HENRY MATTHEW ALT

TO GIVE A DEFENSE

Month: June 2019

Constantine founded the Catholic Church! Answers to common objections VII, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 30, 2019 • Apologetics; Church History

This myth is pecu­liar­ly intractable despite the fact that it is also pecu­liar­ly easy to refute. The claim is an anachro­nism. If we can find an instance of the Church refer­ring to itself as “the Catholic Church” before Con­stan­tine lived, we can dis­prove the claim. And so we do. To men­tion just one place, we find it in Ignatius of Anti­och. In his Let­ter to the Smyr­naeans, he writes: “Wher­ev­er the bish­op shall appear, there let the mul­ti­tude [of the peo­ple] also be; even as, wher­ev­er Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church.” This let­ter was writ­ten around the year 110 A.D.

On the limits of apologetics.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • • Apologetics; On Other Blogs

Now, I do Catholic apolo­get­ics myself, and I love read­ing Catholic apolo­get­ics, and Catholic apolo­get­ics helped to bring me into the Church. So I am not at all averse to a pre­sen­ta­tion of ratio­nal rea­sons for a posi­tion. When I was a kid, my moth­er used to defuse argu­ments by telling me that I should become a lawyer because I love to argue. But argu­ment worked with me when I was in the process of con­vert­ing to Catholi­cism because an argu­ment in favor of the faith was what I was look­ing for. I had already opened my mind.

Purgatory is not in the Bible! Answers to Common Objections VI, seriatim.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • • Apologetics; Purgatory

Except that it is. Pur­ga­to­ry is in the Bible more times than the notion that some­thing must be in the Bible; sola scrip­tura is in the Bible pre­cise­ly zero times. But Pur­ga­to­ry is in the Bible, in 2 Mac­cabees 2:46: “It is there­fore a holy and whole­some thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.” Some teach­ings we derive from the Bible by infer­ence. If a per­son is in heav­en, he does not require our prayers. If a per­son is in hell, no prayers can help. There must there­fore be a third place, or state. This, we call Pur­ga­to­ry.

Health care is a human right that precedes the State.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 28, 2019 • Church Social Teaching

Recent­ly a meme made its way around Face­book; and on the left side, it depict­ed a mem­ber of the U.S. mil­i­tary; and on the right, a Mex­i­can attempt­ing to scale a wall. The meme told us that the sol­dier deserves free health care and the Mex­i­can does not. He’s break­ing a law, don’t you know? What dis­turbed me most — per­haps it ought not have – was, the rea­son I came across this meme in the first place was because a well-known Catholic apol­o­gist shared it. The nar­ra­tive we’re sup­posed to accept here is that health care is a reward.

How much does God hate lying? (Proverbs 6:16–19)

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 27, 2019 • Exegesis

Solomon — or who­ev­er the author of Proverbs — announces a list. “These six things doth the Lord hate!” he begins. But at once he must cor­rect him­self. “Yea, sev­en,” he decides, “are an abom­i­na­tion to him.” In rhetoric, we call what has just hap­pened metanoia. It is when you make a state­ment, and then instant­ly cor­rect some part of it. St. Paul uses it in 1 Cor. 7:10: “And unto the mar­ried I com­mand, yet not I, but the Lord.” And in Gal. 2:20: “I am cru­ci­fied with Christ: nev­er­the­less I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” And Jesus him­self uses it in Matthew 11:9.

But Alt! The Church says nations have a right to control borders!

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 23, 2019 • Church Social Teaching; Politics

The USCCB says that a nation may restrict immi­gra­tion “for the com­mon good.” “Catholic social teach­ing is real­is­tic: While peo­ple have the right to move, no coun­try has the duty to receive so many immi­grants that its social and eco­nom­ic life are jeop­ar­dized.” That’s true, and it’s a fear many have; though many politi­cians also exploit this fear against a par­tic­u­lar dis­fa­vored group — such as, at one time, Catholics. One must be care­ful. This sec­ond “basic prin­ci­ple” is not a veto of the first. It’s not a get out of Leviti­cus 19 free card. One text does not excuse you from anoth­er.

Don’t cite Leviticus 18 if you’re going to ignore Leviticus 19.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 19, 2019 • Church Social Teaching; Exegesis; LGBT Issues

You can’t say that wel­com­ing the stranger is the “least” com­mand­ment in the first place, or some­how not an abom­i­na­tion as opposed to gay sex. Remem­ber the para­ble of the sheep and the goats. For every stranger you do not wel­come, you are not wel­com­ing Jesus. If you do not wel­come the stranger, you reject Christ. I think it’s safe to say that’s an abom­i­na­tion too. So if you’re going to be silent about what’s going on at the bor­der with many thou­sands of migrants being locked up in con­cen­tra­tion camps, then you also need to be qui­et about gay sex.

Pope says don’t criticize pope; FaithfulCatholics™ weep and gnash teeth.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 16, 2019 • papacy; Pope Francis

The pope said: “In order to demon­strate our love for the Pope, it is nec­es­sary to obey him. There­fore, when we love the Pope, there are no dis­cus­sions regard­ing what he orders or demands, or up to what point obe­di­ence must go, and in what things he is to be obeyed. When we love the Pope, we do not say that he has not spo­ken clear­ly enough, almost as if he were forced to repeat to the ear of each one the will clear­ly expressed so many times not only in per­son, but with let­ters and oth­er pub­lic doc­u­ments; we do not place his orders in doubt, adding the facile pre­text of those unwill­ing to obey.

Pope Francis Derangement Syndrome XXIII: Cardinal Burke & four rebel bishops create parallel Magisterium.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 10, 2019 • Pope Francis Derangement Syndrome

They’ve been in a com­pro­mised posi­tion for some time. But now Car­di­nal Burke; Arch­bish­op Athana­sius Schnei­der; and bish­ops Janis Pujats, Tomash Peta, and Jan Pawel Lenga have all signed a new cor­rec­tion of the Holy Father. (No doubt it’s fil­ial. These things always are.) The cor­rec­tion is titled “Dec­la­ra­tion of the truths relat­ing to some of the most com­mon errors in the life of the Church of our time.” So, you know: Wow. I think it’s a total dis­grace. Fake Site News and the For­mer­ly Catholic Reg­is­ter are, as you might expect, doing cart­wheels.

Yes, I’m a Social Justice Warrior. Why aren’t you?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • June 9, 2019 • Church Social Teaching

One self-appoint­ed Catholic sage writes: “Once they”–they here mean­ing the so-called Catholic Left–“get start­ed down the SJW trail, they just keep going.” That’s a nov­el con­cept: Social jus­tice as a sort of gate­way drug to more and more extreme forms of dis­sent. Cer­tain­ly that is not how the Church under­stands it. The acronym “SJW” is meant to be a pejo­ra­tive, and I used to bris­tle at it. But when I read the above dic­tum from The Sage, I won­dered why I ever should have. Social jus­tice is an impor­tant part of Catholic teach­ing. Of course I’m a war­rior for Catholic teach­ing.

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