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Sunday Lectionary: A Talent Worth Sharing

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Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time: November 13, 2011

The readings this week continue with the theme of the Second Coming, particularly focusing upon how we should “spend” our time waiting for the Lord to return…

In the First Reading we hear praise of the “worthy wife”. She is holy, conscientious and industrious. In the Second Reading, St. Paul explains to the Thessalonians what we learnt in last week’s Gospel, that the Lord will come when we least expect, but also that He should find us ready. In the Gospel Reading this readiness is spelt out in concrete terms – we should be using our God-given gifts in the service of the Master. He will someday return and we shall be called to account concerning our stewardship of His gifts…

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Things that make me happy

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The other day I was thinking about things which make me happy. It’s actually quite a difficult exercise – if you don’t believe me, give it a go. What are the things which make you really, truly happy? Where are the places you can always find joy?

After sitting down and writing the list I’ve concluded that I’m actually quite easy to please. Although in many ways I’m extremely demanding of myself and others, it doesn’t actually take a whole lot to make me happy:

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St. Thomas Aquinas: Pro-Choice?

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A friend of mine recently referred to the book “Good Church, Bad Church” by Tom Kane, a former Catholic priest. I read the synopsis on Amazon and read the extract on the author’s website.  In the extract, a couple came to Kane while he was still a Catholic priest and he counseled them to have an abortion, calling upon St. Thomas Aquinas as justification:

“The great Catholic theologian, Saint Thomas Aquinas, whose theological reasoning is the foundation of Catholic morality, said that a fetus does not contain a soul until several months because there is not enough development yet to hold a soul, so the fetus, Thomas says, is not a person,” I said. “Yet the Vatican and the Vaticans of Protestantism would sacrifice an endless number of lives for a miniscule embryo that resembles an amoeba.”

“But the fetus has life,” he said.

“Yes, but what kind of life? Plant life? Animal life?” I said. “A fetus has a very primitive form of life—not yet a human life.”

AquinasInTheLouvre

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March For Life Discussion: Live and let live

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Today I’m continuing my series of posts in response to the Facebook discussion a couple of weeks ago concerning the March For Life.

In my previous entry I briefly looked at what I think can be done to raise the standard of dialog between pro-life and pro-choice advocates. I would now like to start looking at some of the particular issues which were raised during the exchange. Today I would like to focus upon the opening comment from a former schoolmate:

“I kinda just wish people would stop telling other people how to live their lives….I’m pro-CHOICE, not pro-telling-people-what-to-do….”

As a pro-lifer, you hear sentiments similar to the one expressed above with considerable regularity and, on the surface, such a position seems extremely commendable. In fact, it is one of the sacrosanct secular doctrines in contemporary culture.

Live and let live

I think that respecting other people’s opinion is a good thing, I do. I mean, nobody likes to be told what to do, right? However, there are some immediate problems here. For a start, the statement self-refuting. As soon as you tell someone that they should mind their own business, you’re attempting, at least in some measure, to impose your own will on another person. That means you’re breaking your own rule and not minding your own business!

In the remainder of this post I would like to look at whether the live-and-let-live ideal is consistently applied…

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TEA: Is there life before marriage? (Goretti Group)

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Bridget

Last night I gave a talk for The Goretti Group. This was a variation on a talk I gave at the Southern Kansas Young Adult Conference.

Is there life before marriage? (Download)

I’ve written a couple of articles for the Goretti Group in the past which you might like to read: Dear Miss Lawrence and “I waited until my wedding night to lose my virginity and I wish I hadn’t”.

Bible alone? Part 1

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sola scripturaToday I’d like to speak about “Bible Alone” Christianity, also known by its Latin name, “Sola Scriptura”.

Sola Scriptura is an important issue to discuss because it underpins virtually all of Protestantism. It was the Formal Principle of the Reformation. This topic has come up in every discussion I’ve ever had with non-Catholics. It is the major Protestant presupposition and, although the Catholic Faith can certainly be defended from Sacred Scripture, this presupposition really needs to be tackled early on in any Catholic-Protestant dialogue.

This article is another of those half-written posts which languished in my “Drafts” folder for a long, long time. I had intended to write a substantial and thorough article concerning Sola Scriptura since my own realization concerning the shortcomings of this doctrine was the tipping point in my return to the Catholic Church.

However, once again, my desire to write a thorough post has prevented me from writing anything at all. I resisted writing until I had time to do the subject matter justice. So, once again I am forced to return to the words of G.K. Chesterton “If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing badly”. Rather than waiting until I can do a perfect job I’m just going to sit down, write something and get it out there. So, please put on your crash helmets…here we go…

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