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The word spirit can have a very wide meaning. It is derived from the Latin word spiritus, meaning a breath. Then because the soul of man is as invisible to bodily eyes as a breath, and also because its presence is manifested by the breathing of a living body, the word spirit acquired a transferred sense, becoming a substitute fo…
If you were true to the Bible, no one could prove you wrong. But you are most unbiblical. Your very system leaves you without any real proof that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. It cannot say what is the real sense of all that is contained in the Bible. It concentrates upon a few misinterpreted texts, and ignores the whol…
There would be, if I could take part in a religious service conducted in the name of a religion opposed to the Church established by Christ. It would be disloyalty to Christ, and I cannot sin even for the sake of my mother. She would not be my mother but for the love of God, and the more we appreciate God’s gifts the less right …
He may not make a false oath to anyone on behalf of anything. The mere fact of calling upon the God of truth to witness to a falsehood is a grave sin under any circumstances, and a sacrilege. NOT is this true only for a Catholic. It is true for any man at all. Every Catholic knows that it is never lawful to tell a deliberate lie…
Good works prompted by purely natural motives cannot save a man. Thus St. Paul says, “If I should give all my goods to feed the poor, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.” 1 Cor. XIII., 3. Yet good works inspired by faith in Christ and love for Christ are necessary. “By works a man is justified, and not by faith only.”…
What was the basis for the probable opinion of Ingersoll that he alone had read the Bible through that year? An opinion, to be probable, must have good reasons. A guess won’t do. Ingersoll’s only reason was that other men did not come to his own conclusions. Therefore they could not have read the Bible! If he can get a probable …
At least he did not say that he was God Almighty! He simply meant that, through no merits of his own, he had been promoted to a position which had annexed to it the promise of Christ, “Whatsoever you bind upon earth is bound also in Heaven.” Pope Leo was speaking of his commission, not of himself. Gladstone said to Queen Victori…
The number of marriages outside the Church might be diminished, but the number of mixed marriages might greatly increase. By this law the mind of the Church is kept constantly before Catholics, and they do not think lightly of entering upon such alliances. If a Catholic would marry outside the Church because of such a law, she h…
We are obliged by the law of charity. But charity does not forbid one to tell the truth. It forbids blaming people who, through no fault of their own, do not know the truth. Nor would the Catholic Church wish Protestants to admit that she is right if she were not right. And since she can prove that they are not right, she is not…
Even if the government returned Catholic taxes, Catholics would be paying for their own schools. The Catholic position is not unreasonable in this matter. If to have a conscience is to be narrow-minded, then Catholics are narrow-minded. They can never be broad-minded enough to say that education omitting religion and a knowledge…
Thousands of Masses are said every year for the poor by thousands of Priests, when no offering at all is made. As a matter of fact the law of the Church obliges a Parish Priest to offer Mass every Sunday and on every Holy Day of Obligation for his parishioners, excluding all private requests and offerings. And every Priest, in a…
The Catholic method is not a method of human policy. We accept it because Christ imposed it. Yet the mere fact that Christ chose such a method is a guarantee of its wisdom. And the scepticism and irreligion which are the fruits of non-Catholic systems are but a further tribute to the wisdom of Christ.
By the restriction of its activities according to the limitations of the created agent of torture, and by the intellectual apprehension of the suffering fire normally causes. But difficulties concerning its method of action make no difference to the fact that it exists.
The Catholic Church exists to sanctify men. She must give them all that is necessary for their salvation, and safeguard them from all that could hinder it. Any Church which has no prohibition of dangerous books would not be doing its duty. Meantime if a leading writer publishes stuff which can lead souls to hell, then the Cathol…
It did, but rather for evil than for good. It led to dire results and the wrecking of the Catholic faith in many unthinking people. I am speaking, of course, of those delegates at the Diet who protested against its decisions, and am dealing with religious thought. Scientific thought would have gone on in any case. It is not to P…
Catholics are perfectly loyal to the Protestant king. They admit that he is head of the Anglican Church as the law declares. Since by law he is head of that Church, every Catholic says, “Right. Then he is head of the Anglican Church.” And loyalty demands no more. It certainly does not demand that I accept the Church of which he …
Witness in oneself may easily be purely subjective persuasion, and is no sure test of truth. Men holding totally divergent views claim to experience this witness within themselves, yet they cannot all have the exact truth revealed by Christ. Thank God, intellectual mistakes do not always mean evil dispositions. But remember that…
The Protestant flag of what liberty? You are dealing with a very dangerous word. There is no absolute liberty. Liberty always implies relative restriction. If I am free from truth, I am subject to error; if free from virtue, subject to vice. When science proved the world round, it took away my liberty to believe it to be flat. B…
No one will ever be lost save through his own fault. Christ is God, and, as God, can work with secondary causes or without them. The ordinary means of salvation is by Baptism, and one who is convinced of the necessity of Baptism yet deliberately refuses to receive it cannot be saved. But God can supply the grace usually given by…
Masonry did not exist in ancient times. But if, since the decree of Pope Clement, a renegade Priest did join Masonry, he at once ceased to be a practical member of the Catholic Church by the mere fact of doing so.
Now you take your own virtue as a standard, and proceed to find other people wanting when measured by it. It often happens that those who practice no religion canonize themselves as the models of perfection, and regard religious people as sinners and hypocrites. But those who go to church are constantly told of their own failing…
There is no value in pointing out the differences of form in this word according to the Latin or Greek languages, in which they are accommodated to the masculine for Peter as a man, and to the feminine for stone. Our Lord spoke in Aramaic, in which the form is the same in both cases, simply Kepha.
We cannot use the word dictatorship of the Pope in the ordinary sense of the word. The Pope has supreme authority according to the laws dictated by Christ in the constitution He gave to the Church. The authority of the Pope extends to both spiritual matters and to temporal matters in so far as they have connection with spiritual…
The Catholic Church cannot bless a false religion. We do admire the good dispositions and the zeal of those who do not realize that Protestantism is false. We have to love those who are mistaken, but not their mistakes. To ask the Catholic Church to bless the efforts of Protestant missionaries is just the same as asking her to b…
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