"We are travellers…not yet in our native land" – St. Augustine
“After you have made a decision that is pleasing to God, the Devil may try to make you have second thoughts. Intensify your prayer time, meditation, and good deeds. For if Satan’s temptations merely cause you to increase your efforts to grow in holiness, he’ll have an incentive to leave you alone.”
– St. Ignatius of Loyola
(Thanks to Anh for this one)
Yesterday I posted a video of some Dominican Nuns reacting to Pope Francis’ election. Here is the other video which I really wanted to post during my Lenten blog fast:
For those of you who don’t live in the US, the chap on the right is Penn Jillette, one half of the magic group “Penn & Teller” and a vocal atheist. I’m pretty sure everyone knows the guy on the right, the former British tabloid writer and editor, Piers Morgan.
Until recently I had no idea that Piers called himself a Catholic, but when Pope Benedict resigned he became incredibly vocal about it, tweeting and saying many things that would give a first year theologian a rather impressive aneurism.
I love the way it takes an Atheist such as Penn to explain to a professed Catholic such as Piers the basics of Catholicism…
I wanted to post this video back when Pope Francis got elected, but because I was on a blogging fast I couldn’t. So, here it is, Dominican Nuns reacting to the news of the new Pope’s election…
I was looking through some old emails I wrote several years ago to a friend who was leaving the Catholic Church. Here’s the short section I wrote about the Eucharist…
The Eucharist
From the conversation we had, I’m not particularly sure whether or not you still believe in Jesus’ Real Presence in the Eucharist, so in case you do, I’ll be brief. Denial of Jesus’ Real Presence in the Eucharist is a very common teaching among many Protestant denominations (but as always, not universally).
Scripture
The Eucharist was a central part of life for the Apostles (Acts 2:42) yet in most Protestant churches Holy Communion is pretty rare. If the Eucharist is only symbolic, why is unworthy reception of the Eucharist (1 Cor 11:27-30) spoken of in such strong, sacrilegious, life-and-death terms? Scripture records Jesus saying in John 6:35-70 that we must eat His body and drink His blood. If he was only speaking symbolically why did he lose so many followers that day?
Church History
Outside of Scripture, something that you will find without exception among the Early Church Fathers is the belief that Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is one of the central topics examined in the Didache (70-90 AD), probably the earliest Christian writing not to be included in the canon of the Bible. This First Century document calls the Eucharist a “sacrifice”.
As you may have now read, St. Ignatius of Antioch (96 AD) described the Eucharist as “the medicine of immortality” and described the Gnostics as those who “abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and which that Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes.” – Letter to the Smyrnaeans 6
The historical witness for this doctrine is undeniable. Absolutely undeniable.
Whilst I was still in my rather anti-Catholic phase I heard someone say “If you say you’re not being fed in the Catholic Church then you clearly don’t know who you’re eating”. As much as this sounded arrogant and as much as it irritated me, it did prompt me to really examine the teaching of the Eucharist because, if it was true, to miss out would be a tragedy.
I don’t know what they’re putting in the water these days, but several more of my friends have got engaged this week! To celebrate this, here’s a short video by Brent Rice which speaks of the Paschal nature of marriage called “A Crucifixion Type of Love”.
(Thanks to Neal Obstat for this one)
A little while ago there were some statistics released following a large survey asking 3,400 Americans basic questions about Christianity and world religions. Catholics didn’t perform well. How well would you have done?
Why do you think Catholics performed so badly and, more importantly, how do you think we can reverse this arrested development?
It’s time for a Reading List update and, thanks to my vacation and several long plane rides, I have much progress to report…
