Moral Life1 min read
Catholics follow the laws of their Church not apathetically, but willingly. They know that her legislation rejoices in the authority of Christ. You might just as well say, “If I have to follow the ten commandments apathetically, I might as well have been born without freewill.” You are mixing up physical freedom with moral freed…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
Because the ancestors of its present members rejected and left the Catholic Church, setting up Churches of their own. But must the religion of the British Empire be the true religion? Is that the infallible test? If Anglicanism is true because it is British, we may as well add, “and because it is not French, or Spanish, or Itali…
The Church1 min read
It is not a fact. She stands for lawful, authority, but urges all men not to be dominated by mammon.
Moral Life2 min read
It is not impossible for the strike-conditions I gave to be fulfilled and for a strike to be without sin. Every one of the conditions I gave is sensible and moral. The end cannot justify the means, and the means must be within the limits of moral law. Meantime, an employer has by no means a free hand. If it is manifestly impossi…
God & Faith1 min read
He did. And the Pope demands independence of any earthly king’s authority precisely that Caesar, with his worldly power, may not interfere with the things that belong to God
Moral Life1 min read
I can see the evils of to-day, but they are not the result- of the God-given right to private property. They are due to the abuse of that right, to the greed of people not satisfied with reasonable comfort, and to certain economic factors men have not been able to understand or entirely control. Men are forced to study deeply in…
The Church1 min read
The Catholic Church preaches, not democracy, but Christian doctrine. In any case, democracy has nothing to do with your question. Democracy suggests that the lower classes are as equally considered as the so-called higher classes. And as far as the Papacy is concerned, democratic principles are observed. Pope Leo XIII. was a Pri…
Sacraments & Worship1 min read
“The lips of the Priest shall keep knowledge, and they shall seek the law at his mouth.” Mai. II., 7. The married state is not exempt from God’s laws, and the Priests must know those laws. Every Priest studies all the possible duties of marriage from a moral point of view during a long course of theology before he enters a Confe…
Moral Life1 min read
Whilst your children may be outwardly all that you wish them to be, can you read their souls? Christianity is essentially an interior and spiritual religion. Interior virtue is not regarded highly when religion and morality are excluded from week-day education. The mere fact that religion is excluded from the weekday curriculum …
Moral Life1 min read
That is not true. The thousands of Priests, Brothers, and Nuns who have vowed poverty in the Religious Orders of the Catholic Church never receive a penny personally in wages, they renounce the possession and administration of property, and are given merely such shelter, food, and clothing as are absolutely necessary. Those Prie…
Moral Life1 min read
When Christ expelled the money-changers, and the buyers and sellers from the Temple, their crime was not gambling. Their crime was the conducting of secular business in such a place, and their own dishonesty in charging exorbitant prices for goods and exchange. But gambling as such was not involved in this matter.
The Church1 min read
No. Excommunication cuts a man off from the visible Church on earth. But no man can be excommunicated save for mortally sinful conduct which supposes that he has already cut himself off from God’s grace and from the soul of the Church. If he dies excommunicated and without repenting, his own unrepented sin takes him to hell, not…
The Bible1 min read
There is more than sufficient warrant for convent life in Sacred Scripture. But even were the only warrant to be found in Catholic traditions, that surely would be quite a natural place to seek a warrant for a Catholic custom. Where else would you want me to find a warrant for it? In Totemism?
Moral Life1 min read
Remember that the Church has to exercise the authority of Christ in this world. To do this, she needs to be free to deal with Catholics of every nationality, Riid therefore to bs free from the political interference of any particular nation. Now she can be free either by being independent of all rulers, or by being subject to a …
The Church1 min read
Yes. They have been exempted from the law obliging all Priests of the Latin Rite. The Church has tolerated the ancient custom of marriage in those Eastern Churches which have sought re-union with her, allowing married men to be ordained amongst them, though marriage subsequent to ordination is forbidden. But in the Western Latin…
The Bible1 min read
How can you appeal to the English form, if the English translation does not adequately express what Christ meant? Surely you want the exact teaching of Christ! The English version is not an infallible rendering, nor does anyone versed in these matters claim that the English language fully expresses the sense of the originals. Bu…
The Bible1 min read
If men say that, ask them to prove it. If they could mention a thousand books which do not mention such a census that would not prove that a census did not take place, but merely that those books do not mention it. Josephus, in his Jewish Antiquities, describes a census of Judea; a census to which St. Luke refers in Acts V., 37.…
The Bible1 min read
The school-fees provide buildings and upkeep, together with food and clothing for the Brothers and Nuns. That is all the good Brothers and Nuns ask for themselves, and there is nothing left over after expenses are met. Oftentimes expenses are not met by school-fees, and other appeals have to be made. If it were not for the self-…
The Church1 min read
The majority of the people in the countries you mention happen to be Catholics, But that does not mean that the Catholic Church as a Church has political control. Meantime the Church does not want political control her*, and would absolutely refuse on principle to accept it, were it offered,
God & Faith1 min read
The kingdom of Christ is already in this world, though not of it. That kingdom is two-fold, perfect in heaven, imperfect on earth. We pray that God’s kingdom of grace may be extended in the souls of men, and that they may so fulfill the will of God that they may attain that final happiness of the kingdom of heaven. But the words…
Moral Life1 min read
Some may be, and then they sin, and are condemned by the Church. But not all rich men are criminals. A man can lawfully acquire property and wealth, and build up a legitimate stats in life by his diligence and ability.
The Bible1 min read
You are indebted to many collaborators. Between 1525 and 1536 William Tindale translated into English various Greek and Latin copies of the Bible which had been made by Catholic monks, copies which could be traced back to the original Scriptures. Cromwell was not satisfied with Tindale’s translation, so commissioned Miles Coverd…
Moral Life2 min read
In every industrial dispute, in so far as the obtaining of decent conditions is concerned, the Church has given strong support to the cause of the worker. How? By her rigid denunciation of the absence of decent conditions, and her clear statements that social morality demands such decent conditions. Having given this correct tea…
The Church1 min read
It is not necessary that all the laws of earlier Popes must be those of later Popes. Infallibility concerns doctrine, and morals, not necessarily discipline. Disciplinary laws adapted to particular times change with the times.
