Time...

It has disturbed me greatly to find that one of my best friends is an agnostic now. He makes the argument that the existance of pain proves God does not exist, which is absurd and easily refuted. Nonetheless, it was scary, anyone can fall at all times. Yet as his friend I am called to help him when he makes wrong decisions etc. And thus I argue with him. But the scariest part of all is not knowing how much time I have left to change him. Nobody knows when the Second Coming will happen, who knows, maybe I have already failed; the world ends tonight with him still an agnostic.

I trust God though, to make true judgement over him with in mind what may have happened if time continued.

Question and Answer...

Well, to be honest I have run out of things to talk about again, so I ask anyone to ask any question about the Catholic Faith (or Christianity) or if you know someone who has a question, have them ask etc.

Just post a comment on the newest post and I will answer the question as soon as possible and to the best of my ability...

Richard Dawkins versus David Quinn

I just read a very fascinating debate between the two men mentioned above which greatly shows how Dawkins uses straw men arguments to "defeat" religion in his book, The God Delusion.

For those who don't know, straw men arguments are as follows. First a person states the position, idea, you name it, but they do it incorrectly. They insert, either subconsciously, or through ignorance, faults in it that are not actually there. So the analogy is that one tries to defeat another by "making a straw man version" and defeating them.

Also there were these two comments that were posted, I will post the one I like better, seeing that they are both quite lengthy;

"'God knows why faith is thriving' - Dinesh D'Souza Sunday,

October 22, 2006

A group of leading atheists is puzzled by the continued existence and vitality of religion.

As biologist Richard Dawkins puts it in his new book "The God Delusion," faith is a form of irrationality, what he terms a "virus of the mind." Philosopher Daniel Dennett compares belief in God to belief in the Easter Bunny. Sam Harris, author of "The End of Faith" and now "Letter to a Christian Nation," professes amazement that hundreds of millions of people worldwide profess religious beliefs when there is no rational evidence for any of those beliefs. Biologist E.O. Wilson says there must be some evolutionary explanation for the universality and pervasiveness of religious belief. Actually, there is. The Rev. Ron Carlson, a popular author and lecturer, sometimes presents his audience with two stories and asks them whether it matters which one is true. In the secular account, "You are the descendant of a tiny cell of primordial protoplasm washed up on an empty beach 3 1/2 billion years ago. You are a mere grab bag of atomic particles, a conglomeration of genetic substance. You exist on a tiny planet in a minute solar system in an empty corner of a meaningless universe. You came from nothing and are going nowhere." In the Christian view, by contrast, "You are the special creation of a good and all-powerful God. You are the climax of His creation. Not only is your kind unique, but you are unique among your kind. Your Creator loves you so much and so intensely desires your companionship and affection that He gave the life of His only son that you might spend eternity with him." Now imagine two groups of people -- let's call them the Secular Tribe and the Religious Tribe -- who subscribe to one of these two views. Which of the two is more likely to survive, prosper and multiply? The religious tribe is made up of people who have an animating sense of purpose. The secular tribe is made up of people who are not sure why they exist at all. The religious tribe is composed of individuals who view their every thought and action as consequential. The secular tribe is made up of matter that cannot explain why it is able to think at all. Should evolutionists like Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and Wilson be surprised, then, to see that religious tribes are flourishing around the world? Across the globe, religious faith is thriving and religious people are having more children. By contrast, atheist conventions only draw a handful of embittered souls, and the atheist lifestyle seems to produce listless tribes that cannot even reproduce themselves. Russia is one of the most atheist countries in the world, and there abortions outnumber live births 2 to 1. Russia's birth rate has fallen so low that the nation is now losing 700,000 people a year. Japan, perhaps the most secular country in Asia, is also on a kind of population diet: its 130 million people are expected to drop to around 100 million in the next few decades. And then there is Europe. The most secular continent on the globe is decadent in the literal sense that its population is rapidly shrinking. Lacking the strong Christian identity that produced its greatness, atheist Europe seems to be a civilization on its way out. We have met Nietzsche's "last man" and his name is Sven. Traditionally, scholars have tried to give an economic explanation for these trends. The general idea is that population was a function of affluence. Sociologists noted that as people and countries became richer, they had fewer children. Presumably, primitive societies needed children to help in the fields, and more-prosperous societies no longer did. From this perspective, religion was explained as a phenomenon of poverty, insecurity and fear, and many pundits predicted that with the spread of modernity and prosperity, religion would fade away. The economic explanation is now being questioned. It was never all that plausible anyway. Undoubtedly, poor people are more economically dependent on their children, but on the other hand, rich people can afford more children. Wealthy people in America today tend to have one child or none, but wealthy families in the past tended to have three or more children. The real difference is not merely in the level of income. The real difference is that in the past, children were valued as gifts from God, and now they are viewed by many people as instruments of self-gratification. The old principle was, "Be fruitful and multiply." The new one is, "Have as many children as enhance your lifestyle." The prophets of the disappearance of religion seem to have proven themselves to be false prophets. Even though the world is becoming richer, religion seems to be getting stronger. The United States is the richest and most technologically advanced society in the world, and religion shows no signs of disappearing on these shores. China and India are growing in affluence, and the Chinese government is not exactly hospitable to religion, yet religious belief and practice continue to be strong in both countries. Europe's best chance to grow in the future seems to be to import more religious Muslims. While Islam spreads in Europe and elsewhere, Christianity is spreading even faster in Africa, Asia and South America. Remarkably, Christianity will soon become a non-Western religion with a minority presence among Europeans. My conclusion is that it is not religion but atheism that requires a Darwinian explanation. It seems perplexing why nature would breed a group of people who see no purpose to life or the universe, indeed whose only moral drive seems to be sneering at their fellow human beings who do have a sense of purpose. Here is where the biological expertise of Dawkins and his friends could prove illuminating. Maybe they can turn their Darwinian lens on themselves and help us understand how atheism, like the human tailbone and the panda's thumb, somehow survived as an evolutionary leftover of our primitive past.

Dinesh D'Souza's new book "The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11" will be published in January by Doubleday. He is the Rishwain Fellow at the Hoover Institution"

I have gotten an obsession with apologetics lately so if anyone who disagrees with the Catholic Faith and will be respectfull and open, please post an argument....

SIGH...

I have been looking inoto apologetics for the Catholic Church, and I now know if you truly, truly follow it is the best and most perfect religion. But now I am slightly depressed while arguing with athiests/agnostics, for I will never reach all of them and those I do they refuse to see the truth (most have factual errors when showing faults in the Church aka straw man arguments)

Catholicism

Cafeteriagurl said...
I am a Cafeteria Catholic myself by choice of course because of my own convictions,conscience, and prayer. I do attend mass every week and I pray alot. I am only a cafeteria Catholic because I don't see how using condoms is evil, I don't have a problem with women priests, married priests, and I don't believe divorce is always a sin since I know people who have left abused spouses. I don't believe for better or worse means you have to stay with your husband when he tries to pound you physically to pieces or when he tries to abuse your children. Its hard for people to understand my view on this when they grew up with families where such conflicts never took place.Maybe I am just too accepting to prone to Western thing, but what I do know is that I do love Jesus with all of my heart, he's got me through hard times in my life, and whether or not I agree with the Church I will never abandon God and my faith and relationship with Christ. The world does need more Christ. And the number one solution to end abortion is not to have sex before your married or to use the lesser of two evils contraception. I believe if people want to abort their babies then atleast they should put a condom on so they don't kill any babies.Most people I know who have had abortions did not use protection and thought protection was stupid. They believe condoms take the pleasure away from sex, yet they believe that killing babies that result from unprotected sex is okay and they are fundamentally flawed people. Abortion is murder and should not be used as a form of contraception.

(I hope you don't mind me quoting you Cafeteriagirl)


Well, lets see if I can answer any of this, first of all, I would like to point out that it is great you follow your conscience so closely, but ill-formed conscienced are still required to be followed but the actions may be sins. That is why it is SO important to form it correctly. Anyways, lets see, condoms are not actually evil (correct me if I am wrong, and I am going to verify all this with my Theology Teacher) it is the sex outside of marriage. Condoms are not needed if you are married
because it is fine to have sex and babies. And for me, how I have explained why the Church does not allow girl priests (and I am sure It has a better reason) is because if Jesus wanted girl priests, He would have made girl Apostles and made them Bishops too. Or Jesus might have been a girl IF He wanted girl priests. But He wasn't and He didn't, so why should we. Now, to the topic of married priests. First, taking a vocation is GIVING UP THEIR LIVES for a life OF SERVICE. The reason they where black is because it show that they are dead; their personal life has ended. They are living as a complete servant of Christ. Again, back to my theory of if Jesus had then we would too. He didn't get married apostles and He wasn't married himself (the perfect example for priests {and the rest of us too}) so why should we change our views and allow married priests. But if a priest is protestant and converts, is married, and wishes to continue in the priesthood, he can be pardoned by the Bishop and allowed. Divorce is wrong if they get remarried or start dating again, because it may take away the legal part, but it doesn't take away the spiritual. Thats where annulments come in. They do take care of the spiritual and they come from the Bishop only if they have a good reason to stop the marriage. I am sure that abuse in the family would be validation for an annulment. And again, you mention condoms are not evil and you are correct, it is having sex outside of marriage. If you can't (not married) or don'r want a baby (married) than DO NOT HAVE SEX. Simple logic, come on world.

Politicians

Well, i got lazy again thats why it has taken so long but also because i didn't really know who I want to win. But now i do. I have immediately ruled out Obama and Clinton who are both pro-abortion as far as I know. So it is between Mccain and Huckabee. The only problems with Mccain that I have is the recent change to pro-life. There is such a thing as conversion but there are also things called "political manuevering." And it doesn't help he supports embryonic stem cell research which is completely absurd. When I saw in the news that they had a "new-break through" by discovering there is more potential in adult stem cells then embryonic, I burst out laughing. New Discovery??? Are you kidding? I knew that in sixth grade, 5 yrs ago! Down right stupid. Anyways, back to politicians, Huckabee, even though people claim there is no way he can win, is pro-life completely. He has my support. And in response to the numbers stacked up against him, he said, "I went to college for Miracles, not numbers!" LOL, he did too, he studied Theology.

Long Time No Write.....

It has been awhile and I think I'm going to start back up, most likely on the election but we'll see....