To Give a Defense

Geneva’s defenders show true colors.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • February 11, 2013 • Anti Catholicism; Apologetics

It started out badly enough over at Beggars All. On that estimable resource of anti-Catholic snipe, Mr. Alan “Rhology” Maricle, who fools no one by his alias, wrote a post so shockingly dumb that real snipes hid their bills. Pro-life activity at an abortion mill was now to be used, not to defend the sanctity of life, but instead to bash unoffending Catholics for their “blasphemous” prayers. In response, I wrote a strongly-worded but still charitable post, in which I said, among other things, that Mr. Rho may have objected any other time.

Quinquagesima: “Love is alone the worthy law of love.”

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • February 10, 2013 • Liturgical Year

These are important thoughts to consider for the last Sunday before Lent begins: Not just “what will I give up?” but “how have I failed?” Over the forty days to come, I will spend some time in meditation on all the ways in which I have failed the law of love. For the practices of fasting and almsgiving are, at their heart, meant to direct us away from self-love and toward love of God and love of neighbor. On Ash Wednesday, when we receive the sign of the cross in ashes on our head, the priest says, “Remember, O man, that thou art dust, and unto dust shalt thou return.”

Anti-Catholic spectacle “Rhology” strains at the Ave and swallows abortion.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • February 7, 2013 • Anti Catholicism; Apologetics

Maybe Catholics are a curiosity in Norman, Oklahoma. But I confess I am surprised by Rhology’s seeming innocence whether they were praying the Rosary. The man is actively involved in apologetics contra the Catholic Church, so his being unable to positively identify the Rosary seems strange. It’s easily identified by the quotations from Luke 1:28 and Luke 1:42 – 43. Usually, Catholics are holding those funny little beads when they say it, making it the more recognizable. But Rhology is all innocent about such things.

Mr. John Bugay’s false understanding of infallibility.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • February 6, 2013 • Apologetics; Papal Infallibility

In a recent post, the polemical rogue Mr. John Bugay begins with a weird question. “Over at Old Life,” he says, “a commentater [sic] asked: ‘At what point are we free to conclude that a corrupt hierarchy points to a false church?’ ”Mr. Bugay finds the question very compelling, but I find it dumb beyond the power of words. (Don’t ever be told that there is no such thing as a dumb question. In fact, the world is infested with them, like gnats or tweets.) At what point are we free to conclude that a corrupt leadership points to a false country? Or that a bunch of inane posts points to a false blog?

Sexagesima: An examination of conscience.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • February 4, 2013 • Liturgical Year

I am struck with how often Christina Rossetti’s praise of earth, in her duo of poems for Sexagesima, is tempered by her understanding that it is not our real home. Here we have no continuing city. She calls it “The broad foundation of a holy place,” but it is not the “holy place” itself. It is, she explains, “Man’s step to scale the sky.” So earth is to be praised, not for what it is in itself, but for the fact that it is our path to something holier and better. It is only in that context that we can understand what Rossetti means when she refers to earth as “lovely.”

The apostles are also θεόπνευστος, Dr.* White.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 31, 2013 • Apologetics; Exegesis

A reader with the improbable name of “Rooney” dares to dispute my claim that the Greek word theopneustos applies as much to John 20:21 – 23. My point, from an earlier comment in the same thread, was that Dr.* James White (Th.D., D.Min., etc., etc.) is wrong to say that the Scriptures alone are “God-breathed.” He may say it until he runs out of breath — for that seems to be his goal — but he will still be wrong. As evidence, I quoted this singular passage from John, wherein Christ appears to the disciples after the Resurrection and breathes on them.

Septuagesima: What have I withheld?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 28, 2013 • Liturgical Year

Pummel your body and subdue it, St. Paul tells us. Get yourself under your own control. Do not perish — turning to Christina Rossetti’s language — for the lack of one step, one further toil, one word left unsaid. I am reminded when I read this poem: What have I held back from Christ? What have I left undone, saying, “maybe tomorrow”? What part of myself am I keeping for myself when I should give it to Christ? In what room of my soul have I shut the door to him with a sign that says “No entry”? But just that one part more, and the prize is won.

White Man’s Burden redux.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 23, 2013 • Apologetics; Church Fathers; sola scriptura

Dr.* White accuses me of asking him to “prove a universal negative.” The accusation is the same as the one he tried to use in his 1993 debate with Patrick Madrid on sola scriptura. Dr.* White complained that, in order for him to prove how unique is the Bible, he would have to scour the entire universe in search of something exactly like it and come up empty. (I wasn’t aware sola scriptura claims only that the Bible is “unique.”) Mr. Madrid denied that Dr.* White needed to go that far.

To Susan Vader.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 18, 2013 • Apologetics

When Christ said to you, “Come, leave your nets, follow me,” you did something few have courage to do. You left your nets. You followed the Lord. There is no greater joy. A great convert, formerly a Pentecostal minister, recalled the moments when people would ask him why he became Catholic, and his answer always was: “I had to. How do you tell God no? How do you look in the face of a loving Savior, who loved me so much He died that I might be with him — how do you look at Him and say no?” You said yes.

Questions for a Reformed apologist.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 15, 2013 • Apologetics; sola scriptura

Consider, dear reader, if you will, these words: “The novelty of biblical revelation consists in the fact that God becomes known to us through the dialogue which he desires to have with us.” Does the author believe in sola scriptura? What do you think? For, after all, he describes the Bible as “novel.” That is to say, it is unique; it is different than anything else. More than that, he describes the Bible as the means by which “God becomes known to us.” He refers to it as God’s “dialogue” with us. He points to no other source of knowledge or dialogue with God.

I see men as trees walking, part 3: The allegory of fear.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 15, 2013 • Personal Narrative

When Christ comes to us, he does not come for the sake of punishment; he comes to perfect us in love. It is we who cry out, “You are hurting me.” We can be so comfortable in our fear. But what I detect, in both the blind man of Jerusalem — at least, in the beginning — and in the hypothetical prisoners in Plato’s cave, is fear also of truth. We can be so comfortable in our ignorance. We can become comfortable with lies — including, and perhaps especially, the lies we tell ourselves. Christ wants to throw that all away. He wants our perfection.

Baptism now saves you; remember your baptism.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 14, 2013 • Apologetics; Exegesis; Liturgical Year; Sacraments

God has a remarkable proclivity for accomplishing his work through the material things of this earth – but foremost among them, possibly, is water. At the very beginning of creation, God is said to be “moving over the face of the waters” (Gen. 1:2). Before God has created anything specific or concrete, water exists. He creates the “heavens and the earth,” but as yet they are “without form and void.” They are just the raw materials, created ex nihilo. But there is water; when God says, “let there be light,” his spirit is upon the waters.

Eisegesis Master Mr. John Bugay tries to force sola scriptura upon unwilling texts.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 12, 2013 • Apologetics; sola scriptura

The best argument that Catholic apologists have against sola scriptura is that it is self-refuting. If the Bible alone contains all that is required for faith and practice, and sola scriptura is required for faith and practice, then why is sola scriptura not to be found there? Search as long as you may please, you will not find it. Protestants know that they have a difficulty here. They know that, in order to defend sola scriptura, they must do so from the only source of doctrine to which they point. They must tell us which verse teaches sola scriptura. (Just one verse will do.)

Thoughts on Bishop Fellay and the ugliness of schism.

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 11, 2013 • Church Scandals

It pains me to have to write this, because I had great hopes for the reunion of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) with Rome. I had hoped, from all that I had read, that Bishop Fellay was committed to achieving reconciliation, and was disappointed to learn that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) had decided to discontinue further negotations. And it is impossible to listen to Bp. Fellay’s latest talk of ninety-plus minutes and doubt that his love for the Church is sincere. However, I think that he has done irreparable harm to his Society’s chances for reconciliation.

Did Adam & Eve practice sola scriptura?

BY: Henry Matthew Alt • January 9, 2013 • Apologetics; sola scriptura

Unusual as the question may sound, no less a personage than the polemical rogue John Bugay makes that wery claim here. The title of this blog article (for the man does not quit but grows more wild) is “The First Adam, Sola Scriptura, and His Commission as King, Priest, and Protestant.” Yes, dear reader, it would seem that Adam was a Protestant. Now, what Mr. Bugay seems to be up to this time is to wring wet and curious claims out of a sponge of a book by G.K. Beale called A New Testament Biblical Theology, in a passage where Beale is discussing the first covenant.