God is dead
My “Life Verse”
A lot of Christians choose a “life verse”, a favourite verse from the Bible which is a source of encouragement and inspiration. If I had to pick one passage from the Bible I guess I’d choose the following text from 2nd Corinthians:
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. – 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Here’s what Tim Hawkins has to say about his favourite Bible verse…
TOT: The Reality of Porn
Last week we had the final session of our Theology On Tap series here in San Diego. I had not encountered Theology on Tap (ToT) until I came to America so, in case you have not been exposed to it, it’s an outreach and catechesis initiative embraced by many Catholic dioceses as part of their Young Adult ministry.
Typically what happens at ToT is that the Catholic Young Adults from a diocese take over a bar or restaurant. They eat some food, drink a beer and then listen to a talk given by a speaker. The idea behind ToT is to give young Catholics an opportunity to hang out together (or if you want to be super-spiritual about it, “fellowship”) and learn about the faith in a relaxed, informal setting.
The talk was entitled: “The Reality Behind the Fantasy of Porn : An interview with an ex-porn star who shares her story”. The chap conducting the interview was Matt Fradd, a recent addition to the Catholic Answers team. He’s been involved in the area of chastity for some time and, in particular, helping men and women recover from pornography. Recently I went to the recording of his new DVD, The Man Talk.
During this final session of ToT, Matt interviewed his friend April, who was in the porn industry for some time, but who now works to help those who wish to get out of that life.
The porn industry is massive and, as the title of the talk suggests, the purpose of the interview is to show the reality of porn, rather than the fantasy which is so often sold to us. As Matt says in his talk Taking Down Goliath, the problem with porn is not that it shows too much, but that it shows too little, reducing a woman to a collection of body parts to be lusted after, rather than a person to be loved.
Main Talk (Download)
Q&A (Download)
(The intro/outro music is Public Domain and available here)
UPDATE: During the talk Matt mentions an interview he did with a girl who had recently become a stripper. The interview is available here on his blog.
Lead Thou Me On
Today Neal Obstat posted the lyrics to the wonderful song “Lead, Kindly Light”, together with a beautiful musical rendition of the text. The words to this song come from the poem “The Pillar of Cloud” by John Henry Newman, a Catholic priest who was recently beatified.
I don’t know how, but this song somehow managed to fly beneath my radar for the past thirty years, but I’ve been captivated by it all afternoon, as it’s a perfect song for a Restless Pilgrim like me…
Lead, kindly Light, amid th’encircling gloom, lead Thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home; lead Thou me on!
Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me…
Meantime, along the narrow rugged path, Thyself hast trod,
Lead, Savior, lead me home in childlike faith, home to my God.
To rest forever after earthly strife
In the calm light of everlasting life.
After a little bit of googling, I found out a little bit about the background to the song. It turns out that Newman penned the words while he was ill in Italy:
“Before starting from my inn, I sat down on my bed and began to sob bitterly. My servant, who had acted as my nurse, asked what ailed me. I could only answer, ‘I have a work to do in England.’ I was aching to get home, yet for want of a vessel I was kept at Palermo for three weeks. I began to visit the churches, and they calmed my impatience, though I did not attend any services.
At last I got off in an orange boat, bound for Marseilles. We were becalmed for whole week in the Straits of Bonifacio, and it was there that I wrote the lines, Lead, Kindly Light, which have since become so well known”
When Church Sucks…
When Christians get together there’s really nothing we love to do more than to complain! In my experience, what we especially like to do is to have a good whine about the problems we have with our parish. In response to this, I would like to write a series of short posts about some common complaints I’ve heard. Today I’ll begin with one of the most common criticisms:
“Our priest’s homilies are boring…”
As I say, this is a very common complaint. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve heard people say something like this. Unfortunately, it’s often a reason given as to why someone left to join a Protestant congregation. 🙁
The Sadducees
I’ve been leading a Bible study group through the book of Acts. Last night the question of the Sadducees came up…
Who were these guys?
Well, at the time of Jesus, within Judaism there were a number of different sects. These were groups of Jews who had their own particular beliefs and practices. We encounter some of these different groups in the New Testament.
The main groups at the time of Christ were as follows:
1. The Pharisees
We encounter the Pharisee party regularly in Scripture. Their focus was upon holiness and the study of the Old Testament. I’ll do a post on them in the next few weeks.
2. The Zealots
These were the political revolutionaries. They wanted a military revolution and the expulsion of the Romans from Israel.
3. The Essenes
Until fairly recently we knew little about this group. We know that they had many practices which we typically associate with monasticism: asceticism, poverty and abstinence. We also know that the Essenes practised ritual bathing. It is believed by many that the Essenes produced the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Finally we come to the group in question, the Sadducees:
4. The Sadducees
The Sadducees were a wealthy group, fairly small in number, who mostly lived in Jerusalem and were closely associated with the Temple.
They were the aristocrats, holding positions of influence, particularly in the Jewish Council (“Sanhedrin”). Because they held power, they were more accommodating and accepting of the occupying Roman force since the Romans provided stability to the status quo.
While the Pharisees gave authority to oral tradition, the Sadducees did not. Not only that, but the Sadducees ultimately restricted themselves to the first five books of the Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy and Numbers). It appears that they also had some kind of denial of angels (Acts 23:8). Finally, they also denied the afterlife and the resurrection (Matthew 22:23; Mark 12:18-27; Acts 23:8).
The Sadducee party was effectively destroyed in AD 70 when the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed by the Romans. Many were slaughtered. Without the Temple or the political support of Rome, the Sadducees effectively ceased to exist.
Why I’m involved in Catechesis…
(Please ignore the silly YouTube title)