Saturday, October 22, 2016

My Bishop

                                                 +AJPM+

THE CATHOLIC HTOWNER:

Before we begin, I am aware I have not posted anything concerning Election 2016. Any point I could make about it has already been stated in the link here about Catholic voting.

Having said that, I bring it up now because within the last few days of this post's original publication, a voting event was held in my home city led by its head bishop---the first cardinal of the US Deep South---, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo.

I know a lot of Catholics say their bishop is special and unique...but I have solid proof of how special my bishop is:

-He oversees an archdiocese where on any given Sunday, Mass is performed in 14 different languages and he manages to keep it all together.
-He was the highest ranking bishop to speak out against Notre Dame giving an honorary degree to President Obama, given the president's stand on abortion
-He serves as grand prior of the Southwest Lieutenancy Order of the Holy Sepulchre.
-Under his leadership, the Personal Ordinate of the Chair of St Peter was formed, with a parish in Houston serving as its main hub.
-Starting in October of 2016, there will be a parish run by the Fraternal Society of St Peter thanks to him.
-He is no intellectual lightweight, having advanced degrees from the Catholic University of America and advanced knowledge of early Catholic Church Fathers.
-He currently serves as vice president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
-He served as co-author of the official voting guide published by the USCCB.

With all this, it comes as no surprise when news came out of him leading an event about voting, the room was so packed some people had to stand for the event.


I should know...I was there.


I wish this event was recorded--and too bad it wasn't--because his speech brought up points even I never considered. Here are some highlights:

-He made it clear he was not going to tell people who to vote for because he didn't want people to be robots.

-He did admit he didn't see the final debate, but he did say based on some parts he was disgusted by Trump's view of immigrants..but also disgusted by Clinton's take on abortion.

-He talked about parts of Catholic moral teaching to consider for all political issues, and those parts being sanctity of life, subsidiary (which he referred to as "better to do it smaller than bigger"....in other words, local than federal), the common good, and preference for the weak among us. He would further state most people put common good before subsidiarity when it should be the other way around.

-He also said most people don't seem to know what a right is anymore.

-Speaking of rights, he does not agree with the Supreme Court ruling on gay so-called "marriage." He did admit to arguing with several people on this but he also admitted he has not met any gay marriage advocate who could answer one simple question...

...what is the end goal of gay marriage?
I, too, would love to hear a good answer to this.

-He also admitted as vice president of the USCCB, he knows Catholic charities are starting to be denied permission by the US federal government to help refugees because Catholic charities refuse to provide what the government calls "reproductive services", which any thinking person knows is code for providing abortion services.

-Finally, he had good advise for anyone who still can't bring themselves to vote for either Trump or Clinton:

Still go vote but if you can get away with it, vote only for local offices or local issues related to your area and leave the presidential choice blank.


If anyone here thinks I'm lying about this happening or what Cardinal DiNardo said, feel free to email the archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, and they will confirm everything.



Sunday, October 2, 2016

Atheist Thought Experiments Debunked #10

                                                       +AJPM+

"Why can't Catholics (or Christians in general) just let people live their lives the way they want to live them?"


THE CATHOLIC HTOWNER:

Let's get one thing out of the way about this question: out of all the people in the world, atheists are the LAST people who should be asking this question.

Why?

Because they have the WORST and most HYPOCRITICAL track record when it comes to this issue.
Think about it. In every society or country where atheists hold the key leadership positions, have they ever at any time let Catholics or any religious group worship or preach freely?

Of course not.

From the Red Army's invasion of Tibet, to the explosion of the Christ the Redeemer Cathedral in Russia, to current attacks now against anyone who dare defy the gay agenda, secularists and atheists have NEVER allowed religious people to say what they wanted or even tolerated religious people talking back to an atheist.

All this from a group who says religious people need to "be more open-minded" and "tolerant of other views", that "we live in a multi-cultural society" and "all faiths are the same anyway" and "you shouldn't impose your beliefs on others."

Strange...atheists don't seem to have any problem forcing their beliefs on others...often by the end of a gun barrel.

But back to the question at hand...why can't Catholics or Christians leave others alone?

Simple: error should not go unanswered.

You see, all followers of Christ are called to "be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt 5:48) but since man is a fallible creature, we do make errors, albeit not the same ones or even at the same time. Sure, we may make every effort possible to avoid error, but every now and again, errors do get through and we do need correction. Atheists, whether they want to admit it or not, are in the same boat as their religious counter-parts.

Perfect examples here:
Would an atheist speak out on someone who says a triangle has four sides? What about if someone places an historical event in the wrong time frame? Would an atheist say nothing about this mistake? Of course not.

"But, wait," a vocal yet misguided atheist would say. "What you're talking about here are objective, provable facts. While we can find the definite answers to those, that's not true about morals, so you Christians have no right to say someone else is wrong on their morals."

I, as well as many other Catholics, call out the atheists on that objection, since we're not the ones who claim all is relative while holding something as objectively true...otherwise, all your claims can and will be dismissed as just opinions..and ill-informed ones at that.

Whatever reasons a person can come up with as to why they would never let people keep believing these two falsehoods, those are the exact same reasons Christians would never let people continue in their error.

Here's where I think the atheist's real beef is: it's not so much atheists object to exposing error or making a mistake; they just object to people exposing atheist errors. Any sane adult would face the error and conclude all contrary views to the discovered truth must be false but atheists seem unwilling or too ill-informed to do this.

That in the end is why a) Christians can't leave people alone when the people commit error, b) we will never leave the person in their error and c) we should never expected to leave the person in their error.

Christians admit there is such a thing as an absolute; atheist idiots do not.

THAT makes all the difference in this life and the next.

Take no part in the fruits of darkness, but instead expose them. -Eph 5:11


Saturday, October 1, 2016

10 Assumptions from Atheists I'm Sick of Hearing

                                                            +AJPM+

THE CATHOLIC HTOWNER:


1. "You must hate science."

Actually, I don't have any problems with science. I love science. I've loved it since I was little. This seems to feed into the bogus story of science and religion being at war, when no such war exists. Also, if Christians hate science, how come they keep winning Nobels in science?

2. "You must think the earth is only 6,000 years old."

I have no idea where this came from.
It can't be the Bible: it doesn't say how old the earth is, and it can't be implied either from the text.
It can't be the Catholic Church: they never issued any statement about the earth's age.
In fact, the only people I can find that use the 6,000 figure are Protestants who don't understand how to understand the time lapse in the seven days of Creation (here's a hint: there's no mentioned ending to day seven), and atheist morons who use the websites owned by said Protestants and think all Christians believe this.
Most Christians in fact DO NOT believe this. At best, only 18% might believe this, but that's about it. In other words, odds are good you'll never come across a Christian that believes this.

3. "You must be against evolution."

Yeah...I've never said I was against evolution. I've never implied it either. Again, the Catholic Church has never been against evolution but has issued a statement supporting the teaching. You'd be hard-pressed to find any Catholic school that doesn't teach evolution.

4. "You must be Republican."

Ok...this one is true but I still fail to see how they came up with it with so little evidence.

5. "You must not be that smart."

Considering I can see right through atheist garbage, can see their nonsense coming a mile away and the fact I've gone about three months without having any intelligent message from an atheist, I think it's safe to conclude I have more brains than all atheists put together.


As a perfect example, I've heard several atheists argue that Hitler must have been Catholic based solely on his claim of being one.
To that I say...so what?
I can put on a football jersey...that doesn't make me a quarterback.

6. "You must not know Christianity as much as atheists do."

On this point, atheists might have something. I don't know as much as they do...

I know a whole lot more.

For example, I know how many books are in the Bible, I know when the final list of biblical books was decided, I don't engage in alternative history theories not backed by scholars, and I don't make things up about Christian history either.

7. "You must be homophobic."

Yeah...there's no such thing as homophobia. No mental health text and no mental health governing body considers homophobia a valid fear.

As far as my view of gay people as a whole....If they had the sense to hire different bakers, and actually listened to scientific findings about sexuality and gender identity, maybe then I wouldn't have a problem with them.

At least when the Civil Rights Act passed, you didn't see black people being in your face about how black they are.

8. "You must have never questioned religion."

Actually, I did...but wound up questioning atheism more. After finding out how many things atheism got wrong or missed the point, I gave up atheism and returned to the faith my ancestors had.

9. "You must think I the atheist am going to hell."

Actually, I don't think that. That would be assuming I knew for a fact about your damnation...knowledge no human is meant to have. The truth is I am no more sure about someone's damnation than I am sure about my salvation, and I have not now nor will I ever say my salvation is a certainty.

10. "Don't you know religion will die out?"

Yeah...that's never going to happen. Atheists have been claiming that since at least the middle of the 19th century. It didn't come to pass then and it won't come to pass now or even by 2050.

No...it is atheism that will die out. Atheists aren't keeping pace with world population growth, they don't have as many kids and of the kids they do have, 7 out of 10 won't stay in atheism by the time they reach adulthood.

Just when I think atheists couldn't be more idiotic, they pull these out of nowhere.