Tag: featured

My Favourite Podcasts

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Podcasts

I listen to a lot of podcasts… I mean, A LOT of podcasts. In fact, I listen to so many that I’ve trained myself to listen to them on double-speed so that I stand a chance at being able to get through them all each day. So, in case you’re interested, here they are…

Personal Development

I Hate My Boss

Side Hustle School

The Art of Charm

The Art of Manliness

The Catholic Man Show

Catholic Creatives

Entertainment

Buffering the Vampire Slayer

BBC Comedy of the Week

How Did This Get Made?

Inside the Exorcist

The Catholic Playlist Show

Trending

WhiskyCast

History

Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History

History Matters

The Fall of Rome

The History of the Early Church

Tides of History

C.S. Lewis

All about Jack

The Eagle and Child

Girl Podcasts

Among The Lilies 

Do Something Beautiful

Theology

Discerning Hearts presents Fr. Timothy Gallagher

Hobo for Christ podcast

Institute of Catholic Culture

Pints with Aquinas

Renovo

Solomon’s Porch

The Art of Catholic

The Jeff Cavins Show

The Liturgy Guys

The Patrick Coffin Show

The Word on Fire Show

Theology On Tap San Diego

Lectionary

Bishop Barron’s Sermons

Homilies – Our Lady of Mount Carmel

St. Elias Homilies (Melkite Church)

St. John Chrysostom Catholic Church

Apologetics

Catholic Answers Live

Cross Examined

Unbelievable

 

Do you have any podcast recommendations?

Coming Soon: The Liturgical Apocalypse

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The third chapter of Dr. Barber’s book he discusses the relationship between the Book of Revelation and the Catholic Liturgy. It is a brief review of the the material covered in another excellent book by Dr. Hahn’s book, The Lamb’s Supper.

Familiar Imagery & Structure

Dr. Barber begins by noting that no other apocalyptic book of antiquity relies quite so heavily on liturgical imagery as the Book of  Revelation. In John’s book we find many things extremely familiar to a Catholic who attends Mass: Sunday worship, priests, vestments, incense, chalices, angels, saints etc.

In fact, the book of Revelation has profoundly impacted Christian liturgy and architecture throughout the centuries.  For example, the celebrant’s chair is symbolic of the throne of God, and the surrounding chairs like those of the “elders” (Revelation 4:4).

This final book of the Bible is even divided into three parts which each have parallels with the sequence of the Catholic liturgy:

1. Penitential Rite
The early section of Revelation concerns seven letters which call the Church to repentance.

2. Liturgy of the Word
Later, a book is opened which brings about judgement.

3. Liturgy of the Eucharist
The book ends with the Church being united to Christ in the supper of the Lamb.

But why use liturgical imagery? Revelation uses liturgical imagery because the Eucharistic celebration is the way the Lord comes to His Church. Dr. Barber points out that the Greek word “parousia” which is used to refer to the Lord’s “coming” actually has the primary meaning of “presence”. Upon hearing this fact, every Catholic immediately thinks of the Eucharist and Jesus’ real presence in the Sacrament.

“Every Eucharist is Parousia, the Lord’s coming” – Cardinal Ratzinger

liturgy

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Sunday Lectionary: Jesus Number One!

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I hadn’t planned to write about last weekend’s Gospel reading, but it has kept coming up in conversation and I’ve spoken to some people who have been really troubled by Jesus’ words, perhaps rightly so:

Great crowds were traveling with Jesus, and he turned and addressed them,

“If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.  Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Which of you wishing to construct a tower does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if there is enough for its completion?  Otherwise, after laying the foundation and finding himself unable to finish the work the onlookers should laugh at him and say, ‘This one began to build but did not have the resources to finish.’

Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down and decide whether with ten thousand troops he can successfully oppose another king advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops? But if not, while he is still far away, he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms.

In the same way, anyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple.”

Masochism or poor linguistics?

What did Jesus mean when he said we must “hate” our family and even “hate” our own lives? That sounds rather masochistic!

Is this just a bad translation?  Actually, no, it’s not.  The Greek word being used here is “miseo”, which, according to Strong’s Greek Lexicon means “to hate, pursue with hatred, detest”.

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The “brothers” of Jesus

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A friend recently sent me a Facebook message asking about a passage from the Bible she had heard at Mass:

“Can you shed light on the “brothers” of Jesus in the gospel today for me? James, Joseph, Simon and Judas…” 

The passage referred to was from Matthew’s Gospel:

They were astonished [at Jesus] and said, “Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds? Is he not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother named Mary and his brothers James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas? Are not his sisters all with us? …”  – Matthew 13:54-58

So what do we make of these guys, these “brothers” of Jesus?

Mary, Mary, quite contrary…

The Catholic Church teaches that Mary was not only a virgin at the time of Jesus’ birth, but also that she remained a virgin for the rest of her life. However, doesn’t the above passage mention the “brothers…[and]…sisters” of Jesus? Doesn’t that prove that Mary had other children after Christ?

As you can imagine this issue is often raised in Catholic-Protestant dialogue, since the doctrine of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary found in Sacred Tradition seems to many Protestants to obviously contradict Sacred Scripture.

There’s a lot which could be said on this subject, but in this post I would like to offer a brief response and explain how Catholics understand the mention of Jesus’ “brothers”.

Mary

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Quick Apology: Soul Sleep?

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The other day I received an email from a reader who had spoken to a non-Catholic with a rather rare point-of-view, and who asked for helpful suggestions when speaking to him…

Objection

During a discussion about the Saints, the Protestant in question made the following statement:

“…no one is in Heaven except Jesus, Enoch, and Elijah.”

This sort of theological position is rarely held by those in mainstream Protestantism, but how might we respond to this?

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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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Does the Church think that Scripture is important?

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During my various apologetic endeavours I have often heard the assertion that that Catholic Church doesn’t think much of Sacred Scripture. I have been told by well-meaning non-Catholics that the Church doesn’t care about God’s word and that our clergy do everything they can to keep the Bible out of the hands of their congregations.

When meeting with these assertions, I invite my interlocutors to peruse the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is the official compendium of all that we believe as Catholics. The section concerning Sacred Scripture begins at paragraph #101. It draws heavily from a Second Vatican Council constitution “Dei Verbum” (“Word of God”) and is a nice summary of that conciliar document.

So, what does the Church actually believe and teach about Sacred Scripture?

Bible

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