July 2018 - To Give a Defense

Infant baptism is not in the Bible! Answers to common objections V, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • July 29, 2018 • Apologetics; Sacraments

Where is infant baptism in the Bible? You could, if you like, turn the question around; you might ask: “Where in the Bible does it say it must be in the Bible?” The doctrine of sola scriptura is not in the Bible; the objection that such-and-such a practice is not found in the Bible is thus a moot point. If one is going to object, it must be on some other basis; unless, that is, one can find the Bible expressly forbidding the practice. We need not go that route, though. Leave sola scriptura for another time; infant baptism is in the Bible.

This Paul VI encyclical really deserves a birthday party.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • July 25, 2018 • Church Social Teaching

On March 26, 1967, Pope Paul VI published Populorum Progressio. It is about the right to a just wage, employment, safe working conditions, to join a union, and the universal destination of goods. Did I miss it last year when Catholics threw a 50th birthday party for Populorum Progressio? I mean, John Paul II thought it merited birthday celebrations. In 1987, he celebrated it with a brand new encyclical. You may recall. It was called Sollicitudo Rei Socialis. John Paul II said that PP was a “distinguished” addition to Catholic social teaching.

The Bible says call no man father! Answers to common objections IV, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • July 22, 2018 • Apologetics

Odd it is that the same person who insists that “This is my body” is just a metaphor also insists that “Call no man father” must be utterly literal. But no one really thinks that I can not call my dad “father.” No one really thinks I can not call George Washington “the father of his country.” (Well, maybe there are a few oddballs who do say such things, but the real objection is not to calling dads “father” or Washingtons “father” but to calling priests “father.” The objection is reserved for priests.) To be fair, there is a certain logic in it.

Let’s watch as St. John Paul II “kitchen sinks” pro-life.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • July 15, 2018 • Blind Guides & False Prophets; Church Social Teaching; Pro-Life Issues

Recently Leila “Bubbles” Miller, a Catholic writer with a certain following, plained, yet again, about what she calls the “kitchen sinking” of the term “pro-life.” She worries — given the existence of that pesky New Pro Life Movement—that the term must now include everything, I mean everything, even the wery kitchen sink. Because proper sanitation is somehow not a pro-life issue. Imagine this. Her post was in response to an article at the right-wing Catholic Vote, by Eric Sammons, entitled “Why I’m Through Being Pro-Life.” In it he bewails the New Pro Life Movement.

Yes, the term “social justice” can be found in Church encyclicals.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • • Church Social Teaching

Someone saith that though, yes, we do owe the Church religious assent even when it does not speak infallibly, but still and all, I will “eat my hat” if you can find the term “social justice” in any encyclical. Really? In Quadragesimo Anno (1931), Pope Pius XI uses the term nine times. He writes: “To each, therefore, must be given his own share of goods … [in] conformity with the norms of the common good, that is, social justice.” Social justice is part of the “moral law,” says Pius XI; it is, by 1931, “firmly established” in Church teaching. Some hat-eating is in order, methinks.

The Eucharist is only a symbol! Answers to common objections III, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • • Apologetics

As it happens, I have already answered this objection before in a two-part exegesis of John 6. But recently an anti-Catholic stated the objection to transubstantiation in a peculiarly absolutist sort of way: “[Communion] is supposed to be done purely has a symbol or metaphor of the body and blood of Christ.” Wait. It is supposed to be merely a symbol? Who says? Where is that in the Bible? Is there a text where Christ says, “Now, do this as a symbol of my body and blood?” Without that, we have a question of interpretation.

Priests can’t forgive sins! Only God! Answers to common objections II, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • July 8, 2018 • Apologetics; Sacraments

Suppose you owed a debt you could not repay. Suppose further that my father is a wealthy man, and because you are a family friend, he decides to pay off this debt for you. He entrusts the money to me to pass on to you. I give you the money, and you pay the debt. In an immediate sense, I gave you the money; in an absolute sense, however, the money came from my father. He paid your debt, not me. He just did so through me, as an intermediary. That is how Catholics view the sacrament of penance. Priests, of themselves, do not forgive sins.