224 articles from the existing collection.
We can prove historically that God certainly gave the Christian revelation, and right reason cannot refute the evidence. It has to admit the value of the Gospels as documentary sources. But reason alone cannot make a man accept the contents of that revelation as having binding value. Only the grace of God can do that, and the pr…
Man is created to praise, love, and serve God in this life, and by doing so to attain eternal life with God hereafter. This is not our only life. It is but an infinitesimal part of it.
You are. And you might be able to think out ideas just as valuable as ourselves. But here it is not a question of human opinions. It is a question of God’s teaching, and neither your opinions nor our opinions have any value if they contradict that. Catholic doctrine is not our opinion, but His doctrine who sent the Church to tea…
True Christian faith cannot lead one into error. We prove that God has said a thing, and believe because He has said it. Doubt would be possible only could God be deceived, or deceive mankind. But He could not. He knows all things, and is Truth itself. Also He has given abundant external signs to confirm His revelation. We are c…
No. Such Protestants are saved not because of, but in spite of their erroneous religion. They have simply been true to a conscience which was erroneous through no fault of their own.
With the help of God’s grace, which will not be refused if you desire it, you are able to believe that it is true. A classification of possible states of mind will clarify things for you. (1) After due study of a certain proposition, a man might see that its truth is intrinsically evident, as one knows for example that two and t…
Since God does not deny any man of really goodwill sufficient grace, the fault liesin your own will. You can believe, if you wish. If you have not examined the evidence for His divinity, you can do so. Until you have done so, your belief that He is not God is mere credulity. You should say, “I have no opinion on the subject. I h…
Yes. But the context shows that he used those words in the sense in which St. Paul spoke of Christ crucified as being unto the Gentiles foolishness. I. Cor. I., 23. He did not mean that he was prepared to believe things repugnant to principles of right reason. There are mysteries in the natural order, and still more there are an…
I have never admitted that there is no real evidence, nor that there are no original documents in existence. There are thousands of original documents in existence. The particular original documents, the copies of which we now possess in the Gospels, have perished. But the copies are perfectly reliable, as has been established b…
The dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary has nothing to do with biology. It does not mean that she was conceived miraculously in the physical sense. She was normally conceived and born of her parents, Joachim and Ann. But in her very conception her soul was preserved immaculate in the sense that she inherited no stain of o…
If a thing be not true, it is not to be accepted as true, no matter who says it But when the Pope defines infallibly, he cannot say what is not true, and Catholics accept his official teaching precisely because it is infallibly true. If, prior to a definition, a Catholic was of a diverse opinion, then once the Pope has given the…
One has to exist before one can be consulted, and then it is rather late to consult us concerning that which has already occurred. We therefore had no choice in this particular matter. Nor could we reasonably wish to have a choice. If a thing will necessarily be to my harm, I would reasonably wish to have an opportunity of decli…
Yes. In Gen. III., 15, God said to Satan, “I will put enmities between thee and the woman … thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.” The radical enmity between Satan and that second Eve, the Mother of Christ, forbids her having been under the dominion of Satan, as she would have been had she ever contracted original sin in actual f…
You have no evidence for that assertion. I know that God usually makes use of secondary causes which He Himself has established, and it is my faith that God will continue to grant them efficacy which takes me to a doctor who has studied their properties. But Christian Science is not faith in God at all. It is faith in self and s…
Science has nothing very definite to say on the subject, and in any case, the age of the human race cannot be calculated from the Bible. I certainly believe the Bible account in its own proper sense. As far as that account is concerned, man could have been on the earth a hundred thousand years. No one can say with certainty exac…
As I remarked, she received the grace of the Catholic faith before she died. But had she not, it would rather have been because I could not believe what she believed, and could not honestly pretend to do so, that I would have refrained from any part in the rites of a non-Catholic religion. And my particular mother would have bee…
You are not asked to believe anything which cannot be substantiated in order to be saved. By what rule of evidence, then, can the miracles of the Gospel be substantiated? By sworn affidavit, or in other words, by written declaration on oath. If, in a modern court, I offered documentary evidence given by my friend Jones, the cour…
The Church is not inhuman. She has never pretended that fallen human nature will find the service of God easy. She calls this world a valley of tears, and she has tears for the sufferings of her children. But she has to be true to God, and to tell us the law. What would be the good of the Church if she did not do so? The Church …
To admit that Christ is God, and then to doubt an exact statement of His teaching is certainly a sin, for that implies a denial either of His knowledge or of His veracity. But we do not need to doubt a thing before we can begin to study it I do not doubt the fact that the earth moves round the sun, yet I am perfectly free to wei…
The “Witnesses of Jehovah” merely constitute a form of that sect known as the Russellites. They have no evidence whatever that Jehovah ever asked them to be His witnesses. The Russellites were named after Pastor Charles T. Russell, an American who started a new form of Protestantism. Their religion is based upon the conjecture t…
Christ allowed permanent separation if adultery be committed, but He does not allow divorce and re-marriage in the sense you intend. When He said, “Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for the cause of fornication, maketh her to commit adultery, etc.,” the sense He intended was this, “Whosoever shall put away his wife (I am…
Yes. Historically, it is certain that Christ really lived, really claimed to be God, proved that claim by His supreme command over the laws of nature established by God, taught the Christian religion, and obliged man to accept that religion. Philosophically, Christianity alone gives an adequate solution and explanation of the or…
There are things in the New Testament just as hard to believe as many things in the Old Testament, and on your principle you should reject much of the New Testament itself. Yet let us act on your admission that you do accept the New Testament. Christ and the Apostles had the same Old Testament as we have today. They treat it alw…
Protestantism was not a true reformation of the Church. The identity of the Church is indissolubly linked with a continuous identity of doctrine, worship, and discipline. The so-called Reformation involved the abolition of essential doctrines, worship, and discipline, substituting completely different and humanly invented altern…
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