Sacraments & Worship1 min read
No. It is because, being perhaps experts in their own line, they consider themselves expert in every line, and condemn the Church on insufficient data. Other scientists, equally expert in their scientific lines, realize that they are not therefore qualified in matters of religion any more than they would be fitted by a knowledge…
The Church1 min read
The Greek Churches are both schismatical and heretical. They are separated from the obedience due to the authority of Christ in His true Church. They acknowledge no infallible head. They may retain valid orders and the Mass—things which Protestantism lost—but they have fallen into errors concerning the Holy Trinity, the Immacula…
The Church1 min read
The Baptist Church is certainly not mentioned in Scripture. The Catholic Church is most clearly described there. Meantime, do Baptists act as did the first Christians? Do they go to Confession? Have they the sacrifice of the Mass? Baptists, like other Protestants, insist upon one thing not commanded by Christ, and neglect mo3t o…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
They imitate many of our external practices. But even this attempt is in defiance of their own Bishops. Nor does their imitation of Catholic worship make them Catholics. If some stranger were my double in appearance, that would not make him my blood brother. The only way to be a Catholic is to be one. We went from God by disobed…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
The Catholic Church certainly believes in the existence of the spiritual world, of God, of good and evil created spirits, and in the continued existence of the souls of men. But the phenomena of Spiritualism are due at best to natural causes; at times to imposture; very often to evil spirits. Certainly any effects due to the inf…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
That you lead a good life is to be commended. But it would be better to do it in the way God wishes, rather than in your own way. Your leading a good life cannot prove your religion true. If it did, then the fact that a Catholic lives a good life also proves the Catholic Church true. Yet if your religion is true, the Catholic Ch…
God & Faith1 min read
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…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
That is untrue. For over three centuries Protestantism could not inspire the thought of foreign missions. The Catholic Church was missionary from the very beginning and has ever retained that characteristic. In any case where are the English and American Protestant missions in Italy, Spain, Germany, Austria, Russia, etc.? Do not…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
Never. The Catholic Church, subject to the Bishop of Rome, has the same constitution as that given her by Christ when He said to St. Peter, “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I shall build my Church.” She has the same foundation as the one and only Church in England until the substitution of himself by Henry VIII. as the founda…
Sacraments & Worship1 min read
The state holds the marriage to be valid in state law. And all Catholics hold the marriage to be civilly legal. But the state says nothing whatever about God’s view of the matter, and the Catholic Church declares the marriage null and void before God, and therefore in conscience. Even after that declaration, if the parties do no…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
Catholic Churches are still more open, and for longer hours. But convents are not churches, nor are they public institutions. They are the private homes of ladies who wish to live together in the service of God.
The Church1 min read
Very often. But there is this difference. The Catholic who does not understand Protestantism does not know the wrong thing. The Protestant who does not know Catholicism does not know the right thing. I personally know both, having been brought up in Protestantism, which I renounced in favor of Catholicism.
God & Faith1 min read
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…
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
There were older societies of stone-workers before that date, but having no connection with Masonry, and making no absurd pretentions to a fantastic heredity. The old guilds had ceased to exist, and the spirit of the new Masonry was a contradiction of that which prevailed in the earlier and non-connected Catholic guilds. Masonry…
Sacraments & Worship1 min read
Why should you worry about a thing which does not affect you? Let Catholics, who do go to Confession, do the worrying. They find it full of compensating consolations. Your only worry should be your ignoring of the words of Christ as recorded in St. John XX., 21-23.
Other Christians & Religions2 min read
Vain repetition in the manner of heathens is forbidden, but not useful repetition which is not in the manner of heathens. Vain repetition relies mechanically upon the mere number of prayers or formulas uttered. But Catholics do not rely on the mere repetition of prayers, nor upon their multiplication, but on the intrinsic worth …
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
You show complete ignorance of Catholic theological works, written by the cleverest men of the centuries. St. Thomas Aquinas had the Catholic Faith very deeply, yet wrote probably the greatest masterpiece of religious thinking the world has ever seen.
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
All things else being equal, and strictly from the viewpoint of the religions, Catholics have many advantages. They have the full truth contained in Sacred Scripture and in the teaching Church. The Protestant accepts only part of Scripture, and has no God-appointed guide. Certainly a man with full information as to the road lead…
The Bible2 min read
Masonry claims to go much farther back than Solomon’s Temple. “The Freemason,” an English Masonic periodical, August issue, 1926, says: “Freemasonry can stand and watch all religions as they pass in review.” W. A. Waite, in his book, “Emblematic Masonry,” 1925, p. 286, says: “Masons alone are truly ordained and have a succession…
God & Faith1 min read
It is ten thousand times a pity. But remember that the Catholic Church did not start the conflict. She cannot be blamed for the domestic troubles of Protestantism. All Catholics at least are in doctrinal unity.
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
If you are really convinced that the Catholic religion is false and your present religion true, you could not do so. You would be violating your conscience in a very grave matter. But you have probably taken your Protestant religion for granted, and have never gone deeply into the question. For the sake of the girl you can have …
Other Christians & Religions1 min read
In virtue of their valid Baptism they are radically Catholics. But despite affiliation with the Catholic Church by valid Baptism, one can exclude himself from the true and visible Church by conscious heresy or schism. If a child is baptized validly in the Church of England, that child is a Catholic and remains a Catholic until i…
Sacraments & Worship1 min read
A Catholic may not act as an official witness. A wedding in a church is not a merely social event; it is also a religious ceremony. Though non-Catholics may not see it, the Catholic position is alone logical. Protestants should choose witnesses of their own faith and spare Catholics the pain of having to refuse.
God & Faith1 min read
You err both in fact and in doctrine. In fact, for the Apostles complained of errors, not of the Church, but of individual professing Christians even in their own days. In doctrine, because you practically assert that Christ failed to preserve His Church; that the Holy Spirit did not remain with her; and that the gates of hell d…