Category: Catholicism

Top 11 reasons why all men should learn to dance

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All in all, I’ve taught quite a few dance classes this year. For example, at the beginning of the summer, I visited a local school and introduced a class of Eighth Graders to swing dancing and last month I taught a group of a hundred and fifty teenagers (eesh!) at a youth retreat in Julian.

As a general rule, when I teach dance lessons, the girls are really enthusiastic about learning whereas the guys are usually more reluctant. I’ve noticed that this reaction is not limited to teenagers. I’ve seen the same thing when I’ve taught  “young adults” and I’ve even seen the same reaction among real grown-ups too! For example, towards the beginning of the year I taught Nightclub Foxtrot at a local parish event and, when it was time for the lesson, all the men were suddenly rather absent… Where had all the “leaders” gone?

In this post I would like to outline the top eleven reasons as to why every man should learn to dance. Anyone who knows me well will know that I think all guys, without exception, should know how to dance. In Medieval times, a knight’s training was considered incomplete if he could not dance. It was true then and I think it’s no less true today… 🙂

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Chrysostom and Marriage

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Yesterday was the feast day of one of my favourite Early Church Fathers, St. John Chrysostom . I’ve said for a while now that I’ve wanted to work to produce something which introduces Pope St. John-Paul II’s “Theology Of The Body” using the writings of St. John Chrysostom, to use this revered eastern father as a gateway for Eastern Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christians who haven’t really been exposed to the Catholic Church’s former pontiff’s magnum opus.

Below is a short video from the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology which speaks a little bit about St. John Chrysostom’s beautiful theology surrounding marriage:

How do you honour Mary?

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When doing apologetics, I personally find it best to vary the approach I take. Every person is wired differently and a well-crafted explanation which would convince one person may completely fail with someone else.

annunciation

Often when Catholics and Protestants talk about Mary, they jump straight into the “big” topics: the Immaculate Conception, the Assumption, Intercession, the title “Mother of God” etc. However, I have often found it helpful to rewind the conversation when I see things moving in this direction. Instead of speaking about specific doctrines, I like to talk about Marian devotion at its most a basic level.

So, in today’s post I would like to present a dialogue between a Protestant (“Pete”) and a Catholic (“Catherine”), modeled on some conversations I’ve had where I have used this approach…

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Jesus Never Existed? Bart Ehrman Responds

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Several times over the last few weeks I’ve had conversations where friends have have seriously cast doubt over the very existence of Jesus of Nazareth, claiming that there’s no evidence that He’s even a real, historical figure.

You tend to hear stuff like this a lot on the Internet, but such claims are noticeably absent in respected academic scholarship. When I say “academic scholarship”, I’m not just referring to conservative Christian scholars either. I’m including liberal scholars, atheists, agnostics and those of other faiths. To demonstrate this, here’s an interview with Bart Erhman, who is an agnostic, former Christian, and a well-known figure in the area of Biblical criticism:

(I’ve moved the video start time past the pejorative preamble)

Catholic Answers recently produced an article in response in response to a recent article on Salon.com also on this subject.

Absolutely Relative

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I recently had a conversation in which a friend said that he was quite liked relativism. Relativism has all kinds of problems, not least of which is that there exists a logical contradiction at the most basic level, since it makes an absolute statement in saying that everything is relative.

Despite this logical error, relativism is extremely popular. After all, it seems a rather nice, live-and-let-live outlook on life. However, the very practical problem with relativism is that it’s not how we really live our lives, since we all hold many things to be absolute truths. This means that, in order to be a consistent relativist, one ends up having to say some pretty crazy things. For proof of this, please see the video below…

Update – Here’s a follow-up conversation on Facebook which I think is worth sharing so as to really spell out the ridiculousness of some of the things said:

Friend: Well besides the fact that Todd Friel is clearly a douche-bag, I am supremely in agreement with the relativist! Sorry!

Me: Oh yes, Todd is extremely obnoxious, that’s a given. But how can you agree with the relativist? Aside from the fact that he can’t see the inherent logical contradiction in the very definition of relativism, he says things which he can’t possibly believe to be true.

He couldn’t even affirm that 2+2=4! I can *guarantee* that he doesn’t live his life as though that could be false. Consider the question of his race. If that man had been asked in ANY other context, he’d have had no problem answering the simple question. He just knew that his paradigm was at stake, so he was forced to deny the obvious. This is the primary problem with relativism – it’s not how people really live their lives…

* If this guy bought some gum at a store with a $20 note, do you think he would complain if I tried to just give him a dime change? Are there objective arithmetic truths when his own money is at stake?! 🙂

* When this chap was filling in the enrollment form at college, do you really think he was unable to commit to saying that his ethnicity was African-American?

* When taking his Math final, do you think he seriously entertained the idea that 2+2=5?

* In his history class, do you think he would have disputed with someone who claimed that the Holocaust was evil? When studying about African Slavery in the deep south, do you think he would have suggested that, from a certain point of view, the brutal treatment of the slaves was, in fact, a morally praiseworthy thing?

This is the weakness with relativism – it’s not how anyone lives their life and, if applied consistently, renders someone completely unable to confront moral evil since even something as horrific as rape could technically be morally good from another person’s point of view.

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