is Far More Reasonable than Lutheran Consubstantiation [from Bishop Bossuet; Facebook]

Cardinal Wiseman on Quick Mass Baptisms in the Book of Acts as a Proof of the Profound Authority of the Catholic Church and Binding of New Converts to Even its Future Decrees [Facebook]

Cardinal Gibbons: Analogy of the Papacy to the High Priest of the Old Testament [Facebook]

Cardinal Gibbons on the False, Unbiblical Dichotomy Between Interior Pious Disposition and External Formal Ceremony, Liturgy, and Ritual [Facebook]

Sacrifice of the Mass in the Synoptic and Pauline Consecration Formulas From the Last Supper [from Ferdinand Prat, S. J.; Facebook]

The "Obedience of Faith" in Paul and its Soteriological Implications (Justification and Denial of "Faith Alone") [from Ferdinand Prat, S. J.; Facebook]

The Nature of Papal Leadership: "Servant of Servants" [from Karl Adam; Facebook]

BACK COVER

The front and back covers were designed by Dave (with help from wife Judy) Armstrong.

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Purchase Options:

Paperback (special low price: $14.95) from the Lulu book page

Part of e-book package deal: 15-for-$24.95 [COMING SOON]

Updated on 11 February 2012

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Comprehensive Response to Protestant Robin Phillips' Essay, "Why I am Not a Roman Catholic"

2012-01-31T21:08:00.004-05:00

Robin Phillips is co-director of the Reformed Liturgical Institute. he studied philosophy at London University and received a B.A. in Western Civilization from the UK’s Open University. He was a history teacher at the Classical Christian Academy in Idaho, where he developed a six year curriculum spanning all of Western Civilization. Currently he is working on a PhD in historical theology (King’s College, London). He is the director of the Alfred the Great Society, a columnist for the Chuck Colson Center and the Spokane Libertarian Examiner, the author of the monthly ‘Letter from America’ and ‘The Persecuted Church’ columns for the Christian Voice magazine. In addition to these positions he also acts as a contributing author for Touchstone, Fermentations, The Jonathan Edwards Society, World Net Daily, the Kuyper Foundation’s biannual Journal Christianity & Society, Northwind, Salvo Magazine, and their blog Signs of the Times. His book, The Decent Drapery of Life is currently scheduled for publication with Wipf and Stock; his volume, Saints and Scoundrels will be published by Canon Press in 2012. He has also compiled a collection of his essays: The Twilight of Liberalism (Lulu, 2011).

Theologically, Phillips describes himself as "kind of a Calvinist," and "passionately Trinitarian, avidly covenantal, fervently post-millennial, unashamedly ecumenical."

The following is a point-by-point response to his essay, Why I am Not a Roman Catholic (12 December 2011): posted at his website, Robin's Readings and Reflections. It is cited in its entirety, in blue, with the exception of the portions at the end of his essay that specifically address "traditionalist" Catholics (they can defend themselves!). All words in black are my own.

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Earlier in the year my friend Brad Littlejohn wrote an article for his blog titled ‘Why I Won’t Convert’, outlining his continued commitment to Protestantism. Now it’s my turn. Having used my previous post to reaffirm my commitment to Calvinism (kind of), I wanted to use the present post as an opportunity to explain why I am not a Roman Catholic.

I always appreciate clarifications / affirmations of this sort, from Protestant brethren who are not weighed down by the silly and logically circular mindset of anti-Catholicism. It also gives me a great opportunity to make a Catholic response; to "bounce off" the thoughts and to be intellectually stimulated to make a further defense of Catholicism, as the case may be. I enjoy few things more.

First the qualifications. Keep in mind that I am still in the process of learning about Roman Catholicism and I do not claim any expert knowledge. I cannot even guarantee that what I will say is not tinctured with protestant caricatures or inadvertent uncharities. I am hoping my Roman Catholic brothers and sisters will enlighten me on any factual mistakes in what follows.

Glad to be of any service. I appreciate the "humble" approach.

The purpose of this post is not to claim any special authority on Roman Catholicism, but simply to explain from a personal point of view why I have not chosen to convert. What follows is not written out of any sense of antagonism towards Roman Catholics. Rather, it was written after feeling pressure from a traditionalist Roman Catholic brother that I should convert to Rome. (No problem there: if someone believes that RC is the true church, they should want to convert me out of love. But equally, it only seems fair I should respond by explaining the reasons I have chosen not to convert.)

Perfectly understandable and acceptable . . .

Finally, although I will be critical of Roman Catholicism, this should not be taken as overshadowing my strong commitment to ecumenism that I have articulated elsewhere (see my article, ‘Sola Fide: The Great Ecumenical Doctrine’) nor my belief that Roman Catholics are Christians.

Fully understood. It sounds like Robin is very much of the mind that I am, myself: committed to both apologetics (in a charitable way) and ecumenism. That is why I look forward to this so much. It's refreshing. This is how it should be among Christians.

One of the primary reasons I have not converted to Rome is because Rome does not seem to be Catholic enough. Consider just three areas where Protestants normally find fault with Rome: (A) Rome’s sacramentalism; (B) Rome’s claims to universality; (C) Rome’s concept of authoritative traditions or the magisterium.

Now these three areas are indeed problems, but not because Rome puts too much emphasis on these things, as Protestants often erroneously claim, but too less. The real reason Rome’s sacramentalism is a problem is not because she is too sacramental, but because she is not sacramental enough. The real reason that Rome’s claim to universality is a problem is not because she claims universality but because she isn’t universal enough. The real reason that Rome’s concept of an authoritative tradition is a problem is because her traditions are not authoritative enough. Let's take each of these in turn.

A curious thesis . . . okay, let's see where this goes.

Rome Trivializes the Sacraments

In practice, Rome seems to minimize the importance of the sacraments. Think of the way the blessed Eucharist was functionally devalued in medieval Europe within a system that was prepared to deny wine to the laity and restrict even the bread to annual services.

But communion in one kind is not automatically a "trivialization." The fact remains that within the assumption of bodily Real Presence, Jesus is fully present under either form (since He can't be divided). This is a biblical teaching:

1 Corinthians 11:27 (RSV, as throughout) Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord.

Note the all-important "or." This shows that Jesus is fully present in either. If we profane the consecrated host, we are guilty of the body and blood of Christ. The logic (even the grammatical structure or syntax) is unassailable. Jesus Himself also alludes to one form only being salvific:

John 6:33-35 For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world." [34] They said to him, "Lord, give us this bread always." [35] Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.

John 6:50-51 This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that a man may eat of it and not die. [51] I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.

John 6:57-58 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats me will live because of me. [58] This is the bread which came down from heaven, not such as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live for ever.

These passages don't exclude both forms, but they do show that one only is quite sufficient for the purpose of receiving our Lord Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity: a thing directly tied to salvation (John 6). The widespread withdrawal of the cup had nothing to do with a goal of deliberate deprivation, and everything to do with hygienic and reverential considerations. It was much easier for abuse to take place with liquid. It was also more difficult and risk-laden to take the Eucharist to the sick in their homes (as was widely done in the early Church) in liquid form.

When many Protestants later ceased believing in the Real Substantial Presence altogether, such considerations were irrelevant: a little wine (or the unbiblical grape juice, due to the social pressure of the temperance movement) splashes out? So what: it's only symbolic, anyway. No biggie. But when one believes that it is literally our Lord Jesus, then the utmost care is taken.

Moreover, how sacraments or liturgy are conducted in details is a relevant consideration as well. I could just as well argue that the Calvinist tradition trivialized baptism by not routinely using immersion, which seems indicated or some kind of norm, at least in some Bible passages. It was deemed a proper development and not fatal to the essence of baptism, by most Protestants, to allow pouring or even sprinkling. The Baptist would argue, on the other hand, that immersion as well as adult baptism are both central or essential to the rite. Most Christians (including the majority of Protestant) disagree.

Lastly, those of us who believe in baptismal regeneration (the vast majority of all Christians throughout history) also hold that to deny that result is to violate the very essence of the sacrament: to "gut it" of its power and central purpose. But these are the same kinds of arguments made with regard to Holy Communion: because Rome didn't allow the cup for many years, somehow it is "trivializing" the sacrament. It simply doesn't follow; and the more one understands the reasoning, the less force this objection has. I hope Robin can be thus persuaded to drop it as an objection.

The only case that has any "teeth" at all here is the complaint about infrequent communion. But the Church in due course changed that. I'm not sure what the earlier rationale was. Further reading:

Biblical Evidence for the Distribution of One Species in Holy Communion

More Biblical Evidence for One Species In Holy Communion

Or again, consider the way Rome trivializes the Eucharist by allowing those who support abortion and even homosexuality to have access to Christ’s body and blood merely because they are Roman Catholics.

I agree that there should be more vigilance on the part of priests in this regard; however, all this proves is that there is some abuse of the norm. It proves nothing one way or the other as to the theological truth-claims of Catholicism. The claim of "there are abuses, therefore the system itself is unworthy to be adhered to and is untrue" is filled with logical fallacies that I think are apparent, upon a little reflection. I trust my readers enough to not feel that I have to spend any further time explaining why.

The bottom-line questions is: who offers the true sacraments, as understood throughout the history of the Church (which ties into apostolic succession), and who does not? That is what has to be determined, and when the answer is found, the seeker is duty-bound to follow the truth wherever it leads. Abuses are present in any human organization, insofar as human elements are necessarily involved. It's a legitimate concern but not a "system-defeater."

Such people would be quickly excommunicated in conservative Protestant churches and in the early church (see Paul’s correspondence with the Corinthians) and yet are allowed full table privileges in Rome. The patience and slowness of the Roman Catholic church on these matters is an innovation compared to the early church.

It's true that more "conservative" Protestant denominations and congregations will usually take a harder line on issues of this sort (thank God for that); however, it still remains true that Protestantism as a whole is precisely that portion of Christianity which has most massively compromised with modernism and the sexual revolution. Important parts of it have not (again, thank God) but the historical tendency is clearly a strong trend toward liberalization and compromise. Hence, it is a fact that there are now entire denominations, including virtually all of mainstream Protestantism, that espouse legal abortion and homosexual practice; even clergy.

Catholicism, on the other hand, is as firmly against abortion as always, and against homosexual acts. That is our dogmatic teaching. How it is applied or "enforced" is a separate (and to me, far lesser) issue of concern. But it seems to me that if the larger issue is "why or why not to be a Catholic?", it can't be based only on a consideration of abuses. The far more important consideration is: what does a Christian body teach as to the rightness and wrongness of various acts, such as abortion, etc.?

I am a Catholic myself in large part because I was sick and tired of Protestant compromise dogmatically with the sexual revolution and modern immorality in general. I looked to see which group had maintained traditional moral teachings in their entirety, and there was only one clear choice: Catholicism. We forbid divorce, abortion, contraception (a thing all Christians prohibited until 1930), and we alone hold to apostolic (and biblical) morality in its entirety. I didn't expect that all individual Catholics would adhere perfectly to all this, since we are a fallen human race. I didn't become a Catholic because Catholics were outwardly more saintly than everyone else (heavens no!). I did because it was the fullness of Christian truth, I came to conclude (and particularly impressive and unique in its moral teaching).

Rome is to be applauded for her high view of the Eucharist, but we do right to protest against her for not holding a higher view.

But I respectfully submit that all these objections (save one, which is no longer even an issue, and is in the nature of a past shortcoming) fail, per my reasoning above, and certainly any form of Protestantism is more vulnerable to the same criticisms.

Rome Isn’t Catholic Enough

Rome is right to emphasize the importance of the church’s visible unity and catholicity, and Protestants have much to learn from catholic teaching in this area. Yet when Rome excommunicated many eastern patriarchs in the 11th century and continues to be incredibly slow about pursuing institutional unity with the Eastern Orthodox church since they do not accept the supremacy of the Roman pontiff (though there is some hope things may change during the present millennium), one has to wonder how deep her commitment to visible unity really runs.

The mutual anathemas have been lifted. No one has been more desirous of a reunion than the Catholic Church. Several times in recent years it seemed within reach, but invariably it was factions in Eastern Orthodoxy that sunk it (just as in the Council of Florence in the 15th century). It is odd, then, that we are criticized for what is far more a widespread practice and difficulty within Orthodoxy.

(The Eastern Orthodox churches came back in union with Rome in 1096, which lasted until 1204 when the horrendous behaviour of the crusaders destroyed all hope of unity.

That works both ways. This presents the usual one-sided view that it was all our fault. There were horrendous sins committed by Catholics, but also (what we never hear about) by the Orthodox. See my paper: Reflections on the Sack of Constantinople in 1204 and Lesser-Known Byzantine Atrocities. In Wikipedia, ("Eastern Orthodox Church") it is noted:

In 2004, Pope John Paul II extended a formal apology for the sacking of Constantinople in 1204, which was importantly also strongly condemned by the Pope at the time (Innocent III, . . .); the apology was formally accepted by Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople.

Pope Innocent II was outraged at the sacking of Constantinople. His scathing letter of condemnation reads in part:

How, indeed, is the Greek church to be brought back into ecclesiastical union and to a devotion for the Apostolic See when she has been beset with so many afflictions and persecutions that she sees in the Latins only an example of perdition and the works of darkness, so that she now, and with reason, detests the Latins more than dogs? As for those who were supposed to be seeking the ends of Jesus Christ, not their own ends, whose swords, which they were supposed to use against the pagans, are now dripping with Christian blood they have spared neither age nor sex. They have committed incest, adultery, and fornication before the eyes of men. They have exposed both matrons and virgins, even those dedicated to God, to the sordid lusts of boys. Not satisfied with breaking open the imperial treasury and plundering the goods of princes and lesser men, they also laid their hands on the treasures of the churches and, what is more serious, on their very possessions. They have even ripped silver plates from the altars and have hacked them to pieces among themselves. They violated the holy places and have carried off crosses and relics.

During the 15th century in Florence the Roman Catholic church held a council which decreed the necessity of being in submission to the Roman pontiff, and the patriarchs of the East accepted this while Rome in turn recognized the legitimacy of the Eastern Patriarchs. However, when the Patriarchs when back to the East their people rejected what had been decided and replaced the Patriarchs with bishops who did not accept the primacy of Rome.

Just as I noted above: reunion was quite achievable then, but the masses, in their strong prejudice against the "Latins" wrecked any hope of it. This prejudice was so deep that even western offers of military aid against the Turks were rejected, and Constantinople was overrun in 1453: just eight years after the ecumenical council ended.

Even so, to this day Rome accepts the legitimacy of the Eastern Orthodox churches in a qualified sense and allows them to participate in the blessed Eucharist, though the same does not apply the other way round:

according to a series of decrees, EO’s can officially have communion in RC churches but RC’s cannot officially have communion in EO churches.)

More evidence that we are relatively more ecumenical . . . I find this whole line of reasoning odd and curiously insubstantial. It's clear that we have been (on the whole, and especially recently) more "Catholic" than the Orthodox have been. Yet the present charge is directed against the Catholic Church. In any event, I don't see how these objections succeed in their aim. I see no reason here to not be a Catholic.

What then of Rome’s attitude towards Protestants? Even when Vatican II’s Decree on Ecumenism acknowledged that some Protestants are “members of Christ’s body” (3.20), part of “Christian communions,” (1) and “justified by faith,” (3.20), Rome still didn’t have the guts to officially retract her earlier sectarian statements to the contrary.

The Catholic Church made all kinds of positive ecumenical statements about Protestants. See my paper about this decree and other similar statements: How Catholics View Protestants.

Does Vatican II’s Decree on Ecumenism mean that Pius XII Mystici Corporis Christi is no longer accurate, specifically when it gave submission to the Roman hierarchy as one of the four conditions to church membership?

Catholics distinguish between implicit and explicit membership in the Church. Ours is an infinitely better and more charitable view compared to the confessions and creeds of most Protestant denominations, which routinely class us with the antichrist or Whore of Babylon. The Lutheran Confessions (even after the allegedly profoundly ecumenical Augsburg Confession), describe the Catholic Mass as akin to the worship of Baal. Thus these charges ring rather hollow.

The Catholic Church is clearly committed to ecumenism. There has been a rapid and welcome development of this line of thought in the last 60-70 years. The historic "difficulties" present some problems to work through but the Catholic position through the centuries can be defended. I have done so, myself, in demonstrating, e.g., that ecumenical motifs were present in St. Thomas Aquinas and others, and are not completely new. But the emphasis of the Church has definitely changed.

Similarly, since the Anathemas of the Council of Trent and Pope Pius IX's ‘Syllabus of Errors’ still officially stand (both of which gathered together in one spot teaching that was already part of the magisterium), both Protestants as well as Roman Catholics have been struggling to understand just how serious Rome’s claims to catholicity are in the post-Vatican II world.

This is also massively misunderstood. Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin showed in a superb 1996 paper, "Justification by Faith Alone," how the Tridentine anathemas do not apply to most Protestants:

The three theological virtues of Catholic theology are thus summed up in the (good) Protestant's idea of the virtue of faith. And the Protestant slogan "salvation by faith alone" becomes the Catholic slogan "salvation by faith, hope, and charity (alone)."

This was recognized a few years ago in The Church's Confession of Faith: A Catholic Catechism for Adults, put out by the German Conference of Bishops, which stated:

Catholic doctrine . . . says that only a faith alive in graciously bestowed love can justify. Having "mere" faith without love, merely considering something true, does not justify us. But if one understands faith in the full and comprehensive biblical sense, then faith includes conversion, hope, and love . . . According to Catholic doctrine, faith encompasses both trusting in God on the basis of his mercifulness proved in Jesus Christ and confessing the salvific work of God through Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit. Yet this faith is never alone. It includes other acts.

The same thing was recognized in a document written a few years ago under the auspices of the (Catholic) German Conference of Bishops and the bishops of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany (the Lutheran church). The purpose of the document, titled The Condemnations of the Reformation Era: Do They Still Divide?, was to determine which of the sixteenth-century Catholic and Protestant condemnations are still applicable to the other party. Thus the joint committee which drafted the document went over the condemnations from Trent and assessed which of them no longer applied to Lutherans and the condemnations of the Augsburg Confession and the Smalcald Articles, etc., and assesses which of them are not applicable to Catholics.

When it came to the issue of justification by faith alone, the document concluded:
"[T]oday the difference about our interpretation of faith is no longer a reason for mutual condemnation . . . even though in the Reformation period it was seen as a profound antithesis of ultimate and decisive force. By this we mean the confrontation between the formulas 'by faith alone,' on the one hand, and 'faith, hope, and love,' on the other.
"We may follow Cardinal Willebrand and say: 'In Luther's sense the word 'faith' by no means intends to exclude either works or love or even hope. We may quite justly say that Luther's concept of faith, if we take it in its fullest sense, surely means nothing other than what we in the Catholic Church term love' (1970, at the General Assembly of the World Lutheran Federation in Evian).
If we take all this to heart, we may say the following: If we translate from one language to another, then Protestant talk about justification through faith corresponds to Catholic talk about justification through grace; and on the other hand, Protestant doctrine understands substantially under the one word 'faith' what Catholic doctrine (following 1 Cor. 13:13) sums up in the triad of 'faith, hope, and love.' But in this case the mutual rejections in this question can be viewed as no longer applicable today
"According to [Lutheran] Protestant interpretation, the faith that clings unconditionally to God's promise in Word and Sacrament is sufficient for righteousness before God, so that the renewal of the human being, without which there can be no faith, does not in itself make any contribution to justification. Catholic doctrine knows itself to be at one with the Protestant concern in emphasizing that the renewal of the human being does not 'contribute' to justification, and is certainly not a contribution to which he could make any appeal before God. Nevertheless it feels compelled to stress the renewal of the human being through justifying grace, for the sake of acknowledging God's newly creating power; although this renewal in faith, hope, and love is certainly nothing but a response to God's unfathomable grace. Only if we observe this distinction can we say
"In addition to concluding that canons 9 and 12 of the Decree on Justification did not apply to modern Protestants, the document also concluded that canons 1-13, 16, 24, and 32 do not apply to modern Protestants (or at least modern Lutherans)."
During the drafting of this document, the Protestant participants asked what kind of authority it would have in the Catholic Church, and the response given by Cardinal Ratzinger (who was the Catholic corresponding head of the joint commission) was that it would have considerable authority. The German Conference of Bishops is well-known in the Catholic Church for being very cautious and orthodox and thus the document would carry a great deal of weight even outside of Germany, where the Protestant Reformation started.

Furthermore, the Catholic head of the joint commission was Ratzinger himself, who is also the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome, which is the body charged by the pope with protecting the purity of Catholic doctrine. Next to the pope himself, the head of the CDF is the man most responsible for protecting orthodox Catholic teaching, and the head of the CDF happened to be the Catholic official with ultimate oversight over the drafting of the document.

Before the joint commission met, Cardinal Ratzinger and Lutheran Bishop Eduard Lohse (head of the Lutheran church in Germany) issued a letter expressing the purpose of the document, stating:
"[O]ur common witness is counteracted by judgments passed by one church on the other during the sixteenth century, judgments which found their way into the Confession of the Lutheran and Reformed churches and into the doctrinal decisions of the Council of Trent. According to the general conviction, these so-called condemnations no longer apply to our partner today. But this must not remain a merely private persuasion. It must be established in binding form."
I say this as a preface to noting that the commission concluded that canon 9 of Trent's Decree on Justification is not applicable to modern Protestants (or at least those who say saving faith is Galatians 5 faith). This is important because canon 9 is the one dealing with the "faith alone" formula (and the one R.C. Sproul is continually hopping up and down about). It states:
"If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, so as to understand that nothing else is required to cooperate in the attainment of the grace of justification . . . let him be anathema."
The reason this is not applicable to modern Protestants is that Protestants (at least the good ones) do not hold the view being condemned in this canon.

Like all Catholic documents of the period, it uses the term "faith" in the sense of intellectual belief in whatever God says. Thus the position being condemned is the idea that we are justified by intellectual assent alone (as per James 2). We might rephrase the canon:
"If anyone says that the sinner is justified by intellectual assent alone, so as to understand that nothing besides intellectual assent is required to cooperate in the attainment of the grace of justification . . . let him be anathema."
And every non-antinomian Protestant would agree with this, since in addition to intellectual assent one must also repent, trust, etc.

So Trent does not condemn the (better) Protestant understanding of faith alone. In fact, the canon allows the formula to be used so long as it is not used so as to understand that nothing besides intellectual assent is required. The canon only condemns "sola fide" if it is used "so as to understand that nothing else [besides intellectual assent] is required" to attain justification. Thus Trent is only condemning one interpretation of the sola fide formula and not the formula itself.
I should mention at this point that I think Trent was absolutely right in what it did and that it phrased the canon in the perfect manner to be understood by the Catholic faithful of the time. The term "faith" had long been established as referring to intellectual assent, as per Romans 14:22-23, James 2:14-26, 1 Corinthians 13:13, etc., and thus everyday usage of the formula "faith alone" had to be squashed in the Catholic community because it would be understood to mean "intellectual assent alone".

Note that these ecumenical sentiments were wholeheartedly espoused by none other than the present pope: Benedict XVI (formerly Joseph Ratzinger). We can continue to be stuck in the mutual anathemas of the 16th century or we can move ahead, with this sort of charitable understanding of each other. One may not want to become a Catholic, but at least (hopefully) our position can be correctly understood, as it is clarified and explained in greater detail.

So while I applaud Rome for holding a high view of catholicity, I think we do right to protest against her for not holding a higher view.

I don't see anyone else holding a higher view than we do. If the procedure is to present a (well-meaning but still . . .) caricature of what our view is, knock that down, and pass on presenting any superior alternate view, then obviously, a person will conclude against Catholicism. But nothing is accomplished in terms of a true comparison of relative merits. The present paper allows readers a chance to:

1) See various Protestant criticisms of Catholicism;

and also

2) See how a Catholic apologist responds.

Read both sides and make up your minds which side is more plausible and worthy of belief!

Rome’s lack of catholicity leads to a misunderstanding of the sacraments. Even though the Second Vatican Council’s ‘Decree on Ecumenism’ acknowledges Protestants to be “members of Christ’s body” (3.20), part of “Christian communions,” (1) “justified by faith,” (3.20) and that Protestants as Protestants have “access to the community of salvation,” (1.22) Protestants are still bared from participating in the blessed Eucharist with them, thus introducing an unchurchly division between the rite of baptism and the sacrament of holy communion.

This is because, in the Bible and early Church one must believe the entirety of Catholic beliefs before partaking in the Eucharist. This is the reason why there were very lengthy periods of time for catechumens. Almost all Protestants do not believe as we do regarding the Eucharist: and our view is demonstrably the prevailing one throughout Church history. One of the Protestant denominations that is closer to our view: the Missouri Synod Lutherans, also has closed communion, so it is not a characteristic unique to us. The Orthodox do not allow us to commune with them.

But the more one departs from traditional eucharistic belief, the more lax one will be as to whom are allowed to partake of communion. This is how liberal ersatz so-called "ecumenism" works: the less one believes, the more they can band together and unite organizationally. As for the necessity of doctrinal agreement, see my papers:

Replies to a Lutheran Who is Offended by Being Excluded From Holy Communion at a Catholic Mass:

Anglican Anti-Traditional Principles of "Development" and the "Cult of Uncertainty" (vs. Dr. Edwin Tait)

Response to Rev. Michael Pahls on "Theological Humility" and the Protestant "Non-Quest" Regarding Christian Certainty

Glorying in Uncertainty: a Peculiar Post-Enlightenment Protestant Phenomenon (Dialogue With a Calvinist)

This is sometimes defended on the grounds that Protestants do not believe that the Eucharist is really the body and blood of Christ; however, most of the Protestants I know do accept that the Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ in some sense, and so it is difficult for me to take this argument very seriously.

For the Catholic "some sense" is not sufficient. it is this argument that is doctrinally lax and unserious. It thumbs its nose at Christian and Catholic tradition, as altogether foolish and insubstantial (no pun intended). We believe that the consecrated Eucharist is truly our Lord Jesus: Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. Thus, we can hardly allow someone to partake who doesn't even agree. But in our view (which is apostolic and patristic) there is a necessity to accept all that the Church teaches: not just concerning the Eucharist: to be admitted both to the Church and the Church's table.

Again, for Protestants to whom agreement in doctrine is a relative trifle, none of that matters. But if doctrine did matter deeply to them, they should be the first to understand this relatively elementary principle: "believe in a group's teachings before being admitted to its most sacred and important rites." To me (including when I was Protestant) it's always been a no-brainer, but many people have the hardest time with this. I've never understood why.

Make no mistake, Rome does acknowledge the Trinitarian baptisms of Protestants to be valid, which is why Protestants who convert to these traditions do not have to be re-baptized. Yet despite the fact that Rome recognizes Protestant baptisms as being legitimate in a way that the baptisms of heretical sects (i.e., Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses) are not, such baptisms are still seen as being insufficient to establish Eucharistic fellowship.

That's correct: on the grounds above. The true faith is one, and cannot be divided up. That's what we believe:

Ephesians 4:4-5 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, [5] one Lord, one faith, one baptism,

In light of Galatians 2 (which I discuss here), I wonder what would Paul say about a group of Christians who excluded from the Eucharist all other believers simply because they do not believe in doctrines like the immaculate conception or the assumption of Mary or papal infallibility – doctrines which I am quite certain Paul himself never heard of.

He would say what he always says: that there is one body of apostolic tradition, whose content is known, and it is to be unconditionally accepted. Those who do not are the ones causing division and scandal. He also stated the following: showing definitively that he believed in the Substantial Real Presence (therefore, those who did not would obviously be excluded by him from the rite, since they would be not sufficiently catechized as Catholics):

1 Corinthians 10:16-17 The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? [17] Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. (cf. 11:27, seen above)

Paul also believed that the Eucharist involved a sacrifice (and all Protestants reject that, save for a tiny number of anglo-Catholics). I provide several biblical arguments for why I believe that, in my book, Biblical Catholic Eucharistic Theology.

Rome Trivializes Tradition

Rome is to be applauded for her high view of tradition, but we do right to protest against her for not holding a higher view.

Now I'm starting to detect a pattern of argument . . . thus far, it is a failed one.

Think of the way Vatican II rendered some of the Church’s past tradition meaningless by reinterpreting the meaning of past documents without recourse to authorial intent, rather like liberal judges routinely do with the American constitution.

The usual Protestant misunderstanding of development of doctrine vs. evolution of dogma (condemned by the Catholic Church) . . . Vatican II overturned no dogma of the Church; it merely developed them. Some things, such as the issue of religious freedom in particular (more on that below), were not dogmas in the first place, but issues of social policy and the relation of Church and state. Thus, there was considerably more freedom to expand the understanding of those: a lot more "leeway."

When a Protestant succumbs to the impulse of liberalism, all he has to do is to say that he no longer assents with his church’s historic confessions, whether it be the 39 Articles or the Westminster Confession of Faith. But when a Roman Catholic becomes liberal, he cannot reject the infallible magisterium and so he simply reinterprets it.

That's correct. And this is precisely what the Catholic dissidents who rejected the substance of Vatican II did. They simply pretended that it was something that it was not. But of course there are plenty of Protestants who play games with words in the same way. Presbyterian populist apologist Francis Schaeffer wrote an entire book about it: The Great Evangelical Disaster: comparing the 80s to the 20s. He cited J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism, that described the same process of equivocation and intellectual dishonesty that is the liberals' stock-in-trade. So it is just as prevalent in Protestantism.

Hence, a statement like Cyprian’s Extra ecclesiam nulla salus (“outside the church there is no salvation”) which was once used to exclude Protestants, is now interpreted in a way that includes Hindus (at least, according to some of the more liberal interpretations of Mystici Corporis Christi of 1943).

Very long discussion. See these articles for treatments on this complex and often poorly understood topic:

The Catholic Church's View of Non-Catholic Christians (Karl Adam)

Brief Overview of the Vexed "No Salvation Outside the Church" Issue

On Salvation Outside the Catholic Church (Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J.)

On Romans 2 and the Vastly Misunderstood "No Salvation Outside the Catholic Church" Issue

Dialogue on "Salvation Outside the Church" and Alleged Catholic Magisterial Contradictions (Particularly in the Middle Ages; With Emphasis on St. Thomas Aquinas's Views)

The Catholic Understanding of the Anathemas of Trent and Excommunication

Dialogue on the Definition of "Christian" and Whether Catholicism is Christian, With a Reformed Pastor / Did Trent Anathematize All Protestants?

Such fluid hermeneutics are often defended by Newman’s ‘development of doctrine’ theory, though it leads one into cases of serious historical anachronisms.

Not in the slightest. I know a little about Cardinal Newman. I have a large web page about him, development of doctrine is my favorite theological topic (I even wrote a book about it); he was the biggest influence in my conversion, and I recently completed a book of his quotations, that is to be published by Sophia Institute Press. Development (in the conjunction with the history of Catholicism) can be thoroughly defended, and I have done so many times. It is very poorly understood by many many people, including Catholics. But we would expect this of any brilliant, nuanced thought such as Newman's.

Consider, for example, the Declaration on Religious Freedom known as ‘Dignitatis Humanae’ (and which can be read on the Vatican’s website here). This document, which made its way into Vatican II, says that all nations have a right to public and private worship, thus contradicting (or ‘reinterpreting’ in good Roman Catholic form) Pope Leo XIII’s formal statements to the contrary.

I already dealt with this bogus charge above. Here are three great papers (from others) that extensively discuss religious freedom (one / two / three). See also the papers linked above on "no salvation outside the Church" for coherent replies.

Given this fluidity, I often find it very confusing trying to figure out just what the Roman Catholic church officially believes.

That is easy enough to determine: simply read the Catechism of the Catholic Church (available online). It's far easier to find out what we believe than it is with almost any Protestant denomination.

I have tried to resolve this dilemma by speaking to Roman Catholic friends of mine, but it is not uncommon that I receive differing, even contradictory, answers. One person told me that if I am confused trying to navigate through all the contradictions and figure out what the Roman Catholic church officially teaches, I should consult the 1994 Catechism of the Catholic Church. However, when the Catechism contradicted earlier documents,

But this is circular reasoning by an insufficiently informed outsider. Rather than say, "I'll see what the Catechism informs me about Catholic teaching, since the pope said it was the 'sure norm of faith,'" this approach is more like, "I'll continue with my [unproven] gratuitous assumption / premise that it simply contradicts earlier Catholic dogmas." Such critics ought to be content to let Catholics work out their own dogmatic history and alleged "problems" that may arise because of it. "Difficulties" in understanding are always present in any complex system.

As I always say, C. S. Lewis observed that "it is the rules of chess that create chess problems." Once you believe something, or have a set of rules, sometimes there are difficulties of application. The same holds true of science as well. But those who operate by no rules are blissfully free of such difficulties.

Protestants themselves work through such quandaries (real or alleged) all the time, in relation to the biblical text. That doesn't cause them (non-liberal ones) to ditch the infallibility of Scripture, because there are exegetical "problems" to work through. So why is it that we Catholics aren't allowed to work through our internal belief-system and difficult dogmatic or historic questions without having to hear these accusations that we are massively self-contradictory: even to the extent of using these objections as a reason to not be Catholic?

Do we not know our own beliefs and history far more than an external critic? If someone is thoroughly familiar with a belief-system and maintains that it has logical problems that's one thing, but to make such charges simultaneously with a profession of substantial lack of expertise, is a bit much. In any event, I accept Robin's willingness in good faith to be corrected by his Catholic friends, where necessary.

like it did when it’s statements on religious freedom contradicted Pope Leo XIII’s earlier authoritative statements,

Precisely an example of what I was just talking about . . .

or when it incorporated into it Pope John Paul II’s private opinions on the death penalty even though such views were without precedent in earlier tradition, the Catechism becomes as much a part of the problem as the solution.

This is much ado about nothing. No contradiction is present here, as I explain in these two papers:

Reply to Two Lutheran Pastors on Fundamental Misconceptions Regarding the Catholic Position on the Death Penalty

Capital Punishment: Catholic Teaching and My Own Applied Interpretation of Same

Paradoxically, by making church tradition equal to Holy Scripture, Rome ends up with a fluid concept of tradition that has the effect of devaluing the authority of tradition in practice.

. . . a bald statement without even argument, let alone examples adduced as proof, so I can hardly respond.

The problem is something that Protestantism avoids, since a Protestant who rejects his church’s past tradition can simply say he doesn’t believe the creeds anymore; however, because Roman Catholics are committed to an infallible church, they do not have that luxury and must content themselves with reinterpreting the meaning of past statements under the banner of 'development.'

Protestants believe in development, too: just not as widely. For example, any educated Protestant will freely admit that there was much development of the Trinity and Christology in the first seven centuries. The question, therefore, becomes: how much and what sort of development is proper?

For Rome, therefore, everything is up for grabs because the interpretation of all authoritative documents is in a constant state of flux.

This is simply not true. We know what we believe. It's all laid out in magisterial documents: quite the opposite of this description. It's a sort of Protestant game to frequently make these sweeping charges of massive confusion in Catholic ranks, as if our problems were of the same nature as their own. Such a thing is infinitely more true of Protestant doctrinal chaos. Perhaps critics are sometimes projecting onto us their own problems: passing the buck (but illogically so).

Rome is to be applauded for her high view of tradition, but we do right to protest against her for not holding a higher view.

I think this repeated rhetoric is starting to wear a bit thin by now, since, as far as I am concerned, not a single charge has held water under scrutiny, and most redound back upon Protestantism and harm it far more than us. We never really get down to brass tacks, with a one-to-one comparison of the merits of Catholicism and Protestantism.

Too Catholic to Convert to Rome

Given the above, one reason I have not converted to Roman Catholicism is because Rome does not go far enough in the areas she claims to affirm. This may sound trite, but I believe that as a Protestant I can do a better job at being 'catholic' than Roman Catholics themselves. As a Protestant, I believe I can trump Roman Catholics at their own game. As Peter Leithart wrote in the Foreword to Brad Littlejohn’s book The Mercersburg Theology and the Quest for Reformed Catholicity:

I teach my theology students to be ‘because of’ theologians rather than “in spite of” theologians. God is immanent not in spite of His transcendence, but because of His transcendence. The Son became man not in spite of His sovereign Lordship, but because He is Lord, as the most dramatic expression of His absolute sovereignty. Creation does not contradict God’s nature, but expresses it.

So too with Protestant Catholicism: Protestants must learn to be catholic because they are Protestants, and vice versa.

I have no idea how to respond to this section because I don't have the slightest idea what it means in the first place. I won't even try. We need to see some sort of substance and hard facts, rather than vague platitudes.

Apostolic Succession Isn’t That Important

What about Rome’s claims to have apostolic succession? Isn’t that a reason to convert? I have numerous questions about apostolic succession that would need to be satisfactorily addressed before I would be convinced that apostolic succession is even in Rome’s favour.

It is part and parcel of Protestants to reject a central tenet of Christian authority, that is discussed in the Bible itself, and was universally held among the fathers and all through Christian history till the 16th century, when Protestants denied it in order to shore up their novel and revolutionary system that couldn't (as was the case with all heretical innovations, in particulars) be traced back through history to the apostles. I have many papers about it:

Apostles Can Become Bishops (Apostolic Succession)

Bishops in the New Testament and the Early Church

The Visible, Hierarchical, Apostolic Church Apostolic Succession Based on Biblical Data / Supposed "Prooftexting" and Protestant Reluctance to Discuss Bible Text Interpretations With Catholics (vs. Jonathan Bonomo)

Apostolic Succession: Various Biblical Arguments Outlined

Apostolic Succession and the Definitions of "Protestant" and "Church"

Dialogue With Protestant Apologist Jason Engwer on the Rule of Faith in the Church Fathers, Part One (Papias)

However, even if Rome is correct about this, why does it really matter since the Vatican now acknowledges that Protestants, while being outside the chain of apostolic succession, are still fellow Christian “brothers” (albeit “separated brethren”), “members of Christ’s body”, part of “Christian communions” with “access to the community of salvation” and “justified by faith”?

Well, because it is always better to possess the fullness of the faith, rather than a skeletal, bare minimum conception of it. Catholic Christianity is better than mere Christianity. Secondly, we don't think Protestants have valid ordination; therefore, Protestants don't possess the Eucharist, which is the central focus of Christian worship and our most profound spiritual nourishment. And they are missing out on many elements of biblical, apostolic, patristic, traditional Christianity (all of those aspects that were rejected by Protestantism).

Or again: “The children who are born into these [Protestant] Communities and who grow up believing in Christ cannot be accused of the sin involved in the separation, and the Catholic Church embraces upon them as brothers, with respect and affection.”

Yes, but that is irrelevant to competing truth claims. We are not saying that because Protestants are Christians, they ought to remain Protestants. That would be like saying that a child should always remain a child, drinking milk, and should never grow into adulthood and eat (spiritual) meat. I'm not trying to be condescending, but this is how we regard Catholicism: as the fullness, the deepness and most advanced manifestation of Christianity.

I'm very grateful for my Protestant background, because I learned so many good things (including some things that are sadly underemphasized in practice in Catholicism). But I've learned much more since becoming a Catholic, and the Bible has opened up into a far richer, more in-depth source of continual wonders, and I have a much fuller understanding of many texts that we scarcely dealt with at all as Protestants.

Or again, “For men who believe in Christ and have been truly baptized are in communion with the Catholic Church even though this communion is imperfect. …even in spite of [the barriers] it remains true that all who have been justified by faith in Baptism are members of Christ's body, and have a right to be called Christian, and so are correctly accepted as brothers by the children of the Catholic Church.” If I can have all that as a Protestant by virtue of my Trinitarian baptism (and Vatican II says I can), then why does it matter if my baptism was not performed by someone standing in the link of apostolic succession?

I just explained it. If the Eucharist is part and parcel of salvation and a vibrant spiritual life (John 6:48-58), no one ought to be without it. One mustn't confuse the nature and purpose of ecumenical statements, with more "apologetic" or dogmatic statements. They aren't mutually exclusive, and don't contradict. The Church acknowledges that Protestants are Christians by virtue of baptism, trinitarianism, belief in Jesus' death on the cross as the means of salvation, grace alone, and many other common beliefs. But we continue to assert that we possess the fullness of truth.

Hence, the Church document Dominus Iesus (2000) reaffirmed our belief that the Catholic Church is the One True Church, making statements such as the following:

16. The Lord Jesus, the only Saviour, did not only establish a simple community of disciples, but constituted the Church as a salvific mystery: he himself is in the Church and the Church is in him (cf. Jn 15:1ff.; Gal 3:28; Eph 4:15-16; Acts 9:5). Therefore, the fullness of Christ's salvific mystery belongs also to the Church, inseparably united to her Lord. Indeed, Jesus Christ continues his presence and his work of salvation in the Church and by means of the Church (cf. Col 1:24-27), which is his body (cf. 1 Cor 12:12-13, 27; Col 1:18). . . .

The Catholic faithful are required to profess that there is an historical continuity — rooted in the apostolic succession — between the Church founded by Christ and the Catholic Church: “This is the single Church of Christ... which our Saviour, after his resurrection, entrusted to Peter's pastoral care (cf. Jn 21:17), commissioning him and the other Apostles to extend and rule her (cf. Mt 28:18ff.), erected for all ages as ‘the pillar and mainstay of the truth' (1 Tim 3:15). This Church, constituted and organized as a society in the present world, subsists in [subsistit in] the Catholic Church, governed by the Successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him”. With the expression subsistit in, the Second Vatican Council sought to harmonize two doctrinal statements: on the one hand, that the Church of Christ, despite the divisions which exist among Christians, continues to exist fully only in the Catholic Church, and on the other hand, that “outside of her structure, many elements can be found of sanctification and truth”, that is, in those Churches and ecclesial communities which are not yet in full communion with the Catholic Church. But with respect to these, it needs to be stated that “they derive their efficacy from the very fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the Catholic Church”.

[sections 20-22 discuss specifically the relation of the Church to salvation and reassert the traditional understanding, despite the claims from many critics that somehow the Church believes differently today about the Church's centrality to salvation, as a human instrument ordained by God]

But I am not even convinced that apostolic succession even matters, given some of the questions I have raised about it elsewhere.

Anyone can choose to reject biblical, apostolic, patristic, traditional Christianity (even God grants them the free will to do that), but I think it is a foolish choice to make.

As for the sections at the end of the paper devoted to the arguments of so-called "traditionalist" Catholics and the criticisms therein, I do not subscribe to their views, and they depart in some ways from what the Catholic Church teaches, so I will let them defend themselves (I couldn't defend such incoherence anyway). But just a few thoughts on a couple of things here . . .:

The current pope stated in no uncertain terms in 1985 that the authority of Trent and Vatican II rest on precisely the same basis, so that one cannot reject one without also rejecting the other.

"Traditionalists" (especially of the more radical type) are not more consistent than regular old "orthodox Catholics" like myself (whom they sometimes disdainfully call "neo-Catholics"), who accept all that the Church teaches. To the contrary, they are quite inconsistent. They want to remain Catholic, but pick and choose what doctrines they will accept and which they will reject (what we call "cafeteria Catholics"): precisely as Catholic liberals do, and like Luther when he started his revolt; and as Protestants do today. They put themselves in the driver's seat, judging popes and councils alike with impunity, which is not what the Catholic Church teaches. It's a liberal and Protestant notion of private judgment.

We do not say that our view is preferable to that of Orthodoxy, simply because we say so (which indeed is logical circularity and a sort of fideism), but rather, because our view is more in line with both the Bible and early Church history (things that can be demonstrated), and that the Orthodox interpretations, where they differ with ours, are unsustainable in light of both.

I have a web page on Orthodoxy and also a book about it, for those further interested in our replies to their contra-Catholic claims. "Holy Tradition" is shown by what the Church fathers actually believed in consensus: a thing that is demonstrable (I have a book that collects important utterances of the fathers as well).

I agree with "traditionalists" insofar as they say that Protestants are in danger of going to hell. I would argue it in a different fashion and nuance it a lot more, but it is perfectly true that if a person of any persuasion understands and knows that the Catholic Church is the One True Church and rejects it, then he is in distinct danger of hellfire: precisely because of the truth that "outside the Church is no salvation."

Blessedly (for their sakes), among Protestants, so few truly know what the Catholic Church teaches and doesn't teach. Therefore, what they reject is (largely) not the Church herself, but a caricature of the Church. But there is but one Church (a truth extremely clear in the New Testament) and all Christians are duty-bound to seek and find it, and not to play games with the doctrinally relative, anti-biblical, sectarian, chaotic foolishness of denominationalism.

I also think that if anyone grapples in great depth with the nature and belief-system of the early Church, and cares about Church history as part and parcel of Christianity (which was always a fundamentally historical religion), then they will eventually become either Orthodox or Catholic (or else have to ineffectively rationalize why they are Protestants). How most Protestants avoid this difficulty is to simply ignore or minimize the fathers and claim to adhere to a Bible-based faith only.

None of this involves circular logic at all, rightly understood and closely analyzed. Jesus was an actual, historical Person Whose life is recounted in infallible, inspired, inerrant Scripture. Before He rose from the dead (thus proving He was Whom He repeatedly claimed to be: God), He set up an actual, historical Church that was initially headed by Peter, and then by successors (apostolic succession being referred to and demonstrated in the Bible, and also, massive biblical indications of Petrine primacy and the papacy). It has historical continuity. The first council in Jerusalem gives us an idea of how its authority worked -- with St. Paul proclaiming its decrees in his missionary journeys as binding upon all (Acts 16:4).

All we need do is identify the body that continued all this from the beginning, without departing doctrinally or morally, since we are promised that the Holy Spirit will guide the Church into all truth (John chapters 14-16) and there are various biblical indications of indefectibility. It's not difficult to do. It's not easy, but it's not difficult, either, once the arguments are laid out. They are solid, and will stand up against scrutiny.

Finally, as for the relation of popes and ecumenical councils (even the earliest ones): alluded to near the end, this too, can be established on historical grounds, not dogmatic claims only (arguably circular), see my papers:

Does the History of the Papacy Contradict Catholic Ecclesiology?

Pope Silvester and the Council of Nicaea

Pope St. Leo the Great, the "Robber" Council of 449, and the Council of Chalcedon in 451 (Newman)

Reply to James White on the Council of Nicaea and Its Relationship to Pope Sylvester, Athanasius' Views, and the Unique Preeminence of Catholic Authority

Papal Participation (Through Legates) in the First Seven Ecumenical Councils

*** THE END ***

Biblical Arguments Against the Supposed "Proof " of Sola Scriptura in 2 Timothy 3:16-17 on the Basis of the Phrases, "Man of God," "Profitable for Teaching," Etc.

2012-01-27T04:59:00.000-05:00

Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman (1802-1865)

I came across the preliminary basis for this argument (quite new to me), by perusing the work, Lectures on the Doctrines and Practices of the Roman Catholic Church, by Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman (London: J. S. Hodson, 1836), in preparation for my upcoming book (a collection of excerpts), Classic Catholic Biblical Apologetics: 1525-1925.

First, here is the Bible passage under consideration (RSV):

2 Timothy 3:14-17 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it [15] and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. [16] All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, [17] that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

On pages 208-209 of his book, Cardinal Wiseman comments upon it:

. . . it is manifest that St. Paul is speaking of the Scriptures here used, not as it has to be read and used for the individual instruction and edification of all the faithful, but as it is to be observed by pastors—for observe what he says; he says, expressly, it is profitable for those purposes which are the exclusive function of the ministry, and not of others, for the learners, for the subjects of the Church of Christ; for he says, it is "profitable for doctrine," that is, as the word means in its proper native sense, "for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." Therefore, he is to hold fast the doctrines which St. Paul taught, remembering upon whose authority he received them— that is, the authority of the Apostles. . . . he is to know besides, that this Scripture is profitable for the practice of his ministry, for correcting, for reproving, for instructing. These are points not for individual improvement, not for each one's edification; but they are essentially acts for the ministry of the priesthood, for those who have to teach others; and, consequently, if this text prove anything regarding Scripture, it only goes to prove that the pastors of the church should be familiar with it, and make use of it for the purpose of correcting, and edifying their flocks.

This (for me) was a new approach to the passage, and I was struck by how "individualistic" my take in the past had been: shot through with the casually non-institutional assumptions of my "low church evangelical" Protestant past. I had assumed without conscious analysis, that the "teaching," "reproof," "correction," and "training" referred to came straight from the Bible to the individual, whereas Cardinal Wiseman noted that it specifically referred to priests and pastors teaching their flocks. The Bible was, in other words, profitable as the essential aid for Christian teachers (essentially priests) to learn, in order to pass on Christian doctrine to laypeople. That is far different from the populist, anti-institutional, or anti-sacerdotal notion of sola Scriptura: the "me, my Bible, and the Holy Spirit" mentality.

It's very interesting also, how in the larger context (the two previous verses: 3:14-15) of the passage as usually cited in Protestant polemics in favor of sola Scriptura (3:16-17 only), we see clear reference to apostolic tradition ("continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it"). St. Paul is talking about himself and how he passed on the Christian tradition to Timothy (compare his language about receiving and delivering tradition -- including oral tradition -- in 1 Cor 11:2, 23; 15:1-3; Gal 1:9; 1 Thess 2:13; 2 Thess 2:15; 3:6; 2 Tim 1:13-14; 2:2).

Now here comes my part in this "new" analysis of a very familiar passage (much-beloved by Protestants as a supposed "proof" of sola Scriptura). Having discovered a better way to analyze in a general way the root meaning of the verses here, it occurred to me that the phrase "man of God" may be a further clue or key as to what St. Paul's intention was. I thought that it could very well be a description of the clergyman or person otherwise very specially devoted to serving God. And then I was curious how it was used elsewhere in Scripture. This turned out to be a very fruitful avenue indeed. hence, the (Catholic) Navarre Bible (commentary) on 1 Timothy 6:11, the only other place in the New Testament where the phrase appears ("But as for you, man of God, shun all this; aim at righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness"):

“Man of God”: this expression was used in the Old Testament of men who performed some special God-given mission — for example, Moses (Deut 33:1; Ps 40:1), Samuel (1 Sam 9:6–7); Elijah and Elisha (1 Kings 17:18; 2 Kings 4:7, 27, 42). In the Pastoral Epistles (cf. also 2 Tim 3:17) it is applied to Timothy insofar as ordination has conferred on him a ministry in the Church.

Protestant reference works concur in the general sense of noting that the phrase was used in the Old Testament to refer to exceptionally prominent followers of God; not any believer at all. Accordingly, The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary ("Man of God", p. 684) notes:

A designation for early prophets in Israel . . . The term is used of unnamed prophets (1 Sam. 2:27; 1 Kgs. 13; 2 Chr. 25:7, 9), Moses (Deut. 33:1; Josh. 14:6; 1 Chr. 23:14; 2 Chr. 30:1; Ezra 3:2), the angel of the Lord -- thought to be a prophet (Judg. 13:6, 8), Samuel (1 Sam. 9:6-10), . . . Elijah (1 Kgs. 17:18, 24), and Elisha (e.g., 2 Kgs. 1:9-13; 5:8-15). In later periods the term apparently came to be applied to some, other than prophets, who were thought of as bearing some special relationship to God, such as David (Neh. 12:24, 36; cf. Jer. 35:4).

Likewise, Keil and Delitzsch' Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 5: Psalms, Part III, p. 48 -- a renowned Lutheran work -- (on Psalms 90), observes:

To the name, which could not be allowed to remain so bald, because next to Abraham he is the greatest man known to the Old Testament history of redemption, is added the title of honour [Hebrew] (as in Deut. xxxiii. 1, Josh. xiv. 6), an ancient name of the prophets which expresses the close relationship of fellowship with God, just as "servant of Jahve" [Yahweh] expresses the relationship of service, in accordance with the special office and in relation to the history of redemption, into which Jahve has taken the man and into which he himself has entered.

Wikipedia ("Man of God") gives a nice and handy summary of the usage, noting that only Moses was given this title in the Torah (first five books). Clearly, it was not used of any Jewish believer. See the entirety of all of the passages with the phrase, from an online RSV search page.

The argument then becomes, of course, that Paul was referring specifically to Timothy (an apostle) and other "men of God" of like eminence (priests) in 1 Timothy 6:11 and 2 Timothy 3:14-17. If so, the authority of Scripture was specifically to be delegated through authoritative, ordained interpreters, in accordance with the larger apostolic tradition (2 Tim 3:14-15, etc.). This is quite different from sola Scriptura in its usual Protestant definitions, and it is precisely harmonious with (if not identical to) the Catholic "three-legged stool" of Church-Scripture-Tradition.

If we go even deeper into the passage and reflect on the terms used, the case is strengthened all the more. For example, "profitable for teaching" (2 Tim 3:16). Does this make more sense as describing the Bible, or rather, a teacher (the "man of God") who is teaching from the Bible with authority? If we search "teach" or "taught" or "instructed" or any similar terms in the Bible, we are hard pressed to find them ever applied to a mere book. In every instance I have found so far, it is always applied as a description of a man or God teaching (at times using the Bible as an aid). Examples:

God Teaching Moses

Exodus 4:12, 15 Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak. . . . [15] And you shall speak to him and put the words in his mouth; and I will be with your mouth and with his mouth, and will teach you what you shall do.

Deuteronomy 5:31 But you, stand here by me, and I will tell you all the commandment and the statutes and the ordinances which you shall teach them, that they may do them in the land which I give them to possess.

Moses

Exodus 18:20 and you shall teach them the statutes and the decisions, and make them know the way in which they must walk and what they must do.

Deuteronomy 4:1 And now, O Israel, give heed to the statutes and the ordinances which I teach you, and do them; that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land which the LORD, the God of your fathers, gives you.

Deuteronomy 4:14 And the LORD commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and ordinances, that you might do them in the land which you are going over to possess.

Deuteronomy 6:1 Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the ordinances which the LORD your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it;

Aaron

Leviticus 10:11 and you are to teach the people of Israel all the statutes which the LORD has spoken to them by Moses.

The Levites

Deuteronomy 33:10 They shall teach Jacob thy ordinances, and Israel thy law; . . .

Ezra

Ezra 7:10 For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach his statutes and ordinances in Israel.

Parents Teaching Children

Deuteronomy 6:7 and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. (cf. 11:19)

Eleven Disciples

Matthew 28:20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you . . .

Paul and Barnabas

Acts 15:35 But Paul and Barnabas remained in Antioch, teaching and preaching the word of the Lord, with many others also.

Paul

Acts 20:20 how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house,

Timothy

1 Timothy 4:13 Till I come, attend to the public reading of scripture, to preaching, to teaching.(cf. 4:11, 16)

Elders

1 Timothy 5:17 Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching;

I can't find a single example of "the Bible taught" or some sense of teaching directly from the Bible, in Scripture itself. If anyone finds this, please let me know. Here are all the instances of "teach" in the Bible, and "taught", and "instruct[ed]", and "learn[ed]".

When I search "word / teaches" to find some connection, I come up with nothing. When I search ""taught / word" I don't get passages referring to learning directly from the Bible; rather, I find passages (again) about people teaching the Word:

Galatians 6:6 Let him who is taught the word share all good things with him who teaches.

Then when I found "word" and "taught" together in another instance, it turned out to be an astonishingly striking corroboration of the Catholic interpretation of 2 Timothy 3:16-17, in similar words, and reinforcing the concept of authoritative interpretation and teaching of the Bible, since it is about a bishop:

Titus 1:7-9 For a bishop, as God's steward, must be blameless; he must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, [8] but hospitable, a lover of goodness, master of himself, upright, holy, and self-controlled; [9] he must hold firm to the sure word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to confute those who contradict it.

I want to make it clear that I am not arguing that no one can learn directly from Scripture. Of course they can. I'm referring specifically to the meaning and exegesis of 2 Timothy 3:14-17 and the phrase "profitable for teaching" and contending that according to all (far as I can determine) other instances of the notion of teaching in connection with the Bible or the Law (or separate from same) in Scripture itself, it always comes through human teachers or God, not directly from the Bible or the Law (that eventually comprised most of the first five books of the Old Testament). Therefore, I conclude that the phrase in 2 Timothy means "Scripture is profitable for the purpose of priests and other authoritative teachers in the church to pass on Christian teaching / tradition to all other believers."

The same scenario applies to the other words used. The notion of "reproof" or "reprove" in Scripture is always used of God or persons, not the Bible or the Law. For example:

Titus 2:15 Declare these things; exhort and reprove with all authority. Let no one disregard you.

Revelation 3:19 Those whom I love, I reprove and chasten; so be zealous and repent.

It is the same for "correction" and for "training" (also never applied directly to the Bible apart from a teacher of it, and is applied to tradition):

1 Timothy 1:3-4 As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, [4] nor to occupy themselves with myths and endless genealogies which promote speculations rather than the divine training that is in faith;

Titus 2:11-12 For the grace of God has appeared for the salvation of all men, [12] training us to renounce irreligion and worldly passions, and to live sober, upright, and godly lives in this world,

Everything we can find in the Bible itself along these lines leads inexorably to the same conclusion: 2 Timothy 3:16-17 is no proof for sola Scriptura at all, and is, to the contrary, a strong proof for the Catholic belief regarding authority and the rule of faith: the "three-legged stool" of Bible-Church-Tradition.

***

Why Don't Protestants Call the Blessed Virgin Mary "Blessed" When the Bible Records Four Such Instances, States That "All Generations" Will Do So, and Describes Her Also Being Hailed by an Archangel?

2012-01-27T03:41:00.000-05:00

Luke 1:26, 28 (RSV: non-Catholic version): . . . the angel Gabriel . . . [28] . . . came to her and said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!"

Luke 1:41-42, 45 And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit [42] and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!" . . . [45] "And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

[Elizabeth is described in 1:6 as "righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless"]

Luke 1:47-48 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, [48] for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden. For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed;

Luke 11:27 As he said this, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, "Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!"

***

Exchange on Biblical Indications of Papal Succession and the Development and Nature of the Papacy

2012-01-27T02:18:00.000-05:00

[from a Facebook discussion, initially about my paper, The Biblical, Primitive Papacy: St. Peter & the "Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven": Scholarly Opinion (Mostly Protestant). My opponent's words will be in blue ]

* * * * *

Yet it always hinges on "interpretation" - the keys to Peter is scripturally clear . . . the passing of those keys as an "office" in perpetuity is an interprtation based on human thought rather than scripture . . . perhaps not unreasonable thought, but neverthless not scriptural.

It is not explicitly scriptural (passing on of the office), but it doesn't have to be. I would argue that it is common sense and straightforward deduction from other passages in the Bible about offices and succession. Peter is constantly portrayed in the Bible as the leader of the apostles.

There is a succession of Church offices: they are said to be perpetual in the Church. Judas defects and they choose Matthias to continue his function. Paul appears to pass on his office to Timothy (2 Tim 4:1-6).

Now, if Peter is given these keys, and it has the meaning as suggested by all these commentators in my paper, then it is simply common sense to assume that this was intended to be a permanent office in the Church. You could argue that this lone office of all offices discussed in Scripture was strictly temporary: confined to Peter alone, but I don't think it makes any sense. Why would there be a leader of the Church for Peter's lifetime only, and then there is to be no leader for all of the rest of history? I made a more extensive argument for papal succession elsewhere.

The only problem with assuming "common sense' in application of revealed realities is that common sense doesn't always fit or apply: for example, the true presence in the Holy Eucharist - it defies and even seems in opposition to "common sense" yet is the reality . . . it required divine revelation to know this . . . so one can't rely on common sense as always having validity in things of Jesus. :)

I don't think that objection works because the Eucharist is an acknowledged mystery that goes beyond reason (without contradicting it). The papacy is an office, and not a mystery in terms of not being able to fully be rationally understood. It takes faith to believe in the office, just like anything else in the Bible, but common sense applies to how the office was to be "worked out" through history. People often reject the papacy not because it isn't understood, but because it is understood and they don't like the notion of being in submission to a final authority in matters of faith.

It's like the scenario in John 6: some disciples thought it was too difficult to accept Real, Substantial, Bodily Presence and so they split. They didn't simply misunderstand it; they rejected it. They lacked faith in Jesus; no longer totally trusted Him.

If you disagree with my rationale for common sense as an argument in favor of papal succession, then by all means try to overthrow my reasoning. Simply saying that the Eucharist is a mystery sidesteps the point and is not a sufficient analogy, I humbly submit. We see succession in several ways in Scripture. The only thing that remains is to determine if and how that also applies to the papal office.

How the Christians worked it out through history certainly suggests that they thought the papacy was a perpetual office.

Dave, I never said that your thoughts about the succession of the office was unreasonable . . . nor illogical . . . just that it isn't scripture mandate, but a human application within the context of the "human aspect of the Church" rather than Divine directives. nothing wrong with that . . . just not an absolute based on Divine teaching.

Why do you require that it has to be explicitly scriptural in the first place? It does not. To require such a thing is pure Protestant sola Scriptura reasoning (itself massively unbiblical and unreasonable) What is it in my reasoning that is implausible as an interpretation of the scriptural data we do have?

It's not a merely human mandate if it is the perpetuation of an office divinely established (Matthew 16), by analogy to the perpetuation of all other offices in Scripture. I'm asking why anyone would make a special case for the papacy and assume it is to cease, while all other offices continue?

One either believes that God established the office of the papacy to lead the Church at all times or not. Many lack the faith to believe that; they disbelieve in that dogma of the Church: based on the biblical data. If someone disbelieves it, I think they run into many serious problems in the Bible itself: some of which I am briefly enumerating here.

This is, of course, also one of the Orthodox arguments that are made: the papacy was a mere human happenstance rather than a divinely mandated office: intended by God to be perpetual. I don't buy it. I think it fails to take into account many considerations such as the cross-referencing in my post above.

The Divine bestowal of the office says explicitly: you are Peter! . . . Jesus does not add, "and your successors as well" . . . my only point is that one must always distinguish between what is explicitly from Jesus and what is
not . . . always dangerous to confuse the two.

It is implicit in Scripture by massive analogy. You have to take into account the analogy of Scripture with regard to other offices.

What do you personally believe? Was the papacy instituted by God or not? If not, you deny Matthew 16.

If you say it was established by God in Matthew 16 and Jesus' commissioning of Peter, but it was not perpetual (because you don't find that to be plausible based on lack of explicit Scripture: which is a Protestant methodology), you have to explain the seeming absurdity of God establishing a Church office, only to have it die an early death with the death of Peter. That makes no sense to me at all.

If it makes sense to anyone, I'd like to understand how they conceptualize such a thing in their heads, given what we see in the Bible. I have always found the anti-papal arguments based on the Bible rather weak and inexplicable and desperate.

I don't argue against the papacy . . . I simply observe that taking the office beyond Peter is a human reasoning within the institution . . . one that is not unreasonable . . . yet also one not able to show a direct teaching of it by Jesus . . . that's all I point out . . . it is more than open to evolution, change and even devolution as it has been such since the death of Peter . . . who knows where it will go in the future for the sake of ecumenical inter-communion . . . most relevant in these days where secular/social culture is anti-all-religion.

As an example of analogical argument, it was argued in the paper above by many Protestant commentators, that Jesus was hearkening back to the earlier office of prime minister to the king. That office did indeed have succession.

In effect, then, it would be like saying, "I am establishing, with you as the first office-holder, an office that is akin to the monarchy of England."

In American culture, we know what the English monarchy is, and was, and that it is an office of succession. That is understood in the very notion of the thing. Likewise, the Jews understood His reference to the keys, because it was a thing in their own Scripture, that they were familiar with.

If the direct analogy understood in the commission refers to an office itself inherently possessing succession, as a matter of historical fact, then it follows straightforwardly that the analogical office presently being established is also one of succession. That's not even just common sense (there are two distinct arguments to be made here). It is purely logical and based on facts concerning the thing that is the basis of the analogy.

And in that sense it is even strictly explicit in Scripture. Only the analogy is not explicit, but it is very clear and strong, which is why all these commentators are all talking about it, as the "key" to understand the passage in the context of its ancient Hebrew / OT background (pun intended).

I have just shown, I think, that it indeed was a "direct teaching of Jesus" by a compelling inescapable analogy to what he was referring to in the OT office that was the keyholder. So I disagree with you about the fact of it.

You seem to not grasp how analogical, scriptural cross-reference / exegetical reasoning applies in this case, because you keep sidestepping my various biblical arguments.

All I'm doing (ironically) is following the reasoning of the Protestant scholars. Obviously they have no stake in the papacy. They are just calling it as they see it, as Bible commentators and exegetes. That's why the argument is so strong, because it's not based on Catholic dogma; it's based on Protestant biblical exegesis: sort of a "hostile witness" scenario.

Again, it is a human assumption/interpretation that Jesus was hearkening back to the earlier office of prime minister to king . . . again, a human understanding and possibly then a misunderstanding. my point again is to not confuse the human thinking with Divine. Catholic human thinking / Protestant human thinking . . . still not divine mandate.

I leave my reasoning to other readers who will see what I'm arguing (and accept it), I think.

Dave . . . the reality is I am not arguing against the papacy at all. :)

Right. You simply redefine it. I know the game well . . .

Dave, the papacy has been re-defined often in its 2000 year history . . . and not by "me" . . . but even by Rome itself.

. . . in the sense of consistent development of dogma, not inconsistent evolution of dogmas (that you referred to), which has been condemned by the Church.

Clearly it is something very different from what it was at the time of Saint Peter. It definitely evolved . . .

It developed, with complete consistency; two completely different things. Evolution of dogma was condemned by the Church. Pope St. Pius X commended Newman's view of development at the same time he condemned evolution of dogma. I had a whole debate about it with an anti-Catholic Calvinist, who claimed that the two views are identical. Wrong!

Yeah; it's different: in the way an oak tree is different from an acorn, or you and I are different from what we were one minute after we were conceived.

David, what you say about its "development: is pure human rationalization . . . nothing divine about it . . . the world developed and the structure of the papacy and the church has more in common with the Roman Empire of the caesars than scriptural schematic . . . what you say is true: the papacy was redefined and changed from what it originally was with Peter.

Just a as a final "p.s." note; according to Vatican I - the authority of The Pope rests in himself and is not able to be delegated - yet it is delegated universally across the entire Catholic Church . . . so quite a change even from the Vatican Council which defined the papacy. anyway . . you are free to understand or misunderstand it as you see it to be . . . have a great night.

Nothing essential in the papacy is changed at all. Vatican II: Lumen Gentium, III, 22 states:

But the college or body of bishops has no authority unless it is understood together with the Roman Pontiff, the successor of Peter as its head. The pope's power of primacy over all, both pastors and faithful, remains whole and intact. In virtue of his office, that is as Vicar of Christ and pastor of the whole Church, the Roman Pontiff has full, supreme and universal power over the Church. And he is always free to exercise this power. The order of bishops, which succeeds to the college of apostles and gives this apostolic body continued existence, is also the subject of supreme and full power over the universal Church, provided we understand this body together with its head the Roman Pontiff and never without this head. This power can be exercised only with the consent of the Roman Pontiff. For our Lord placed Simon alone as the rock and the bearer of the keys of the Church, and made him shepherd of the whole flock; . . .

And in III, 25:

And this infallibility with which the Divine Redeemer willed His Church to be endowed in defining doctrine of faith and morals, extends as far as the deposit of Revelation extends, which must be religiously guarded and faithfully expounded. And this is the infallibility which the Roman Pontiff, the head of the college of bishops, enjoys in virtue of his office, when, as the supreme shepherd and teacher of all the faithful, who confirms his brethren in their faith, by a definitive act he proclaims a doctrine of faith or morals. And therefore his definitions, of themselves, and not from the consent of the Church, are justly styled irreformable, since they are pronounced with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, promised to him in blessed Peter, and therefore they need no approval of others, nor do they allow an appeal to any other judgment. For then the Roman Pontiff is not pronouncing judgment as a private person, but as the supreme teacher of the universal Church, in whom the charism of infallibility of the Church itself is individually present, he is expounding or defending a doctrine of Catholic faith.

The pope works together with bishops and Councils; of course; but He is the supreme head in a way in which they are not. ". . . therefore his definitions, of themselves, and not from the consent of the Church, are justly styled irreformable . . ."

It's the same old conciliarist claptrap: to try to deny this and pretend that the Council or a vote of bishops is on a par with the pope. They are not. Vatican II is completely consistent with Vatican I: it merely developed the role of the Council and the layperson more. Both are consistent with Trent; and all three councils with the Bible.

Development of doctrine is a completely biblical concept, as I have demonstrated in many papers (one / two / three).

Just always remember to distinguish between his "infallibility" in dogmatic proclamations and his "authority" - two separate things altogether . . . dogmatic proclamations are so rare . . . yet the exercise of 'authority' which is in his person is applied daily . . . yet by delegation, which is in itself not true papal authority.

So the pope delegates; so what? That is no disproof of his supreme authority at all, since God Himself delegates. Jesus delegated His apostles to represent Him directly. Does that mean He had less authority in so doing? Nope. "He who receives you receives me" (Matt 10:40; cf. Jn 13:20). "He that hears you hears me" (Lk 10:16). ". . . we are ambassadors for Christ . . ." (2 Cor 5:20).

But it does matter . . . for his authority to remain: "papal authority"; it cannot be delegated . . . it rests in his person . He must be present where he exercises it . . . can't be in Rome exercising authority in New York. That's not my version of it. That is Vatican I. But that might limit him so, Vatican I is ignored except for the part that states his infallibility and authority. I find that interesting in the 'evolution' of the papacy.

That's not true, Michael. Historically, papal legates were at most ecumenical councils. The pope need not be present to have authority. He has it by virtue of being pope. Period. This is neither inconsistent with Vatican I or II nor the historic Church all the way back to Nicaea.

Now you are not debating "me" but Vatican I's definition of papal authority. So take it up with those long deceased council fathers and pope.

Sheer nonsense. I have backed up everything I have said, with Scripture, reason, and Church documents. But you keep giving simply your own opinion backed up by nothing. Readers may decide where the truth lies.

Sheer nonsense is what you are proffering . . . I simply stated Vat. I teaching on Papal authority . . . you do not accept it . . . and I agree it is largely ignored by even the pope. It is not my opinion . . . it is simply the way it is. The institutional structure rests more on the old Roman Empire and emperor than on Jesus . . . I am not implying that the gospel does, but the ecclesial structure does . . . but as I said, you can see it as
you wish to.

I may indeed. And I see it as an orthodox, faithful Catholic, who accepts all that the Church teaches me, and who wishes to think with the Mind of the Church rather than cultural happenstance or the fashionable finger-in-the-wind zeitgeist.

I have no dispute with that. I am an Orthodox believer myself . . . I just comment on the human aspects and gravitate toward the Christ ones more . . .

You are Eastern Orthodox?

[no reply]

***

Martin Luther and His Lutheran Followers on the Duration of the Real Presence in the Eucharist, the Elevation, and Adoration; Various Internal Absurdities of Arbitrariness

2012-01-27T01:14:00.000-05:00

From Bishop Bossuet, The History of the Variations of the Protestant Churches, Vol. 1 (New York: John Doyle, 1842), pp. 193-197; further primary source information can be found by following the link for the book. A few minor variations of proper names were added, in order to adopt more standard usage.

* * * * *

Although Luther permitted Melanchthon to say whatever he pleased against the Mass, yet he in nowise departed from his former notions, nor did he reduce the presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist to the bare reception of it. It is even plain that Melanchthon shifted with him on this subject; and there are two of Luther's letters, in 1543, wherein he commends a saying of Melanchthon's, "that the presence was in the action of the Supper, but not in a precise and mathematical point." As for Luther, he determined the time to be from the Pater Noster which was said in the Lutheran Mass immediately after the Consecration, until all the people had communicated, and all the remaining particles were consumed.

But why stops he there? If, at that instant, the communion had been carried to the absent, as St. Justin tells us was done in his time, what reason would there have been to say, that Jesus Christ had immediately withdrawn his sacred presence? But why should he not continue it for some days after, when the Holy Sacrament should be reserved for the communion of the sick? It is nothing but mere caprice to take away the presence of Jesus Christ in this case; and Luther and the Lutherans had no longer any rule, when, out of the actual reception, they admitted the use of it but for never so short a time.

But what made still more against them is, that the Mass and Oblation always remained; and, had there been but one moment of presence before the communion, this presence of Jesus Christ could not be deprived of any of the advantages which attended it. For which reason Melanchthon always aimed, whatever he might say to Luther, at placing the presence in the precise time of the reception alone, and this only way could he find of destroying the Oblation and Mass.

Nor was there any other way for destroying the Elevation and Adoration. It has been shown that, at taking away the Elevation, Luther, so far from condemning it, approved the principle of it. I repeat once more his words:—"The Elevation," he says, "may be preserved, as a testimonial of the real and corporal presence; since the doing that is saying to the people, Behold, Christians, this is the body of Jesus Christ, which was given for you." This was what Luther wrote after abolishing the Elevation; but why, then, one may say, did he abolish it?

The reason is worthy of the man; and we learn from himself, "that if he attacked the Elevation, it was only out of spite to the Papacy; and, if he retained it so long, it was out of spite to Carlstadt. In a word," concludes he, "it should be retained when it was rejected as impious, and it should be rejected when commanded as necessary." But, upon the whole, he acknowledged what, indeed, is not to be doubted—that there could be no difficulty in showing to the people this divine body from the very time it began to be present.

As to the Adoration, after having one while held it as indifferent, and another laid it down as necessary, he at length adhered to his last conclusion; and in the positions which he published against the Doctors of Louvain in 1545, that is, a year before his death, he called the Eucharist "the adorable sacrament." The Sacramentarian party, who had so much triumphed when he set aside the Elevation, was in a consternation; and Calvin wrote, "that, by this decision, he had raised up the idol in God's temple."

Melanchthon was then more than ever convinced that it was impossible to destroy the Adoration, or the Mass, without reducing the whole Real Presence to the precise moment of the manducation. He saw, even, that it was necessary to go further, and that all the points of Catholic doctrine relating to the Eucharist returned upon them one alter another, if they did not find out a way to separate the body and blood from the bread and wine. He then pushed the principle already spoken of so far as that nothing was done for the bread and wine, but all for man: insomuch, that in man only was the body and blood to be really found.

[see Facebook post, "Melanchthon's Silly Argument for a Temporary Real Presence"]

Melanchthon has never explained in what manner he would have this to be done: but as to the foundation of this doctrine, he never left off insinuating it with great secrecy, and in the most artful manner he was able: for there were no hopes, as long as Luther lived, of making him relent on this point, nor of being able to speak freely what men thought: but Melanchthon so deeply rooted this doctrine in the minds of the Wittenberg and Leipzig divines, that, after Luther and he were dead, they plainly explained themselves in favor of it in an Assembly, which, by the Elector's orders, they held at Dresden, in 1561.

There they feared not to reject Luther's proper doctrine, and the Real Presence which he admitted in the bread; and finding no other means of defending themselves against Transubstantiation, the Adoration, and Sacrifice, they went over to the Real Presence taught them by Melanchthon; not in the bread and wine, but in the faithful who received them.

They declared, therefore, "That the true substantial body was truly and substantially given in the Supper, although there was no necessity of saying that the bread was the essential body or the proper body of Jesus Christ, or that it was corporally and carnally taken by die corporeal mouth; that ubiquity raised a horror in them; that it was a subject of astonishment that men should be so positive in affirming that the body was present in the bread, since it was of much more importance to consider what is done in man, for whom, and not for the bread, Jesus Christ rendered himself present."

After that they explained their sentiments concerning the Adoration, and maintained that it could not be denied, admitting the Real Presence in the bread, although it should even be explained that the body is not present in it except in the actual use: "That the Monks would always have the same reason for beseeching the eternal Father to hear them through his Son, whom they rendered present in this action; that the Supper having been instituted for the remembrance of Jesus Christ, as he could not be taken nor remembered without believing in, and calling on him, the addressing one's self to him in the Supper as present, and as placing himself in the hands of sacrificing priests after the words of Consecration, could by no means be hindered."

By the same reason they maintained that, admitting this Real Presence of the body in the bread, the sacrifice could not be rejected, and they proved it by this example: "It was," said they, " the ancient custom of all suppliants, to take in their arms the children of those whose assistance they implored, and present them to their fathers, in order to prevail with them by their interposition."

They said, in the same manner, that having Jesus Christ present in the bread and wine of the Supper, nothing could hinder us from presenting him to his Father, in order to render him propitious to us; and, lastly, they concluded "that it would be much more easy for the monks to establish their Transubstantiation, than for those to impugn it, who, rejecting it in word, affirmed, nevertheless, that the bread was the essential body, that is, the proper body of Jesus Christ."

Luther had said at Smalkald, and made the whole party subscribe to it, that the bread was the true body of our Lord equally received by saints and sinners: he himself had said, in his last "Confession of Faith," approved by the whole party, " that the bread of the Eucharist is the true natural body of our Lord." Melanchthon and all Saxony had received this doctrine with all the rest, for Luther would be obeyed: but, after his death, they fell off from it, and owned with us, that these words, "the bread is the true body," import necessarily the change of bread into the body; since, it being impossible for the bread to be the body by nature, it could not become so but by a change; thus they openly rejected their master's doctrine.

But they went much further in the above declaration, and confess that, admitting, as Lutherans had hitherto done, the Real Presence in the bread, there could be no objection to the sacrifice, which Catholics offer to God, nor to the adoration they pay to Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.

Their proofs are convincing. If Jesus Christ is believed to be in the bread, if faith lays hold of him in this state, can this faith subsist without adoration? Does not this faith itself necessarily imply the highest adoration, since it draws after it the invocation of Jesus Christ, as Son of God, and as there present? The proof of the sacrifice is not less conclusive: for, as these divines say, if, by the sacramental words, Jesus Christ is rendered present in the bread, is not this presence of Jesus Christ of itself agreeable to the Father, and can our prayers be sanctified by a more holy oblation than that of Jesus Christ present?

What do Catholics say more, and what is their sacrifice else but Jesus Christ present in the sacrament of the Eucharist, and representing himself to his Father the victim by which he had been appeased? There is no way, then, of avoiding the sacrifice, no more than the adoration and transubstantiation, without denying this real presence of Jesus Christ in the bread.

Thus the Church of Wittenberg, the Mother of the Reformation, and whence, according to Calvin, the light of the Gospel proceeded in our days as it proceeded formerly from Jerusalem, no longer can maintain the sentiments of Luther, her first founder. The whole doctrine of this head of the Reformation contradicts itself: he invincibly establishes the literal sense and Real Presence: he rejects the necessary consequences therefrom, as maintained by Catholics. If, with him, the Real Presence is admitted in the bread, the whole Mass, with the Catholic doctrine, must of course be admitted without reserve.

This seems too grating to these new Reformers; for what good have they been doing, if they must be forced to approve these things, with the whole worship of the Church of Rome? but, on the other side, what more chimerical than a Real Presence separated from the bread and wine? Was it not, in showing the bread and wine, that Jesus Christ said, "This is my body"? Has he said, we should receive his body and blood divided from those things wherein it was his pleasure they should be contained; and if we are to receive the proper substance of them, must it not be after such a manner as he declared at the institution of this mystery?

In these inextricable difficulties, the desire of abolishing the Mass prevailed; but the method which Melanchthon and the Saxons had taken to destroy it was so bad, that it could not subsist. Those of Wittenberg and Leipzig themselves soon after came back, and Luther's opinion, which placed the body in the bread, kept its ground.

***

Guess I Hit a Nerve: the Singular "Apologist" (???) Bob Sungenis Goes Nuclear Against Yours Truly in His "Reply" to My Two Rational Critiques / Responses

2012-01-26T14:53:00.007-05:00

For background, see my two recent papers:

"2012: A Sungenis Odd-yssey": Robert Sungenis Pushes a "DVD of the Month" from an Anti-Christian Gnostic Space Case, Claiming that Famed Director Stanley Kubrick Filmed Fake Moon Landings

Robert Sungenis' Lousy "Comedic" Attempts to Rationalize His "Fake Moon Landings Filmed by Kubrick" Viewpoint, Complete with (Twice!) Imaginary Words of Yours Truly

The following sustained rant constitutes Bob's "answer" to the second paper (his pathetic attempt at reductio ad absurdum was his "answer" to the first); conveyed through his surrogate James Phillips in a combox on my blog for the second paper, in four installments (one / two / three / four). I have selected (for the convenience of readers) the more entertaining and revealing highlights. All of the words below are Bob's except for interjections of mine (blue and bracketed) and one quotation of my words from Bob (in green).

* * * * *

. . . Well, as I feared, Dave’s ego got the better of him . . .

Dave, first of all, you don’t engage in “public criticism.” You engage in slander, name-calling and bullying. You haven’t engaged in constructive criticism since you began your website. Your website is all about Dave Armstrong and how great you think you are. Anyone who challenges that puffed up notion gets your wrath. We all see it, Dave. It’s about time you admitted it.

Perhaps we should call you a Washington Warmonger, just like the rest of the US Neo-Cons. You like US imperialism that spends trillions of our tax-payer dollars and kills innocent civilians all for purpose of spreading Masonic “democracy.”

As for “not taking kindly to criticism,” don’t make me laugh. You’re the king of that category. Go read your own website.

All of us who read the books and actually do the research into 9-11 and other such issues are just not good patriots, right?

Dave, your hypocrisy reeks. I advertise one secular DVD in the 19 years I’ve had a website, but you have a whole website droning on and on about your teenage years and showing your devotion to the scum bags like Led Zeppelin, The Who, The Doors, Cream, The Rolling Stones,

[this shows once again that Bob's goofy failed attempt at humor, in critiquing my articles about music (I've been a devoted musician and music collector for 45 years and play about ten instruments) had a dead-serious intent. He despises this; yet, as I argued in my second paper, he has no rationally consistent case against me, unless he listens to no music at all: rock or classical. It remains self-evident that art is not intrinsically a saintly exercise. But it could never do for Bob to actually offer us a rational reply to the solid counter-arguments I made. No, instead we get these sorts of insipid, vacuous insults. It's vastly different to say, on the one hand, that you advocate and promote (right on top of your website!) a film by an anti-Christian Gnostic wingnut, as offering profound truth, and on the other, to simply acknowledge that good music is good, wholly apart from the morals of the ones who created it. With art, the bottom line is not truth, but rather aesthetic beauty, which is almost purely subjective and a matter of taste. Long discussion, but there is no analogy whatever here, and Bob foolishly thought that there was . . .]

. . . and yet you have the nerve to call me a “kooky conspiratorial theorist”!

[I searched the two papers and their comboxes and never found any such description of Bob (quotation marks normally suggest a direct citation). I have called the fake moon landing views and suchlike "kooky" -- along with various nutty views of Weidler (several times), but not Bob himself. It's a very important distinction that I always try very hard to observe: along the lines of "separate the sin from the sinner"; likewise, we shouldn't equate kooky ideas with the one who espouses them. I grant, though, that sometimes it is a very fine line . . .]

You are all emotion and prejudice.

And don't let Bob pretend that he doesn't severely criticize others in the apologetics world. He has savaged Karl Keating, Scott Hahn, Mark Shea, Jimmy Akin, myself, and others (not even to mention Blessed Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI). And it is far worse than anything I have ever done.

No, Dave. The only one out of that group that I would consider “savaging” is you, because you are proving yourself to be such a putz. They neither bore us to tears with their past life, nor gossip like an old lady about inane issues, nor do they have a giant ego, like you do. I respect them, although we may disagree from time to time.

[This is simply untrue. Bob has gone after Karl Keating in particular, implying that Catholic answers was a fundamentally compromised, money-grubbing institution in a past paper. I can also remember very pointed attacks on Mark Shea. The problem is that Bob routinely deletes past outrageous statements, so as to eliminate a paper trail of his absurd and calumnious remarks about others. At one time I had documented what he wrote about Keating, but removed it as a charitable act (not to hide anything, as Bob does). I can find it if I have to, in Internet Archive. I have a very good memory, and I remember this distinctly. I don't make reference to imaginary meetings or quotations or posts, like Bob does.

How fascinating, e.g., to look at what Bob wrote in his "Q&A January 2005: Question 3 - Response to Dave Armstrong on Catholic Apologetics" [now safely deleted, of course, but I retrieved it at Internet Archive] Remember that Bob said above: "You engage in slander, name-calling and bullying. You haven’t engaged in constructive criticism since you began your website." Right. In January 2005 he was saying something quite different about me, over against Mark Shea: whom he is now denying ever having savaged:

First of all, Dave, I didn't include you in the quote about the "darker side," because to my knowledge you haven't posted anything which makes slanderous accusations against geocentrists, least of all anything that makes someone who holds the view look like a derelict who walks around with an aluminum hat. Conversely, Mirus, Shea and a few other have done so to varying degrees, and Shea with his usual sardonic venom. The fact is that most of these "critics" haven't studied the issue, and won't even open up their mind to discuss it, yet elicit their pompous remarks as if an angel from heaven just came down and whispered the truth in their ear. When I see this kind of calculated, slanderous and deliberate obstinance, then I can only assume it is not of angels but of devils. If you want to believe there is some in-between realm of influence, that is your prerogative, but I tend not to. On the other hand, Hoge has been a gentlemen, and I respect him for it. . . . As for Scott Hahn, although I have critiqued him (as many other people have done), our QA board shows that I place him far above people like Mark Shea and Shawn McElhinney. [bolding added presently]

So we see that seven years ago, Mark Shea was on the "darker side" and I was commended for not having posted "slanderous accusations against geocentrists." We have it right from Bob. Now he revises history and completely reverses it: I supposedly have done nothing but slander and puff up myself since I began my website (February 1997), and I am a "kook" and other choice descriptions, while he "respects" Mark Shea. Ironically, Mark Shea put up a post just yesterday (1-26-12), linking to my first one about Bob's views, describing him in a far worse fashion than I ever have: "Bob Sungenis’ complete transformation into an anti-semitic conspiracy theorist kook". How ironic that Bob seems to think I called him this ("kooky conspiratorialist") and uses false quotation marks, but I didn't; Mark Shea: the one he tried to distinguish against me, as respectable, did (yesterday).

Bob has trashed Blessed Pope John Paul II (one / two) and Pope Benedict XVI (one / two) and both together. Fortunately, I documented all that in five papers (from his materials written in May 2011: a particularly vitriolic period, probably because of John Paul the Great's beatification on May 1), because I checked the links to Bob's hit-pieces and in every case they were removed. His opinion hasn't changed; he's simply covering his tracks. Hence he is currently hosting a guest article / hit-piece on the Holy Father (from 11 November 2011) that consistently calls him "Joseph Ratzinger" and opines: "Ratzinger, now pope, as a type of Manchurian Candidate, is a symbol of America’s occupation of the Catholic Church."]

But you’re such a company man, Dave, a real patriot. You’ll find a way to excuse all of these doctrinal anomalies and make everyone believe that you’re a good Catholic apologist in the process; and that people like me who point out these errors are just “kooky conspiratorialists.” The reality is, you’re the kook, and you’re in a conspiracy of your own making.

[This is now the second time Bob used a fake quotation in these rants (the two slightly different), as if I used a description of him that I never used. I guess that is a companion to his two other bogus quotations of my alleged words, that I documented in my second paper above (both written by others). It ain't there, folks! In fact, I did a search on my blog and neither phrase ever appears, anywhere in my writing: not even once. But you see now, that he has just called me, straight out, a "kook" and even alludes (irony of ironies) that I am a conspiratorialist. Thus he falsely accuses me of the thing that he hypocritically proceeds to do himself.]

You pride yourself on being able to discern the most minute and esoteric theological subjects (God’s omniscience); difficult political and engineering issues (9-11) and complex science issues (cosmology) . . .

You’re not really in it for the truth. You just want to be one of the boys in the club. You won’t allow anyone to burst that Catholic “everything is rosy” bubble you’ve created around your head. The truth will set you free, Dave. Try it sometime.

Stop your gossiping and start actually doing the research into the things that you think you already know.

David Armstrong, listen up. Cut the crap about the promotion of Gnosticism. Weidner's DVD was promoted for one reason and one reason only -- to bring ostriches like you out of the ground to wake up to what your country is doing to you, not to promote Gnosticism. Your attempt to smear Kubrick's DVD by digging up dirt on Weidner is typical of your demagoguery and character assassination style of argument. You should be so wary of undesirables in your choice of which music to listen to and promote on your website. Led Zeppelin comes right out of the pit of hell yet you promote them as if they were choir music. Your double-standard reeks of hypocrisy.

[Like I said, obviously I "hit a nerve" -- this sort of drama queen histrionics and filthy, slimy mud thrown my way is strong proof of that . . . Unfortunately, it's all part of the game of apologetics. It doesn't bother me personally at all. Good heavens, no (yawn . . .zzzzz)! But what does bother me a great deal are error and tomfoolery and conspiracy theories passing themselves off as legitimate Catholic apologetics (or rational analysis). It gives the Church and Catholic theology and the apologetic enterprise a bad name, and I am duty-bound to speak out against it. You see what (predictably) happened when I did that. Please pray and do penance for Bob.]

***

Neo-Geos: Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain (David Palm on Robert Sungenis)

2012-01-26T12:51:00.000-05:00

[see original posting on David Palm's blog]

In my last installment of my Neo-Geo series, Neo-geos Come Unravelled, I highlighted the numerous ways in which the neo-geo case implodes when subjected to serious scrutiny. Bob has issued a rebuttal to that piece here, along with comments to an exchange I had later with Rick Delano here. I have no intention of continuing a point for point exchange with Bob Sungenis. But his last two replies are so full of outright errors and additional examples of fraudulent debater’s tricks that I thought that one more sampling would be helpful (citations below will be from those two replies, unless otherwise indicated.) Then by God’s grace I’m going to avoid the temptation to fire in such a target-rich environment and press on to complete my series on neo-geocentrism, so that I can happily move on to other things.

What I will highlight below is just a sampling of the errors and sleight of hand deployed by Bob Sungenis in the defense of his neo-geocentrism. I hope you’ll begin to see the patterns so you can more easily spot these ploys if you run across them in his writings again. Just ask yourself this question. Is this someone who is really just “In this for the truth”, or is this someone who will say anything in order to win an argument?

Biblical Inerrancy: Is the Magisterium Clear or Unclear? Bob Says Both

Catholic Institutions and Inerrancy

Did Bob Only Have a “Personal Difference” with Bishop Rhoades?

Does Bob Really Know the Science? Elliptical Orbits Versus Epicycles

Has Bob Accurately Represented Fr. Olivieri, the Commissary General of the Inquisition?

Why were the works of Rheticus put on the Index? Were the works of Copernicus banned prior to 1616?

Does the Roman Catechism Teach Geocentrism?

Did the Editors of Newton’s Principia Have Some Endorsement From Rome?

Leo XIII and Pius XII: “Magisterial Fundies” Turn the Magisterium on its Head….Again.

The Magisterium Teaches 100% of the Faith

Biblical Inerrancy: Is the Magisterium Clear or Unclear? Bob Says Both

I’m going to start by examining Bob’s handling of the issue of biblical inerrancy and the Magisterium, in order to illustrate a pattern. Watch how it unfolds, with this question firmly in mind: Is this really all about the truth for Bob, as he claims, or is this really all about winning an argument at all costs?

My position is simple and straight-forward. The Magisterium of the Catholic Church explicitly teaches all of the doctrines of our Faith, even the difficult and controversial ones, right up to this present day. But the Catholic Magisterium does not teach geocentrism. Therefore, it is not a doctrine of the Catholic faith.

The neo-geos try to counter this by manufacturing phony examples to try and form a parallel with geocentrism. So Bob first employs the sleight-of-hand that “johnmartin” did, pointing to conditions in various places or institutions, instead of keeping the focus where it belongs – on on actual Magisterial statements. But Bob goes further and claims that the Magisterium has not clearly reiterated the doctrine of biblical inerrancy, at least since 1943:

If Mr. Palm thinks otherwise, he needs to find us a statement after 1943 on full biblical inerrancy . . . . He won’t be able to.

And I pointed to the statement from 1998 in which the Magisterium affirmed once again, “the absence of error in the inspired sacred texts” and placed this in the highest level of theological certainty, the denial of which is formal heresy. Notice again that the statement is unqualified in any way. The Magisterium, as recently as 1998, taught that error is absent in the inspired sacred texts. Period. There is nothing vague or ambiguous about that statement. Game over. Bob is simply wrong.

But Bob has a personal dogma to protect, so right on cue, he steps in to claim that:

This just shows how naïve or oblivious to the real state of affairs Mr. Palm is. I am well aware of the CDF statement about “the absence of error in the inspired sacred texts,” since I am the one who quoted it in my commentaries and even in Galileo Was Wrong. . . .

As I said in my last rebuttal to Mr. Palm, the Church has issued various statements about inerrancy in the last 50 years (such as the 1998 CDF statement) but they are all anemic and leave the door open for someone to hold that the Bible is only inerrant when it speaks of salvation. . . .

“The absence of error in the inspired sacred texts” is a very general and open-ended statement that allows Catholic biblical scholars to still believe that only the “salvation” parts were inspired Scripture and the rest was the result of redactors who were not eyewitnesses or even in the same generation as the actual events of Scripture! I rest my case.

So the 1998 statement from the CDF is anemic, general, open-ended, and vague. That’s his answer to me. And he’s obviously irked that I seemed to have assumed that he didn’t know about this 1998 statement because, after all, he’s the expert who wrote the definitive treament of this issue, Galileo Was Wrong. Naturally then, you would assume that Galileo Was Wrong completely supports his point in great depth and detail.

Well, you know what they say about “assuming.”

In GWW, this very citation of the 1998 CDF statement comes under the heading, “Official Statements from the Catholic Magisterium on the Inspiration and Inerrancy of Sacred Scripture”. And here is what Bob has to say about the nature of this quote, which is included by him with other magisterial statements without any qualification:

The Catholic Church, throughout her two- thousand year history, has been very clear and adamant in her teaching that Scripture contains no error when it speaks on theology, history, science, mathematics or any other discipline or factual proposition (GWW2, p. 57; my emphasis).

Well, isn't that pretty much the exact opposite of what Bob said in answer to me? Why yes, it is.

When Bob wants to make a case specifically in support of biblical inerrancy, he insists that the Church’s teaching throughout her entire two thousand year history (with no qualifications) has been very clear and adamant. But when he needs to make a case specifically for geocentrism, he says just the opposite. Suddenly, the very citation he included to help make his case for that “clear", "adamant”, and continuous teaching becomes instead “anemic” and “open-ended” and anyone who rejoices in the fact that the Magisterium of the Catholic Church continues to teach this dogma in very clear and unambiguous terms is “naïve or oblivious to the real state of affairs”. (Question to Bob: If the authors of this statement by the CDF really weren't interested in upholding biblical inerrancy then why did they include it in the 1998 statement at all? How much easier would it have been to just leave it out? Let me guess: they included just so they could (supposedly) purposely water it down, right?)

So, how could the world’s self-proclaimed foremost expert on geocentrism contradict himself so blatantly? It’s simple. In the book, it was to Bob’s advantage to argue that the Church has always been consistent, clear and adamant on complete Biblical Inerrancy. But in his discussion with me, it was to his advantage to make the polar opposite argument.

So I ask, is this really “all about the truth”, as Bob repeatedly claims, or is this really only about trying to win an argument at all costs?

Again, the whole point is that even in these difficult and confusing times, the Magisterium continues to teach 100% of the doctrines of our Faith, including full biblical inerrancy. The neo-geos only wish that they had anything like that sort of statement in support of geocentrism in the past 300 years or more. Too bad for them, they don’t. Their only two options are to continue to throw the Catholic Magisterium under the bus as incompetent, dishonest and bumbling, or to admit that geocentrism is not a doctrine of the Faith. Unfortunately, they consistently choose the former.

Catholic Institutions and Inerrancy

Bob’s reply to me concerning Catholic institutions that teach biblical inerrancy stands in very much the same vein. Bob objects to being accused of using debaters’ tricks. Well, follow how this exchange has played out and decide if that isn’t the only reasonable description of his behavior. Bob’s initial claim was this:

If Mr. Palm thinks otherwise, he needs to find us a statement after 1943 on full biblical inerrancy, or find a Catholic institution today that teaches it. He won’t be able to.

I already gave Bob the statement after 1943 on full biblical inerrancy and we saw above how he talks out of both sides of his mouth concerning that magisterial teaching. But in addition, Bob asks for one and only one Catholic institution that teaches full biblical inerrancy and says flatly that I won’t be able to come up with one. My reply was as follows: "Finally, as for Catholic institutions that still teach full biblical inerrancy, Bob only asked for one, but here are three off the top of my head (I'm sure more could be added)...."

Bob’s challenge was met and tripled. I explicitly said that those three were “off the top of my head” and that “I’m sure more could be added”. And what does he do? First, he ignores the fact that his challenge was met and even bested—he asked for one institution and he got three. Worse, he blatantly distorted what I did say:

Mr. Palm has already admitted that he could only find three Catholic institutions in the US that teach full biblical inerrancy.

This is classic Sungenis. By what sort of strange alchemy does “three off the top of my head (I’m sure more could be added)” morph into “admitted he could only find three”? Is this even a remotely fair representation of what I said? And then he once again claims that I’m naïve concerning the true state of the Church today:

As for Mr. Palm’s mention of the three universities who teach full inerrancy, this is another example of his naivety.

Then, following the example of his mentor, the end of the world date-setting Harold Camping, he launches into a goofy and irrelevant calculation of the percentage of all the Catholic institutions in the world that these three represent. Of course, this is another vintage Sungenis debating tactic: the diversion. The hope is that no one will notice that this has no bearing at all on the fact that he was proven wrong on his “challenge.”

If Bob doesn’t want to be accused of engaging in cheap debater’s tricks, then perhaps he should: 1) stop throwing out explicit challenges without being man enough to admit when his challenge is met and even bested, and 2) stop blatantly distorting what his opponent says.

The bottom line is that I’m not naïve about this matter. I’m perfectly well aware of the downfall of many, even most Catholic institutions over the past decades. Happily, there are still some who hold fast to the Faith in its fullness. But what I continue to assert is that, despite the deviation of many individuals and Catholic institutions, the Magisterium of the Catholic Church has continued to teach 100% of the doctrines of the Faith. That is what ultimately matters and I rejoice in that fact. The neo-geocentrists, on the other hand, seem to find this good news vexing and so they seek to play up the Church’s difficulties to the utmost, in order to save their private “dogma”. There’s something seriously wrong with that frame of mind.

Did Bob Only Have a “Personal Difference” with Bishop Rhoades?

At one point in my previous article, I made the observation that although we can still find Catholic institutions that teach full biblical inerrancy, sadly, we can’t number Bob’s among them since he was told by his bishop to remove the word “Catholic” from his apostolate. Sungenis replied,

This is typical of Mr. Palm’s cheap shots, which are designed to create scurrilous innuendo that sounds good to itching ears. This is why I even hesitate to get into any discussions with Mr. Palm, but I will do so for the sake of the truth of geocentrism. That Bishop Rhoades threatened to make me take the word Catholic from my apostolate was due to a personal difference he and I had about the Catholic approach to the Jews and Jewish beliefs. It had nothing to do with whether I or Bishop Rhoades believed in biblical inerrancy, but leave it to Mr. Palm to make it part of this discussion (Response to David Palm on the Tridentine Catechism’s Treatment of Cosmology, p. 25).

But did Bob and Bishop Rhoades have a mere “personal difference . . . about the Catholic approach to the Jews and Jewish beliefs”, thus rendering my statement above a “cheap shot”? Far from it, as we’ll see below.

First, let's be very clear about the nature of the years' worth of anti-Jewish material that had accumulated at Bob's web site that finally prompted the bishop to act. The reader is invited to view a sampling of this material here:

Sungenis and the Jews: Anti-Semitism -- What it is and Evidence of it

see also,

Sungenis and the Jews: Timelines

But now, with regard to his bishop, Bob employs a blatant double standard in the way he treats Bishop Rhoades, versus the way he reacts to my own words:

R. Sungenis: I find it interesting that Mr. Palm earlier accused me of not providing a citation about Oliveiri’s [sic] official position, but he fails to provide even a link to what I purportedly said at the Canada debate! Rather than asking me if I ever said such a thing, Mr. Palm has no shame in accusing me. This is nothing but calumny. Nevertheless, allow me to satisfy Mr. Palm’s lack of research – the claim is absolutely bogus. I never said any such thing, and never would, and never have. Mr. Palm is familiar with all my geocentrism writings, so why didn’t he appeal to them to compare against what some hostile critic is saying about me? There is not one statement I have ever written that even comes close to what Mr. Palm is alleging.

There are yet more falsehoods here. First, I most certainly did provide a link to what he purportedly said at the Canada presentation. I don’t know how Bob missed that, but here it is again.

Second, I didn’t “accuse” Bob. What I said was, “Or how about a talk he gave in Canada during which this was reported”. That’s not—and by definition can’t be—calumny, because it’s true. Bob was, in fact, reported to have said exactly what I indicated. There were two people at the presentation who state that’s what they heard him say, namely, that "if you did not believe in a geocentric universe you were atheist." I did state that if he didn’t say it, then that’s fine, but there’s an audio recording. Still, I left open the possibility that he didn’t say it. However, given the extreme rhetoric that Bob regularly deploys, along with the constant linkage throughout his writings between atheism and a denial of geocentrism, I find the allegation at least plausible, which is why I mentioned it.

It turns out that Bob made the hosts of the presentation in Canada sign a form that forbids them from distributing the audio or video of this event. But if Bob will contact those people and give his permission in writing, they’ll send me the audio/video and I will seek to verify this quote. If I am unable to do so, I’ll be perfectly willing to retract the claim and apologize.

But now, let’s contrast Bob’s outrage at this episode with how he’s treated Bishop Rhoades. In the case of Bishop Rhoades he has leveled a host of serious charges against His Excellency—charges which, by the way, Bishop Rhoades calls “slanderous and erroneous”. Since Sungenis has continued to level the charges, even after the bishop’s denial, Bob is implicitly calling His Excellency a liar:

R. Sungenis: Rhoades’ allegiances are not difficult to discern. His lifelong mentor is William Cardinal Keeler who was the previous bishop of Harrisburg and who ordained Rhoades to that position in 2004. It appears that he and Keeler are on the same wavelength when it comes to reinterpreting Catholic doctrine to accommodate the Jews.

R. Sungenis: it was up to him to prove his case against me, since it now became a matter of faith and morals, for I am not required to obey the bishop if he is going against Catholic faith and morals. Anti-supersessionism is against Catholic faith and morals.

R. Sungenis: Rhoades [sic] made no attempt to convert [the Jews in the synagogue his visited] to Christianity, since he and his fellow Jewish ideologues believe that Judaism is just another way to God and that Christianity is only a better means of doing so. He learned that from his mentor William Cardinal Keeler, the co-author with Jewish rabbis of the 2002 document Reflections on Covenant and Missions [RCM], the document that claimed that the idea that Jews were to have the Gospel preached to them and that they needed to convert to Christianity was no longer theologically acceptable.

R. Sungenis: During the meeting with Fr. King, I discovered that both he and Bishop Rhoades held to the heresy of antisupersessionism...this came as little surprise to me, since William Cardinal Keeler had held the same heresy in his 2002 document Reflections on Covenant and Missions...

R. Sungenis: I knew upon leaving the building the erroneous theology [Fr. King], Rhoades [sic] and the USCCB were attempting to propagate to unsuspecting Catholics.

R. Sungenis: How is it that the Jews have garnered such a market on suffering that Bishop Rhoades finds it necessary to pay homage to them? Is it because they own the mortgages on the Catholic buildings erected in his and other dioceses?

R. Sungenis: “During the meeting with Fr. King, I discovered that both he and Bishop Rhoades held to the heresy of antisupersessionism – the view that the Jews still retained legal possession of the Mosaic covenant.”

So Bob publicly accuses a successor of the Apostles of holding a heresy and purposely attempting to propagate that heresy to “unsuspecting Catholics”. He accuses his bishop of going against “Catholic faith and morals”. He accuses the bishop of having greater “allegiances” to Jews than to the integrity of Catholic doctrine. He accuses His Excellency of “pay[ing] homage to” the Jews, insinuating that this might be because they hold the mortgages on church property.

Serious charges, eh? Way, way more serious than anything that I have ever said about Bob. Now, has Bob ever cited any statement from Bishop Rhoades that is in any way heretical? No. Has he cited any statement from Bishop Rhoades that even hints that his “allegiances” are more solidly with the Jews than they are with the Catholic Faith? No. Does Bob ever cite any eyewitnesses who have heard any such words from Bishop Rhoades? No. Has Bob ever even spoken to Bishop Rhoades? No.

So let’s get this straight. When I cite two eyewitnesses as to what he reportedly said at a talk—something that was perhaps ridiculous but not heretical—Bob gets all up in arms about “calumny”. But he can publicly and repeatedly slander a successor of the Apostles with multiple false accusations of the most serious nature, without one shred of direct evidence to back it up, and that’s fine in his world. Got it. For once it would be nice to see him even half as concerned about the reputations of those he publicly attacks as he is about his own reputation.

The bottom line is that Bob has ignored the new essays that Michael Forrest and I have written that further expose what Bishop Rhoades himself calls Bob's "slanderous and erroneous" attacks and accusations against His Excellency (links below). Bishop Rhoades has also rightly described Bob's attacks on the Jewish people as "hostile, uncharitable and un-christian." This was no mere “personal difference”.

I think readers will find in the documentation below ample parallels to the same sloppy scholarship, tendentious argumentation, and slander that we have seen him deploy in support of geocentrism. Bob needs to forthrightly retract and apologize for his grotesque statements attacking the Jewish people (which can be found here and here). He also needs to retract his baseless, public accusations of heresy against Bishop Rhoades, issue an unqualified apology to His Excellency, and do penance in reparation for the scandal he has caused.

Bishop Rhoades and the Dual Covenant Theory

A Defense of Bishop Rhoades from More False Accusations by Robert Sungenis

Sungenis's Own Standards of Heresy: Why Don't They Apply to Bishop Rhoades?

Does Bob Really Know the Science? Elliptical Orbits Versus Epicycles

This is going to be a little technical, but I think it’s important since Bob presents himself as an expert on physics and astrophysics. In Galileo Was Wrong, Bob grossly misrepresented Fr. Olivieri, the Commissary General of the Holy Office during the early 1800s, by claiming that Fr. Olivieri’s entire case for allowing non-geocentric cosmological views to be disseminated in the Church boiled down the matter of “elliptical orbits”. (See here for more important background on this discussion.)

The mystery is, where did Bob get this notion that Fr. Olivier’s case was all about “elliptical orbits”? He certainly did not get it from actually reading Olivieri’s writings. Upon some further investigation it appears to me that Bob got this whole schtick from Fr. George Coyne’s essay, “The Church’s Most Recent Attempt to Dispel the Galileo Myth”. Fr. Coyne states in a most cursory fashion that, “Olivieri devised the following formula. Copernicus was not correct, since he employed circular orbits and epicycles.” (The Church and Galileo, “The Church’s Most Recent Attempt to Dispel the Galileo Myth”, p. 346.) This, as I’ve demonstrated elsewhere, is a gross oversimplification, to the point of being an outright misrepresentation. Unfortunately, Bob basically reproduces this argument, but goes well beyond Fr. Coyne by heaping scorn on Fr. Olivieri for being so allegedly simple-minded and sneaky. Fr. Coyne was at least dignified enough not to launch into the insults and invective that Bob unleashed on the Commissary General of the Holy Office (see a litany of Bob’s attacks here.)

Now it’s interesting that Bob states in GWW2 that Fr. Coyne is "liberal-minded" and "aligns himself more with the liberal theological and exegetical school of thinking". Normally that would make Bob suspicious. But in this instance it would seem that it was more convenient to swallow Fr. Coyne's analysis of Fr. Olivieri’s arguments whole, even though Bob could just as easily have read that whole section of Finocchiaro's book for himself and found out that Fr. Coyne had misrepresented the Commissary General of the Holy Office.

Next, in the comments section of the Creative Minority blog, we find Rick Delano repeating the same error, stating that,

Father Coyne notes in his “Galileo and the Church”, the imprimatur was granted on false grounds: it was argued that since Copernicus’ system contained epicycles, that was the basis of the condemnation. It wasn’t. The condemnation makes no mention of epicycles anywhere.

It is true that the 1633 condemnation makes no mention of epicycles. But the problem for Fr. Coyne, Bob Sungenis, and Rick Delano is that Fr. Olivieri doesn’t either! So Fr. Coyne first misrepresented Fr. Olivieri by contending that his case against Copernicanism boiled down to Copernicus’s reliance on epicycles. And now Bob and Rick have uncritically perpetuated that misrepresentation.

But Bob went one further, coming to the “rescue” of Delano and in the process screwing up the distinction between elliptical orbits and epicycles, which are two totally different things:

R. Sungenis: Finocchiaro, himself, admits that Kepler’s epicycles were an issue. Note this paragraph on page 251 of his book, Retrying Galileo:

“Along with modern astronomers, Settele does not teach that the sun is at the center of the world: for it is not the center of the fixed stars; it is not the center of heavy bodies, which fall toward the center of our world, namely of the earth; nor is it the center of the planetary system because it does not lie in the middle, or center, but to one side at one of the foci of the elliptical orbits that all planets trace. Still less does he teach that the sun is motionless; on the contrary, it has a rotational motion around itself and also a translational motion which it performs while carrying along the outfit of all its planets.” (emphasis mine.)

This quote is supposed to “prove” that Fr. Olivieri really did make epicycles an issue in the discussion. The problem? If Bob had read carefully he would see that the word “epicycles” is never used. In the underlined sentence Fr. Olivieri is not talking about epicycles at all, but elliptical orbits, as the quote makes quite clear. In fact, nowhere in that section of Finocchiaro’s book in which Fr. Olivieri’s argumentation exists is the word epicycle used. A computer search of Finocchiaro’s entire work shows that the word “epicycles” is used exactly once, on p. 313 and in no connection to Fr. Olivieri’s case.

The reference to “one side at one of the foci of the elliptical orbits” should have waved Bob off from swallowing Fr. Coyne’s erroneous claim that epicycles had anything to do with Fr. Olivieri’s argument. As it stands, the case laid out by the Commissary General of the Holy Office is perfectly cogent—an ellipse has two foci and therefore, if the sun sits at one of the two foci of elliptical orbits around it, it can't be in the very center of the solar system, let alone the whole universe as Copernicus and Galileo believed.

Now again, I repeat, lest anyone miss this, that the matter of elliptical orbits was but one of many examples which Fr. Olivieri gave to show that the views of modern astronomers are not the same as those addressed in the 1633 decree from the Holy Office. But the fact that Bob bungled this distinction between epicycles and ellipses indicates one of two things. Either he’s found yet again to be sloppy and tendentious (even while accusing a Catholic priest of the same). Or he simply does not know the science as he claims, not understanding the difference between epicycles and ellipses. Perhaps it’s both. Let the reader decide.

Has Bob Accurately Represented Fr. Olivieri, the Commissary General of the Inquisition?

Continuing with Bob’s slander of Fr. Olivieri, the Commissary General of the Congregation of the Holy Office (Inquisition), I would ask the reader first to read the section in Neo-Geos Come Unravelled to acquaint himself with the scurrilous charges that Bob has leveled against this Catholic priest. In his latest rebuttal we find Bob defending his slander thus:

So it’s against some code of ethics to accuse a priest of subterfuge, even when we have the evidence from historical scholars that Olivieri did precisely what I accuse him of? And if Mr. Palm thinks that I misconstrued the true office of Olivieri, let him show us the evidence instead of his mere assertions.

The last sentence of that quote is referring to the fact that he repeatedly said in Galileo Was Wrong that Fr. Olivieri was the Commissary General of the Congregation of the Index. But in fact, he held that office in the Congregation of the Holy Office (Inquisition). Bob erred, but he challenged me to provide more evidence. Here it is.

I obtained on inter-library loan the volume Giuseppe Settele, Il Suo Diario e la Questione Galileiana (ed. P. Maffei, Foligno: Edizioni dell’Arquata, 1987). It includes a facsimile reproduction of the original work by Fr. Maurizio Benedetto Olivieri, issuing from “Suprema Sacra Congregazione del S. Officio” (p. 425) and he signs himself “Commissario” (p. 449). Note, of the Congregation of the Holy Office, not of the Congregation of the Index as Bob contended. Witness also Dr. Maurice Finocchiaro, one of the most eminent Galileo scholars: “Maurizio Benedetto Olivieri (1769–1845), a Dominican friar, professor of Old Testament at the same university, and Inquisition consultant; in July 1820 he became commissary general of the Inquisition and held that position until his death” (Finocchiaro, Retrying Galileo, 193; my emphasis). Here are more sources:

Antonio Beltran Mari: “el padre Maurizio Benedetto Olivieri, socio del comisario del Santo Oficio” (Galileo, ciencia y religion, p. 224)

William Wallace: “Earlier, Settele had asked his colleague at the Sapienza, Benedetto Olivieri—who was professor of Old Testament there but also happened to be Commissary of the Holy Office, the branch of the papacy that had condemned Galileo—whether he could openly teach the earth’s motion without running into difficulty with the Church.” (The Modeling of Nature, p. 394).

There, Bob has his evidence. As I have said, if you are going to accuse a Catholic priest of subterfuge and blatant dishonesty you should at least get your facts straight. The fact that Bob dug his heels in over his blunder concerning the office held by Fr. Olivieri, instead of just forthrightly admitting he was wrong, is just another testament to his own lack of scholarly integrity.

And of course, it’s certainly against the Catholic code of ethics to twist the evidence from historical scholars and then use that twisted analysis to falsely accuse a priest of subterfuge. Here is Bob’s reply to my demonstration that he totally misconstrued what Fr. Olivieri meant by “devastating mobility” (sometimes also phrased “devastating motion”):

Mr. Palm is wrong. First “devastating mobility” can refer to a number of things, not just the idea that the surface of the earth would be disrupted by movement through space.

Of course, this is a gratuitous assertion. I cited Fr. Olivieri’s own work to show what he meant by “devastating motion” and he said nothing about “elliptical orbits” in that connection. Again, how Bob got anything about “elliptical orbits” out of “devastating mobility” or “devastating motion” is a complete mystery. I contend it’s a figment of his imagination. But he can easily clear this up. First, he needs to tell us what, exactly, is “devastating” about the motion in an elliptical orbit as compared to a circular one. And if I am so wrong and this connection between “devastating motion” and “elliptical orbits” can really “refer to a number of things”, including elliptical orbits, then let Bob produce a single scholar who will support him in this. Find just one scholar who agrees that "devastating motion" has anything to do with elliptical orbits. We need more than Bob’s ipsi dixit at this point, since he’s shown himself unreliable on so many other points. I predict that Bob won’t even make the attempt and will let the matter drop, because this is all a matter of his own nonsensical invention. But he presses on:

Second, and most important, Olivieri admits himself that elliptical orbits of the planets are the crux of the issue, and I quote his admission.

This is false. The passage that Bob cited doesn’t contain any such admission that elliptical orbits are the “crux of the issue”. That’s just another outright fabrication. As I demonstrated, Fr. Olivieri cited many ways in which modern cosmological views differ from Copernicanism. And there is no evidence that “elliptical orbits” held any special place in his thinking, let alone being the “crux of the issue”. Here is the passage Bob cited:

Along with modern astronomers, Settele does not teach that the sun is at the center of the world: for it is not the center of the fixed stars; it is not the center of heavy bodies, which fall toward the center of our world, namely of the earth; nor is it the center of the planetary system because it does not lie in the middle, or center, but to one side at one of the foci of the elliptical orbits that all planets trace. Still less does he teach that the sun is motionless; on the contrary, it has a rotational motion around itself and also a translational motion which it performs while carrying along the outfit of all its planets. (From Olivieri’s November 1820 Summation, titled, “Ristretto di Ragione, e di Fatto,” ¶30, as cited by Finocchiaro in Retrying Galileo, p. 205.)

Copernicus and Galileo said that the sun was the motionless center of the entire universe. Fr. Olivieri points out, quite rightly, that modern astronomers do not hold that the sun is the center of the whole universe. Notice that he only mentions elliptical orbits with respect to the sun’s position in the solar system. But in this very passage he also points out that the sun is “not the center of the fixed stars”, is “not the center of heavy bodies”, and is not motionless, as Copernicus said, but has both rotational and translational motion. So right in that passage there are not one but four ways in which modern theories differ from Copernicus. Can Bob tell us where, in that passage, Fr. Olivieri makes elliptical orbits “the crux of the issue”? He can’t and I predict he’ll just quietly drop this argument, rather than admitting that he was wrong once again.

Elsewhere, Fr. Olivieri also points to the matter of “devastating motion”, which Bob has wrongly confused with the “elliptical orbits”. And Fr. Olivieri also points out scientific discoveries—e.g. stellar aberration and nutation—that cannot be explained by geocentrists without resorting to special pleading. Therefore, Bob’s contention that Fr. Olivieri makes “elliptical orbits” the “crux of the matter” is unsupported and false. Elliptical orbits was one of many things to which Fr. Olivieri pointed to demonstrate that the views of modern astronomers were not the same as those of Copernicus and hence not the same as what was addressed in the 1633 decree. Based on a false and sloppy analysis, Bob has repeatedly and unjustly accused this Catholic priest of lying and subterfuge. Such, it seems, is the typical approach of the neo-geocentrist.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, there’s more. Bob insists that it is “indisputable” that Fr. Olivieri was wrong because, he claims, the focus of the 1633 decree against Galileo was the motion of the earth:

R. Sungenis: The indisputable point in fact is that Olivieri proposed a line of reasoning that was false. The issue before the Church was not whether Copernicanism made the Earth move with a defective and “devastating mobility,” but that the 1616 and 1633 Church said the Earth did not move, AT ALL. Let’s look at the Sentence once again:

** “the false doctrine taught by some that...the Earth moves, and also with diurnal motion”

** “The proposition that the Earth is not the center of the world and immovable but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically…”

** ““the false opinion of the motion of the Earth…”

** “doctrine of the motion of the Earth…is contrary to the Holy Scriptures and therefore cannot be defended or held”

** “and that the Earth moves and is not the center of the world; and that an opinion may be held and defended as probable after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to the Holy Scripture.”

** I [Galileo] must altogether abandon the false opinion that the sun is the center of the world and immovable and that the Earth is not the center of the world and moves.” (emphasis his.)

But Bob’s contention is “indisputable” only if you don’t bother to look at what he cropped out by using ellipses. What does the 1633 decree actually say, with the ellipses filled in?

"the false doctrine [NB: singular] taught by some that the Sun is the center of the world and immovable and that the Earth moves, and also with a diurnal motion"

[Note that even the neo-geocentrists have to admit that the motion of the earth is no longer “absurd and false philosophically”, thus even they would have to admit that the 1616 commission, which was quoted (but not adopted) in the 1633 decree was in error.]

"the false opinion [NB: singular] of the motion of the Earth and the stability of the Sun"

"the doctrine [NB: singular] of the motion of the Earth and the stability of the Sun is contrary to the Holy Scriptures and therefore cannot be defended or held."

"the doctrine [NB: singular]—which is false and contrary to the sacred and divine Scriptures—that the Sun is the center of the world and does not move from east to west and that the Earth moves and is not the center of the world"

“I [Galileo] must altogether abandon the false opinion [NB: singular] that the sun is the center of the world and immovable and that the Earth is not the center of the world and moves.”

Thus, what the 1633 decree (and Galileo’s abjuration) actually addresses is a singular doctrine/opinion which includes two points (notice that they are connected with the conjunction “and”, not “or”), viz., that the earth moves and that the sun is the immovable center of the universe. But, as Fr. Olivieri rightly states, the modern astronomer does not believe that the sun is immovable, nor does he hold it to be the center of the universe. Reading this decree strictly—that is, according to the Catholic Church’s stated canonical principles (see here)—it becomes clear that modern views do not fall under this condemnation at all. And that was exactly Fr. Olivieri’s point. Bob is wrong that the earth's motion can be isolated in the way he did. A strict interpretation of the decree forbids such selective cropping. And he is equally wrong that there was anything untoward about what Fr. Olivieri did in pointing out that, according to a strict canonical interpretation of this decree, modern views do not fall under the condemnation.

Bob has repeatedly accused the Commissary General of the Inquisition of dishonesty and subterfuge. But if anyone is guilty of such unseemly behavior it would seem to be Bob himself.

Why were the works of Rheticus put on the Index? and Were the works of Copernicus banned prior to 1616?

In an earlier rebuttal, Bob claimed that the work Narratio Prima by Rheticus was placed on the Index of Forbidden Books in 1541. I pointed out that this was not true, since the Index itself was not established until 1559. Again, I would encourage the reader to acquaint himself with the background to this discussion by reading first here. Now, here is what Bob says to my rebuttal:

I made a mistake in saying that Rheticus’ work was put on the Index in 1541. I was working from memory instead of checking my notes. What I should have said is that Rheticus’ work was published in 1541 and put on the Index in 1559.

Now, what disturbs me about Mr. Palm’s correction is that he knows what the truth is about this issue, that is, he knows that Rheticus’ book was put on the Index in 1559 but he doesn’t say so in his rebuttal. But I know Mr. Palm is aware that Rheticus was put on the Index since he has a copy of my book Galileo Was Wrong, Volume 2 (from which he has quoted many times before, and specifically this section dealing with the 1500s).

Now, if Mr. Palm chose to be as accurate and forthright with his audience as possible, he would have alerted them to this fact, since it is clearly written in my book. Subsequently, he would have instead revealed that in my recent rebuttal to him I made an oversight in saying Rheticus was put on the Index in 1541 since I say in my book that it was 1559. But we don’t see any such consideration and leeway given by Mr. Palm. So I need to pose this question: is Mr. Palm interested in the truth, or is he just interested in trying to make Robert Sungenis look bad? . . .

So in the end, Mr. Palm only dug his hole deeper. By not being forthcoming with his audience and instead trying to strain at the gnat of a simple and easily corrected mistake while swallowing the camel of a tendentious misreading of the historical data, he has given us a chance to set the historical record straight and show that his thesis is even more dubious than before, since the placing of Rheticus’ book on the Index was only seven years prior to the publishing of the Tridentine Catechism instead of twenty five years prior!

I appreciate Bob’s forthright admission of error with regard to the dates of 1541 and 1548. For my part I said, “I find no evidence that Rheticus' works were ever put on the Index, but my search was certainly not comprehensive. Even if they were at some point, it certainly was not in 1541 or even in 1616” (emphasis mine.) Thus, I didn’t commit myself to the position that Rheticus’ works were never put on the Index, only that it didn’t happen in 1541 or 1616. I was correct about the dates, while Bob is correct that those works were eventually put on the Index in 1559. What eludes me is how Bob has concluded that I knew this information all along and was deliberately hiding it from the reader. For the record, I didn’t and wasn’t and this is merely another instance of rash judgment on Bob’s part.

Bob admits that his own memory is “faulty”, but insists that I should have “alerted” everyone because “it is clearly written in [his] book”. Excuse me? Now follow this. Bob can’t even remember what is in his own book and yet my forthright admission that “my search was certainly not comprehensive” gets turned into an accusation against my honesty. Hilariously, according to Bob, it’s apparently my responsibility to know the contents of his book better than he does himself! I appreciate Bob’s admission of error, but his attempt to impugn my honesty based on his errors and defective memory of his own material is just idiotic.

And now, here’s the proverbial rest of the story. Bob continues to insist that the placement of Rheticus’ work on the Index is of some significance for the Church’s stance on geocentrism prior to the Roman Catechism (1566). He asks,

So how is Mr. Palm going to explain that a Catechism published so shortly after a major decision of the Church to ban alternative cosmologies will be blatantly disagreeing with that prior Church decision to ban heliocentrism? Likewise for the banning of Copernicus’ book in 1549.

It’s simple. As in so many other instances, all you have to do is look up Bob’s sources and read what he decided to leave out. His treatment of the works of Rheticus smelled a little fishy, so I looked up Bob’s cited source, an essay by Michel-Pierre Lerner. Here’s what Lerner actually says, including what Bob left out:

By contrast, all of Rheticus's works (including, therefore, the openly Copernican Narratio prima) were banned in the different editions of the Index librorum prohibitorum published at Rome between 1559 and 1593 on the grounds that their author was "a disciple of Oswald [Myconius] and a school-fellow of Conrad Gesner”. (The Church and Galileo, "The Heliocentric 'Heresy'", p. 17; my emphasis).

In other words, Rheticus’ work on Copernicus wasn’t singled out by the Index—rather, all of his works were proscribed. And the Index says explicitly why Rheticus's works were there and, lo and behold, it had absolutely nothing to do with heliocentrism, but rather was due to his connection with Protestant scholars. Now it seems hard to believe that Bob didn’t read the last half of that sentence. So why did he choose to omit it in Galileo Was Wrong or in this most recent discussion with me? Why would he continue to give the reader the impression that the works of Rheticus were put on the index because of their Copernican ideas and then go on to accuse me of dishonesty in supposedly suppressing information from the reader?

But there’s more. With respect to the works of Copernicus Bob writes:

Bartolomeo Spina, the Master of the Sacred Palace from 1542 until his death in 1547, sought to have Copernicus’ book banned, which was eventually carried out by his Dominican colleague Giovanimaria Tolosani, who died two years later in 1549.

In other words, the correct history is that Copernicus’ book was banned in 1549 by the Master of the Sacred Palace (which is like our prefect of the CDF today). Now, wouldn’t it have been more honest and certainly more beneficial for the reading audience for Mr. Palm to give this precise history since, as is apparent, he is claiming to be such a stickler for details?

Is this really the “correct history” and “precise history”? No, it’s not. First, Bob’s claim that “the Master of the Sacred Palace” is “like our prefect of the CDF today” is false. The prefect of the CDF today would be equivalent to the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation of the Holy Office then. Rather, the position of the Master of the Sacred Palace, "may briefly be described as being that of the pope's theologian" and "Before the establishment of the Congregations of the Inquisition (in 1542) and Index (1587), the Master of the Sacred Palace condemned books and forbade reading them under censure" (Catholic Encyclopedia, s.v. “Master of the Sacred Palace”.) So Bob is once again exaggerating for effect, to the point of falsehood (see here for more examples).

Second, Bob’s claims that the banning of Copernicus’ book “was eventually carried out by . . . Giovanimaria [sic] Tolosani” and that, “Copernicus’ book was banned in 1549 by the Master of the Sacred Palace”, are also false. Fr. Giovanni Maria Tolosani was never the Master of the Sacred Palace and his work against Copernicus was never published. Nor is there any evidence that the work that he wrote resulted in any official action by the Church. Bob cites no source for his assertions. But here is the real story:

Tolosani ends his little treatise with the following interesting revelation: "The Master of the Sacred and Apostolic Palace had planned to condemn this book, but, prevented by illness and then by death, he could not fulfill this intention. However, I have taken care to accomplish it in this little work for the purpose of preserving the truth to the common advantage of the Holy Church." The Master of Sacred Palace was Tolosani's powerful friend, Bartolomeo Spina, who attended the opening sessions of the Council of Trent but died in early 1547. As trenchant as Tolosani's critique of Copernicus had been, there is simply no evidence that it received any serious consideration either from the new master or from the pope himself. Meanwhile, Tolosani's unpublished manuscript, written in the spirit of Trent, was probably shelved in the library of his order at San Marco in Florence awaiting its use by some new prosecutor. The result was that sixteenth-century Catholic astronomers and philosophers worked under no formal prohibitions from the Index or the Inquisition. (Marcus Hellyer, The Scientific Revolution: The Essential Readings, p. 57; my emphasis.)

And:

Only later, in the wake of the Galileo affair in the early seventeenth century, was it discovered that a Florentine Dominican, Giovanni Maria Tolosani, had quickly written against Copernicus, but his patron died before the manuscript was printed, and his blast languished on an archival shelf. (Ferngren, Science and Religion: A Historical Introduction, p. 99; my emphasis).

So Bob is wrong yet again. There was no official condemnation of Copernicus and no banning of his book, prior to 1616. Rheticus’s book was not put on the Index because of its Copernican content and therefore none of these actions have any bearing whatsoever on the content of the Roman Catechism published in 1566. Bob's entire section on this in Galileo Was Wrong is full of errors.

Now, I think it's important to understand that I’m not an expert in this area. I've never claimed to be one and I don’t play one on TV. It's Bob Sungenis who claims to be the expert. The fact that I can show that he repeatedly makes such elementary historical blunders and errors of interpretation illustrates how incredibly sloppy and tendentious his work is. He insists that he's "in this for the truth" -- and it's possible he really believes that -- but there's just too much evidence to the contrary. I think the most charitable explanation is that Bob is so completely convinced he's right about geocentrism and so committed to proving it to the world that he sees "proof" where there is none and can't see all the contrary evidence -- even when it's right in front of his eyes. It happens, just as it happened with Bob's mentor, the repeatedly wrong, end of the world, date-setting, Harold Camping. Interestingly, note that the blindness not only affected Camping; it also affected his followers, who continue to listen to him regardless of how many times he was proven to be wrong.

It's also important to remember that the "Ph.D" Bob received from Calamus is based on this very same work and that Calamus even gave him their highest marks for the supposed quality of his methodology and research" ("My Ph.D. From Calamus International University", p. 10). This is just more evidence (as if more was needed: see here) that Calamus is little more than a New Age diploma mill. It is to protect against phony degrees issued by bogus academic institutions like this that accreditation standards were developed in the first place. The reason for pointing this out isn't to be insulting and "mean" to Bob. But the fact, by his own admission, is that he sought out a "Ph.D" from this Internet company in the West Indies because he wanted to gain credibility in the eyes of his readers. He says, "The only thing it does is allow me to show the world, in a glance, that I have the same academic credentials as those who receive a Ph.D. in Religion from a United States accredited institution" (My "Ph.D. From Calamus International University", p. 26). So, he publicly admitted that we wanted people to see him in the same light as respected scholars and he knew those little letters help him to accomplish that goal. He knew that this claim to a doctorate would lend legitimacy to what he's saying. Why do you think he signs everything he writes with "Robert Sungenis, Ph.D."?

Well, when those three little letters are genuinely earned, according to accepted academic standards, then they certainly do carry some weight and lend some legitimacy.

But in the case of Bob's phony "doctorate", they clearly don't.

Does the Roman Catechism Teach Geocentrism?

Moving to the matter of the Roman Catechism, this is another good opportunity to show the reader the shell game that too often occurs in Bob’s writings. Remember that he’s the one who has asserted that the Roman Catechism contains, "One of the clearest official and authoritative statements from the Catholic Church defending the doctrine of geocentrism..." and he speaks of the "Roman Catechism’s dogmatic assertion of geocentrism". It was Bob who made the claim that, "It [the Roman Catechism] never says the earth moves and, in fact, says the earth “stands still”." And when challenged to show us exactly where the Catechism uses that phrase, what did Bob do? He changed the subject and hoped we wouldn’t notice that he failed to provide the answer. Again, yet another standard debater’s trick. So one more time, Bob. You’ve claimed that the Roman Catechism states that the earth “stands still”. Will you show us exactly where the Catechism uses those words, or retract the claim?

He also claimed that one passage, in particular, would, "expel any doubt about what objects are revolving". But I demonstrated conclusively that that passage does not refer to the place of the globe with respect to the universe, but the relationship of the dry land with respect to the rest of the earth (see here).

Bob responds:

Mr. Palm wants us to believe that the only way to read the Catechism’s statement is for us to see “terrum” [sic: should be terram] as referring only to the “dry land” of the earth and not the earth at large.

Notice that Bob has admitted that my interpretation is possible. By so doing, he’s already given the game away because he claims that this is the clearest magisterial statement establishing geocentrism. If this is the clearest statement he’s got, then it’s his burden to show that his interpretation is right and mine is wrong. Otherwise, he’s effectively admitted that he’s building his case on a very flimsy foundation.

But it’s actually worse than this for Bob, because my interpretation of the passage is not just possible. It’s correct. And given the context, his interpretation is not possible at all.

His only really new argument is to insist that because the Catechism says that the terram was placed in the “midst” (in media) of the mundus, this must indicate that the terram was placed in the exact center of the mundus and therefore refers to the earth being placed in the exact center of the universe. But this doesn’t follow of necessity. The Catechism, in this section, is drawing from the language of Genesis 1. Gen 1:9 says that God gathered the waters in one place and the dry land (terram) appeared. So it’s perfectly reasonable for the Catechism to say that the land was placed in the midst (in media) of the earth. That no more implies that things have to be in the center of the earth than me saying “I hiked in the midst of the mountains” means that I was at the mountains’ exact center.

Again, this passage of the Roman Catechism is clearly drawing from the language of Genesis 1. And in Gen 1:10 God explicitly calls the dry land terram. And now, for the fourth time, I put this question to Bob: If terram means the entire globe rather than the dry land, then how can the Catechism say that God filled it with living creatures, "as He had already filled the air and water" (quemadmodum antea aquas et aëra)? The terram here is something distinct from the air and the water, therefore it cannot be the entire globe. But we know what the terram is. It’s just what God said in Gen 1:10, it’s the “dry land” (aridam). This completely dismantles Bob’s reading of geocentrism into this passage of the Roman Catechism.

So yes, the only way to read the Roman Catechism’s statement is to see the terram as referring to the “dry land” of the earth and not to the earth at large. This passage says absolutely nothing about the place of the earth in the universe. This was the best he had, but Bob has erred in applying this passage to geocentrism.

Did the Editors of Newton’s Principia Have Some Endorsement From Rome?

Now, let’s turn to Bob’s fabricated assertion that the priest-editors of an edition of Newton’s Principia had an official commission from the Church and that their words represent the ruling of “the Church”. Remember that in GWW2 (p. 41) he said that “the Catholic Church apparently had enough power to assign two Minim friars…as editors…who represented the Catholic Church” and that they were “commissioned by the Church”. And in his more recent reply to me he said, “the Church required a disclaimer to be put on Newton’s Principia” (my emphasis). To my challenge on this Bob says,

Although I admit that “commissioned” may perhaps be too strong a word, I did not mean it in the sense that the Church formally employed Jaquier [sic; Jacquier] and Le Sure [sic; Le Seur] to write the commentary but that Jaquier [sic] and Le Sure [sic] had the Church’s undivided sanction and endorsement. You can depend upon it that if the Church had disagreed with the disclaimer and had decided by 1739 to accommodate cosmologies other than geocentrism, the disclaimer would have been removed since the disclaimer is making the bold and well publicized proclamation that all the “Supreme Pontiffs” have rejected Newton’s heliocentrism.

I had pointed out that even the anti-Catholic writer William Roberts calls this merely "the opinion of its Roman editors". Bob replies:

What Mr. Palm misses is that Roberts called them “ROMAN editors,” not just editors. In other words, even Roberts knows that these Franciscan friars are working with and have the endorsement of Rome. Everyone knows this, except, apparently, Mr. Palm.

In all candor, when I wrote my last piece and included the quote from Roberts, I thought that the only way Bob could potentially counter this was to claim that the adjective “Roman” somehow represents some official mandate from the Catholic Church. But c’mon, I thought, one can’t chase after every ridiculous counter-argument. And yet here we are, faced with just that nonsensical reply. So shame on me, I guess, for not going with my “gut” and rebutting this foolishness earlier.

Roberts calling them the “Roman editors” no more implies that they are “working with and have the endorsement of Rome” than calling Roberts an “Anglican author” means that he had some official mandate or endorsement from the Anglican church. Especially in nineteenth century documents, Roman is just shorthand for “Roman Catholic”, with perhaps a slight pejorative twist. It’s absurd for Bob to claim that it implies some sort of official mandate from Rome.

But it does show how silly this is all getting, with Bob grasping at anything no matter how flimsy to try to ”win”. The whole point that I am making, and which Bob seems not to grasp, is that none of this is magisterial. The opinion of these editors is not magisterial. Period. They have no office in the Church, no commission from the Church, no sanction from the Church, no explicit endorsement from the Church. Their contention that the seventeenth century documents concerning Copernicanism proceeded from the “Roman Pontiffs” is just their opinion and has no authority. There were plenty of other Catholics during that same period pointing out what I and others have pointed out more recently, namely, that the position against Copernicanism “(a) was promulgated only in disciplinary documents, not in formally doctrinal ones; (b) was never promulgated directly and personally by any Pope, only indirectly, through the instrumentality of the Vatican Congregations of the Index and the Holy Office” (Fr. Brian Harrison, Roma Locuta Est - Causa Finita Est).

And that’s precisely the point. Bob doesn’t have anything magisterial in support of geocentrism for more than 300 years. Bob objects to me pointing out this centuries-long lacuna:

Mr. Palm continues to use the “300 year” figure even though I have corrected him on this several times. It’s not 300 years. How could it be when, in fact, Jaquier [sic] and Le Sure’s [sic] disclaimer was still put on Newton’s Principia only 178 years ago? How could it be when Mario Marini wrote a defense of the Church’s decision on Galileo in 1850, just 161 years ago? How could it be when the president of the Pontifical Academy of Science said in 1943, just 68 years ago, that neither Newton, Foucault or Bradley proved heliocentrism? Mr. Palm just likes to ignore these events because a 300 year figure will make his argument sound better.

How could it be? Easy. Again, none of these are magisterial. As I’ve demonstrated, the opinion of Frs. Jacquier and Le Seur isn’t magisterial. Marini’s work wasn’t either. An address by the president of the Pontifical Academy of Science isn’t magisterial. What Bob needs is a magisterial source and that is precisely what he is unable to produce. 300 years is just a good round number. It’s actually longer than that. The last magisterial act that had anything to do with positively enforcing the seventeenth century discipline against promoting Copernicanism was Alexander VII’s Index of Forbidden Books in 1664. That was 347 years ago. Since then the official magisterial acts have been to incrementally remove that discipline against Copernicanism and to promote the dissemination of non-geocentric views throughout the Church.

Bottom line: The fact that Bob has to rely so heavily on such non-magisterial sources to try and make his case shows how incredibly thin his case is. The actual Magisterium of the Catholic Church doesn’t consider geocentrism to be a matter of faith.

Leo XIII and Pius XII: “Magisterial Fundies” Turn the Magisterium on its Head….Again.

We have seen above and elsewhere (link) that the Church’s immemorial principle is that canonical penalties and condemnations are to be interpreted strictly, that is, as narrowly and affecting as few people as possible. But what do the neo-geocentrists do with 1633 decree against Galileo? Exactly the opposite—they strive to interpret it as broadly and as affecting as many people as possible. Sungenis takes this to the extreme, cropping out portions of the decree which show that it no longer applies to modern cosmological views.

Now let’s look again at how they handle the teaching of Popes Leo XIII, Pius XII, and John Paul II that the Bible doesn’t contain information about “the essential nature of the things of the visible universe” or “details of the physical world”. It’s important at the outset to establish just who bears the burden of proof. Remember that I’m arguing that Catholics are free to embrace any of a number of cosmological views. It’s Bob who seeks to restrict Catholic thought to only one, geocentrism, and to argue that this is the official teaching of the Catholic Church. This means that when confronted with magisterial texts that prima facie give freedom to a Catholic to embrace something other than geocentrism, it’s Bob’s burden to prove that those magisterial texts can’t be interpreted to give such freedom, that they can only be interpreted to restrict this freedom of thought.

But true to form, Bob seeks to flip this burden of proof back onto me:

The fact remains that the burden of proof is on the one who claims that a document addresses a certain topic when, in fact, the document makes no mention of the topic. That Mr. Palm refuses to recognize this shows his desperation. As I said in my previous rebuttal, one could just as easily claim that Leo XIII and Pius XII did not mention cosmology because they were directed by the Holy Spirit not to do so, in addition to the fact that neither Leo XIII or Pius XII wanted to call into question the decisions of the 1616 and 1633 Church without doing a formal and official study of the matter.

This is illegitimate for a number of reasons. First, let’s remember that canonical penalties must be interpreted strictly. Pope Leo XIII knew as well as anybody else at that time that the Holy Office had already acted upon the Commissary General’s factual position that modern cosmological views are fundamentally different than the strict Copernicanism condemned in the 1633 decree and hence don’t fall under that condemnation. There was absolutely no canonical requirement for Pope Leo XIII to do “a formal and official study of the matter” before laying out principles of interpretation which would extend to these matters of cosmology.

Second, let’s remember the context of Providentissimus Deus 18-19 (and Divino Afflante Spiritu 3, which cites from that former encyclical.) Pope Leo is addressing instances in which there appears to be a conflict between the discoveries of physical science and certain passages of sacred Scripture. And the Holy Father says that in those instances we must remember that the Holy Spirit did not reveal to the authors of sacred Scripture “the essential nature of the things of the visible universe” and thus it’s fruitless to seek those details on Scripture because its authors, “did not seek to penetrate the secrets of nature, but rather described and dealt with things in more or less figurative language, or in terms which were commonly used at the time, and which in many instances are in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science.” Only examples that fit this context are admissible as part of this discussion. Geocentrism is a classic example of this alleged conflict between the physical sciences and sacred Scripture. Therefore it fits the context perfectly.

Third, Bob continues to miss that Leo XIII laid out a principle—Pope Leo XIII calls it a “rule”—of interpretation. A principle or rule, by its very nature, applies broadly. Therefore, he doesn’t need to tell us specifically all the instances where it can be applied. Far from it being my burden to show that general principles or rules apply to a specific case—in this case the matter of geocentrism—it is Bob’s burden, precisely because these are general principles, to show that they do not apply to the matter of geocentrism. This he certainly won’t be able to do, because the principles plainly do apply to that topic.

This is further supported when we notice that Pope Leo XIII has, as many scholars have observed, essentially adopted the hermeneutical principles advanced by Galileo in his own defense:

on the relationship between Scripture and physical science, the encyclical could be seen to advance Galilean views. . . . Not only were both Galileo and Leo asserting the same principle that Scripture is not a scientific authority in answer to analogous problems involving questions of the relationship between Scripture and science (or natural philosophy), but they also shared some crucial aspects of the reasoning to justify this principle. . . . Besides the formal similarity of problems, the substantive overlap of content, and the deep-structure correspondence of the reasoning, Leo’s account was reminiscent of Galileo’s even in its appearance, on the surface, and as a matter of initial impression. This parallelism involved the quotations from Saint Augustine and how they were interwoven with the rest of the argument. In fact, Leo’s two main passages from Augustine had also been quoted by Galileo in his Letter to Christina: Augustine’s statement of the priority of demonstrated physical truth (“whatever they can really demonstrate . . . , we must show to be capable of reconciliation with our Scripture”) and his statement of nonscientific authority of Scripture (“the Holy Ghost . . . did not intend to teach men . . . the things of the visible universe”). (Finocchiaro, Retrying Galileo, pp. 265f.)

So those who would claim that Pope Leo’s words can’t apply to geocentrism at the very least would have to admit that the Pope was, in that case, an incredibly bad communicator, since the very structure of his argument and even the authorities that he cites recall and parallel the arguments advanced by Galileo.

Fourth, another clear indication that the Church herself intends for the teaching of Leo XIII to be considered to be a principle that should be applied broadly, comes in its application to the six days of creation. The Pontifical Biblical Commission, which was a magisterial office at the time, issued this statement in 1909 concerning the language of Genesis 1 – language that clearly hearkens to Leo XIII’s Providentissimus Deus:

Whether, since in writing the first chapter of Genesis it was not the mind of the sacred author to teach in a scientific manner the detailed constitution of visible things and the complete order of creation, but rather to give his people a popular notion, according as the common speech of the times went, accommodated to the understanding and capacity of men, the propriety of scientific language is to be investigated exactly and always in the interpretation of these? -- Reply: In the negative.

Notice that it’s taken as a given that the author of Genesis 1 didn’t intend to “teach in a scientific manner the detailed constitution of visible things and the complete order of creation”. It’s simply assumed that, rather, it was his intention “to give his people a popular notion, according as the common speech of the times went”. Thus, the Magisterium concludes, it’s not necessary to seek scientific details in the sacred text. As Pope Leo XIII teaches, no such details were revealed by the Holy Spirit to the sacred authors.

On the other hand, those who want to claim that Leo XIII’s principle doesn’t apply to geocentrism struggle mightily to come up with any other example that would fit his words better. Bob takes this to a goofy extreme, proposing a whole list of Scripture passages that allegedly would fit Leo XIII’s principle:

Leo could have been talking about a number of other statements in the Bible (e.g., Nm 11:7; 1Sm 28:14; Ez 1:5; 8:2; Dn 8:15; 10:6; Jl 2:4; Am 5:8; Mt 16:3; 28:3; Mk 8:24; Lk 12:56; Ap 4:1; 15:2).

Now those who are still “wowed” by Bob’s alleged prowess with the Bible will assume he knows what he’s talking about. They won’t even bother to look up those citations, assuming that they prove his point. That would be a bad mistake. Not surprisingly, if you look them up, you’ll see that they do nothing to support Bob’s contention that Pope Leo XIII might have had such passages in mind.

First, let’s ask ourselves which of these passages are an example of an apparent conflict between the discoveries of physical science and sacred Scripture? None of them. So this is a strong indication that Bob is just tilting at windmills.

Second, setting aside a passage like 1 Sam 28:14 which doesn’t seem to have anything do to with what we're discussing, the majority of the rest are similes, that is, they use the pattern "X is like Y" to describe something. None of these are uses of the phenomenological language addressed by Leo XIII. The Scriptures do not say the sun moves "as if" or "like" it was rising. It says it rises and sets.

The closest Bob has to a real example in this list is Matt 16:3: "And in the morning, 'There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.' Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times?” But there, our Lord explicitly says that we are discussing the “appearance of the sky” and so this is not a real parallel. Similarly, Luke 12:54 says, “"When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, 'A shower is coming'; and so it happens.” But this is not phenomenological language at all, it’s literal—a thunderhead literally rises up and you know it’s going to rain. So none of Bob's examples are actual examples of phenomenological language and therefore none of them are pertinent examples.

Third, which of the examples he cites are represent "more or less figurative language, or in terms which were commonly used at the time, and which in many instances are in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science" as the Pope says? Not one. Bob claims in a couple of places that what Pope Leo XIII and Pius XII were really referring to were things like “atoms, forces, etc.” and “not to the general movements of the cosmos” (Response to the SSPX Press Release on Geocentrism, p. 3 and Response to David Palm on Galileo Trial, p. 4). But this won’t work at all. The popes explicitly speak of language “commonly used at the time”, i.e. in ancient times. It would be interesting to see Bob come up with even one example of any author of Scripture using the “commonly used” language of his day to describe “forces” and “atoms”.

So, Bob’s attempt to skirt the teaching of the Popes is a misfire. There’s one really classic example of this sort of phenomenological language that was used in ancient times and "which [is] in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science" and that’s the language of sunrise and sunset. Everybody with a gram of common sense can see that Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical pertains first and foremost to this classic example of an apparent clash between the discoveries of physical science and sacred Scripture. It’s no wonder, then, that staunch neo-geocentrist “Cassini” writing at the Catholic Answers Forum, admitted forthrightly that, “The only interpretation of note in the history of the Church that the encyclical [Providentissimus Deus] could be referring to was the fixed sun/moving earth heresy [sic] (link)” Of course, in classic neo-geo fashion, he then went on to blame it all on a Masonic conspiracy—“We think it may have been written by Cardinal Campolla a Freemason”—but his admission was telling nonetheless.

Bob’s only real remaining response to this is that Pope Leo XIII would have to mention geocentrism explicitly, since it was already addressed in prior magisterial documents. But this founders since we’ve already seen that, according to the Church’s own immemorial canonical principles, the decree of 1633 simply does not apply any longer to the views of any living person (and never will again). It is, in that regard, an ecclesiastical dead letter. Remember too that, based on this fact, in 1822 the Holy Office issued blanket permission for non-geocentric views to be disseminated in the Church. Pope Leo XIII knew those things. He was not in any way bound to present neo-geocentrism as a sort of exceptional case. Rather, he was free to lay out general principles, which Catholics are in turn free to apply to the cases that obviously fit these principles.

The bottom line is that these “Magisterial Fundies” (as Rick Delano has taken to calling himself) once again flip magisterial documents completely on their head. When commenting on the decree of 1633 against Galileo, they ignore the Church’s dictum that canonical condemnations are to be interpreted strictly, that is to say, as narrowly and affecting as few people as possible. They instead seek to interpret that decree broadly, affecting as many people as possible. And now, when Pope Leo XIII (and after him Pius XII) lay out broad principles to be applied to questions of apparent conflict between Scripture and physical science, the MFs want to interpret those as narrowly as possible.

The Magisterium Teaches 100% of the Faith

The material I’ve presented above once again highlights a number of things. First, it illustrates the sloppy “scholarship” of Bob Sungenis. I’m sad to say that in Bob’s writings on neo-geocentrism and certain other topics (such as Jews and Judaism) we’re treated again and again to quotes taken out of context, exaggerations to the point of outright falsehood, misleading analyses, false accusations, double standards, and outright errors of fact.

As I’ve stated a number of times, what concerns me most is that the neo-geos are so willing to undermine the Magisterium if it will help them prop up their pet belief. It’s unseemly and un-Catholic. The Magisterium of the Catholic Church does not “abandon” doctrines of the Faith for centuries. Period. The Popes and all the bishops in communion with them do not allow the spread of a “formal heresy”, even promote its spread, for hundreds of years. This is completely incompatible with a real Catholic dogma, namely, the indefectibility of the Church. The neo-geocentrists have yet even attempted to harmonize their views with that dogma of our Faith.

The neo-geocentric case today can only be sustained through exaggeration to the point of falsehood and by turning magisterial documents on their head. Neo-geocentrism remains an elaborate exercise in ecclesiastical and scientific special pleading.

***

Robert Sungenis' Lousy "Comedic" Attempts to Rationalize His "Fake Moon Landings Filmed by Kubrick" Viewpoint, Complete with (Twice!) Imaginary Words of Yours Truly

2012-01-25T15:20:00.004-05:00

Catholic "apologist" (???) Robert Sungenis is desperately trying to evade responsibility for promoting a wacko video by Gnostic anti-Christian nutcase Jay Weidner (see the details in my paper, "2012: A Sungenis Odd-yssey": Robert Sungenis Pushes a "DVD of the Month" from an Anti-Christian Gnostic Space Case, Claiming that Famed Director Stanley Kubrick Filmed Fake Moon Landings).

In his "reply" to that heavily documented paper (R.I.P. to Dave "Stairway to Heaven" Armstrong), Bob pulls out all the stops with an attempted reductio ad absurdum treatment of my well-known love of classic rock music, as a supposed tongue-in-cheek, turn-the-tables equivalent of my critique of his conspiratorial space-case views. In so doing, he utilizes (not just once, but twice) words of someone else that are not even my own; but Bob presents them as my words. In the pitifully failed effort to be funny and at the same time to allegedly make a profound "gotcha" point, Bob does indeed provide plenty of comic relief.

But the funny thing is how bad his reductio is, and how ridiculous he makes himself in the details of it, that involve factual whoppers. It's like laughing oneself silly, watching a terrible 1950s science fiction B-movie. He simply doesn't know how to do it. People are usually either very good at satire or very bad. Bad satire is very funny, but not for the reasons that those who write it, think it is funny. It's hilarious because the bad attempt at satire is itself funny, in how lousy it is. It also has a pathetic aspect. Bob's attempt fits the bill in spades.

Bob first directs his reductio towards my stated admiration of the Led Zeppelin song Stairway to Heaven. The point was to show in a "funny" way how my liking music written and performed by drug- and sex-crazed degenerates, is no different from his advocacy of wacko nutcase conspiracy theories written by New Age loons. He is trying to "prove" that I tarred him by a guilt-by-association or "poisoning the well" or the genetic fallacy, and so he returns the favor with a reductio.

But apart from the obviously bad logic in the failed attempt at a humorous analogy, Bob stumbles in his wild interpretations. It's understood (I reiterate) that he is being humorous and not being literal; yet given the kind of people who regularly defend him on my site, it's quite possible that some of them will actually believe silliness such as the following (with my interjections in blue and brackets):

Wasn’t that song about drugs, as were most of the songs coming out of that 1960s hippie “peace and love” “drop in and drop out” era? [actually most informed commentators think it was about Celtic or Norse mythology; and Plant was a lover of Tolkien also; Led Zeppelin did a few songs straight from Lord of the Rings; e.g., The Battle of Evermore, from the same album as Stairway to Heaven] The famous line in the song goes, “And she’s buying a stairway to heaven…” Translation: at that time, you bought LSD (lysergic acid developed and promoted for the hippi [sic] generation by Dr. Timothy Leary) and it gave you a “trip” that almost seemed like you died and went to heaven. My guess [and that's all it is] is that Dave probably indulged in some acid from time to time [I've never done drugs at any time, and have not even ever been drunk, to my knowledge; never smoked, either], and had a wonderful “trip” to nirvana, and hearing “Stairway to Heaven” forty years later he just can’t help reminiscing over those glory days [since there were no such "glory days" I can hardly fondly remember them]. We can see Dave now, riding in his 72’ Pontiac Firebird [it was a '70 Ford Torino] high as a kite on acid [no ticket for DUI in my record] with his buddies [right], all of them screaming the lyrics of “Stairway to Heaven” out the car windows. [I was in high school from 1973-1976, and my friends -- most of them music majors -- were into classical music, not rock music; I played trombone in the orchestra and was an usher for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra]

If we want to find someone high on acid (?), driving around with a bunch of rabble-rousing teenage rebels, it might very well be Bob himself, as we learn from his conversion story in Surprised by Truth:

But by the time I was a freshman in college and was away from the constraints of a nominally-Catholic home, I did what so many in my situation have done: I made friends with the wrong crowd and promptly fell away from the Church. I soon found myself floundering with no sense of direction . . . (pp. 104-105)

I converted to serious evangelical Christianity in April of 1977, five months before I ever went to college. I didn't live in dorms; I lived with my parents; worked at the medical library while in college, and I was hardly running around with crazies; in fact, it was a rather lonely, isolated time in my life. I did immoral things like hiking the Grand Canyon. In my fourth year of college I got involved with a wild, dope-infested fraternity, called Inter-Varsity. :-) As you can see, my experience was vastly different from Bob's. Apparently, he felt he could project his own college-era experience onto mine. Wrong. I was the true rebel. I had rejected the whole youth culture routine and had devoted myself to our Lord Jesus and a serious, life-transforming Christianity. That was radical: not the usual sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll lifestyle of teens that (it sounds like) Bob followed, like millions upon millions of others.

Biblical Evidence for Catholicism: Dialogue on Romanticism and ...
Nov 20, 2006

Dave writes: “I think I was spared this, because, unlike you all, I had the sort of Christian upbringing which had me afraid of so much as listening to a Led Zeppelin record, lest I should become possessed by the Devil. Yes, it would tend to ...

Commentary: Oh, we’re beginning to see the dynamics here. Poor Dave was conflicted. He just knew that Stairway to Heaven “had everything great lyrics, an unbelievable vocal, dramatic drumming, pretty guitar lines...” but his “Christian upbringing” made him feel guilty for liking it. Ask any psychologist and he’ll tell you that this wrecks havoc on the human soul. Unfortunately, Dave decided to alleviate the conflict and take the plunge, but in the wrong direction. Somewhere along the line Dave began to believe that Zeppelin and his followers were no longer “possessed by the Devil,” and thus Dave begins to speak rather admiringly of them. This is the same group whose Stairway to Heaven, if played backwards, was understood to reveal that the Led Zeppelin group chose to worship Satan. (See this and many other reports: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbNqeDr5mlQ).

Perhaps this might have worked if my own positions were accurately described. The big problem, however, is that I never wrote what he cites me as writing. It might have been helpful for Bob to cite actual web pages, so people could see some context. But he provides no link. In this instance, the post in question is Dialogue on Romanticism and Christianity (with Keith Rickert, Jr.). See the other guy in the title? He's the one whom Bob quoted. His words are in blue (as I often do in dialogues; just like this present paper), and he wrote this, not me. My background was entirely different. There were no rules whatever about listening to music, and I was only nominally Methodist.

Consequently I have never had ridiculous notions about music as Bob has. I wasn't legalistic against it or fanatical in favor of it. I understood (once I was old enough to have the wits to analyze it) that music is not produced by canonized saints and that good or great art is not the same as sainthood; that lyrics can be (and often are) morally objectionable. I never went through a legalistic phase of throwing out all of my records after a conversion.

I was never influenced by rock songs to behave in an immoral way in the slightest: not one bit. I rarely listen to lyrics in the first place. I'm notorious for not retaining lyrics, because I don't care about them. I am almost solely interested in the music. Even with the musician I admire most for lyrics, Bob Dylan, I couldn't give anyone the entire lyric of a single one of his songs, and I listen to his lyrics probably more than anyone else's. Thus Bob's quack psychoanalysis misses the mark as far as east is from west, since he is analyzing another person's report, that was vastly different from my own mindset then or now.

Bob then goes back to one of my papers on music that expresses an admiration for the album Led Zeppelin IV and remarks:

Now, there’s two icons of the world that you want your children to emulate: Robert Plant and Jimmy Page!

Right. Of course I have never taught my four children (ages 20, 18, 15, and 10) to emulate rock stars or to live in ways that many lyrics of songs suggest. If they emulate anyone, it is my wife and I and other Catholic and Christian models, which is why they are not into drinking, sex, drugs (just as my wife Judy and I weren't), rebellion, and vulgar music (infinitely worse than anything Led Zeppelin ever put out) that is so prevalent today. They spend their time with good Catholic youth groups, pro-life activities, charitable activities, teaching children catechism, music ministry, helping the youth minister, watching carefully controlled television shows (almost all rented), playing sports, riding bikes, etc. They are even more conservative (and far, far more religiously observant) than I was because I was a good liberal in my attitudes (if not my actions) up till age 18. It's all in how one is brought up.

Sungenis then engages in a lengthy lecture on various aspects of immoral conduct of rock stars, which is perfectly irrelevant, since I have never in my wildest dreams sought to deny any such thing. I simply like the music. The lives of many classical composers were every bit as immoral, if we want to really get into this. Does that mean that we don't listen to them anymore? Beethoven is out the window because he had many affairs and never married and was nominally Catholic at best? Tchaikovsky is out because he was a practicing homosexual (like Bernstein and Copland and others); Wagner and Liszt because they were notorious womanizers; Brahms (also never married) because he frequented the prostitutes in Vienna; Schubert because he appears to have likely died from venereal disease; Mendelssohn and Mahler because they were (gasp!!!) -- worst sin of all -- Jewish? Virtually no one would take such a view.

He makes himself even more silly by spelling names wrong and botching basic facts: "Jimmy" [Jimi] Hendrix, "Mitch" [Mick] Jagger; claiming that Hendrix and Jim Morrison "committed suicide" (Hendrix choked in his vomit after an overdose; Morrison had a heart attack in his bathtub: neither death a known suicide method, to put it mildly). Morris never "stripped naked" on stage; there was one famous incident (that I won't go into in mixed company) that is notoriously disputed as to even what actually happened. But in any event it wasn't total nudity, for sure. I'm not defending it; I'm merely making the point that Sungenis seems to have little or no regard for basic accuracy in reporting known incidents.

Having made a total fool of himself already (in the course of a failed comedic reductio), Sungenis steps in it again by quoting more imaginary words of mine that I never wrote:

Biblical Evidence for Catholicism: Michele Bachmann: Anti‐Catholic?
Jul 14, 2011
Dave writes: “I was actually in the running for a ticket to the ‘07 Led Zeppelin reunion, but alas, that failed to go my way.”
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/
Commentary: You zee the problem, now, Dr. Sigmund? Look at dis poor boy! He’s pushing 50 years old and he’s still waiting in line for a Zeppelin ticket vith teenagers of whom he iz old enough to be their grandfather! My guess is that Dave’s tombstone will read: “Maybe I’ll see Zeppelin as I travel the Stairway to Heaven. Wish me luck!”

Once again no link is provided and Bob makes another embarrassing mistake. It reminds me of his claim a year or so ago when we were wrangling over his geocentric views: that we supposedly met and had a meeting in California (complete with further descriptions of it): a thing that never happened. I have met Bob once and it was in Virginia in 1998. So we have imaginary meetings, fictional descriptions of what I believe, and "quotes" of mine that never occurred. Very impressive! Does this not indicate a problem in accuracy and citation, and a certain faultiness in care and thoughtfulness? It verifies rather spectacularly Bob's problems of ramshackle research that were evident in my critique.

In my actual post, Michele Bachmann: Anti-Catholic?, the words cited as my own come from commentator "williamthegreat": deep into the combox discussions. He was replying to my saying, "I'm goin' to see McCartney in nine days (first time)!" by writing:

Sadly, I have yet to see either Macca or Jimmy Page at a live venue, which would be my two greatest wishes. As a songwriter and a guitarist myself, they are my greatest idols. I was actually in the running for a ticket to the '07 Led Zeppelin reunion, but alas, that failed to go my way.

I have never seen Led Zeppelin. Nor would I even wish to now. The last I heard from Plant and Page working together was the 1998 album Walking Into Clarksdale, which I thought was terrible, and got rid of after one listen. I like some of Plant's solo work, though.

Sungenis goes into even more ridiculous tongue-in-cheek analysis that is so stupid I won't even bother documenting it. Trust me on this . . . But now he becomes serious and leaves the reductio. I shall cite the entirety of this concluding "serious" section. It is as ludicrous as what preceded it:

Now for a moment of reality:

The foregoing was to show what I can do, from David Armstrong’s own words and actions, to make him appear like a sick and dangerous man. Not a very pretty picture, is it? I did it merely to show that this is what David Armstrong consistently does to me on his website, constantly looking for any chink in my armor that he can exploit to make me look bad in the public eye. I felt Dave needed a taste of his own medicine.

But it ain't my "medicine." I present facts about Bob's absurd, illogical, non-factual views on various matters; he comes back with this pathetic attempt at failed humor that misses the mark entirely: with fallacies everywhere, fake "quotes" and sheer silliness.

The latest attempt by Dave Armstrong to engage in his predictable character assassination is to make a fuss over the DVD of the Month that I put on our website: Jay Weidner’s new documentary on Stanley Kubrick and how Kubrick was hired by NASA to fake the moon landings (http://www.catholicintl.com/index.php/latest‐news/620).

Thanks for the verification, Bob. Now if you remove the material we have it documented and reiterated in your own words, complete with the URL (and we have screenshots, too).

Dave Armstrong’s hypocrisy shines through when he admits to us that he still listens to the sex‐crazed, drugcrazed, anti‐establishment‐crazed lyrics of “Hendrix, Cream, The Who, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Stones, Doors, CCR, etc”

Yes, I like good music. So what?! Who does Bob listen to: Pat Boone? Bob wrote in one paper that Beethoven and Mozart (as well as Lincoln and Roosevelt: dunno which one) had syphilis. Does that mean now that we can't listen to the music of Mozart and Beethoven because they weren't perfectly holy and saintly?

(so much so that he entered a contest to see if he could get a ticket to hear them again just five years ago),

. . . which never happened, because this quote was from someone else, as shown. Note that now we are in the serious re-cap portion of his paper, and Bob repeats the myth. But so what if I did, anyway? It's just a music concert. Does Bob only go to Catholic supermarkets and banks, where everyone is a practicing Catholic? Is he careful to avoid buying anything whatever from China: where the country is officially Communist and atheist and where forced abortion and horrendous labor conditions abound? Does he avoid buying anything from Japan, because very few are Christians there? I highly doubt it. It's impossible to avoid non-Catholics and non-Christians. We can't live in a bubble. Our task is to be in the world but not of it.

Bob engages in Pharisaic legalism: the sort of mentality that recoiled when Jesus ate with the sinners that He came to save. Jesus said:

Matthew 15:10-11 . . . Hear and understand: not what goes into the mouth defiles a man, but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man.

We can't avoid being with non-Catholics and non-Christians and items or art, as the case may be, produced by same. The intelligent Christian knows how to discern the good from the bad. If something is sinful, we are not to emulate or be influenced by it. If I start advocating drugs or free sex or drunkenness or any immoral thing, and do so by the direct influence of the lives of rock stars (and classical composers), then I am wrong, and acting immorally. But to simply listen to music that is not absolutely perfect morally, is not a sin.

I'll guarantee that if Bob would list the music he listens to (unless he listens to none at all, except for Vivaldi, who was a Catholic priest), that there will be immoral people involved, and he'll be in the same boat he puts me in. It's a certainty, since virtually all pop musicians have engaged in promiscuous sex. Graham Nash of Crosby, Stills, and Nash has even noted more than once that the primary reason most (male) musicians pursued music was to "get the girls."

but when it comes to someone questioning the political establishment, Dave draws his arbitrary line in the sand and would rather demean a fellow Catholic than even consider the possibility that the establishment could be pulling the wool over our eyes. The most pitiful thing is, Dave Armstrong never watched Weidner’s DVD. But this is typical of his style – shoot first and ask questions later. If he had watched the DVD he would have seen that Weidner doesn’t dispute that NASA sent a man to the moon; rather, he has a third alternative: NASA sent someone to the moon, but in order to sell the program to the world, NASA staged the moon landings in a studio.

Right, Bob. In your thought-world, this is compelling, profound "evidence." I didn't have to watch this piece of trash to learn about it, because I read about it. I was aware that he actually thought there were moon landings, because I took note of it in my paper, citing a review by Andrew W. Griffin, who stated:

Weidner leans towards the idea that the U.S. did go to the Moon but that the Apollo missions between 1969 and 1972 shown to the public were all staged and Kubrick was the guy directing the whole thing. . . .

Thus, we have the sweet irony of Bob blasting me for not watching a video by a Gnostic lunatic (pun intended), who believes that aliens called "Archons" visited the earth and gave us the Bible, to fool and hoodwink and oppress mankind:

. . . the early Christians were actually Gnostic followers of Jesus instead of what we, today, call Christians. The entire New Testament was completely rewritten by Constantine and all of the information on the Archons was removed . . . Anyone who is following this mad, insane god, Jehovah, will be lead to their death for certain.. . . The defining myth of Western mythology is that Jehovah told Adam and Eve that they could not eat of the Tree of Knowledge. Not only that but if they did eat of it, they would surely die. Yet they both ate of it and didn’t die so he wasn’t even telling them the truth.

Clearly, on the other hand, while he urges me to watch movies made by this anti-Christian wingnut, Bob didn't read all of my critique, or else he wouldn't make a dumb remark like this. But think of what this means. We did go to the moon (presumably with a man; or maybe it was a monkey?), so says Bob and nutcase / space case Weidner but it wasn't in the period of 1969-1972. So there had to have been a secret rocket launched sometime after 1972, and the whole mission took place with no one's knowledge about it except those who planned it. A rocket, with all that is entailed in that, could secretly launch and go to the moon. That is an amazing conspiratorial scenario indeed. But Weidner covers himself by only "leaning" toward the idea. Bob continues on with his profundities:

Weidner shows very persuasive evidence since he is a film expert who can clearly see the patchwork cinematography that NASA tried to pass off as authentic moon landings. He then tells the story of how Stanley Kubrick was hired by NASA in 1964 to make fake moon landings, but Kubrick wasn’t allowed to tell anyone, of course. But Kubrick didn’t want to die and have humanity at the mercy of the US government’s lies. So he made a movie in the late 70s titled “The Shinning,” [sic] and in it Kubrick tells the story of the government conspiracy in symbolic language. If you ever wondered what “The Shinning” (starring Jack Nicholson) was trying to say but never had a clue, Weidner will show you in graphic detail.

Yes; who could doubt it? I could see, though, that Weidner is as nutty as the character played by Jack Nicholson became in the movie . . . that's a clear connection that I can observe here. So all is not lost! There is a connection between The Shining and Weidner's goofy, tin foil hat hoax theories, which is nutsville and madness.

So, please forgive my attempts at comic relief with Dave Armstrong’s prior and present life, but enough is enough.

You are forgiven, Bob, because of the laughs you have provided all of us (for reasons other than you think).

Perhaps Dave will think twice before he pulls the trigger again.

I pulled it today all of one day after his piece, so obviously I am trembling in abject fear . . .

Robert Sungenis
January 24, 2012

Dave Armstrong
January 25, 2012 (alas, the last year we have on earth . . .)

***

"2012: A Sungenis Odd-yssey": Robert Sungenis Pushes a "DVD of the Month" from an Anti-Christian Gnostic Space Case, Claiming that Famed Director Stanley Kubrick Filmed Fake Moon Landings

2012-01-23T01:26:00.003-05:00

On "Catholic apologist" (???) Robert Sungenis' website, The Bellarmine Report, a page was put up on 1-16-12 under the category, "Latest News," entitled, "DVD of the Month: Stanley Kubrick Hired to Fake Apollo Moon Landings." I first saw this in a rotation ad at the top of his main website, when I visited shortly after midnight, eastern time, on 1-23-11. It's necessary to go into such detail because Bob has been known to remove controversial materials from his site, once someone critiques them. If he does, readers may trust that I saw this with my own eyes. I certainly didn't make up all this detail.

The film in question is called Kubrick's Odyssey (by Jay Weidner). Here is exactly what Bob posted on his page (from You Tube):

The lyric of the music heard in this ridiculous piece must be heard to be believed. I won't even attempt to describe how weird it is.

The film is offered at a bizarre site mentioned in the preview video, called Sacred Mysteries Marketplace, which offers all sorts of spiritually exotic materials that appear to be anything from theosophy to New Age to "alchemy." The page for the DVD here examined states:

In Kubrick's Odyssey, Part I, Kubrick and Apollo, author and filmmaker, Jay Weidner presents compelling evidence of how Stanley Kubrick directed the Apollo moon landings. He reveals that the film, 2001: A Space Odyssey was not only a retelling of Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick's novel, but also a research and development project that assisted Kubrick in the creation of the Apollo moon footage. In light of this revelation, Weidner also explores Kubrick's film, The Shining and shows that this film is, in actuality, the story of Kubrick's personal travails as he secretly worked on the Apollo footage for NASA. . . .

"Weidner produces devastating proof that the landing was shot in a studio on Earth."
--David Icke

Even more bizarre is a linked review of the DVD by Andrew W. Griffin, from the Red Dirt Report website. Here are some profound, irrefutable tidbits from it:

And there are lots of secrets within Kubrick’s films, as we soon discover. Kubrick, suggests Weidner, is not only a great filmmaker, he was “privy to the main secrets of an occult society that rules the Earth.”

One of the biggest and most shocking is that Weidner speculates, through clues he found primarily in The Shining, that Kubrick faked the Apollo Moon landings, using his work on 1968’s 2001: A Space Odyssey as cover. Weidner, however, does believe the U.S. did get to the Moon, just not in the fashion we were told. . . .

Because the U.S. Government, through NASA, was hellbent to get a man on the Moon before the end of the 1960’s, as President Kennedy had promised, and because they wanted to prove to the Soviet Union that the U.S. was going to win the space race, they had to have some insurance – a way to prove, at least to the public and the world – that the U.S. had the technology and wherewithal to get to the Moon.

That’s where Kubrick comes in. Impressed with his work on Dr. Strangelove, Weidner speculates that Kubrick made a deal with the U.S. Government to fake the Apollo Moon landings – with Apollo 11 ultimately being the first one to land in July 1969.

Weidner leans towards the idea that the U.S. did go to the Moon but that the Apollo missions between 1969 and 1972 shown to the public were all staged and Kubrick was the guy directing the whole thing. . . .

. . . things get even stranger further in Weidner’s film when he uses Stephen King’s novel, The Shining, as the basis for a film with the same name. Of course this interpretation would bother purists and confuse others. But Weidner explains that Kubrick needed a way to get it out there that he was the one behind the Apollo Moon landing hoax and that The Shining would be the way he could accomplish this.

Alright. Sure! I guess Bob was getting anxious to find some new exciting conspiratorial hogwash to foist upon his readership, and this fit the bill rather spectacularly! Of course, we must visit Jay Weidner's web page: cited in the review. This is the wise sage whom Sungenis chose to promote by making his DVD the featured one of the month on his site. What can we find out about him on his page? We learn very quickly that he is a Gnostic heretic of the first order. Here is just one example of his thinking: an article from an interview of Weidner, called "Rise of the Archons." It makes for rather surreal and exotic reading:

People don’t realise that, 2,000 years ago, there was a religion on this planet called Gnosticism, which was the biggest religion on earth at the time, was vying with Hinduism. You could go take a university course on the history of religions now and wouldn’t even find a mention of Gnosticism. The Nag Hammadi texts provide a description for what the Gnostics believed. Gnostic is a Greek word meaning knowledge – gnosis. The Gnostics believe that liberation can only be achieved by knowledge, by the consumption and evaluation of reality through knowledge. The library at Alexandria was run by Gnostics and they were the first people to collect scrolls and books and assemble this information. . . . Gnostics preached that there was an invasion that occurred about 3,600 BC and, about 1,600 years before the Nag Hammadi texts were buried, they wrote that this invasion was like a virus and, in fact, they were hard pressed to describe it. The beings that were invading were called Archons. These Archons had the ability to duplicate reality, to fool us. They were jealous of us because we have an essence of some kind, a soul, that they don’t possess, and the Nag Hammadi texts describe the Archons. One looks like a reptile and the other looks like an unformed baby or a foetus. It is partially living and partially non-living and has grey skin and dark, unmoving eyes. The Archons are duplicating reality so that when we buy into it, when we come to believe that the duplicated, false state reality is the real reality - then they become the victors. . . .

I believe many of the stories of Jesus are actually Gnostic myths about a possible rebellion against the Archons who came down very severely on the rebel.. . .

I really hate to say this but we have all been fooled. The whole idea that some kind of messiah is going to come to save us is an Archon trick to make you think you don’t have to do anything about your present situation, no accountability. Maybe some supernatural force will come but I think you have to look at how this oppression occurred and why it was written out of history. When you begin to look back, you realize the early Christian, from the time of Jesus to the time of Constantine in 310 AD, they were preaching that they did not worship Jehovah; they worshiped the one true God. It could be argued that the early Christians were actually Gnostic followers of Jesus instead of what we, today, call Christians. The entire New Testament was completely rewritten by Constantine and all of the information on the Archons was removed and the ideas of Jehovah being a cruel god were lessened. This is a fact. The Nag Hammadi texts are older than the New Testament by 400 years. The New Testament that we have today wasn’t concocted until about 350 AD. When you go back to the Nag Hammadi, it doesn’t have the sin factor; they say what they really think. . . .

Rense [interviewer]: Many people look into the media – not the mainstream media – for information. So who are these Archons now? These are Talmudic Zionists, to a large degree. They are part of it, perhaps they are the central core of it. We need to start looking at the name values are and where their DNA says they came from, the Czarian Empire. They adopted Judaism and used it like a stick to beat people and hide behind at the same time which is a great tragedy for true, honest and Jews of good heart and there are millions of them. [my bolded emphasis] . . .

Weidner again: Anyone who is following this mad, insane god, Jehovah, will be lead to their death for certain.. . . The defining myth of Western mythology is that Jehovah told Adam and Eve that they could not eat of the Tree of Knowledge. Not only that but if they did eat of it, they would surely die. Yet they both ate of it and didn’t die so he wasn’t even telling them the truth.

There you have it, folks. Robert Sungenis wants to host and promote a video made by an anti-Semitic Gnostic wingnut like this? I trust that further documentation of this sort of pathetic, ludicrous, anti-Christian, conspiratorial nonsense is unnecessary. I have provided the links, if anyone else wants to discover further wonders of revelation . . .

None of this is particularly new for Bob (aside from, perhaps, the incredible recourse to an anti-Christian Gnostic as a source). I knew that he was an "agnostic" (his description) about the moon landings over a year ago, and that he believed "9-11 was an inside job and that the Muslims had nothing to do with it". Here is a portion of one of my papers about Bob's odd beliefs (his words in blue):

Bob is disturbed that I am inclined to accept what NASA tells me about science. This makes perfect sense, I reckon, since in one exchange the following skepticism regarding the authenticity of the moon landings is documented:

Jordanes had stated earlier in the combox thread that he didn't think you asserted that the moon landings were faked. Someone ("Pete") produced "documentation" that you did believe this. I find this to be insufficiently documented, as it was based on "gossipy"-type hearsay from a former associate, and from a post on a hostile website. So if you think the lunar landings actually happened, I'd be happy to hear you clarify that, so that it can be stated as a matter of record on my blog that this is an unjust charge against you.

I do not know whether they were real or fake.
He expanded his "lunar skepticism" to 9-11 as well in his piece, "Response to Jared Olar":

As for my right to be an agnostic about the moon landings, I’m certainly not the first and won’t be the last. Any intelligent person who has studied the issue is going to have doubts as to whether the United States had the capability to put a man on the moon in 1969 when, for example, the processing power of a 1969 computer was less than one-tenth of that in a typical cell phone of today, especially when the U.S. was at the height of the Cold War and was still stinging from the Russian launch of Sputnik in 1957, and especially when the ability to fake a moon landing in a hidden studio was well within the talents of Hollywood technicians. My suspicions are only heightened when I see Neil Armstrong holding an American flag on the moon and suddenly a gust of wind forces the lower part of the flag to move up to the upper part of the flag. Any fool knows there is no wind on the moon. You can see this video on the Internet and in the documentaries made of the moon landings. [see one lengthy critique of this theory] Yes, and I might as well tell you so I can beat Mr. Olar to the punch: I also believe 9-11 was an inside job and that the Muslims had nothing to do with it, and I maintain this belief along with several thousand other intelligent scientists, engineers, military personnel, airline pilots, firemen and the like who, from their expertise in this area, are thoroughly convinced that we have been sold a bill of goods by our government.

I'm obviously part of this nefarious conspiracy, myself, being named Armstrong . . .

In the same paper I documented from his site, Bob's belief in "an earth of approximately 10,000 to 15,000 years old" and that "the universe rotates around the earth once per day." He denies that the earth itself rotates.

***

Clonelike Radtrads Go Bananas After Reading One of My Papers on the Topic and Engage in a Calumnious "Feeding Frenzy" Against Despised So-Called "Novus Ordo Catholics" / "Modernists" / "Neo-Catholics" Etc. Guess I Hit a Nerve, Huh?

2012-01-16T14:26:00.006-05:00

A guy who goes by the nickname "SPB" read my paper, Syllabus of 60 "Traditionalist" Errors, Fallacies, and False Principles (written in 2000) and wrote the following in a thread devoted to me:

Syllabus of Errors for Traditionalists - 60 errors! I must say, there are some things here, many things, I do agree with. Others seem to be laughable and outright fallacies. Others again I am on the fence about, and others I agree with one sentence and the next I disagree. Overall, this man has done a huge amount of work - not only in this whole document but also in other areas. I will post the page he has dedicated to trads. He basically has around 40 essays dedicated to the traditionalists.

One thing I do find... odd, I guess, is that he constantly berates traditionalists for using "rhetoric" by calling themselves traditionalists... and then he goes on to constantly point out that he is a positively "orthodox" Catholic. Oh, and prepare yourself for a few straw-men and red-herrings along the way; the most prominent being the accusation that no traditionalists have ever pointed out any examples of the difficulties they have trouble with, and only moan about things [though, I take this to be half true, as I also tend to agree that most trads that aren't scholars/clergy moan a lot].

I found this interesting, and it has given me a lot to think about. Overall, I found myself to be more and more sure that I personally must disengage with these arguments. Some are called to the fight, as it were. I believe such people are the clergy and lay theologians. Not me. I found this and I thanked God after reading it. I am not at all qualified enough, or in any position, to start talking about most of these things. Which is not to say I don't hold some of the same positions that I have always held.

First of all, most of my criticisms are directed towards what I would call "radtrads": not all self-described Catholic traditionalists. For clarification's sake, anyone wondering about my own general position should read the lengthy disclaimers and explanations at the top of my web page, Radical (Barely Catholic) "Traditionalism".

Secondly, SPB wrote:

. . . he goes on to constantly point out that he is a positively "orthodox" Catholic.

This must be understood in context. I don't habitually call myself an "orthodox Catholic." I only do so in order to clarify, when I am being classified as a "conservative" or "Novus Ordo Catholic" or (far worse) a "neo-Catholic." When that happens, I make the point that we shouldn't need to have to use qualifiers like "traditionalist" or "conservative": that the only useful qualifier is "orthodox": in order to show that there is a "correct belief" in Catholicism and heretical, dissident ones. Thus, if I call myself an "orthodox Catholic" I am saying that I fully, wholeheartedly accept all that the Church teaches. I laid out my opinion on this in detail, in a 2005 paper:

I am content to simply call both you and myself "Catholic." If I must make distinctions due to liberal or far-right rot in the Church, then I use the qualifier "orthodox" as well, to indicate that I accept all the teachings of the Catholic Church. You and others want to call yourselves "traditionalists."

Well, there is a right and wrong usage of that term. If one accepts notions that go contrary to orthodox Catholicism, and uses the term, I must object, because "Tradition" is a good Catholic word which must not be trifled with (and those who reject some of it ought not to be allowed to co-opt the term to themselves as if they actually exemplify a particular devotion to "tradition" as they themselves define it). Even if you are orthodox, but insist on using the term, then it must be because it is being used to distinguish yourself from the likes of me, who has supposedly somehow become simultaneously "liberal" and "orthodox" (by the application of the silly term "neo-Catholic").

So it is still attempting to create division in the Church and separate Catholic believers into a superior-subordinate relationship, with the "traditionalists" being the ones who "get it" and the "neo-Catholics" being dupes and fellow travelers of their liberal overlords in the lower hierarchies of the Church. Either way, it stinks to high heaven.

SPB's view was not the majority feeling in the thread (to put it mildly, and with a big smile on my face!). The first reaction (by "CollegeCatholic") was (I edited out the worst of it, as we are in "mixed company"):

Absolutely useless and a waste of my time. . . . let's just all pray alongside heretics like St. Pope John Paul the Great the Beloved and the Bestest Ever did.

SPB replied:

I apologize for wasting your time. I only post what I myself find interesting, I can't cover everybody else unfortunately. I also post what I hope will help people become better Catholics in some way or another. This has helped me. I am sorry it didn't do the same for you! . . . I know that he's got a soft spot for Blessed JP II, and this is evident in his writing, but look past your clear dislike for Bl. JPII and his supporters and pay attention to what he says. To brush him off because he liked Bl. JP II is just as fallacious as some of the arguments he gives. He brushes you off for hero worship of Archbishop Lefebvre.. and you brush him off for hero worship of Bl. JPII! Stalemate. In any case, what I take from that paragraph I have always held to be true: that among trads there is a cult of personality, and hero worship of Archbishop Lefebvre. This is only my observation, but I see it a lot, and it mirrors a lot of what trads accuse neocons of doing.

If the things he says do nothing for you, give you nothing to ponder over, that is perfectly fine. God bless you on your way.

Someone else ("CrusaderKing") wrote:

Armstrong . . . usually gives the same old worn out, tired canards that the neo Caths are noted for. I wish I'd have saved on my Notepad the exchange between him and [Name], who used to blog under the name of [nickname], as [Name] schooled him big time, albeit politely.

I had a great discussion with the person above, whose name I removed, because he asked me to remove his name from our discussions, for important personal reasons. It was a five-part discussion (one / two / three / four / five). Make up your own mind who gave a better case. But we got along fine, as I do with most "traditionalists" who are not radtrads, and who are able to discuss issues calmly and rationally without name-calling and hyper-rhetoric. It is quite possible. But this is assuredly not the case with almost all radtrads.
"TrentCath" goes after one of my 60 points:

53. That ecumenism undermines, and is contrary to, evangelism and apologetics.

It does not at all - the two goals being distinct and complementary endeavors, not contradictory ones. I rejoice in the truths which I share with my Protestant or Orthodox brothers and sisters in Christ; at the same time, I try my best to convince them that the Catholic Church is the fullness of the faith. John Paul II operates from the same presuppositions.

Pope John Paul II also agrees with kissing the Koran, allowing altars to have budhhas on them, praying with false religions and allowing others to pray to false Gods in a city dedicated to the one true God and a whole host of other heterodox ideas, I suppose he would suggest that we agree and do all this too? Aside from 'Pope John Paul II does it so it must be right' he doesn't even attempt to provide another argument, its almost a relief as it would most likely have been as absurd as what we see coming from Rome as regards the dialogue with the SSPX.

This paper was written in 2000. It doesn't represent my final or most elaborated-upon opinion on everything. Brief points were obviously neither encyclopedic nor comprehensive in nature. I have an entire web page about ecumenism (that was present in 2000 on my website). On that page I have two papers about the Assisi conferences (one / two). I also have two lengthy treatments of the Koran-kissing incident (one / two).

TrentCath continues, caricaturing my expressed opinions, then giving his own:

I agree there's a crisis and its due to a modernism but everything's going to be alright... so I don't have to do anything . . . thanks be to God that we can actually see what is going on rather than obstinately denying it.

I guess that's why I have a web page about theological liberalism, too, and half of one of my books devoted to it. Odd, if in fact I am supposedly denying the modernist crisis. I am so far from denying it, that I wrote in my #13: the very one being commented on here:

I have "justified" no such thing. I have ignored nothing, either. My own opinion (directly influenced by Fr. John Hardon -- who has insanely been called a "modernist" by "traditionalist" friends of mine) is that the present crisis is the most serious the Church has ever faced, per Pope St. Pius X's summation of the evils of modernism.

But because I refuse to descend to despair, and remain optimistic that God is in control of His Church, and have a firm belief in its indefectibility because of God's supervision, I get accused of "obstinately denying" modernism. This is the pathetic radtrad mentality. Then this character who goes by "The Dying Flutchman" (heaven forbid anyone use a real name!) wrote:

I know many Novus Ordo Catholics that have made JPII the 4th member of the trinity despite the fact he was probably the worst pope of the last 200 years. . . . it was hard not to come to the conclusion that the Church after the late 60's professed a different religion than the one of the late 1950's.

What's wrong with this person's faith in God? It's just like the anti-Catholics. Instead of the Church dying with Constantine or Pope Gregory the Great or with the Inquisition or Trent (all equally arbitrary and historically and doctrinally absurd dividing-points), instead it was taken out by the devil in the late 60s. "Vincentius" then gives us his pearls of wisdom:

Like most new Evangelical converts to the Catholic faith, Armstrong is anti-traditionalist, and ranks along with the most prominent one, Mark Shea and a slew of others who have brought along their baggage of protestantism along with them as they crossed the Tiber.

"Spooky" adds the profundity: ". . . it appeals to their Protestant leanings with a sheer veil of Catholicism."

Right. This is the tired old canard of "converts are still half-Protestant." I've directly dealt with this absurd charge at least twice (one / two). Isn't it interesting that this false accusation invariably comes from one of two sources: radtrads and anti-Catholic Protestants. It's completely ridiculous to assert this, seeing that I am utterly despised by anti-Catholic Protestants and am regularly insulted in public by them, with every conceivable calumny and lie. I get accused now and then of being "anti-Calvinist" and "anti-Lutheran" and "anti-Protestant."

I have extensive web pages (containing many hundreds of papers) critiquing and disagreeing with Calvin, Calvinism, Luther, Lutheranism, Anti-Catholic Protestantism, Contra-Catholicism, and Protestant historical intolerance and persecution. I have written books critiquing Luther and Calvin and Protestantism generally. I have written two books (one / two) against sola Scriptura: one of the two "pillars" of the so-called "Reformation," and another mostly devoted to refuting "faith alone": the other pillar.

All this, yet I am accused of being in bed with Protestantism and remaining half or more Protestant (as if my conversion story is a big pack of lies). I have critiqued Protestantism and helped bring more people out of it than, I highly suspect, all of these loudmouthed critics of mine put together. I receive letters all the time reporting conversions and reversions, largely or partially as a result of my writings.

[Later added note: I am now being unfairly blasted about the above paragraph in a second thread devoted to me, mentioned in the combox below. The gist of it is that I am supposedly full of myself, filled to the brim with spiritual pride, and so woefully ignorant that I don't understand that it is God Who gives the increase and brings about conversions and not the bearer of the message. Examples:

I find it interesting how he makes a point of boasting about how many people he's converted (exact wording, I don't remember). Seems like a rather big ego to me.

Last time I checked it's God who converts the sinner, not men. Men are just His instruments. Armstrong might want to re-check the gospel.

It's not a Catholic thing to take credit nor a tally of "wins" as Ned Flanders from the Simpsons would describe it. Catholicism is not the standard, the testimony of untested Protestants and converts both for and against Dave's writings on the Church. You don't prove your Catholicism with yourself as the standard.

I converted from protestantism and was led by the Holy Spirit and nothing else.

This, of all the charges leveled against me in these threads, is perhaps 1) the most ridiculous of all, and 2) the one most easy to disprove from any rudimentary search of my writings. Here is just one example of what I am sure is many dozens that could be found:

For all these reasons I don't get weary, because I'm not trying to convert the world. Technically, I'm not trying to convert anyone personally, through my own efforts. I'm simply passing along the reasons I have come to believe, for why Catholicism is the fullness of Christian truth. If that helps someone else, great, but their (possible) conversion is not ultimately my responsibility at all. It is the Holy Spirit's and their own. I'm just trying to be a good steward of the gifts that God has given me; to play my role in the whole process, which is an extraordinary privilege: to be able to be used by God in any way whatsoever. I believe everyone has a vocation from God (including every occupation in the world); this is mine.

If someone compliments me for helping them become a Catholic, I'll accept it and say "thanks" but then I always try to remember to say "all glory to God" and "it's all by His grace." I absolutely believe those things. It all goes back to God. All of us are mere leaky vessels and greatly flawed messengers at best. But God uses us poor miserable sinners for His purposes, which is the amazing thing.

(Q & A on Catholic Apologetics: Why I Do What I Do {As My Vocation}, 2-25-09)

The fact is that I am constantly; constantly giving all glory to God, for any conversions or success of my writings. Anyone who follows my writing at all (here or on Facebook or in my books) knows this. Here I happened to not mention the thing I have a million and a half times. But nothing here "proves" that I don't believe it. Note also that I did qualify my remarks. I wrote that I "helped bring more people out" of Protestantism. Nothing wrong with that at all. I did participate. It's a true statement. I didn't claim it was just me or some such ludicrous thing; as if I were the sole cause, but rather, that it was "largely or partially as a result of my writings".

So, for example, if someone writes to me (as many have), saying that my writings were the main reason they became persuaded of Catholicism (just as Cardinal Newman's writings were in my own case, and one particular friend of mine whom God used to help convert me), that is a true description of a factual occurrence. It doesn't follow at all that either they or I are denying that God was the primary cause. I was the instrument God used (as one critic pointed out: as if I don't know that already).

The Bible (that these people claim I am ignorant of in this regard) even says that we are God's "co-workers": "we are God's fellow workers" (1 Cor 3:9: RSV); "I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God which is with me" (1 Cor 15:10; cf. Rom 15:17-18); "be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain" (1 Cor 15:58); "Working together with him"(2 Cor 6:1; cf. Eph 2:10; Phil 2:12-13).

Moreover, the Bible (usually St. Paul) uses the language of people "making converts" with the implicit background understanding that it is working with God (per the above examples). It's not necessary to mention God every time: "I magnify my ministry in order to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them" (Rom 11:13-14); "Wife, how do you know whether you will save your husband? Husband, how do you know whether you will save your wife?" (1 Cor 7:16); "I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some" (1 Cor 9:22); "by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers" (1 Tim 4:16); "I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain salvation" (2 Tim 2:10); "whoever brings back a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death" (Jas 5:20); "that some, though they do not obey the word, may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives" (1 Pet 3:1).

All this being the case, I have written nothing whatsoever that is improper or scandalous or denying any glory to God. The point in context (that I made very clear, above) was that I am being accused of being compromised with Protestantism. Thus I turned the tables and noted that I am helping to cause Protestants to become Catholics by the scores. Why would that be if I am supposedly so compromised with it? Is it even plausible? Of course it is not at all. This is a completely relevant point and refutation of the charge (among many). That was the context. And the point has not been overthrown by this ludicrous false accusation that I allegedly think I am bringing any of that about apart from God, on my own, in some idiotic spiritually prideful sense.

To close this note, here is an actual response I made exactly a week ago to someone who sent me a private message in Facebook. He was an Episcopalian who became a Catholic in 2004. He wrote to encourage my work, and said that during his conversion process, my "website was the first place I normally went for answers." My reply was altogether typical of how I answer letters like this: "Thank you very much for your warm, kind letter. Praise God that He chose to use this poor sinner to help you on your journey a bit. . . . I appreciate the encouragement and may God abundantly bless you!" That is my spirit. I try to give glory to God at every turn, even if someone compliments me.]

These quasi-schismatic radtrads and SSPX devotees, on the other hand, spend their time (many of them, but not all) bashing Holy Mother Church and popes (precisely as both anti-Catholic Protestants and liberal Catholics do: groups that radtrads highly resemble in many key ways), while I defend her and critique the errors and sins of her professed enemies. Radtrads and self-important "more-Catholic-and-reverent-than-thou" self-proclaimed pseudo-experts don't have time to defend the Church against calumnies, while I devote my life to it. The contrast couldn't be any more stark than it is.

Nor am I "anti-traditionalist." I am anti-radtrad. I attend an extremely traditional (and beautiful German Gothic revival) parish in downtown Detroit (St. Joseph's), where the liturgy is very reverent and the doctrine completely orthodox. Our cluster is one of the few in metro Detroit that offer the Tridentine Mass, and I have attended it on several occasions, though (gasp!!!) I dare to prefer the Novus Ordo Latin Mass.

"INPEFESS" chimed in with more ludicrosities in the "Bash Armstrong and Neo-Catholics" thread:

They act as though there was no Catholic Church before the council, or that the Catholic Church began in the 1960's. If you ever listen to EWTN or read any post-conciliar authors, they almost exclusively reference the Second Vatican Council and the post-conciliar popes: "as the Second Vatican Council taught . . .;" "as Blessed John Paul II once said . . .;" "as Mother Theresa [sic] used to say . . ."

It's as though the entire 2000-year history of the Catholic Church simply disappeared.

I don't know who the intended target of this nonsense is (though the thread is about yours truly, after all). It's certainly not an accurate description of me, seeing as I have web pages about the Church fathers, G. K. Chesterton, Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman, and in the past hosted web pages (for several years) devoted to St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine and Medieval and Renaissance Culture. I have edited a book of Chesterton quotations (he died in 1936), and will soon have one published of Cardinal Newman quotations (he died in 1890). I wrote a book devoted to the Church fathers as well. Currently I am working on editing a book called Classic Catholic Biblical Apologetics: 1525-1925: my fourth volume where I have collected materials of great Catholics: all of whom lived prior to 1936. It really sounds like I am exclusively stuck in the post-Vatican II era, doesn't it?

Some things never change. You can't successfully defend falsehood by lying about or severely distorting what others believe (nor by any other method). This thread provided lots of unsubstantiated rhetoric and polemics and calumnies. I respond with facts and true Catholic principles and activities and beliefs.

If these folks wanna throw more mud and raise a big ruckus, let them. I can't stop them. Back to your regularly scheduled program and back to my work. The harvest is ready; the laborers are few (we Christians -- even us Catholics, sadly -- are too busy name-calling and fighting each other to care about the souls on the way to hell).

* * *

Sophia Institute Press (My Primary Publisher) Acquires Catholic Exchange; Exciting Plans for the Future! / My Recent "Book News" / 25% Off Sophia Books Through January

2012-01-06T12:39:00.000-05:00

I just learned of this today, in browsing the newly designed Sophia Institute Press website (see also an article from Catholic News Agency). Sophia itself became the publishing arm of Holy Spirit College and Thomas More College in April 2011 and is presently revitalizing itself, looking forward to a bright future. All of this is very good news to me personally, since my four books (one / two / three / four) published by them (soon to be five) will be advertised and promoted far more widely.

Catholic Exchange is a major Catholic portal (read more "about" it). According to their advertising info-page, the site receives 100,000 unique visitors per month and 850,000 page views per month. That's a lot of folks! The Sophia announcement article (22 November 2011) stated:

For the past ten years Catholic Exchange has led the way in the use of new media for evangelization. Screenwriter Barbara Nicolosi has commented: “Catholic Exchange is just what the Church of the 21st Century needs. It isn’t just a tool of the New Evangelization called for by John Paul II; it IS the New Evangelization.” Every weekday CatholicExchange.com features stories from the contemporary press and timely articles, columns, blog posts, and podcasts on how the message of Jesus Christ addresses the crucial problems of everyday life and fulfills the deepest desires of the human heart.

The move was announced at CE, in the article, "New Era Begins at Catholic Exchange" (17 November 2011). Harold Fickett, who will continue to oversee CE, wrote in a second article, "Catholic Exchange 3.0—CE Reinvented" (2 December 2011):

Over the next few weeks I’ll be unfolding our plans, explaining the changes in detail, and taking account of your feedback.

Here are a few of the developments we will be discussing.
CatholicExchange.com will be redesigned. We’re opening it up, flattening it out, and updating subcategories of GROW, WORK, SERVE, LOVE, with a topical navigation system.
We’re broadening our content, substantially increasing news coverage, and redesigning our blogger section.
We’ll provide more in-depth means of formation through online certificate programs in biblical studies, catechesis, apologetics, canon law, biblical languages, and Latin. We’re also building a resource section with study tools, video lectures, and audio presentations.
We will concentrate on fundamental issues on which we can have measurable impact — the value of human life, the impact of divorce, the tragic legacy in women’s lives of abortion, the problem of addiction to pornography, and the reinvention of Catholic education.
We will pursue a social networking strategy that connects our community members with vital Catholic ministries concerned with these fundamental issues, sending out committed Catholics who are ready to put their faith into action.

Of particular interest to me is the section highlighted in blue, above, since these programs will utilize Sophia books. In an apologetics course, my five books would certainly be included.

I have been informed that my latest book for Sophia, The Quotable Newman, will likely be released in the fall, with lots of marketing to take place before then. It may possibly be available from Sophia somehow in an unabridged form (my present manuscript is 655 pages: Times New Roman 12 font: single space), as well as a more compact paperback version. If not, I will create my own "Volume II," to be published at Lulu. I'll announce more details as they are decided upon.

My new book published by Catholic Answers: 100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura, will probably be published in the next few months. Thus, 2012 promises to be a very exciting year for my writing endeavors (2011 was the year of developing my Facebook and Twitter pages, and writing these new books). I will be putting out two more books on my own in the coming months as well: Classic Catholic Biblical Apologetics: 1525-1925, and a volume about the communion of saints.

I suspect that the former may be accepted for "official" publication in due course. It certainly fits in with Sophia's emphasis on classic Catholic writing, just as the Newman book does (and Catholic Answers' exclusive devotion to apologetics). But be that as it may, I continue to write what I want to write at any given time: to "follow my muse," so to speak. This is what I want to do at present. If someone publishes it, great. If not, then it still has value. I don't concern myself with that. I just write what I feel "called" to write and let the chips fall where they may. This is the secret of how I have been able to write so much over the past twenty-one years as a Catholic, and sixteen years online (26 books and 2500+ blog posts).

Be sure to stop by the Sophia Institute Press website: currently, all books are 25% off, through January.

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I Predicted Santorum's Victory and Exact Percentage in Iowa (Also Gingrich's Victory in SC) / Proposed Gingrich-Santorum "Reaganite Pact" / Links to Many Facebook Political Discussions on the GOP Primaries

2012-01-04T12:34:00.014-05:00

Romney won by eight votes: 30,015 (24.557%) to 30,007 (24.551%) for Santorum. [1-19-12 Note: now it looks like Santorum actually won by 34 votes]

I made my predictions for the Iowa Caucus in a Facebook post, written on 2 January, the day before the Caucus (Monday), 1 PM ET. Here they are, followed by the actual results, in blue (from this page) and how close I got to each (in red):

Santorum 25% | 24.55082% | + 0.44918

Romney 23% | 24.55737% | - 1.55737

Gingrich 15% | 13.3 % | + 1.7

Paul 14% | 21.4% | - 7.4

Perry 13% | 10.3% | + 2.7

Bachmann 8% | 5% | + 3

Huntsman 2% | 0.6% | + 1.4

I did amazingly well (if I do say so)! Excluding Paul, where I was way off, since I was assuming a marked downward trend and miscalculated that (just as I incorporated a striking upward trend for Santorum; thus many "late-breakers" must have gone for Paul), I was within 3 percentage points for all the other six candidates, and within 1.7% for four of the seven, including three of the top four. The average deviation (whether plus or minus) of all seven was 2.6%.

I got the order right, except for the top two: separated by a mere eight votes, or .006%, and Gingrich/Paul (#3 and #4 spots); thus showing again that my only serious miscalculation was Ron Paul's percentage. If I had given him 18% rather than 14% (taking away two points from Gingrich and one each from Perry and Bachmann, to even it out), then I would have been within 3.4% for all seven candidates, and within 2 points for all except for Paul.

I'd like to see anyone match that! If anyone can find a prediction that came so close, I'd be very interested to see it. In particular, the following prognosticating words of mine in my Facebook post, came true:

Santorum's strategy of working all 99 Iowa counties may indeed have succeeded in the end, as a tortoise and hare strategy, and prime example of "old-fashioned" methods of winning the Caucus.

* * *

Going forward, I think that the most interesting factor now will be the relationship of Santorum and Gingrich: the two mainstream conservative "anti-Romneys" left standing (Paul being too libertarian, but above all: out of the mainstream of the party on foreign policy -- to the left even of Obama --, and a predicted eventual non-factor).

They will -- for the time being -- continue to split the relatively more conservative Republican vote, assuming that Gingrich maintains any of his numbers, such as significant leads in South Carolina and Georgia. Newt's poll numbers may indeed rapidly collapse, with big money and "true-blue" conservatives / Reaganites gravitating to Santorum as the "comeback kid" and Final Non-Romney. If so, then Santorum and Romney will duke it out and, respectively, play Reagan and Bush in 1980: the classic establishment vs. populist / people's choice scenario.

But the other prime consideration is that Santorum now has the bullseye on his back, and will receive 200 times more scrutiny. Romney's negative ads will now target him: as the biggest threat to Romney's "inevitable" magisterial pundit-proclaimed majestic coronation as the new Establishment / Country Club GOP King. The liberal media and Obama minions will immediately start painting him as a far-right lunatic who would force raped women to have abortions, and ostracize homosexuals and institute a Puritanistic Catholic Theocracy (as if that category even makes any sense). This may stall his momentum or even stop Santorum's "Big Mo" dead in its tracks. He may go the way of all the other rising / falling non-Romneys (Bachmann, Perry, Cain, and probably now Gingrich, respectively). All of that could happen. He'll take a hit, for sure.

What I think will be the wisest, most sensible, classy course of action, from my own Reaganite Gingrich-Santorum / critical of Romney perspective, would be a secret "pact" between Gingrich and Santorum. They clearly like each other and have a lot in common. Asked in television debates to choose another of the candidates that are akin to them, I know that Santorum chose Gingrich at least once, and possibly vice versa. Gingrich last night praised Santorum for his positive campaign and great comeback.

If they can both act as good Catholic men, and maintain this charity, they ought to recognize that the conservative cause lies with both of them now, and that a continuing split may very well cause Romney to be the candidate: a thing both are united in opposing. Therefore, in mutual self-interest, they should agree between themselves for one or the other to bow out, if and when they go below a certain predetermined average percentage in the polls (probably the Real Clear Politics website average, which is regarded as a standard), and that when one of them does, they will immediately endorse and even (possibly) work for the other, in order to assure Reaganite victory and someone besides Romney as the nominee.

This makes perfect political sense to me, on the assumption that the Cause is placed above individual ambitions and egos. It may be humanly impossible, but it is true that despite Gingrich's considerable ego, he has been quite magnanimous and fraternal towards the other candidates. Assuming he is the one to bow out (which seems a safer bet at this juncture), it is conceivable that he could do this: towards a friend, fellow Catholic, and, for the large part, political ally. It would be the classy move for him, and show that his charitable demeanor during previous debates was genuine and not a mere ploy.

Otherwise, I can see the writing on the wall already: Gingrich is already being cast (even by the Fox commentators) as "angry Gingrich": out to get revenge for Romney's smear ads against him. he doesn't want to go down in history as the angry, bitter old man: pouting and whining that he lost (this is how he is being perceived; again, I think it is unjust and unfair). If his numbers fall rapidly, that will be the outcome, and what people will remember about him. He can avoid that fate by showing class and getting out with dignity and endorsing Santorum if the situation dictates this to be the wisest course for the conservative cause. Then he'll be seen as a self-effacing team player, who can still be somewhat of a kingmaker, and thereby maintain relevance and stature. He can do his thing (what he excels at) away from the spotlight and negative nonsense.

Santorum should do the same if it goes the other way, but I think it is at least 70-30 odds that it now swings Santorum's way because of momentum, Newt's famous "baggage" (warranted or not), and America's love for comebacks and working-class middle-American backgrounds of second-generation immigrants. Santorum is the "fresh face." That gives him the edge, on all these counts.

For the record, I continue to like both men a great deal. I still prefer Gingrich overall, but realistically, in terms of politics, I think he is too "damaged" (and it is most unfair, in my opinion) to be the better choice of the two now. Santorum has the better chance in the real world, and I must swallow my relentless idealism. But Santorum is a fabulous candidate, too: a good Catholic and authentic, passionate, "progressive / compassionate conservative". If he succeeds in being elected, he ought to include Gingrich in his administration, in some capacity: as a "feel-good" reward for his support (if my scenario comes to pass).

Additional Facebook (lively!) political discussion threads regarding the Republican primaries:

Latest GOP Polls vs. Obama

"Romney Does Flip-Flop and Forces Catholic Hospitals to Distribute Morning-After Pill"

"Gallup state numbers predict huge Obama loss"

"The Republican Establishment's Strategic Blunder"

What Huckabee Said About Romney in 2008 (Reverses Himself Now)

"Cannibals in GOP Establishment Employ Tactics of the Left"

"Drudge, conservative media criticize Newt Gingrich"

"The Man Who Gave Us Newt"

"Gingrich lead expands on final night" [Public Policy Polling]

Four Latest Polls in SC: Newt Gingrich Leading by Average of 4.25 Points

Poll of likely GOP voters shows Gingrich just 3 points behind [In South Carolina]

"Special Editorial: From Bain to Main"

"A worthy challenger to Romney: Could Santorum shake things up in New Hampshire?"

"Romney Leads, Santorum Second in National Poll"

Regarding Mitt Romney

Gingrich's New Position of Opposing Abortion Exceptions for Rape and Incest

Evangelical and Mormon Endorsements for Rick Santorum (link to post by Lisa Graas)

Dr. Walter Williams interviews Dr. Thomas Sowell

Troubles in Iraq After American Withdrawal

Ron Paul's "Mischief Voters"

Iran's Potential Nuclear Capability

"Why the Establishment Fears Newt Gingrich"

Romney's Refusal to Debate Gingrich One-on-One

"The Company Ron Paul Keeps"

Rush Limbaugh's Parody of Ron Paul

Thomas Sowell's Defense of Newt Gingrich Against Personal Attacks.

Romney Frontrunner in Iowa?

"Gingrich Surges to Wide Lead"

Tony Blankley Endorses Gingrich

President Obama's Approval Ratings and the Economy

Updated on 10 February 2011

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Catholic Social Teaching and Myself: Brief Explanation and Clarification

2012-01-03T12:35:00.004-05:00

[initially a reaction to criticisms made by those of various political persuasions, on my Facebook page]

The Catholic Church is not officially pacifist (i.e., opposed to all wars or use of lethal force whatsoever, for any reason). It acknowledges the God-given prerogative of states to bear the sword (CCC #2308) and details the criteria of just war (2309-2310). Of course we try to avoid war, as we are strongly urged by the Church to do (2308, 2327). But it's not always possible in an evil world. Thus, Catholics can't argue that support for any war effort whatever is intrinsically contrary to Catholic social teaching. Good Catholics and honest, informed men can differ in good faith on particulars regarding armed conflict.

Some want to argue that (among current Republican candidates in this early primary process), only Ron Paul is consistent with Catholic teaching. I respond that Catholics are allowed to argue for war in particular instances, according to just war criteria -- war is not intrinsically evil in every case -- but they are not allowed to advocate the position of allowable abortion in the cases of rape and incest: which Ron Paul does (as I documented in a Facebook discussion thread).

Thus, Ron Paul goes directly against Catholic social teaching and advocates murder insofar as he does that. Catholic Rick Santorum (among these candidates); also Michele Bachmann (evangelical Protestant) do not allow those exceptions, in terms of advocacy (and Gingrich and Perry also appear to have recently adopted this more consistent and "Catholic" position). Senator Santorum has voted for some measures, however, that include that, in order to prevent as many abortions as possible (less total numbers of abortions, if it is not politically or legally possible to prevent all), which is permissible under Catholic social teaching and political philosophy.

If Paul supporters want to argue that "their guy" alone fits with Catholic teaching, they are factually incorrect. He advocates intrinsic evil in that instance, whereas, e.g., taking out Iran's nuclear plant (something Santorum favors) is not intrinsically evil at all. It is the opposition to quite possible mass murder and annihilation of cities: a measure that is quite agreeable with Catholic teaching. It's not targeting populations, but rather, nuclear power plants (which is not the same as exploding a nuclear bomb over a city).

Some political critics of mine claim that I write with little or no knowledge of Catholic social teaching. This is sheer nonsense. I have, e.g., written extensively on the evil of our nuclear bombing of Japan. This raised such a fuss that I actually lost a friend over it, and he uttered more bitter, slanderous words against me (all in public) than even the most virulent anti-Catholic Protestants ever have. I've also critiqued other immoral actions in World War II, such as carpet bombing of cities.

I have written publicly that the United States is the wickedest nation in world history due to abortion: hardly a typical conservative perspective. And I first stated that shortly after 9-11, and said that this could possibly be the beginning of judgment for the US. I caught tremendous hell for that. In other words, I am not guilty of the Americanist heresy of (among other things) glorifying America over against the Church. I'm not "more American than Catholic," or "more politically conservative than Catholic."

I have written about a Catholic "third way" that is ultimately neither conservative nor liberal.

I've critiqued corporate capitalism in no uncertain terms and have stated that I like distributism and subsidiarity. I have severely critiqued libertarianism, that is often rampant in conservative circles, as a quite insufficiently Catholic political philosophy. I have argued for progressive almsgiving (i.e., rich people give a lot more, by percentage) rather than a straight 10% rate ("tithing").

I've written a lot about the great evil of racism, and condemned it in no uncertain terms.

I've outlined the nuanced Catholic perspective on illegal immigration.

I oppose the death penalty, except in the very worst case scenarios, such as terrorism or mass murderers (the pope made clear -- in 2004 -- that Catholics and states have the right to do so, without being considered in violation of the Church's teaching).

Many of these things are not "conservative" emphases at all, or at least not prominent "talking points."

We can disagree in good faith without the condescending descriptions of each others' views. I was with an old Baptist friend of mine on New Year's Day who is a democratic socialist in politics. We get along fine. We have respect for each other. I have homosexual friends, atheist friends, Muslim friends, tons of Protestant friends, people of all kinds of political persuasions and ethnic groups. I get along with anyone. I allow any viewpoint to be expressed on my Facebook page or my blog, as long as it is charitable and civil.

There is such a thing as a just war, and folks like myself can legitimately argue that particular wars qualify as such (and other Catholics can and do argue that no war in the history of the world ever did, but they can't claim that others are not allowed to disagree with them and still remain good Catholics). Reasonable men in good faith can disagree. We are allowed to.

I don't claim to be any sort of expert at all on Catholic social teaching. I have many other things that I am far more concentrated on, as an apologist (doctrinal and theological, rather than social). I readily grant that many Catholics know a lot more than I do about it in very many particulars.

What I take strong exception to, however, is the claim that I am rejecting Catholic social teaching (or am grossly ignorant of it altogether) simply because I take what are regarded as "conservative" views on some issues (I would classify it as "progressive conservatism"), such as broad foreign policy and ways to improve the lot of the poor and underprivileged. Not true at all . . .And arguably, sometimes such critics can be said to be (at least in some respects) "more politically liberal than Catholic." Certainly, those who vote for pro-abortion politicians (given a choice of a pro-lifer) are acting in such a manner in that respect.

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